It’s FitDog Friday time and today I’m talking about my senior sister Katie, who has pretty bad arthritis. Katie’s issues with arthritis started probably around the time she was eight years old. The Kuvasz has a long life expectancy for a large breed, 12-14 years, so having issues at just eight was a bit early.
Over the last three years or so, we have tried around eight to ten different supplements and prescriptions to help Katie feel better and lessen the effects of her arthritis. Some have not worked at all, some have worked for a time but not long term. Through blogging, I have learned about many different products which has been very helpful. Katie had been doing pretty well since last summer, but in the late fall, she started getting worse again. Lucky for us, we won a bottle of Rejenease on my friend’s blog, Heart Like A Dog. Rejenease is said to repair and protect joints and is a form of liquid glucosamine. Katie is quite picky and won’t take most medicines, but she takes the Rejenease no problem.
Katie has lots of different issues besides just the stiffness which goes along with arthritis. For a long time she was dragging her right back paw which actually wore the claws down to the quick on the paw causing them to bleed. Thankfully, she only drags it now and then these days, but we do keep a close eye on it. In the above photo you can see how the claws are worn down totally. Mom hasn’t trimmed them in over two years!
Katie’s front left leg/paw had gotten so bad they are no longer straight and actually turn in towards the right. A few months ago, when walking, she crossed the left front leg over so far to the right, she almost tripped herself. Now, most of the time the leg walks almost straight. The claws on this paw are all worn off to a slant because of how she lands and pushes off on it.
More than anything, Katie loves to go for walks, but by November, she didn’t want to walk at all or just around the block. She was only eating about half her food and she was licking her paws all the time we think because of pain. It was pretty sad. We received the Rejenease in January and started her on a double dose for a month. In about two weeks time, we noticed a difference. Katie started eating all her food again, she wanted to walk, and each day, she wanted to walk further. She isn’t running or getting wild, she has a slow and steady stride, but she enjoys being out walking and visiting her collection of boyfriends around the neighborhood, like Vegas in the above photo.
Although most of the products we have tried over the years are similar, some work better with Katie than others. Right now Rejenease is our miracle. In the short video of Katie walking you can see how her front left leg is walking fairly straight, she isn’t dragging her back right paw, there is no limping, and she enjoys walking along…slow and steady. Her hips are in great shape, as are all her other organs and functions, it is “only” the arthritis causing her problems. Our vet told us Katie is lucky she has been active her entire life as it helps hold off some of the arthritis, and she has always maintained an ideal weight which also aides in helping her joints. Had she not been an active dog, or been overweight, she most likely would not be with us at this time.
Thank you to Rejenease and Jodi at Heart Like a Dog for getting us started on this product! I also want to remind my friends and their pet parents to maintain a proper weight and workout regularly to increase not only your quality of dog life, but extend the length of your dog life as well!
**On a side note, the cold weather has actually made Katie feel better. On the mornings when it is -10 or more, she wants to walk and walk and walk. Mom has to go home because Katie walks so slow, Mom starts to freeze. In Florida, Katie was miserable. She didn’t want to go walking at all! So much for the cold vs. warm weather theory with arthritis!
Disclaimer: My GBGV Life was not asked to review this product. My GBGV Life is not a veterinarian. The opinions expressed in this post are our own findings. Please consult with your own veterinarian before trying any supplements and/or exercise programs with your pet.
NOTE! Starting tonight, My GBGV Life will be undergoing a facelift. At times the site may be unavailable or appear strange, but never fear! I hope to have everything up and running again by Sunday or Monday at the latest. I won’t be posting Saturday or Sunday this week.
I’m co hosting the FitDog Friday Blog Hop with SlimDoggy, and To Dog With Love! Please join us on Fridays to share your fitness stories with others, find new ways to have fun, and new fitness ideas too! Tell your friends to stop by as well – fit dogs are healthier, happier dogs!
Can’t wait to see the facelift. This was a timely post for me. I have been bouncing back and forth with a joint supplement for Harley. He’s 6 yrs old now and although he’s not showing any signs of having problems I do want to get ahead of it. I will look into this one. Have a great weekend.
The biggest piece of advice my mom and I would give you is that every dog reacts differently to medicines and supplements. What works for 99% of dogs did nothing for Katie, so trial and error has been our friend. It reminds me of my Gramma who needs a certain medicine and the one made her miserable but she tried a different brand which was essentially the same and it works like a charm. Rejenease is our lucky charm right now for Katie.
Wow! This looks like a great product and we are going to talk to our vet to see if Rejenease might help Bilbo with his arthritis!
Smileys!
Dory, Jakey, Arty & Bilbo
A lot of the supplements we have tried our vet hasn’t even heard of, but some of them worked. This one does wonders for Katie right now. Hopefully it can help out Bilbo as it is sad to see our siblings in pain.
Shiner takes Rejenease and it’s been working well. Except for today, I think she isn’t feeling well. But that may be due to some sort of injury I suspect… I think her neck hurts 🙁
Katie has her good and bad days, but even the bad days are better than they were and often times it is because she does a lot one day and needs to rest the next. She will be 13 in June, so she is older and has had problems for so long. We are just happy she feels better in general all the time.
