Physical Therapy & Emails to the Vet!

Since the last post on the Princesses, Daisy has had her stitches out and has made it through her first physical therapy session. She is doing great. Her parents are a little strung out though...

Our veterinary surgeon is so fabulous that he lets us email him with questions as we need to, so I make full use of this service and email him our concerns, prescription requests, surgical questions and anything else we are worried about!

So when Daisy finished her first prescription for her pain medication, we didn't refill it immediately because we just assumed that they had given us enough to keep her comfortable until the pain had subsided. But as the days passed, we both noticed that she was uncomfortable, but as we had her physical therapy treatment within the next few days we waited to see if we were right in our assessment, or whether we were just being hypochondriac, paranoid parents!

Her rehab consultant was great and gave us more pain meds and sedatives as after her therapy, she said that she may be sore and definitely tired. She took measurements to check the muscle tone and range of motion in both her back legs, she explained thoroughly to us what she was doing and why rehabilitation after surgery was so important. We went into the consultation only half sold on the idea, and thinking that we could do it ourselves, but after her appointment, we realized how important it was and how much more they can do for her than we could do.

We really didn't know what to expect, so when she dressed Daisy in a doggy life jacket I knew we were in for a treat. Well, treat for us, not so treat-like for Daisy! She put her in a perspex tank that she filled with warm water to just past her belly, then turned on the underwater treadmill! It was amazing to watch, but Daisy went into "OMG I'm having a bath" mode and froze until she realized that she had to move her legs so she didn't hit her butt on the back of the tank. The life jacket has a handle which came in very handy when repositioning her on the treadmill as we reached in from above!

Once Daisy got used to it, she seemed to tolerate it and ended up doing two 5 minute sessions in the tank which completely exhausted her. But the great thing about exercising her leg in water, is that it provides more concentrated exercise, less pain and faster results. It also allows Daisy to build up her muscles and leg function so that when she gets the 8-week-all-clear she can return to normal activity without any stiffness or complication from inactivity. Fabulous!

The day after? Daisy did not use her leg at all and Jet was really worried that she wasn't recovering as she should be. But after an email to the vet, he explained that they are just like us - they get sore after a good workout too and if we were still worried at her next appointment to let him know when we arrived and he would take a look at our princess. How nice is that? I think that we have unrealistic expectations of how tough Daisy is and when you combine that with how serious this surgery actually was, we shouldn't be worried yet that she is still limping. It's only been 4 weeks today.

I forgot to take photos of her in the tank, but we have another appointment this Monday, so I will take one then. Sorry about that. You'll all have to make do with these goofy photos of the girls instead.