Lela's Big Surgery

Under the umbrella of "dog ownership/guardianship," there are two things I hoped to never, ever encounter with my own pups:

1. A torn ACL (knee ligament)
2. Copraphagia (poop eating)

Lucky me, with my current pack I have Joey, who LOVES to consume his frozen turdies, and Lela... who somehow, someway, ripped her ACL and shattered the underlying cartilage this year.

I had noticed for a while that she was hitching her gait a bit, especially when we jogged. I chalked it up to arthritis; after all, my greyhounds had started going lame around 6 or 7. We started glucosamine and it got better. But then things got worse, and after I returned from Iceland we did some x-rays and a "drawer test" to find out that unfortunately it wasn't arthritis so much as a knee ligament.

Ugh.

Surgery was scheduled for mid-October. It was hard. Because Lela has a sensitive stomach and couldn't handle the NSAIDs, we used only a mild Gabapentin during her healing. It was weeks before she tried to even put a LITTLE weight on the leg. We did leash walks, daily massages, and all the prescribed exercises. My poor girl pined when Joey got longer walks and she only got a slow meander around the front yard. But... but... the long haul paid off. Lela can now get on and off furniture, do some light runs in the yard, and barely limps! We still have to hold off on rough-housing and really strenuous stuff, but the main drag is behind us.

She was --IS-- my cutie-patootie trooper. :)

-Jen