Upchuck and His Ol' Pal, Pukey

It never occurred to me that I might someday have a dog that suffered from routine carsickness.

Airlie, it seems, is that dog.

Honestly, it's never been an issue before. Kansas has puked, occasionally, when DH drives his wobbly vehicle of the short wheel-base too fast down windy, bumpy roads, but we resolved that issue by driving slower, or letting me drive. Well, that and I stopped offering her water to drink during car trips.

Kansas' issue is also compounded by how often she goes from lying down, to sitting up looking out the window, and back again. She can be a pretty restless passenger, compounded by the presence of cows, horses, sheep, goats in the roadside pastures. We had to stop pointing these out to her, because we were inadvertently contributing to her constant motion.

Taking their dog pillows or crate liners in the car with them helps, too, because it seems to communicate to them one space in which to remain, and they are a lot more cooperative with regard to being still in the car.

Leo just goes to sleep.

Airlie, due to her age, and as per a stipulation in the adoption contract we signed, has been traveling in her crate on the few car trips she's experienced. I knew it wouldn't last forever, nor would it continue to be feasible once she outgrew the puppy crate and was using a larger one. Still, I have been trying to do the right thing.

We thought the carsickness incident during Christmas travel was a one-time thing, since she did not suffer from it on the return trip.

Fast-forward to last weekend, when she first threw up within 15 minutes of leaving the house. True, I had planned NOT to feed her her afternoon meal, but we ended up leaving so much later than planned that I figured she had had ample time to digest it. Nope. From now on she will not be fed at all on any day in which we are driving further than 15 minutes (she doesn't puke on the way to the vet...). But that's a decision that comes AFTER five bouts of vomiting in the three hours we were in the car last weekend. The first two being to empty her stomach, the other three being the result of some extreme anxiety and a tummy full of drool. I have never seen a dog stream saliva like that before! She was most definitely very stressed out. Even after the sun went down and it was dark in the car, she refused to lie down and just sleep. I know the sitting up, looking out the window was not helping her. Neither was the fact that DH, whose delicate sensibilities are easily offended, had the driver's side window wide open. Airlie was alternately staggering around her crate in a panic, sitting and sniffing rapidly, enjoying all of the scents coming in the window, lying down, getting back up,  icking her chops (always the first sign), heaving...

DH really is pitiful when it comes to stuff like this. Honestly, dog food smells the same, dry or recently voided from the front end. I dole out and clean up enough of it to know. Even when it comes out the business end, you can still kind of recognize the scent. Every type of dog food has it's own smell. I can tell what the poop is going to smell like by smelling a bag of kibble.

So, DH rolled down his window immediately, upon the first volley of vomit. That didn't help much, we still found ourselves careering under overpasses and around corners as he hurried his way to an empty corner of the parking lot behind a local Sonic. He says he "had" to drive that way, in such a hurry, or he would have been sick, himself. I fail to see the point, as I had, until this time, successfully managed to keep Airlie from revisiting her pile of puke, and also keep her out of it. DH's driving skills served nothing other than to ensure that Airlie got flung from one side of her crate to the other, repeatedly, splattering soggy dog food all over the car in the process. DH and his dainty sensibilities intact, guess who was left to clean up the mess, ensuring that every speck of puppy puke was removed from the vehicle so he wouldn't risk smelling it and driving like a maniac again? And without any proper supplies to assist me! I had to use my bare hands. Thank goodness it's only wet dog food.

Poor Airlie must have been so horribly scared and affected by that bad experience, no wonder she was a nervous wreck for the next 3 hours! The last two times, we were out of options when it came to dry bedding for the crate. We'd already shaken out and re-folded her blanket to any remaining dry side as many times as possible, and the towel that had initially been used as extra padding under the blanket got sacrificed in the cleaning up of the first incident. She had to ride to my parents house sitting in her own wet drool. At least her tummy was empty and that's all it was. She was miserable.

I had the pleasure of riding shotgun in a car with the driver's side window open the whole time, myself. I hate when men do this. Why does nobody realize that an open window is misery for the female passenger? The wind constantly whips any and all hair, stinging the eyes, teasing the nostrils, itching the nose... I HATE IT! And I sit there brushing stray hairs off my face the whole time, and he's freakin' oblivious!

We thought we planned better for the return trip. No food since breakfast.

Nope. She still blew chunks before we were even out of town- and that was after merely sitting at a stop light for a ridiculously long time!

We even tried covering her crate with the blanket (washed at Mom & Dad's, along with the towel). She still refused to settle down and just tune things out.

After the third round, we gave up. None of our attempts were successful. I don't understand the rationale, but DH suggested we try her out of the crate- just see if she would settle down if allowed to lie down with the other dogs. She was crated right there next to them, anyway, it's not like they were separated. I was nervous about doing anything that might give the rescue group cause to take her from us, but she was miserable and there seemed to be no other recourse.

I'll be damned if she didn't cuddle right up to Leo (and that, in itself, is unheard of. Leo does not allow such antics. He does not like to cuddle with ANYBODY and he particularly does not allow Airlie in his personal space), and go right to sleep. The drooling abated, the restlessness ceased. She didn't move again until we came to the first stoplight 30 minutes from home. At that point she sat up, looked about briefly, then curled up next to Kansas, who put her head over Airlie's back, and they both went back to sleep.

I'll be double-damned!

Unfortunately, this seems to be the solution, short of drugging the poor kid.