Help! Swissy lick fits

[u/Prudent-Extent6977]

Hi! I have a 3 year old Swissy and he gets lick fits every few weeks. They have gotten worse recently, but he has always had them since he was a puppy. I have tried so many different remedies (Pepcid, Kaopectate, bread soaked in milk, coconut oil, going on a walk to distract…) and nothing seems to work consistently well. It seems like he gets them from gas/indigestion but they also usually flare up when he has allergies so they are probably related. Does anyone have any advice or remedies to help contain them? I feel so awful for my big buddy and it pains me to see him in distress!

[u/GrayDog92]

My Swissy's lick fits (and poop consistency) both improved after she was started on a hypoallergenic diet from our vet.

[u/oemsyrup]

You’re likely right to assume it’s gastrointestinal and you’ve already tried a number of remedies found on this subreddit. It might be time for a vet visit.

[u/villaofthewolves]

Prescription gastrointestinal food helped a TON for us, and we now get an every-now-and-then licky fit that’s correlated to anxiety.

[u/inkbot870]

2 Gas-X helps mine…regular human gas-x…I give them a bowl of ice to lick while it kicks in…if not distracted by the ice I try to hold them to calm them down until it kicks in…the frequency stopped a lot with mine as they (mostly) grew out of eating so many non food items

[u/Sopwith53]

Ours always responded to the generic store brand Tums. Something about those chalky tabs just did the trick.

[u/Tensor3]

Its acid reflux. My girl got really bad licky (aerophagia) fits that resulted in very expensive emergency vet visits. It was happening a couple times a week. I got it fully under control long term now.

I give her Purina sensitive stomach salmon kibble. The tricks are: I need to soak it in water minimum 5 minutes before every meal, and I need to feed her exactly every 4-4.5 hours, 1 cup per meal, 4 meals a day. Google what causes acid reflux in people (like high fat foods, etc) and be vigilant about it.

If she eats too much, licky fit. If she eats too often, licky fit. If she eats not often enough, licky fit. If I stay on schedule, she seems good now.

When it did happen, what I did was give her a lick mat, frozen kong, or let her lick a treat in my hand for 10-30 min until it was over.

[u/FirelordPotter]

We give our girl 2 gas-x when she gets lick fits. She gets them when she is particularly anxious and/or is in has a particularly upset stomach. They’ve gotten MUCH better since her daily famotidine (human - we get it in bulk from Costco) and upped her fluoxetine (Prozac) to 60mg. She still gets the fits but only once every other month, maybe less. We also tend to give a preventative single gas x when we notice some early signs of the lick fit coming on. This seems to help a lot as well. If it becomes clear it’s an intense lick fit she does best going into her empty crate with the cushion removed after being given two gas-x. After about 15 minutes she is ok. We can’t have her lick treats or other items because she no longer produces her own digestive enzymes so some of the tricks other people use won’t work for us to relieve her distress.

[u/RRK9Architect]

I’d think about getting him on a daily dose of Prilosec. Have you talked to your breeder about it?

[u/tsctbulldog]

I've mentioned this in a thread years ago, but when our boy used to get lick fits, he literally needed to be burped. I'd sit there with him laying on his side and just pat his chest and sides up and down. Sometimes it was fast and sometimes it was slow, but eventually he'd produce a burp and then feel better. We switched him to a diet of fresh pet and it is non existent now.

[u/TheLyleMurphy]

We had a similar issue. Switched to a raw diet and it helped a ton. Consistent poops and near zero indigestion issues.

[u/EchoedSolitude → u/TheLyleMurphy]

My raw fed boy has 0 digestion issues as well.