It's amazing how things can change in a week. Last week we were so excited that finally we could decrease the steroid dosage for Sailor and, hopefully, have her steroid-free in a month. We started stepping down on Tuesday. Everything was going well until Wednesday night. We had been crating Sailor at night because in the past month because, as I had mentioned in my last post, she has had intestinal difficulties. Specifically, she has had diarrhea with blood in her stools three times in the last month and a half. On Wednesday night (or actually early Thursday morning) she woke up my husband whining. He took her out at 2 a.m. and she had diarrhea again (this was the 3rd time). In the morning, she had another episode. Thursday was her second day to get the half dosage of the steroid. Thursday night (or rather Friday morning) she again woke my husband and he took her outside where she once again had diarrhea. On Friday, I took her back to the vet. She put her on a different antibiotic (called Tylon - a powder administered twice a day with food) for four weeks, because she considered her to have chronic diarrhea. There was some bacteria in her stool. Although she had these intestinal problems, Sailor was still the same sweet dog she's always been. However, on Friday evening, my husband wondered where Sailor was. I went to look for her and she was in our office, just standing there, glassy-eyed, not really acknowledging my presence. I sat down and she lay down, but was not really responsive. We had to help her up to take her outside. Her gait was unstable and she didn't relieve herself. When we came back inside, she went straight to her crate and lay down. We checked on her periodically, but she was not very responsive. At 1:00 a.m. we helped her up and she was able to go outside and relieve herself, but then went right back to the crate and collapsed. Needless to say, we did not get much sleep that night, wondering if Sailor would be with us in the morning. On Saturday, I gave Sailor her steroid, but not the antibiotic and scheduled an emergency visit with the vet. By the time we got to the vet, Sailor had perked up. Diagnosis - steroid withdrawal, though I have my suspicions that the antibiotic may have had some influence. The vet put her on a different antibiotic and said to give her 1/2 the dosage of steroid on Sunday; then on Monday give her the 20 mg. He called the neurologist, and today the opinion is to give her 10 mg. steroid in the morning and 10 mg. at night, every other day. We will see how this works out, and, hopefully, we won't have another relapse. We're now dealing with two problems - the chronic diarrhea and the steroid withdrawal. Hopefully, we can cure them both - just don't know right now. I'll post again soon.