Dapper Travel Diaries: Week 26 – 28 – All about Ella (our dog)

Day 173 – 194 (3 weeks update)

There hasn’t been a Dapper Travel Diaries update in 3 weeks. Not because there’s nothing going on, but because there’s been so much going on, that an update hasn’t been top of mind. My last update, Week 25 here, was all about family time in Pennsylvania. We were only supposed to be there for a week, but we decided to stay a little longer to hang out with Jordan’s family and run extra tests on Ella Griggs (our dog). She’s slowly been losing weight so we wanted some solid answers. We weren’t prepared for what they found – kidney disease with a very scary outlook.

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One thing you might not know about me, I’m not very good with bad news. I always think there’s another way, a different solution, or something else we can do. I’m a fixer and problem solver to the core. After crying our eyes out, I started researching specialists and holistic, integrative veterinarians (yes, they exist!) and found Dr. Carol close to Cleveland, Ohio – a 5-hour drive. The beauty of living in an RV, you can take your whole house where ever you need to go. And Ohio is where we needed to go.

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We spent a great deal of time with her. She looked over Ella’s records, ran more tests, helped us understand what was going on and put a plan together with food, supplements and helping us ween her off the toxic things other vets had put her on. She even showed us how to give Ella fluids – something I thought I’d never be able to do especially not twice a day for 30 days. She was frank with us and said Ella had a long road ahead of her. There’s no guarantees, but she’s doing everything she can to help us.

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Jordan and I decided it if we’re going to give Ella the best fighting chance, there’s no way we can juggle the fast-paced #ultimategolfroadtrip travel schedule and Ella’s health at the same time. So we’re putting a momentary halt on the trip for at least a month until our next check in with Dr. Carol for more tests at the beginning of August.

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In the meantime, we are taking it easy. We visited my best friend and her family in Indiana for a week – perfect timing. Now we’re staying put on Lake Erie focusing all of our time, energy and efforts on Ella – cooking her food, tracking water intake, poop schedule, supplements, energy levels, giving fluids and just loving the crap out of her.

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We’re hopeful she can pull through this. Life wouldn’t be the same without her. In between nursing her back to health, we are getting work done, catching up on blog posts and videos, Jordan is golfing some (I found a campground with a golf course!) and I’m knee deep learning about dog and cat health and all the holistic things. My brain hurts but they are worth it! Taking things slower has been good for all of us!

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2 Comments

  1. Alex Camacho on August 8, 2017 at 3:36 pm

    Hey guys,
    I really hope Ella is getting better holistic and integrative approach. Best of luck to her on her fight against this!



    • Jordan Griggs on August 25, 2017 at 1:45 pm

      Thanks Alex, really appreciate it!