It's like he was never hurt

Well it's been a long while since we posted on this, and Jack's TPLO saga is for all intents and purposes over. At the six week mark back in mid October Jack started spending time outside in his yard (he's also managed to undo a sizable lawn investment in about 1 week) and loves it (it's not easy to get him to come inside - go figure). We just returned from Thanksgiving at the lake and as you can see in the picture, Jacks doing just fine. In addition to wading in the lake, Jack spent a lot of time running and jumping (mostly over trees or logs). His legs are doing perfectly fine. I find myself wincing whenever he lands odd, but he's had no troubles at all. At home he's highly active chasing all manner of critters (squirrels, birds, people - whatever happens near the yard), and does his best to jump up, getting his head over the fence, to say "hi". I can't imagine having not performed the two surgeries for Jack. Seeing him now, seeing him have so much fun again, makes every dollar worthwhile. If you've found yourself here, and are wondering if the inconvenience and cost are all worth it, I have to say yes. If your dog brings you the love and companionship that Jack brings us, it's worth every dollar and every day of inconvenience to bring your lively and active dog back to you. We're not going to keep posting here, but Jack may get another blog soon, maybe one to tell the sage of his yard, now that he's fully back on duty.
Au revoir

Leg's all healed, X-rays and exam give him a green light

Sorry for not posting for so long, things have been a bit hectic (not Jack related). We got back from the vet Thursday and Jack's tibia is all healed up. Yay!!!! Vet said to do short walks, 1.5 miles or so, for the next 3 weeks, then longer walks, longer lead for the 3 weeks after that, and then it's off-leash city! So with this news we moved back upstairs into the bedroom and will be turning the office back into an office. No really interesting news from the past 2 weeks or so, and sorry, no cool pictures. It's been fairly uneventful for Jack, just taking it day by day. Now he has full run of the house again, upstairs and down, only restriction is still being on leash to go out back to pee or poop. We're looking forward to him being able to come and go again as he wants, and to getting him back with his playgroups at WagginWagon. Of course the only downside is our beautiful back yard of newly recovered and healthy lawn will again become his playground, which pretty much means it's gonna be a great big beautiful mud pit... totally worth the trade off. :)

1 More Week Down

Well here we are, past the 4 week mark. Nothing too exciting to report at this stage. Jack's pretty much operating normally although still in jail. This morning during my routine exam of his leg I discovered a staple that was missed two weeks back, so we're off to the vet (the normal vet, not the surgeon) to have it removed. Overall Jack's at about 95% on his leg this week, ongoing incremental improvement. There's no disguising that he feels totally fine, and ready to be out doing what he wants, but he begrudgingly stays inside. Happily there's only 4 more weeks to go before his Xray follow up, and outside walks start. I can't tell you how ready we are for life to get fully back to normal (one of the biggest things will be moving back upstairs and sleeping in our new bed, and making the office an office again). Here's Jack's new side as of yesterday afternoon. X-26 days. :)

Slooooooow progress, getting tougher

Well Jack is most definitely feeling better. Unlike the first surgery, he's now reached the point where staying in the room when someone is home and in the house, is NOT what he wants to do. His most recent antic is to put his front paws on the top of the gate - freaked me out when he did this b/c he absolutely can clear it if he wants to. It's evident to me he's feeling much better now, more so than the same time after the first surgery; his left leg must have been hurting him still which would explain how relaxed he was pretty much the entire time. Well that seems to have gone away now. It's not bad when you're out of earshot and eyesight, but if he can see you or hear you in the house, he really wants out of that room. 34 days to go til xrays (85 days from the first surgery, and a whopping 11 months from when this all started back last October). Sorry, no interesting pics today, I did see Hector out in the park yesterday morning before work, I think he was trying to catch a crow. Oh well... more soon

Crazy - more about Hector

Well, we've learned a few really neat things recently. It turns out, that once you get a great little sanctuary in place, a few good bird feeders, a nice bird bath, some protective shelter, basically a great little wildlife shelter, well that in turn becomes a big giant bird feeder. We've now apparently built the neighborhood's biggest and best bird feeder... for falcons. We now have almost daily sightings in the yard of various birds of prey. This little guy lit on the front porch one day earlier this week, then flew over to the dogwood tree and scoped me out before flying away. Turns out, he's not Hector, Hector's MUCH bigger and definitely a Peregrine; this little guy's either a kid, or a slightly different species. Oh well, now we know, bird feeders come in stages; little bird feeder + birds = bird feeder for bigger birds. I'm sure there's a moral there somewhere, like "just when you relax because everything seems just perfect... that's when the big meat-eater bird comes down, plucks you up, rips off your skin and eats you." Maybe there's a nicer way to phrase that. :)

Just bahdin mah tahm

Jack here, killin time with a little chew. Turns out this "jail" thing ain't so great, but I get by. Mostly just sittin around on their bed, doing my best to lay on just about every part that even remotely smells like the 'rents. Course I get my fun. My parents only THINK I shed like this all the time. Little do they know, I can turn it on and turn it off. Suffice to say, right now it's ON. I just love hearing Mom complain about "how can there be THIS MUCH hair after only one day?"... heh heh heh, if only she knew. Well, guess I'll get back to it, sittin here, killin time with a little chew. Hmmm, could use a little squirrel-seasoning.

Hooray hooray, the staples are gone

And with them the collar (or disc - might be more accurate). Vet visit was Thursday, and it's definitely easier the 2nd time around... to a point. About a mile or two away from the vet, still on the highway, Jack started getting antsy. He definitely knew "where" he was. Once we got inside, the same vet tech came out to assess him, and Jack had absolutely NO intention of letting this guy take him anywhere. I even saw his hackles go up at first... leaving me thinking, "no, please do not eat this nice man, he's trying to help you", but it was all fine; we did the same "fake out" maneuver, all three of us walking to the back, and then they go through and I turn around and go sit down. Every time the door opened I could hear Jack's 'chirps' (he does this, it's a short, high pitched sound, when he can't see us and he knows we're there, I interpret it as "hey, I'm right here, where are YOU"), he wasn't real pleased with being back with these folks that always seem to cause him pain.

But even faster than the first time, out he came, trying with all his might to come back to me, and getting no traction whatsoever on that linoleum floor. Surgical site's healed up and his use of the leg is very good at this stage (I rated him at about 85%, almost no evidence of limping or favoring - not bad 2 weeks after invasive surgery).

So we're in the downhill slope now, with every day getting better and better, legs getting stronger, and slowly getting back to normal. Jack's still in jail for the next few weeks, but before we know it he'll be back for X-rays, and then it's free reign of the house, out for walks, life back in the real bedroom, and eventually freedom to go back outside and run, chase, guard... basically be Jack.

As I type this, Jack has eviscerated a toy that to date had proved much more resistant (must have just not had his full attention - it's dead now, you can see the final carnage in this picture). We're now going to see how this Tuffies dog toy stands up. Suposedly from the website a 300# tiger was given one of these things and couldn't destroy it. Jack for the first time today started giving this thing some serious attention... we'll see. More to come next weekend.