Stress affects dogs too...

From the desk of Kess' mama:

Kess has been suffering from stress-related ailments. Our beagle went to boarding for a week as both J and I were away for work. When she came back, she had no appetite and refused to eat her breakfast. which if you've been following this blog, will know it's unusual for this greedy beagle. In all her 9 years +, the only other time she refused to eat was after her surgery when we spayed her. Even after drinking water, she would vomit. It took 3-4 days after her return before she was back to normal. When we were in Malaysia, she had gone to boarding before and there were no issues. I suspect she's not fully recovered from the move or from being crated! She feels insecure because she's out of her comfort zone as clearly evidenced by her tucked down tail. Usually, her tail will be up in the air like a wavy flag.

Recently, we had to board her for 1 night at a nearby boarding place. When she came back, she had a runny tummy. In fact, when we woke up this morning, she discovered she had a poop accident in the house...we spent quite some time cleaning up her trail of runny poop! Usually, Kess is very good with regards to controlling her bowel until we take her out in the morning once we wake up. On hindsight, there were a few other times when she had a runny tummy, after a stress trigger event.

We've decided to hire a full-time helper to provide more stability for Kess. Hopefully, things will improve once we get full-time help and she won't need to go for boarding when we travel. It'll also give us flexibility to go out without worrying about her separation anxiety.