Acid Reflux? Or something else?

[TattooShan77]

Lately Peanut has a hard time getting comfortable at night and she will sometime have episodes of, well licking air kind of describes it best. It's not quite dry heaves. To be honest it reminds me of what I do when I'm trying not to throw up, trying to breathe deep & frequent swallowing. But she's not nauseated, she makes horrible noises when she is, this is quiet. Her stomach is a little rumbly but not bloated and she's not passing gas. Other than taking forever to get comfy once she goes to bed it doesn't seem to affect her. Currently she is curled up at the head of my bed...little sinker, because I was tired of listening to her very noisy bed creek & rattle as she tried to get comfy. We'll see how long we make it sharing a bed since neither one of us are sound sleepers.
I tried to search for a thread where the dog had similar symptoms and they thought it might be reflux. But before I could find it my ”oh so very smart phone” decided to kick me off the internet every time I click on the search tool

Does this sound like reflux to you guys? Any advice is greatly appreciated.

And for the few of you that think I neglect my dog, I'm just doing research before we go to the vet. Save you're passive/aggressive nonsense for someone else.

Thanks everyone! Time to cuddle with my Peanutty puppy

[Sara]

I've seen that - try tums, gas-ex or something similar to see if it settles her stomach. It may be how she digests her food, anxiety or anything like that.

[shanidane]

My dane did this all the time...used to scare me to death because I would think he was bloating. He is on pepcid ac now and has been fine. I give him a pill every night along with his other supplements.

[Carolyn]

When this happens to mine I give them about 6 TB Mylanta.

If you find this happening often, you might want to talk to your vet about putting her on a daily regime of pepcid.

Good luck,

[dvdslw]

Our Mastiff did this and I found him to be dehydrated. He would lick and swallow for what seemed like ever and it drove me nuts. He also had dark urine which is another tell tale of dehydration. Maybe not the same issue but something to consider. Try giving her a good drink of water before sleep.

[TattooShan77]

Thanks for all the advice. She drinks tons of water during the day but at night ignores it. I think I will try to get her to drink when she has potty/play time at night (she wakes me up 1-2 times a night to go outside).
I am going to ask the vet what he thinks about pepcid and get some for her. We've also got Tums that I may try.
Oh, and her sleeping on my bed didn't last long, she got tired of me moving around so she got up and went in her crate and ”boofed” at me until I got up and shut the crate door! Silly dog.

[Dyan]

OMG, I wonder if its was Gibson does.
FIRST, let me caution you about Pepcid. My vet always says give them Pepcid ( I worked for her for 4 years as a receptionist.... I can't tell you how many times I said " Pepcid " on the phone to a client ) BUT when I took him in for complete bloodwork and check up...this urine ph was very high and he had crystals in his urine.....doing reasearch on that, it could have been because of too many antacids. Meanwhile...vet said " keep him on Pepcid...it doesn't hurt them!" NOT! First.........it doesn't do a darn thing anyway. Tried Tums, Pepto Bismol, keep Ginger snaps on hand and finally bought ginger pills..after all they are good for a bad stomach and won't hurt them.
I call them swallowing fits....had someone PM me and said its known in the Bernaise Mountain Dogs as THE GULPS....and their cousins, the Swiss Mountain Dogs are also known to do this. Dont' know about your dog...but mine then wants to eat grass. Frantically!!! Some of the BMDs do it over night...Gibby does it anytime. I guessed, first stomach issues, sinus, Post nasal drip and just about everything. I have a copy of papers from a dog that was taking to a specialist for this issue...they came up with pretty much only guesses. My vet said " take a video so I can see!"
I wonder if we are talking the same thing. I feel it looks like he is trying NOT to throw up when he does this swallowing thing. AND it scares him to death. THUS...it scares me.
One thing I did that was good...since he wants to eat grass terrible after these swallowing episodes...... and he has eaten lots of leaves from my houseplants while in an episode.....( of course they are all toxic to dogs ) I replaced my houseplants with cat grass...Gibby can go get it any time he wants. I also keep lettuce in my fridge at all times....I discourage the cat grass becuase he pulls it out by the roots.....making a mess. SO when I see him going after the grass...I give him a hanful of lettuce in its place. BUT he always has the cat grass in case we are not at home.

[zoocrew]

My vet said the licking air was a sign of an upset stomach or nausea.
Gunther is on famotidine (extra strength pepcid......but we buy generic) b/c he throwing up regularly after having his stomach tacked. It has helped, and he has only thrown up once (that i can recall) since we started giving him pepcid. I hadn't thought about it before, but he would regularly do the licking air and now that you mentioned it.................he hasn't been doing that either so it is helping him.

[TattooShan77]

We have an appointment with the vet next week for her regular skin check (hopefully our last one) and I am going to ask about the gulping thing. It does seem like she is trying NOT to throw up, and so far she hasn't. She seems pretty frantic while it's going on but once it stops she just wants to sleep, no grass eating and she turns down water.
I'm going to look into the ginger snaps or pills. For now I am going to give her a couple Tums before bed and give her her dinner a little earlier in the evening to she if that makes a difference.

[Quinn]

I was JUST going to post something similar. I posted one thread a little while back in the RAW section because I was afraid Halp had a bone stuck when he did this once after throwing up, and continued doing it all the next day. However on and off he has started doing this with out vomiting at all, I've given him Gas-X for it but not sure it really helps? It just started maybe a month or two ago that he did this at all now its probably once a week or so.
He did it again just now and started getting frantic and just licking the floor, pacing around, licking us etc (which normally he looks a bit upset/confused about it but just stands/ or lays on the bed with me if I tell him to, but not really strange). Maybe the gas-x has taken effect as he's settled down and seems to mostly have stopped the air licking/ gulping.