We are very glad you have something that is helping Katie’s arthritis enough that she is enjoying walking again. It’s hard to watch them hurt so badly and be left behind when they would like to go with you:)
Luckily, Katie has never cared about being left behind. The Kuvasz is very independent. She rejoices when Mom comes back, but when she leaves Katie has no problems. We’ve been walking in different constellations for a couple years now too, so one or two of us is always left behind and it has become normal which helps too. But it is nice Katie wants to walk again.
Glad Katie is enjoying her walks again. Have a fabulous Friday.
Best wishes Molly
TGIF my friend!
I’m glad Katie can enjoy her walks again.
Slow and steady, but she is walking and happy.
After watching the video Mom said this morning, “that Katie is really a beautiful dog.” Happy Friday! More snow tomorrow — hooray! your doodle friend Dash
Yay! A snow fun weekend! Katie always gets comments on how beautiful she is, and I guess she is beautiful, but it is hard to hear all the time when we are out and about. What about scruffy me;)
oh Emma, you are always beautiful to see everyday!
Awww…thank you 🙂
Katie is such a pretty girl!! It’s so great to know there is something out there that has actually worked for her arthritis. Thanks for sharing the information & your experience with this product.
We are hoping it keeps helping her out as she so loves to be out walking and exploring.
Great review and so glad this is helping Katie so much. We won a bottle, too, but just started Jeffie on it a couple of weeks ago.
With Katie having problems for so long we didn’t expect much, but it has been a big change and the double dose the first four weeks made a big difference I think.
Happy Katie is feeling better. So sad when our puppies are in pain. Good luck with the “move”.
It is sad to see the rowdy and defiant Katie not want to do anything, but she now really enjoys her longer slow walks and it makes her happy. We have our paws crossed for the move. I’m sure it will go well, but there are always small things that pop up.
Great product to know about. Our household is holding up ok, but Lucy is loosing some of her back leg co-ordination from spinal arthritis, so I wonder if this might help. Thanks
Katie was to the point of her back end collapsing a couple times each time she was out for a walk, and now it happens once every couple days. I’m not familiar with the types of arthritis, but this does repair joints and reduce pain. The key was the double dose the first month. It may be worth a try.
That was interesting to read… I always thought the cold weather makes it more worse… I noticed that on my fingers once where I have that evil arthritis, but I thought it happens just in my imagination that it was better as I was outside in the cold. So it’s really true… good to know. I hope that this magic potion helps Katie to feel better and to walk with your momma…
We think it has more to do with the dry versus moist air as drier air usually helps those with joint pain. It was -11 Fahrenheit this morning and Katie took Mom for a 35 min walk and loved it. Bailie and I went on a 20 min race, dragging Mom behind us. Who knows, our house is crazy!
So glad you’ve found something that helps Katie – it’s so sad when they are in pain and there’s nothing you can do. Good luck with the facelift!
We hope it keeps helping her for a while but we think now with her being able to walk more it might be a real good thing. Hopefully the transition will go well, usually they do, but one never knows.
We are so glad to hear that Katie is improving on the supplement. I found it very interesting how you could see how the arthritis effected her on her paws. I’ve already been told I have arthritis developing in my shoulder so we will have to remember this when the time arrives. Love Dolly
She has a lot of arthritis in her paws. A few months ago, she wouldn’t let anyone even touch her paws and if Mom did, she would flinch like crazy. We hope it helps her feel better for a long time.
Poor Katie. The mom knows what it is like to feel pain when she walks, and she found out last week she will need to have back surgery involving many screws, removal of a vertebrae, replacement of the vertebrae plus using stem cells and bone from her hip. She is looking at this summer when her insurance problems are (hopefully) resolved. I took a fitness challenge all on my own on Monday. The mom was feeding us breakfast and she found Lyla and Panda in the house. Hollee was in the back yard trying to figure out how to get out of the yard through a fence board that was loose. I was GONE! I figured out how to slither through that loose board! I had a nice run of the ‘hood. In the meantime the mom got dressed, grabbed her keys,and was going for my leash when I danced in through the back door! I was panting from the exertion but so proud of myself for coming back through the fence! I was all wiggly and happy with pride. The fence is fixed, but a girl has to stay fit. XOXO Sparkle the PBGV
Oh man, my mom would have been a wreck too! You can’t go on adventures on your own because there are dangers like cars you might not remember to think about. Glad the fence is fixed and your are back home safe! It sounds terrible with your mom’s back. I sure hope she will be okay and they will be able to fix her back and it works.
That is so awesome you found a product that helps her out. And a face lift….Can’t wait!
My facelift won’t be anything like yours, more of an update to get with the times. We still just love what you did with your site!
Oh wow, sounds like a FAB product!!! I loved this post, very interesting.
ღ husky hugz ღ frum our pack at Love is being owned by a husky!
Thank you. We figure there may be other friends out there in pain who could benefit from this product, so we wanted to share.
