Your BEHAF
Dollars at Work

Here you will find the stories of the Berners that BEHAF
has been able to help out - thanks to YOU !

SPIRIT'S story
CORA'S story
LUCA'S story
NERO'S story
ZURICH'S story

NERO's story:

Nero thanks all those who care "Nero is an 8 year old Bernese Mountain Dog who has been relatively healthy all his life. In January 2002, he started having seizures at night. The frequency was once a month. It was heartbreaking to see Nero suffer during these seizures and we wanted to do everything we could for him. One night during a seizure he banged his nose so hard on the coffee table that there was blood all over his white nose and on the carpet. Poor guy.

Our vet was convinced it was a brain tumor. Over the course of a month we did all kinds of tests to find out. Blood tests, CAT scan, and spinal fluid test. All were negative except for the urine test, which showed an infection. He was diagnosed with epilepsy and benign prostate hyperplasia. Nero was put on an expensive antibiotic, Baytril, to help the prostate infection, but it kept recurring and in May he had to be neutered. Nero is now on Phenobarbital but is still having seizures about once a month. We have changed his diet to the BARF diet in hopes that this will help. I'll keep you posted.

ZURICH'S story:

"The day was May 25th and we had a big party for my son Zachary's first birthday. The dogs were cooped up for most of the party (a few guests were allergic) but when the party thinned out, we let them out to visit and eat dinner. My father commented that the dogs were eating very fast. But they always eat fast so we thought nothing of it. Later we let them out for their last potty. I have no idea if Zurich was running around or got into anything outside at that time."

post-surgery "After everyone left, about 9:30 pm, we were exhausted. What happened in the next hour can only be described as the grace of God. Usually you'd just want to go to bed and crash, but instead we put Zachary down for the night and went to the living room to just relax and watch the end of the Cruft's Dog Show. After that was over, we noticed it was starting over again, and agreed to stay up till we saw the BMD in the show. Not long after the BMD made it's appearance trouble started."

"Zurich started to act like he was throwing up but couldn't. We let him outside, to avoid the mess, but he didn't throw up out there either. He barely came back to the house and refused the treat Scott tried to give him. That's when I noticed the panic in his eyes and that his mouth was as white as his fur. I grabbed his sides and immediately started for the phone and emergency clinic number."

post surgery

"We called and they told us to get him in a fast as we could. Luckily we have the greatest neighbors in the world. I called them to come sit with Zach until my mom could return from Orland Park (40 minutes away). They love our dogs so much they didn't even hesitate. We jumped in the car and took off asap. It was about a 15-20 minute ride to the emergency clinic. I was sure I was going to lose Zurich in the car. He whined with every breath he took and could not get comfortable."

"When we arrived, the vet took him immediately to the back, did the x-ray to see if it was anything else. It was bloat, so they tried to tube him first but his stomach had already started to twist. So they prepped him for surgery. A few of hours later, we were allowed to go back and see him. The vet said we were so lucky to catch it so early, no extra damage had been done internally and he should recover quickly. He had to stay at the vet's for a couple of days, but I picked him up on Tues morning and brought him to my own vet for his follow up treatments."

zurich today "He had to have a tube in his side for 2 weeks. We had to put a t-shirt on him and a big belly bandage (which began to look like lederhosen to keep it from slipping off). Luckily it wasn't too hot yet. Once the tube was removed and all of the holes were closed and healing, he recovered very quickly. We shaved him down a little bit to hide the big area of missing hair, and now it hardly looks like there was a shaved area at all. He is doing well and is back to his old self."

"We are very thankful for the expertise of the emergency vets and our regular vets for getting him better. I especially thank God for making me stay up to watch the dog show despite how exhausted I was. Finally we'd like to thank BEHAF for having such a great program to help out with the cost of this very expensive emergency surgery. We had to get a new credit card just so we could pay for this (we had just gotten rid of many of them). So I guess thank you to American Express too for approving us so quickly on a weekend nonetheless."

Suzanne Lintzenich ownbmdz@att.net

If you are in need of financial assistance for your Berner,
you're welcome to apply for assistance as well.

"TO LOVE ONE BERNER IS TO LOVE THEM ALL!"

Your BEHAFDollars at Work

Your BEHAF
Dollars at Work