[Dyan]

We have an appointment with the vet next week for her regular skin check (hopefully our last one) and I am going to ask about the gulping thing. It does seem like she is trying NOT to throw up, and so far she hasn't. She seems pretty frantic while it's going on but once it stops she just wants to sleep, no grass eating and she turns down water.
I'm going to look into the ginger snaps or pills. For now I am going to give her a couple Tums before bed and give her her dinner a little earlier in the evening to she if that makes a difference.

When Gibby gets this..he frantically wants to eat...eat ANYTHING..which they tell me is when dogs get in a lot of trouble by eating things like rugs, socks..etc etec....and then block. That is my reason for growing grass.
You touched on another thing...One of my things that I wondered about ( besides post nasel drip, heartburn etc etc ) is that his stomach needs food in it. So I went from feeding him twice a day, back to 3 times...and I put down a handful of kibble before bed.
Good luck...hope you get somewhere. The people that I talked to that took their dogs to specialists got no where...my vet took us no where and suggested a specialist.
I could live with it since I know he won't die from it ( anymore ) but it scares him so much, that it kills me to watch him go thru it.

[Dyan]

Gibby is going thru this right now again...started early Sat. morning....between my DH just coming home 2 days after major back surgery ( can't believe the doctor had him come home so early ) and a storm with the wind just roaring......he was up at 6AM. He did vomit foam after a bit of gulping...... and then I took him out and he just pulled and pulled to eat grass. He eventually threw up TONS of grass and some lettuce I had given him and God knows what else...but he is till having problems with the gulping and panic about it. I have found that if I massage his neck he stops....not sure why. BUT also...I broke down and bought some Pepcid and gave him one 30 minutes before his supper. Hoping it will make a difference tomorrow. We'll see.

[Jazzandcompany]

Jazz does this all too frequently. With her it is because she has gas trapped in her intestines. Gas X won't help at this point as it can't get where it needs to be.

She does get preventative gas X with meals, I do rubmassage her abdomen which appears to help as she has been able to pass some of the gas with that. I'm not sure of the reason, but getting a bit of exciteent/adrenaline going seems to help also so simply going for a car ride will calm her down for a bit. If she doesn't c`alm down after an hour and a cerenia pill then she goes to e-vet for a cerenia shot as I won't let her suffer unnecessarily.

As others have said they will eat anything (pica) in attempts to settle their stomach. Jazz has ate curtain ties, a post-it pad, and her own hair = hair ball obstruction. Getting her calmed down is important to me as risking an obstruction is not worth it and I ccan't stand the thought of her being miserable.

Her nutritionist is also not a big fan of pepcid, he prefers her to be on kefir anyway and says it does the same as pepcid so I haven't given her any of that for quite some time

[Dyan]

Her nutritionist is also not a big fan of pepcid, he prefers her to be on kefir anyway and says it does the same as pepcid so I haven't given her any of that for quite some time

Kefir, you mean the liquid Kefir that is fruit flavored liquid or you can buy plain? That is the only that I know of, I was on it a few months back..never even thought to give it to my dog.
That said...yesterday I broke down and bought Pepcid for Gibson. I have to say....I gave him one about 20 minutes before supper last night, just a couple minutes before breakfast this morning...and another about 20 minutes before supper tonight..... he has not had one gulping spell since yesterday early afternoon. I don't know if its coincidence or not... because when I game him Pecid before it did absolutely nothing.....but after talking to someone on the MegaEsophagus Yahoo group...they told me that Acid Reflux COULD lead to MegaEsopagus and I'm not willing to go thru that again with Gibson after loosing Bubblegum to that dreaded illness. So I thought I would try again..... I will cut him down to only one tomorrow and see where we go from there.
Jazz...I would love to know why your nutritionist doesn't like Pepcid when all these vets prescribe it.

[Jazzandcompany]

Kefir, you mean the liquid Kefir that is fruit flavored liquid or you can buy plain? That is the only that I know of, I was on it a few months back..never even thought to give it to my dog.
That said...yesterday I broke down and bought Pepcid for Gibson. I have to say....I gave him one about 20 minutes before supper last night, just a couple minutes before breakfast this morning...and another about 20 minutes before supper tonight..... he has not had one gulping spell since yesterday early afternoon. I don't know if its coincidence or not... because when I game him Pecid before it did absolutely nothing.....but after talking to someone on the MegaEsophagus Yahoo group...they told me that Acid Reflux COULD lead to MegaEsopagus and I'm not willing to go thru that again with Gibson after loosing Bubblegum to that dreaded illness. So I thought I would try again..... I will cut him down to only one tomorrow and see where we go from there.
Jazz...I would love to know why your nutritionist doesn't like Pepcid when all these vets prescribe it.

Yes the kefir you can buy in the stores is fine. I used to make my own until the big spotted dog knocked over my starter grains..... He's a big goof what can I say? I get the plain kefir for Jazz now until I get more starter grains.

I honestly can't tell you why he told me not to give pepcid. I was writing furiously a million supplements he was throwing out at me and when I said she was on pepcid he went on a bit of a tangent on take her off of pepcid since she was on kefir and it does the same thing anyway...... and went on to say he doesn't like pepcid. He's a homeopath and always looking more for the natural alternative.

Sorry I can't be more help