Bad Experience with Trazodone for Dogs - A Cautionary Tale (tail)

My little puppy, actually 50 lbs of energetic Australian Shepherd, was neutered a week and a half ago. As part of the process he needed to get a cone to prevent him from damaging the incision, additionally, I was supposed to keep his activity level down and keep him on a lead at all times. The vet noted that this was an unreasonable expectation for my puppy so she gave me some Trazodone to mellow my dog out so that he could tolerate the cone and mellow my dog down a bit so that the cone is not such a burden on him or us.

At first the pup handled the cone ok, it was never good, but then he started to try and remove the cone by himself, first by pawing it off but then later by trying to break the cone against the furniture, walls, gratings... so we gave him one of the Trazodone sedatives. At first it helped but by the second day of use his behavior started deteriorating greatly, he totally lost is bite inhibition and had a few what I would call psychotic episodes where he could not handle his situation and attacked anything and anyone. I remember having a bad episode with some tranqs myself during a hospital visit so I stopped the medication. His behavior started to improve but by that time the cone was in pieces, we gave up with the cone and just watched him with the incision which thankfully healed up in the first week. He is now a similar pup but with more of tendency to grab your clothing if he doesn't want something.

The whole process has set back his training considerably, but he is now on track again, I was able to start training him to walk with the bike yesterday. Paradoxical aggression can be side effect for Trazodone, I found after researching the drug, this information wasn't shared with us. We won't be using the Trazodone again with this puppy.

3 or 4 day with cone, day before the .... hit the fan. He is asking me to remove the cone.

When such meds are needed, puppy Prozac is the best option.

Hope we don't have to do this again soon. He is very excitable and variations in routine are difficult.

I never get on with cones, just a well-fitted onesie. May take some trial and error to find the right one for him but has never failed me in 11 years and multiple doggy ops including 4 pups x

Jem123 said:

I never get on with cones, just a well-fitted onesie. May take some trial and error to find the right one for him but has never failed me in 11 years and multiple doggy ops including 4 pups x

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We asked about a onesie and the vet said that the male dogs don't do well with it.

It has been a few days now and the pup is behaving more or less normally. That is, he is still badly behaved but is friendlier about it now.

That's good then, glad he's more himself again. I've used for males, different sizes too. Chihuahuas and German Shepherd made my own with an old t-shirt

I have had a number of dogs over the years and this is the first time we actually had a cone after the neutering/spaying. Overall my impression was the cone was a bit cruel, not to mention the bruising to our legs from the dog running into us. Just glad it is over.

He's a gorgeous dog

Jem123 said:

He's a gorgeous dog

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Thank you. He has a nice personality too but also a very strong willed, mixed in with an extremely strong herding instinct that makes him a real challenge.

I bet! Will be well worth the training you are doing though. I'll send a pic underneath of my kc German shepherd (old English straight back). Sadly, we lost him to cancer last month after 10.5yrs. Had him from 8 weeks old. We put in the training with him early on and that, along with a good temperament like your pup, made an amazing adult dog.

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