Welcome to Feel Better Bella

Since everyone has been so sweet to inquire how our dog Bella is doing after her ACL surgery on 4/14/09, I decided to create a blog to keep everyone updated.

Bella tore her ACL on 4/11/09, so we immediately took her to the vet. She had to be put under to have x-rays, and it was revealed that she had completely torn her ACL. When we brought her home, it was very hard to watch her come out of her anesthesia. She was completely out of it, and you could tell she was in pain. I almost feel like that was harder than taking care of her post surgery.

Todd brought her in to the vet on the morning of 4/14, and the doctor called us around 12:30 to let us know that the surgery went well, but he found that she had also torn her meniscus, so he removed that as well. The poor girl was pretty much bone on bone. No wonder she was in pain!

I went and picked her up on 4/15 and brought her home. I was not prepared for the amount of staples all up her leg, and how much of her leg was shaved. I thought it was only going to be a small area. She seemed excited to see me, and to get home. I don't think I've ever driven so slow and carefully!

The first night with Bella home was horrible. Since she's supposed to be confined to a small area, we decided to sleep downstairs with her. The hard plastic e-collar was a nightmare, and she wouldn't even lie down when she had it on. After 3 hours, I finally took it off. I couldn't stand to watch her struggle. I ended up only getting about 2 hours of sleep that night.

The next evening, we decided we would carry her up the stairs instead and have her sleep in our room so we could all get some sleep. I had also stopped at Petco and got her an inflatable e-collar so that she wouldn't be so uncomfortable. What an improvement! It's 100% better than those hard plastic e-collars. I wish the doctor had given us this instead. She can actually use it as a pillow because it's softlikeatravel pillow.

It is now Saturday, 4 days post surgery. It hasn't been too hard keeping Bella still yet since she's mostly just staying in the living room on a blanket. She's on an anti-inflammatory, pain killers and antibiotics. I'm excited to have Bella back... since she's on so many pills, we don't see her personality shining through yet. Hopefully it will happen soon!

We really want to keep her still for the next few months as recommended because we don't want her to tear her other ACL, which is very common. So we have to work on her weight, and keep her isolated. It's going to be a hard few months, but we can do it!

Thanks for all your thoughts and support! I'll post more when there's an update.