Bad news for Susie-Belle

Oh dear, we’ve had some bad news today at the vet, Susie-Belle has a partial tear of her cruciate ligament, an injury that she sustained on Sunday at the beach. It will take 8-12 weeks to heal with only limited exercise allowed, short lead walks and no running, jumping or stairs for Susie-Belle. It is disappointing as she does enjoy going out and about and after the suffering she has endured in her lifetime, we really never want her to suffer anything again, either physically or psychologically. She is on painkillers and being the brave Susie-Belle that she is, she hasn’t yet showed much pain reaction. We think that she learned over the years of confinement and abuse to endure and put up with whatever life threw at her. She had to be stoical to be able to survive the hell of the puppy farm.

But she doesn’t have to suffer now, we will do whatever it takes to make her next few weeks comfortable and healing. Sadly it wasn’t only bad news on her cruciate; our wonderful vet who knows exactly how special Susie-Belle is gave me the news that her hips are awful. Poor poppet Susie-Belle. All the years of bearing litter after litter have truly taken their toll on her body. We have always known that she is a little stiff and not the most supple of dogs, but to know that she really does have terrible arthritic hips makes me sad. The vet has started her on a course of cartrophen injections which will not only help heal her cruciate but will help her arthritic hips too with any luck.

But, we will ensure that she gets everything she needs, we have her on the best supplements and will continue to feed her the very best food that a dog can eat. But, with her limited level of activity now for the next few weeks, she will be on smaller portions, but they will be tasty and delicious, she deserves only the best and this is what she will have. On the up-side, she has chosen the best time of year to be indoors, cuddled up in front of the fire, away from the cold, windy, wet walks that we are enduring many days. By the time she is back out and about as normal, the weather should hopefully be heading towards spring time temperatures.