If you've read my earlier posts this year, you'll know that a very long-held dream came true and I was able to get a border collie puppy. Little Maiki has been an absolute joy and I've so enjoyed having a dog again.So it was a real concern over the past week when Maiki woke up lame on Saturday morning, hobbling along on three legs. There was no explanation for it; she had been perfectly fine the previous day. After three days of limping, we went to the vet, where the x-rays looked fine and so they prescribed anti-inflammatories and "rest" for a possible strained or sprained muscle.
Rest? It's extremely hard to stop an active and energetic border collie puppy from trying to run and play. The poor pup's frustration level rose throughout the week from lack of exercise, but there didn't seem to be a lot of improvement in the limping. On Friday morning I phoned the vet to ask what I could allow the puppy to do and what I needed to prevent her from doing, for her own recovery.
And that's when my happy little world came tumbling down. The vet said that if she was still limping after a whole week, we needed to consider that it could be a cruciate ligament tear - a serious knee injury that usually only recovers with surgery and can sometimes leave dogs with early onset arthritis. More medication over the weekend, and then I had to take Maiki in yesterday for further examination.
Well, our vet's appointment yesterday confirmed the bad news: Maiki has a cruciate ligament tear - a fairly serious knee injury. I'd been feeling hopeful because over the weekend she had stopped walking on three legs and was putting weight on four feet again. But the minute the vet saw her, she said, "Oh, she's really lame, isn't she?" (I guess I didn't know what to look for.)
It's sad news for this little border collie puppy. It could mean that I need to wave goodbye to any dreams I may have held of having an amazing agility dog or frisbee dog in the future (typical border collie sports.) What I can hold onto is that perhaps there is just a tiny chance that we can come through this without needing to put her through invasive and expensive surgery.
The next few days will tell. There's to be no jumping, no playing with other puppies, definitely no turning of any sort (which could damage the knee permanently) - so no playing fetch or any other activity which would involve going in one direction and then turning around to go in the other direction.
On Friday we have another vet's appointment to evaluate whether she has continued to improve or whether surgery is the only way of saving her from a painful and arthritic future.
So, in the meanwhile, I keep praying and hoping for some glimmer of improvement that might mean surgery isn't necessary. This isn't what I would have hoped for when getting my dream puppy, but she's my responsibility now and I need to do the best I can for her.
Some people might feel a little shocked that I would dare to pray for a miracle for an animal. Does God really care what happens with our pets? Doesn't He have better things to do than spend a miracle on healing an animal?
Read on below for why I'm at least going to pray and see what happens.
