Call him Mr. Snarky

[alkite]

I'm not sure what is up with Giz. He's gotten snarky over the last few weeks. Maybe not exactly Snarky, but very verbal. When the house settles or the TV pops he growls. He will wake up and just start growling. We haven't had any previous issues with him waking badly when he is with us. On rare occasion, he will wake up in the middle of the night and howl like a tornado siren, but just to jostle him around on the couch he has never grumped.
I've checked all over for tenderness or anything that I could find abnormal with no results, other than him looking at me like I am seriously offending his sensibilities. He had a vet check yesterday, everything is fine they just called and said his thyroid was fine and no abnormal levels in his bloodwork. We checked his urine for sugar spillage twice to be sure it wasn't a false negative.
He just turned 4, so I don't know if it is just a little bit of a personality change or if I am just blowing the whole thing out of proportion.
I appreciate any suggestions I can get. :o

[Quercus]

Hmmm…well, it does sound a little suspicious that there is something going on. Did the vet do a full thyriod panel? Sent off to an outside lab? Or just T4? What about his teeth...sometimes a bad tooth will make a dog cranky?

[alkite]

I believe it was just a T4, I will call and confirm that with the vet. I doubt they would have the facilities to do a full thyroid and there wasn't time for the test to have been sent away, so I'll request that. Thanks for the suggestion, Andrea.
His teeth are good, the vet checked them and I checked at home. I've manually manipulated every inch of that poor dog at this point. Poor Giz.:rolleyes:

[Quercus]

If your vet says 'well, his T4 is fine, I don't see why you want to run the test', just tell him you would like to get a baseline, so you can compare it as he ages. Let him know that thyroid issues are fairly common in Basenjis, and you just want to have all the info possible. At that point, they are usually happy to take your money and will run the full panel for you.

I have to do this each time I want to run a thryoid panel on my dogs. They say 'oh, but they aren't showing any symptoms'…and I tell them I am just nosey, and want to compare over time

[alkite]

Great tip! I will do that. Our vet used to own a Baseji, so he is pretty good to follow up on "unusual" requests, but I'm still not convinced he knows much about the breed. He is really better with large animals and does a lot of farm work in our rural community. If things progress with Giz and I don't find an answer with him, I will go to a different vet. I figure if it is going to show on a blood test, then we can distinguish that with this vet but I won't wait around if we don't get a resolution!
Thanks again for the advice, I'd end up having a "duh" moment, so now I feel prepared to call. Watch out vet's office.

[MaxBooBooBear]

This is probably a very remote possibility–but it did happen to me and another friend of mine. My german shepherd mix who was very sensitive to loud noises and any kind of firecracker/gun type noise was acting very strangely. She would jump up like she was startled--but I couldn't hear or see a thing that would be causing it. It turns out my neighbor's grandson was using a cap gun in her house--I couldn't hear it, but Pepper could. It wasn't until I heard the grandson with it in the yard a couple of weeks later that I realized that's what it was. It wasn't even that loud in the yard--I didn't even notice at first, but Pepper went into complete adrenline overdrive, and I had to take her to the vet to have her sedated.

[alkite]

Hmm, I hadn't thought about something like that. The house across the street from us sold and we have new neighbors. I wonder if it is him being sensitive to them being there. The house has been empty since Giz game to live with us.

Wow, that hadn't occoured to me at all. hmmmm….