The Blue Devil

Coming home from the hospital. You can see the misery on his face.

ICYMI: On January 4^th, 2020—exactly six years to the day that I brought Sgt. Thomas Tibbs home—he was hospitalized for pancreatitis. For the dog-loving-faint-of-heart, he is home now, nearly fully recovered, feeling happy and back to being my walking partner, thank the Universe. But—all of his pain and trauma could have been avoided. Here’s what happened:

When I adopted Thomas, I wanted him to have a premium dog food since he’d been near starvation before his rescue. After trying a few, I put him on Ideal Balance. He liked it, did well on it, so I kept him on it for a year.

Then it disappeared from Petco and Petsmart. When I inquired, an employee told me that Target had purchased the formula and would be offering it at Target stores within the next year. (That never happened, although it is now available through Hill’s, the Science Diet folks.) On the same day of my inquiry, as I stood perusing all the brands of dog food and squinting at the tiny print on label after label, a nice, grandmotherly-looking lady handed me a coupon for a few dollars off a bag of Blue Buffalo, telling me about the “True Blue Promise” (no corn, wheat or soy, blah blah blah). I bought it. I bought the ad hype and the dog food and Thomas really, really liked it, so he’s been on it ever since.

Fast forward to 2019. Thomas began having digestive issues—lots of foul-smelling burps, mucous in his stool, and sudden bouts of oh-my-Buddha-he-pooped-on-the-kitchen-floor-again. We had a lot of those in 2019. I talked to most of my dog-loving, dog-training friends. I got advice like, “add pumpkin” (done) or “add a probiotic” (done). Most had their dogs on other foods, but when I compared ingredients, it always seemed like Blue Buffalo had the best.

Thomas is twelve now. I thought his decline, his lack of energy, lack of playfulness, his more and more frequent “accidents” had to do with his age or his anxiety or his pemphigus (an auto-immune disease probably generated by his extreme anxiety). I never once suspected the high-priced, “premium” dog food I was feeding him. I didn’t realize his gut hurt. Dear god, I wished I had realized his gut hurt. My poor, poor boy. If only dogs could talk.

On the morning of January 4^th, Thomas was clearly in pain, frantically following me from room to room, stopping suddenly to stretch his belly, whimpering. I got him in to Banning Veterinary Clinic right away. This is what the vet said before she ever examined him:

“It’s probably pancreatitis. We see it all the time in dogs that have been on Blue Buffalo for an extended period of time. Great commercials. Bad dog food. Blue Buffalo is too rich for most dogs to tolerate over time.”

I was skeptical. How could this be?

“How do we pinpoint the pancreatitis diagnosis?” I asked.

“Blood work,” she replied. And then she examined him, head to tail. His heart was strong, his lungs clear. Then she dragged him away (because he won’t go with anyone else), and I sat in the exam room, crying and waiting.

She brought him back quickly, assuring me that he was a good boy, and told me we’d have to wait 20 minutes for the test results. It seemed like hours, but then she was back.

“All of his blood levels are perfect,” she said, “except his pancreas.”

The treatment required hospitalization. They would have to put him on I.V.s with antibiotics and pain medication.

I couldn’t imagine leaving him behind.

I couldn’t wait another minute for them to get started on relieving his distress.

I pulled off the flannel I was wearing over a t-shirt and handed it to the vet to put in his kennel with him, and I kissed my dear, sweet boy good-bye, hoping and praying I would see him again on Monday morning. (They would be closing for the weekend; I wouldn’t be able to visit.)

I had to sit in the truck for a long time before I could stop crying and drive home.

Those who know me well know how much I love this goofy dog. He has been my daily walking partner for six years. He has hiked up mountains and into canyons and across streams and over boulders and through fields of wildflowers with me, past deer and coyotes and bobcats (on more than one occasion) and a fox. He has gone from being a terrified, shut-down dog that hated being touched to a nutty, spoiled pup who runs to my bedroom floor and plops himself on the carpet when it’s bedtime in anticipation of his nightly “love.” When I wake in the night from nightmares—which is often—I lie in the darkness and wait until I hear his deep sighs. They comfort me greatly. He is not “just a dog” to me.

When I picked up Thomas from the vet two days later, he was a mess. Though they’d tried to clean him up, his fur was flecked with tiny pieces of dry dog shit. His nose was dry from dehydration, and his anxiety level was through the roof. He’d never stopped pacing, the vet explained, so they couldn’t keep an I.V. in. He didn’t eat or drink or sleep. He simply reverted to being a wild dog in a cage. They gave him pain meds and sub-cutaneous fluids.

“He’ll recover much more quickly at home,” the vet said.

No kidding.

He has bounced back like a super-ball. He spent the first hour at home lapping up water and eating and trotting around the house, sniffing everything, so happy to be home. Then he crashed and slept for hours. He woke up to eat and pee, then slept and slept all night.

He is back to being his goofy, happy self.

As he’s been recovering, I’ve been researching Blue Buffalo dog food. Oh lordy….

A dear friend and dog rescuer (“I wish I had known you had him on Blue Buffalo,” she said) pointed me to the Consumer Affairs website and the reviews of Blue Buffalo dog food. I am blessed that I didn’t lose him but so sad and angry for others who have lost their pets to this food. Many have mentioned pancreatitis in their reviews. And there are a lot of negative reviews.

Meanwhile, the website for Blue Buffalo continues to tout their “True Blue Promise” and the food the Bishop family formulated and began to produce after their beloved Airedale, “Blue,” was diagnosed with cancer. You’ve probably seen those TV commercials with the family members sitting around in a living room, talking earnestly about how much they loved their dog and wanted him to be healthy, so they created this great dog food. “It’s all about family,” the Blue Buffalo website says.

Yes. Yes, it is. Just not the Bishop family. It’s all about the General Mills family. They don’t mention in the TV commercial that the Bishops sold Blue Buffalo to General Mills in 2018 for millions of dollars. The family does still own 8% of the company. But General Mills owns 92%.

They also don’t mention the class action lawsuit against Blue Buffalo brought by customers who had the food analyzed and found it to contain—you guessed it—corn, wheat and soy. Blue Buffalo’s response to the lawsuit was to throw another company under the bus, a “distributor” of pet food ingredients.

Wait. What the hell does that mean?

Let us continue our education into the making of pet food products by discovering that there are very few of the major pet food companies that use American-sourced ingredients in their food.

Yes, chances are, unless you’re making it yourself, you’re feeding your dog or cat food that contains ingredients from other countries. And as we know, not all countries use the same standards the U.S. does for pet food ingredients. I am still trying to find the source of Blue Buffalo ingredients. I’m sure it’s out there… but not readily unearthed by my digging. I suspect that General Mills employs a software company to “scrub” search results, so that negative reviews and claims of sick pets and accusations of ingredients coming from China will not be easily found. I digress.

In case you’re wondering:

For the first few days, I fed Thomas white rice and lean chicken. (Thank you, Carolyn Bass Burns, for the suggestion.) Then I put him on the Hill’s Science Diet prescription low fat food my vet had recommended. He’s still getting that. It’s $3 a can, even from Chewy.com. But he’s going to be on it for a good long while, until I can find a dog food that is made with integrity.

Wish me luck.

One week after he came home, he was bright-eyed and smiling again.