Does anyone have an old dog who is starting to lose their hearing?

[techgirl]

I finally have to get over my denial that my dog is getting old. He's 17 and I am starting to notice that he just doesn't seem to hear as well as he used to. My concern is with my daughter, she's 4. He does tend to sleep alot(surprise) and a few times she has scared him because he has not heard her running around. We have started putting a kid gate up when he's in our bedroom so she can't scare him and we are talking to her everyday reminding her that Tal can't hear as well as he used to, so she can't run around him or go up to him when he's sleeping. Does anyone else have this experience? Any other things I can do to make this transition in both our lives and his any easier. I can't afford a consult with a neurologist to do the hearing test, but it is obvious that he is losing his hearing. All other bloodwork on him is normal with old dog stuff, ie starting to see some high normal kidney values and an elevated liver enzyme and he's been hypothyroid for years. He's on meds for the liver and thyroid and we're monitoring the kidney values since they are not abnormal yet(I do his bloodwork every 6 months). Thanks for any advice.

 

[Mel&Keith]

Maybe you could try teaching your daughter about hearing impaired people and signing then explain how the dog is like people who can't hear. It's totally understandable that a 4 year old wouldn't understand why running up on the dog would scare it. Maybe if there was a correlation to humans it would help her understand. Can Tal see? When Penny (the Cushingoid Boston) lost her hearing we were still able to teach her a couple of hand signs if we did them near her face. Ultimately it ended in us getting in her face and patting her on the back to let her know we were going to take her outside. It'll definitely be a learning experience for all of you! Good luck.

 

[techgirl]

He can still see but that is starting to give him a little problem too. He has anisosicoria(one pupil is larger than the other, can be due to many things from eye trauma to neuro problems, it's expensive for that testing too) and the nuclear sclerosis(hardening of the ocular lens, early cataract development). He does have some problems seeing at night sometimes if it's really dark and if far distances are involved. We're just doing the best we can. Hopefully we can make this transition go smoothly.

 

[Mel&Keith]

I hope it goes smoothly too. I know you'll do better than most people will. We really didn't know what to do with Penny, we all just kind of adapted to the situation. We're sending well wishes that way for sure.

 

[goReptiles]

I have a dog about 13 or 14, who is lossing both hearing and sight. Several times my dad has almost gotten bit because he's startled him while sleeping. I like Mel's idea for teaching your daughter about the hearing impaired. Other than that I'm sorry, but I don't have too many ideas. Since it's a gradualy loss, he shouldn't have as many problems i comparison to losing it all at once.