back legs giving out, and turning in circles

That was a clickable link to a website in my post, sorry, should have mentioned that. With her it was VERY severe, I came home from work and was sure that she'd had a seizure, she couldn't walk or even stand up without falling over, and her eyes kept rolling back in her head. It was really scary. I called the vet, waited until my hubby got home a few minutes later, and we took her in, certain that it was the end for her. We were surprised and hopeful when he knew exactly what it was, and told us there was a very good chance she'd recover, at least partially, if not fully. Some dogs retain a slight head tilt, but she didn't. She spent several days at the vet, and when we brought her home we had to help her walk around for a few days, she'd walk down the hall bouncing off the walls like she was drunk. There was no way she could navigate the dog door, so we kept the back door open for her so she could let herself outside. After that it was a very slow gradual improvement over the next few weeks.

Since it's an inner ear thing, your description of his trouble with recurring ear infections was an instant clue that it could be a possibility. Good luck!

I've always heard of Vestibular Disease being compared to Vertigo in humans ... BUT ... when Too had her first episode or two I honestly thought she was having a stroke. They scared me to death.

She had to be hospitalized once for it, the rest of the time when she had an episode, they didn't last long and I just sat with her, held her until she was stable enough to get up and walk away. I finally got used to her having the epidsodes.

thank you all for your reassurances. You have no idea how much it's helping me, because he won't be going to the vet until Friday. There is only one vet at the place we go that I'm comfortable with (and that Prince is comfortable with), and she's not in again until then. I'm keeping a close eye on him and since I'm off this week, we're pretty much together 24/7, so I'm not having to deal with being a part from him. The one vet I like is really good with him, and all the others seem really afraid of him. While I can understand a certain level of apprehension, it really pisses me off that the very first thing all of them (but the one I like) want to muzzle him. They want their assistants to do it, too, and won't even come in the exam room with him until he's muzzled. Those vets need to stick to cats and guinea pigs, and if I ever get stuck with one of them again I won't be able to stop myself from saying so. The one vet I like is fabulous. She is so, so good with him. She does everything right. Ignores him at first, doesn't hold her hand over his head, doesn't talk to him in baby talk...the first vet we saw there did all those things and more. Prince is very, very aloof, but does not just ignore everything and whatever is stressful for him (and we are at the vets, stress-city), he will react to. He's not vicious, he doesn't attack, he's just very on-guard and is NOT friendly. It blows my mind that people who are VETS can be so clueless. But our vet is the best. I love her. I feel absolutely confident that she will find out the exact problem and start the right course of treatment. You know she's gotta be good if she can calm me down, as well as the dog!!!!!

I really hate the thought that he's getting old. I know he is, he's going all white around his lips, but he's always been my baby. I watched an Animal Planet show about dogs and their wolf ancestry recently and one of the things it said was that the way to calculate a dog's age has changed. The first two years are actually the equivalent of 25 human years, and then after that, every year is equivalent to 4 human years. So if he's 10 and a half, he's equivalent to 59 years old.
Other than ear infections, he has been unbelievably healthy all these years. I hope this is just blip and not the start of decline. We're going to be moving later this summer and I worry almost obsessively about how he'll do in the transition. If it wasn't for this board I'd think I was crazy!

I've been through this also - our vet calls it "old dog vestibular disease". Chance had much more subtle episodes with a head tilt and loss of strength in his back legs. Like many other posters mentioned, I thought it was a stroke. The first time I was breathless with panic and trying so hard to be calm for him. We also moved - suburbs to city and back to suburbs - with Chance in his last 2 years. I actually think it perked him up, although it was hard to see him struggle with the hardwood floors and one of us would drive to the park in the city so that he didn't have to walk the 20 block round-trip.

This fall, Roxy had more of a full-blown episode with the head swinging and eye rolling and disorientation. It was really scary. She recovered completely within about 30 minutes, but then had another shorter episode later the same day. She hasn't had one since, but did seem to start once and I touched her and it instantly stopped. In her case it seemed to be related to stress. We were on vacation and "Daddy" had to leave earlier to get back to work. We all got up to say good-bye and maybe she thought she was being abandoned in the Outer Banks . . . even though there were 2 other cars and other family and friends still there and she's been to that same house 3 years in a row.

successful visit to the vet today. Prince behaved so well. He's always good, but sometimes more so than others, and today was great. I always love it when he does the scale so agreeably.

Vet says it's not vestibular. She said if it the spell had lasted longer and he had needed time to recover, and if his ears looked really bad, she would think more along those lines, but it was a short episode (in dog years, maybe, but for me, during those 30 seconds HIS life flashed before my eyes) and he was immediately, absolutely fine. He did not have the eye rolling thing, either. She said his ears looked gunky but were not infected at all. She did mention that he might have had a mini stroke, but seemed doubtful even about that. She basically ended up saying that with older dogs, you just have to pay attention. She really had no final diagnosis, but left me feeling that he is basically OK. I have lots of stuff for his ears and we'll just keep managing his seemingly life-long issues. She believes it's allergies, and we talked about diet, etc. Since we've lived in different areas of the country, and he's always had ear issues, she agreed that it could be food related but then again, might not be. So I didn't really get a nice tight definitive answer, but I do feel better. And he's doing great. Our walks are shorter, but he's happy as a clam. Guess I can go back to slightly longer walks for now.

Since he's not on a great food and has had recurring ear problems I'd definitely try a different food. Even if the ear gunk isn't related to his diet, it won't hurt him to be on a better quality food. I use Wellness Core original formula with my two dogs, and they're doing great. They love it and gobble it right down. Jean's link should help you find a good food near you. There used to be pretty limited choices for grain-free, and they weren't always easy to find in a store, but that's changing. They are more expensive, but you'll probably feed less than the Pedigree. I do a calorie comparison when I switch foods so I end up feeding whatever quantity of the new food is roughly equivalent to the same amount of calories as the old food rather than going by the number of cups.

I had Sneaker on *gasp* Science Diet for her entire life. Back then (got her in 1986) I knew absolutely nothing about canine nutrition and thought that was a good food. She also had recurring ear trouble, which very well may have been related to the food. When we know better, we do better. Good luck!