We are so glad that something has been found that really helps Katie…
She won’t be a puppy again, but we are pleased she enjoys walking again and doesn’t appear to be in much pain.
So glad that all your efforts have paid off for Katie.
We keep trying and this is working for now which makes us all happy.
I’m so glad you’ve found relief for Katie. Our first Aussie’s rear hips were arthritic and I wasn’t blogging then. We’d go to the vet once a week and they’d give her a shot. It was working beautifully. And then cancer. But she was nearly 13, so it wasn’t the crush that eight would have been. Here’s to a couple more years with your best friend.
Well, Katie will be 13 in June, but she started having trouble real early. We hope this will help add a lot more happy times to her life.
My Dad wishes something like that was available when there were elderly dogs living here.
We are so blessed to be in the blogging community and learning about things like this product. It wasn’t available years ago, but even now, without blogging we may have never found it.
Glad to hear it is working well with Katie, we won a bottle too and I actually ordered my second bottle. It’s so hard to tell it if it is working with Nellie. She was limping before we started but I knew she was injured, she did great on it and limping went away until this week, she started limping again. I took her in for xrays and she has arthritis in her shoulder so the vet said to keep her on it that it is helping her. Good luck with your facelife, I can’t wait to see it!
We are on the second bottle too. Did you try doubling the dose for four weeks? Rejenease suggested we do that and it helped out, now Katie is on the regular dose and doing well.
I’m glad that you found something Katie is doing well with, it is hard to watch them slow down. I hope the facelift is stress-free. We are excited for the big reveal! ☺
It won’t be a massive change, but a nice update to current times. The current site is the one we started with and is a free WP.com one. We like it, but it is time for a change.
Katie is such a beautiful dog, glad you found something for her. Good luck, can’t wait for the reveal! 🙂
Thank you. She is our elegant old lady of the house…next to Mom of course!
It’s so great to see Katie walking methodically along (I remember those slower walks with Kobi!), and I’m glad to hear Rejenease is working for her. We actually have Luke on that right now, but haven’t seen a huge difference. But his knee issues aren’t an all the time thing so it’s different I think. Sheba is still doing well on the Wag so we’re sticking with that for now. It is so great to see them doing well after they’ve had a hard time.
It’s so nice to see her wanting to walk again since she always has loved going for walks! Wag did absolutely nothing for Katie, but many drugs and supplements everyone loves did nothing. We’re happy Rejenease is working.
I started Mr. N on joint supplements a week or two ago but haven’t noticed any difference yet. It might be hard to tell though, he’s always flying around! Glad they’re helping Katie.
If a dog isn’t having big problems, I suspect it would be hard to notice a difference. With Katie it has been big, alone the fact she is eating again is great!
Hi Y’all,
If Rejenease stops working try hyaluronic acid. It is injected into the joints of performance horses and humans but works well on dogs injected subcutaneous. Unfortunately, since they started using it on humans it’s become very expensive and could be cost prohibitive for many people.
BrownDog’s Human
We will keep that in mind. Many people call Katie a horse since she is a big girl, so it may be a good match!
Katie looks gorgeous 🙂 I hope the Rejeneas will continue to work for her ~ I made a note of it in case our pups might ever need it!
Looking forward to your facelift!
We hope it continues as well. She still has issues, but she is feeling so much better!
Aww!! Its great to see Katie out and about and feeling good. And who knew that the cold weather would make her feel better than the warm.
This morning she actually grabbed a stick and wanted to play tug a war for the first time in like a year!
Oh Emma!! I’m so glad to hear that Katie responded so well to the Rejenease! It has been such a blessing for Sampson as well and I’m so glad it was able to help Katie. Thank you for the shout out too! Sampson is also a bit slower on our walks, but like Katie, he would just keep walking. Hope you guys have a great weekend and can’t wait to see the new blog design come Monday!
We are so happy we got the bottle to try and they recommended the double dose the first month. Paws crossed it keeps on working.
So pleased that you’ve found a supplement that works for her
We are happy too.
Thanks for this information! I’ve had my little Dachshund on a few different things, but nothing with ongoing success. I just placed an order for this product, and I hope it works as well for us as it has for Katie. Do you remember how long she was taking it before you started to see improvement?
The owner of the company told me to double the dose for the first four weeks since Katie is older and really was not doing well for some time. I started noticing after about two weeks, but now after six weeks and on the normal dose, she continues to seem to feel better. Still slow, but so much happier and she wants to do more. I hope it works well for your little one.
I am glad you found something that worked. The new site looks great!
Thank you. We hope Katie continues to feel better.
Aww, sweet Katie. I’m happy to hear you’ve found something that works for her, and I hope it will keep working so she can keep feeling good. She’s such a beautiful girl!
It is amazing how much better she is feeling and how she loves to walk now, but slow.
I don’t see a massive change with Ace when he takes these types of products, but I do seem to see a small improvement. I’m glad the Rejenease is working for Katie! It seems to work for Ace as well.
Some products have helped a bit, but not a huge amount. The double dosage seems to have kick started the process for Katie.