I saw Charlie on Facebook, advertised by the rescue centre Friend in Ukraine. A few volunteers were driving past the place where he lived, took photos, arranged to get him out and I saw the story. I have decided to get him and find him a nice house in UK. I have just sold my house and knew I was going to California to live there permanently, but I just could not leave him there, to join other dogs at the rescue centre after the awful life that he lived until now. I organised for him to be delivered to Poland where I would collect him. He could travel to UK but it would take much more time, which I didn’t have. He came vaccinated from Ukraine, but because he arrived in EU he had to be vaccinated again. Below is the photo which made me to adopt him. The chain was so short that he spent his life jumping on two legs and the collar has grown into his neck. As a result he had a thick, hairless scar tissue circling his neck, which never disappeared.
When I went to collect him from a Polish vet (with my mother and my other dog Linus), he was very scared and hiding behind furniture. I was surprised how very pretty he was. He was a smaller version of collie, but even prettier. His muzzle wasn’t as long as collie’s and he was a beautiful chocolate colour, with beige markings. I have put him in my car and he vomited after a short while. I was prepared for this, had the similar experience with my other dog, Lucy, who reacted the same way when nervous. We broke our trip and stopped at night at my mother’s cousin’s house. He had a very large garden and I was told it was well fenced and the dog won’t get out. Well, Charlie did. Very early next morning I let him outside and he disappeared. I have checked the property and he was nowhere, but I figured where he squeezed under the fence. I went outside and called him, then drove around the area and nothing. I was very upset but when I came back home there he was, sitting in the garden. So it looked like we were meant for each other after all. We travelled a few more hours and got to my mother’s house. We were in the garden when Linus and Charlie started to play, chasing each other. It was nice to see them both interacting so perfectly and I was happy for Linus who missed my daughter’s dog who was his play partner. Charlie slept that night in the middle of the floor on the carpet. I had a bed for him but he didn’t know what it was for. After a few days of observing Linus in his bed, he worked out what the bed is and from then on slept in comfort. He was very thin and had a bad dandruff, but from now on it was going to be perfect, I thought.
When I arrived back in UK it was very hot and I had no food at home, so we left dogs in the house and went shopping. We came back after about an hour and Charlie was in the garden. When I left I didn’t close the garden gate behind me and he was just hanging out there and was very happy to see us. I didn’t understand what happened. Did I really leave him outside? Am I that scatterbrained? I looked around the house for clues and windows and doors were all closed and there was no way for him to escape. After a while my mother, who was staying in the spare room upstairs, called me to show paw prints on her pillow. She has left her first floor window open and Charlie jumped out on a pergola overgrown with wisteria and then down into the garden. Happy that everything ended well I made myself a mental note to always close windows when leaving the monkey dog in the house. Within a week he settled into our routine of early morning and afternoon walks, napping in the garden and chases with Linus. My other dog Lucy ignored him completely. I booked a third kennel on Queen Mary II to New York for him a few days after his arrival in my house. He was going with us, I didn’t want to part with him, the sweet, graceful and grateful Charlie. About 2 weeks after his arrival in UK he had the first seizure. It was truly awful, especially that I never witnessed anything like this before. He would just seize and not move for about 5 minutes and after coming to, he would be paralysed for at least 2 hours. I took him to the vet and he did what he could, but blood checks and x-rays didn’t show any reason for seizures. I was referred to the clinic of Noel Fitzpatrick (the TV Supervet) and Charlie had a CT scan, the spinal fluid and other checks and it turned out he had granulomatous meningoencephalitis (GME). Small tumors were growing on his brain. The prognosis wasn’t good I was told. Dogs survive 6 months to 2 years. Some, oddly, just get better and live on. He was put on enormous amount of steroids for 6 months. His weight was just 12 kg and he took the dose normally prescribed for adult humans. It helped at first and I was happy he didn’t have seizures during our trip to New York and our drive across USA to California. Once we settled in California he started seizures again, but a different kind. He would shake, wee, spin on his side and foam at the mouth. As I was in the state where people strongly believe in natural remedies and weed is legal I was advised to try him on marijuana or CBD oil. I read up on this as much as possible and started him on the mixture of both. He would get completely stoned at first, so I was lowering marijuana (THC) and adding more CBD oil and arrived at the perfect recipe which helped for some time, but then stopped working.
We never managed to be free of seizures. I would try everything I could find, or was told about by others with the same problem, but the improvement never lasted long. Sometimes he had 3 seizures within 24 hours and then be free of them for a few weeks. Sometimes he would have them every day for a week and be free of them for a month. I have tried protein only food, as apparently children who have seizures respond well to keto diet. It helped at first, but then, as usual, seizures started again. He definitely had them when stressed, like when he had to have some teeth removed. I don’t know if the bad mouth infection was caused by steroids or there was a different reason for it, but the vet was not amused and accused me of not taking a good care of my dog. Charlie was left with 7 teeth after the dental work and during our drive home from vets had yet another seizure in the car. It was truly draining on both, him and on me. I would wake up at night, clean the room after seizures, go back to bed and often he would follow that same night with another seizure. If he had just one seizure during 24 hours he would be fine. If it was more than two he would forget everything. He was scared of me and forgot my other dogs. As a result he was untrainable. With his initial seizures I would sit by him and cry, but with time I was just waiting in my bed for him to end spinning, change his bed and hug him to let him know that I am here and he was okay. His muscles were working hard during seizures and some dogs die during them from heart attacks. Because of all of it I was always ready for him to leave us, but I loved him more than if he was healthy and was very protective of him. Linus was another being who cared about Charlie very much. He adored him and was my alarm clock for Charlie. He always listened to noises Charlie made and even when he just coughed Linus would lift his head up and wait. When Charlie was seizing on the floor Linus would walk around him and make little crying noises. When Charlie was done Linus nudged him with his nose. It usually took two- three minutes for Charlie to unsteadily get back on his feet and Linus was always next to him.
I have decided to go back to Europe after 3 years in California. I was very worried about Charlie’s trip back because he was due for his every 3 year rabies vaccine before our departure. I always thought that the rabies vaccine repeated in Poland in July after he was done in Ukraine in May might have been the cause of his illness, and now he had to have it again. It was a relief when he survived the injection and seemed ok. Maybe the double vaccine wasn’t the reason for his condition then. I will never know. When we arrived in Germany I promised myself that I will settle here for good. No more moving and the stress connected to it. Dogs had a big garden to run around and Charlie loved it. He would bouncily speed along our fence and bark at passers by. Some people were annoyed with it, but I could do nothing about it. I told people about him and put a note on our fence, hoping that my misbehaving dog will be left alone and no one will shout at him. I like to think that he was happy here. We would go for long walks around the lake and he was always very excited about it. He had his brother Linus with him and sometimes both would share one too small bed to chew their toys together. His life ended in August 2020. He was with us just over 4 years then. He fell into coma and had the longest, but gentlest seizure. I put him in his bed and drove him to the vet to end his life. It is always very traumatic to say goodbye to my little friends, but with Charlie it was extra sad because his life was so full of pain and he started it with people who who don’t deserve to be near other creatures. I brought him back home after it was done and the first time ever buried my dog in the garden. I always had them cremated but I wanted to do it myself this time. Linus was with me and I think he understood what happened. He was very depressed for about 10 days and barely ate, but recovered and is his usual cheerful self; the excitable little terrier who once loved his buddy Charlie very much.
Lakehaus Lebehn 