Small dog and antibiotics

Updated 5/4/2016: See below

My son went into the Navy, so I know have his small dog. I love the little thing, even though I really prefer larger dogs. Well, she was still in need of a spay so I took her to the vet. Afterwards, they put her on antibiotics and some pain meds. Talk about being difficult, this little booger is so squirmy and fast with her head it was very difficult at first to figure out how to get the pills down her throat. With larger dogs, it was fairly easy because once the pill was put near the back of their mouths they pretty much had to swallow at that point (not sure if that is the correct way either, but I am not a vet). Other times with my larger dogs I would hide the pill in a hot dog or some peanut butter. But not this little beauty, she has a knack of using her tongue to spit anything back out. We started pulverizing the pills with a mortar and pestle and then mixing it into small amounts of canned food. It is a very messy process and tends to get all over her fur. But after some patience and practice I found just the right small amount of the mixture that i can sneak in and on the roof of her mouth. For the most part this has been working. But the biggest part of this is making sure she gets a treat afterwards. After a few days she has started to eat again (even though in small amounts), but not really on her own will. She drank plenty of water and had enough energy to go outside for small walks, but we were getting concerned she did not want to eat. After doing a little research online, it appears that the antibiotics must be killing off the good bacteria in her stomach which keeps her appetite down. The results online talked about feeding her cooked egg and yogurt. Well, the cooked egg is starting to do the trick, this is the treat she gets for putting up with us humans forcing the small amounts of food/meds down her throat. We cook up the egg first and break it up into a bowl. She can smell the egg in the air and gets excited. We then do the sit down and force the small dollop of food/med down her throat and then she gets the wonderful treat. While she still puts up a small fight for the meds, it is starting to get easier…. the best thing to keep in mind is to have patience and understanding. They are your loved pets, but don’t feel bad that you might be causing a little stress in their life. They will forgive you and hopefully the meds will help them get better. You might feel bad forcing food down their throat, but get over that and realize you have to do what you can to keep them safe and healthy and little bit of discomfort is ok (within reason of course, you never want to hurt them physically. which means not smacking around or breaking necks… got it?)

Update 5/4/2016: So the dog has decided that she no longer wants the egg. I had forgotten about this but decided to try baby food. Mainly the idea is to get her used to eating again so that she will start to eat more. I also think that she has coordinated the stress of force feeding with certain foods or situations so I am trying to get her excited again. I ran up to the store at midnight and picked up a small jar of turkey in turkey broth baby food. She really loved the smell and licked up the spoonful quickly and then started to press towards the jar to lick directly out of it. The first round she only took about 1/5 of the jar. An hour or so later she tried another 1/5. This morning, she ate the remaining 3/5 of the jar with no questions. I guess I will have to pick up some more jars after work and see how soon I can introduce her pate and kibble again. Also, she is now on a lighter antibiotic as we found out she had an eColi infection likely in her kidney. Not sure how she obtained it, but likely one time she must have had the runs and some of the poo stayed caked on and likely entered through her urinary tract. So 30 days of this new antibiotic and hopefully appetite comes back quicker now.