Our frog hasn't been eating, then had odd tensing episode after bath

[arlosoft]

Summary: Our frog, J.T., usually eats every other day but has had little to no appetite the past 5 days or so. The last time I tried to feed her, she spit out the superworm and worked her mouth. Her tongue was visible at the side of her mouth. We thought she might need to use the restroom, so we gave her a honey bath then a bath without the honey to rinse it off. As we picked her up out of the second bath and I was looking at her front leg for nuptial pads, she tensed. My fiancé likened her reaction to a seizure without tremors. I describe the episode in greater detail in #15

We're a little concerned about her appetite, but the episode tonight was terrifying, and we haven't been able to figure out what it is so far. We want to figure out what's going on and prevent it from happening again.

1. Size of enclosure - 20 gallon, in the process of moving her into a 10-gallon tonight

2. # of inhabitants - specifically other frogs and size differences: Just J.T.

3. Humidity: approximately 80%

4. Temperature: daytime, 75-79, nighttime approximately 75.

5. Water - type - for both misting and soaking dish: dechlorinated water (using brita filter) to expand coconut fiber and for water dish (she doesn’t go in it), distilled water for misting.

6. Materials used for substrate – coconut fiber (this was on top of a single layer of hydro balls and a layer of mesh over them. We live in the desert southwest, so losing humidty is a problem, so we poured water on the hydro balls to make sure there’s sufficient moisture in the vivarium. The new cage has deeper coconut fiber, but no hydro balls. I mist her twice a day now, which is sufficient to keep the humidity up.

7. Enclosure set up i.e. plants (live or artificial), wood, bark and other materials.
- How were things prepared prior to being put into the viv. – 2 of the plastic hanging plants made by exo-terra or a similar company. We put them in corners of the vivarium to give her a little cover. She likes to hide just backed into one. Rinsed them in dechlorinated water prior to putting in tank. Also have a decorative skull in the back of the larger tank as decoration. It was also made for terrariums, don’t recall the brand.

8. Main food source – have recently been feeding superworms, perhaps for the last 3-4 weeks. We feed her a thawed pinkie every 1-2 weeks. We have occasionally fed her a small dubia, but only a total of about 4 or 5 total. Prior to the superworms, we fed mostly crickets.

9. Vitamins and calcium? (how often) -- We dust the worms with as much calcium+d3 and vitamin powder as will stick (which isn’t a ton) 1-2 times per week. She eats approximately every other day, so it averages every feeding to every other feeding. The pinkie holds the powder better, so that’s where she gets the significant intake of calcium/vitamins.

10. Lighting – no direct lighting over her vivarium, but we have a 5-arm floor lamp with CFL bulbs that provide ambient light approximately half the day. (It’s about 4 feet from her, and behind a wall-mounted tv so it’s not too glaring.)

11. What is being used to maintain the temperature of the enclosure. - We have 2 UTHs for her. One was for about a 10-gallon tank, the other was listed as a micro UTH that we added to supplement the heat. Both are in the back left corner of the tank.

12. When is the last time he/she ate – 3 days ago. Ate a couple super worms. Prior to that, she ate about 5 days ago, and was eating 5-10 at a time.

13. Have you found poop lately – approximately 5 days ago.

14. A pic would be helpful including frog and enclosure (any including cell phone pic is fine) - I am having issues getting a picture to upload. They were on my phone, so I emailed them to myself, then adjusted the width/height so they fit the requirements, but I can't get them to upload in .jpg or .png format. I keep getting the error 'Today.png - This is not a valid image file.'
She generally looks good. We don't notice anything out of the ordinary with her appearance.

15. Describe frog's symptoms and/or recent physical changes; to include it's ventral/belly area. – She hasn’t had much appetite recently. I tried to feed her a superworm yesterday morning. She grabbed it, held the first bit in her mouth for 10-15 seconds, then spit it out. Her tongue was visible on the left side of her mouth for a minute or two. She looked like she had something somewhat hard in her belly on her left side yesterday, but we didn’t notice anything today. We decided to give her a honey bath today in case she had to poop. Chin depth, warm (~85 degree) water with 2-3 drops of honey in a small tote (7” wide x 14” long. Kept her in it for about 15 minutes (she peed immediately, but no poop), then picked her up and replaced the water with fresh warm water without honey and did another soak in that. Our last step was we were going to gently pour water over her to get some of the dried skin off her face—near nostrils. When my fiancé picked her up that last time –before we poured any water, she suddenly tensed. Her legs went straight back and she closed her eyes tightly and her body was rigid. She opened her eyes and her pupils were dilated— completely black, none of the gold around her eye was visible. She started opening and closing her mouth rapidly, and her tongue was visible on the left side of her mouth. She didn’t make any sounds during this process. When her body stopped tensing, she was still opening and closing her mouth another 20-30 seconds, and her eyes still appeared bulged. The entire episode lasted about 1-2 minutes.

16. How old is the frog – about 6-7 months

17. How long have you owned him/her – about 5 months

18. Is the frog wild caught or captive bred – captive bred

19. Frog food- how often and if it is diverse, what other feeders are used as treats – mostly superworms, with pinkies as treats. After reading the forums, we are planning to switch to mostly nightcrawlers soon.

20. How often the frog is handled – rarely. We feed by tongs every other day or so, but pick her up only when working on her cage.

21. Is the enclosure kept in a high or low traffic area – low traffic. She’s near the door of our computer room. No traffic from 8pm – 7am, then I mist her around 7am. After that, usually no traffic till 3pm, then we are mostly in the room till 8pm.

22. Describe enclosure maintenance (water changes, cleaning, etc): - we pick up poo whenever we see it. Replace the coconut fiber about once per month, sometimes switching the stuff in the corner where she tends to hang out every few weeks.