Lula Murphy Clarke

After getting married in April 2006 and moving into our newly built house, my husband and I decided that it was finally time for a puppy. I suppose it was more something I wanted but he went along. I have always had cats that just seemed to find their way to me so going to a breeder wasn't something I was interested in. I found this adorable little meatball of fluffy yellow puppy on petfinde.com. She was one of three sisters listed as lab/shepherd mix. Her one sister was all-white. Her name was Murphy and she was staying with foster-mom-Pam, but ready for adoption. We made the arrangements and drove 2 hours to Raleigh, NC, to pick her up. She was beautiful and sweet, and recovering from her spay (at only 7 weeks old). I named her Lula. We were told that she had an umbilical hernia when born that they "fixed" in the spay operation. Needless to say it wasn't performed properly and she had to have surgery again 2 months later to completely repair it. After that she was a happy healthy pup who kept us on our toes. She ate well, ate lots of things without any gut troubles and always pooped well. She never ate her own poops.

She had come to us eating Nutro Ultra Holistic Puppy and we kept her on that religiously. She celebrated her first birthday in November 2007 and was a very happy girl. Then in February we ran out of food and on a whim I grabbed a cheaper food at Wal-Mart (I will always regret this). She ate it fine for about three weeks. Then out of the blue one day I was getting ready to take her for a run and glanced out in the back yard and there she was eating her own poop! I was appalled. I ran after her, screaming at her. She ducked her head and seemed so disgusted with herself and the look on her face was terrible, but she couldn't help herself- she was ravenous. We cleaned up the yard and took her everywhere on a leash to try to "break" her of the habit. Then, two days later, she started with very loose stools and many more times a day. The consistency was that of spicy brown mustard and she was going about 7 times a day, enough to fill three poop baggies each time.

Something was wrong! Luckily she had a wellness visit that week with the vet. I explained the poop-eating and the diarrhea and he instructed us to fast her for 24 hours, give Pepto 3 times a day and then start slowly back with the Nutro food, small meals more times a day until she was better. We fasted her, and then fed as instructed. After 2 days the poops were better but by 4-5 days later they were bad again. I tried boiling rice and chicken and she scarfed that down but no improvement in stools. My sister-in-law suggested a chicken allergy. I tried just plain boiled rice, and again, she scarfed it down but still had very loose stools. Something was still wrong. I called the vet back and he instructed us to fast her again and when she was worse the next day I took her in to see him.

He performed an exam; we tested for Giardia (her stools had been tested for parasites the week before). Everything came back clean. Then he asked me a strange question. Was she part GSD? I said she certainly could be considering her listing at the shelter and the fact that she was clearly a mutt. He took serum for a malabsorbtion panel and explained what that meant. He gave her metranidazole (14 day course) to start that night. We left the office and bought some chicken-free kibble. She ate that until the tests came back.

She was diagnosed with Pancreatic Insufficiency on March 25, 2008. Her tests came back cTLI= <0.4, Cobalmin=620, Folate= 15.0. She needed to be put on enzymes and a low fat, low fiber diet (although no one said what that meant). I found and joined the k9EPIglobal group that day and it saved us. They urged me to choose the powder over the pills. We ordered Science Diet i/d from the vet and started the routine that most EPIers do. She eats two meals a day but that may change to three if she can't handle it. She gets 1 can of Science diet i/d + 1/ can Wellness venison and sweet potato mixed with 1 1/2 teaspoons of 6X pancreatic enzymes from Co-op. All of it incubates for 25 minutes with 1/3 cup of warm water and lots of stirring. She is doing well (as long as she doesn't sneak cat food!). Her poops are better, firmer, darker, and only 2 a day. She has less interest in eating them although she is still so ravenous that I think she thinks about it. She has tons of energy and still is very much a silly puppy.

She was 60 pounds for the last six months and dropped about 5 pounds after diagnosis, but I think she's putting it right back on now. I have just ordered kibble to try to find her a lifelong diet as I do not intend for her to eat Science Diet long-term. We shall see how that goes!

We are a newly married couple struggling financially and the cost of food and enzymes was a huge obstacle to overcome and frankly made the whole situation very overwhelming. The EPI group and enzyme co-op have made this something that we can now manage for our girl. I can't imagine how we could afford it without them.

We owe our vet an incredible thank you as Lula is the only EPI dog at their practice and he caught it in 2 weeks. We also owe all of my sanity to the EPI group. Lula and I would be far worse off right now if it weren't for them, as I truly believe they saved us. EPI is just a blip in the life of this dog. She has no idea that this is not normal. We are lucky to have her diagnosed so quickly, and stabilized so readily. She has not suffered in the least and you would never know to see her. We are so very fortunate and will do anything to help others catch this in time. Some day the genetic tests will help breeders but for mutts like my Lula I really feel like education of people and vets will help so many.