Hallelujah! Other people with dogs with the same gulping/compulsion to eat grass, etc. I adopted a yellow lab 1.5 years ago. I am her fourth owner and I wonder now if this isn’t part of the reason her first two owners gave her up.
Her first episode was a year ago, right after Christmas. She filled her stomach with fibers from carpets and then tried to eat every toxic plant in my back yard — sago palms, acorns. Then she ate half a lace shirt and the legs off a pair of pajamas.
After a year in which I have learned to watch her carefully, I have concluded that there are both digestive and emotional components to this syndrome.
1) Stress can set off one of these episodes.
2) Digestive upset can set off stress and panic, which in turn sets off one of these episodes.
3) Treating both her acid stomach, digestive sensitivity AND her stress reaction to these problems can stop an episode from getting so severe she needs medical treatment.
The most effective thing has been to keep her on Prozac for her anxiety (you’d be anxious, too, if you kept getting given away!), a Prescription Diet for sensitive stomachs. And if she starts an episode, giving her a mix of valium-like medications (sorry, I forget the name of them — we just switched to a different mix).
She just had her first episode in a long time last night, probably the result of eating a bird. Normally they don’t upset her stomach but she really snarfed this one down before I could get it away. She doesn’t look like she feels good, but she is not making it worse by eating the laundry and poisoning herself.
(And yes, I ripped out all the poisonous plants in my back yard and replaced them with bamboo. Very, very expensive.)
