See, last year at this time, Rigby started holding her right back leg up while walking, running, eating, drinking, panting...well, all the time. We took her to see our veterinarian here in Chestertown and they relayed to us that she had torn her ACL. I related that to a human injury and thought surgery and some down time will get her back to walking, running, eating shape. At 1 1/2 years old Rigby had surgery on a beautiful day in March, not a moment too soon. After her surgery we kept her away from other dogs, away from jumping, running and doing the stairs for what seemed like forever. We also had her go in for some laser therapy which seemed to help any pain she was having. Our homework was to do some physical therapy with her as she was progressing with the recovery. By the summer we had her swimming which also seemed to help with the pain and helped build up the muscle in her leg. After it was no longer pool...i mean river*...weather, her use of the repaired leg seemed to diminish, slowly.
On Christmas Eve of this year, I woke up to our pup with strange green goop coming out of her eye and made a quick appointment with our doc. While we were getting her eyes rinsed the veterinarian said..."so how long has she been holding her leg like that?"I quickly turned red, completely embarrassed about how bad of a mother I was, and said - "since Fall?!?!" Luckily the surgeon was in the office that day and came to check her out. He said it felt like the apparatus was "slipping" and to try some anti-inflammatory as well as some antibiotic (for the eye goop) and come back in two weeks. As soon as Rigby and I hit the parking lot, I was a complete sobbing mess. Christmas Eve has never been such a downer for me. I quickly found my unsuspecting mother at Poppop's house and immediately started to cry. I felt defeated. Mostly, an improper caregiver to this sweet, innocent, furry being.
Two weeks went by and her eye was much less goopy but the leg was the same. Our veterinary surgeon offered to re-do the surgery or we could try a specialist in Annapolis. After Mike did some extensive research we found out that the specialist surgery would be quite costly and I had a very hard time accepting the dollar amount that we were expected to part with in order for our beloved pet to regain strength and comfort in that leg. I had to "sleep on it" but eventually confirmed that yes, Rigby is worth every penny, I just want her happy and healthy! Duh!
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| Rigby 1/31/2013 |
*We have been using an undisclosed pool, at an undisclosed location for rehabing Rigby but we told the owners of said pool that we only use their patch of waterfront for river swimming...
