Both of my childhood dogs were the type that you could put into the car and they'd pass out. One was naturally like this the moment we brought her home at 8 weeks, the other was drugged with dramamine from age 10 weeks until she was about a year old and ended up the perfect car dog. I want Ryuk to be like those dogs in the car and I'm staring to regret not drugging him intensively as a puppy.

He's two, he's been going on car rides with me since he was 5 months (when I got him). We started with diarrhea, urination and vomiting, we then moved onto projectile vomiting, we got out of that when he was about 8 months old...from then until now he pants....excessivly and flat out will not do anything other than stand unless I tell him every 30 seconds to lay down or sit (and he will, for about 15 seconds. I've tried having him sleep in the car (which he does when it's not moving, it can still be running though), I've tried running him to exhaustion and putting him in there (no effect he'll stay standing the entire drive, I've had him collapse out of the car into a parking lot in exhaustion after a lot of exercise and a 5 hour car ride in the middle of the night). I've tried marker training, I've tried switching cars to see if was particularly my car he didn't like, I've tried other drivers (he prefers my driving it seems). When he was a puppy and his crate still fit in the car I tried crating (that was really...REALLY bad). The car has never been a bad place, he has access to water, he'll take treats if they're soft, he's got comfy bedding, his crate won't fit but he's secured in a well fitting seatbelt harness. He doesn't fidget, he's quiet 99.9% of the time, and he's got good manners but he WILL NOT RELAX. This is a dog who can do elevators, boats, buses, I even got to try him in a helicopter once but he will not curl into a ball and sleep in a car that I'm driving. The only time he has ever slept was when he was neutered...but to be honest he wasn't even awake yet when I put him in the car so I don't think that counts.

I'm sick of it. I have a convention he's coming to in 1.5 weeks. This is his 5th convention, second time to this particular one. It's an 8 hour drive there, about 9-10 hours back, I don't want him to expend all of his energy standing in my car, panting, and bugging my passenger with his panting.

Is there ANYTHING safe that I can get that will knock him out for the drive? I'd settle for something to take the edge off even. My father has always used Dramamine however I've heard that it can be dangerous, it was never intended for dogs, etc. The pet store recommended pet-eze tablets or drops but looking online the reviews are either "this product kills dogs" or "this product doesn't work". I was told to check out rescue remedy but their site so so much fluffy bunnies and rainbows I can't even figure out which one to try.

Ask the vet.
They'll give you an antipsychotic that's commonly used to sedate animals for travel.

If he's had a check-up recently, a lot of vets won't even require you to bring the dog in, they'll just let you swing in and pick up the rx.

I have tried Rescue Remedy and it doesn't work. I have heard you can use benadryl but have no idea if it works of if it is safe.

Briards are notoriously car sick, so I can speak to this.....

Bonine (meclizine) is inexpensive and safe. Give one 12 hours before your trip, and another 1/2 hour before.

If your dog will eat some ginger snaps, give him a couple before you put him in the car (he probably won't eat them once you put him in there). Otherwise, don't feed him *anything* four hours before you go.

Is he crated in the car? Be sure the crate is well-ventilated, and in such a position that he can see out of the car. Like people, being able to see outside and orient themselves to the motion can help. This is why I use wire crates in the car instead of airline-type.

It may be as much psychological as vestibular at this point, so you may want to try the bonine on some short trips first.

Tracy

I agree with Tracy, it sounds like he's suffered from car sickness since he was a pup, and now it's just traumatic for him. My sister's dog gets very carsick, unless a window is rolled down. Roll one down, and he's good to go. If you don't want to roll down a window, try a portable fan so he can still get the benefits of the air movement.

You probably won't be able to fix this before your trip in 10 days, but you are going to need to get him over the mental and physical aspects of so many negative trips. Think about it from his point of view, you probably wouldn't be very relaxed in the car if every time you got into one you got sick. Even if you weren't having all the blowouts anymore, just the memory of them would stress you out.

The ginger (in cookies, or candied ginger or even fresh if he'll eat it) can be a great help. Your vet can also prescribe various meds. They may just give you Ace, which in addition to being a sedative has some anti-nausea and anti-spasomadic effects. But talk to the vet, they will have a number of options for you.

Acepromazine, that's what it is!
Thank you, I could not for the life of me remember.

I'd be a bit careful about using Aecpromazine if this is an anxiety issue. Ace incapacitates a dog, but does little for his mental state. So it is not a good choice to use for any sort of anxiety issue.

Here is a quote from veterinarian/behaviorist Dr. Karen Overall

 Quote:

I know that the common "treatment" for storm and noise phobias and veterinary office visits is acepromazine. In truth, I wish this medication would be placed at the far back of a top shelf and used only exceptionally. Acepromazine is a dissociative anesthetic meaning that it scrambles perceptions. Ask yourself if a scrambling of perceptions will make an anxious or uncertain dog worse or better. It's always worse, and we make many if not most dogs more sensitive to storms by using this drug. In part this is also because sensitivity to noise is heightened.

This is a recipe for disaster for these dogs, and, in fact, they learn to be more fearful and more reactive because of these associations. If what you need is sedation - acepromazine can be an acceptable adjuvant, but it makes most of my really fearful and really reactive patients worse, so all sorts of other drug combos can work better and do less harm than is done by the routine use of acepromazine.

Taken from the article Storm Phobias

I'd lean more toward trying something like valium or xanax if I felt the root cause was anxiety. If you have a good relationship with your vet they should be willing to let you try one of those instead of the ace.

Weird that it's considered a dissociative anesthetic in animals. In humans its an antipsychotic, a class of drugs often used to *treat* anxiety and dissociation.

Metabolic differences, I suppose. I imagine canines process dopamine differently than we do.

___

Valium, Xanax or another benzodiazapine are definitely the best choice for anxiety if your Vet is accommodating. Just remember that it should only be used for a very short time- because they are anticonvulsants, seizures can result if a dog receives a long course of benzodiazapines and is then withdrawn abruptly.

I've seen my dog on Acepromazine twice, and hope to never have to allow someone to give it to him again. It's awful to see him so helpless and completely vacant. He forgets how to walk, he drools, just entirely incapacitated.

I would never give it casually.

When I managed the show kennel, we had an older golden retriever that we had to give acepromazine to during thunder storms. She had SEVERE anxiety and would literally hurt hurself without it. It was really horrible to see though..she would become completely lethargic and just lay around panting heavily. I wouldn't choose ace except in extreme situations.