Almost a month ago, a friend and I met at Wompatuck State
Park in Hingham to walk Hannah and Bruce, a yellow lab and golden retriever
respectively. As usual both dogs spent time frolicking in the water, Bruce
being the ambitious swimmer leaping off the dock in pursuit of flying rocks (and
virtually anything else) and Hannah more the observer usually willing to wade
in about belly high and do some extremely cautious swimming.
On the way back down the trail heading back in the direction
of our cars, Hannah and Bruce took a short detour off the path and disappeared into
the woods. Vanishing for only a matter of seconds, Bruce emerged full of energy,
but Hannah was slow to make her way back to the trail. Eventually, my yellow
lab emerged from the woods struggling to get back onto the path with a
noticeable limp. I ran back to see what was the matter thinking that she must
have stepped on something, maybe suffering some kind of a cut on the bottom of
her foot. With a quick look, I realized that this was not the case. It was not
hard to identify that it was Hannah’s back left leg that was the problem, eventually
causing her to (literally) stop in her tracks. She sat down on the dirt trail
and refused to walk looking up at me with incredibly sad eyes. I picked her up
and carried her for a while as we attempted to exit the path. Eventually, I put her back down and
encouraged her to walk slowly which she did. Bruce’s owner suggested putting
Hannah over my shoulders and carrying her out of the woods like an injured
soldier in Vietnam, but I had visions of a squirmy 75 pound dog wrestling
herself loose and dangerously falling to the ground making matters even worse. Finally
out of the woods (literally), I lifted Hannah into my truck, a task she usually
takes care of independently with an extremely enthusiastic jump.
When I got home I immediately called Hannah’s vet, Dr.
Kathryn Sneider of Blue Ribbon Veterinary Medicine in Pembroke. Dr. Sneider scheduled
Hannah for an appointment first thing the next morning. Visibly limping, Hannah was carefully
examined by Dr. Sneider who concluded that Hannah had probably suffered the injury
on her extremely short foray into the woods during which she likely stepped
into a hole and lost her footing. Dr. Sneider estimated that Hannah had either
suffered a strained Achilles heel (which gave me historic visions of Carl
Yastrzemski having his ankles taped before every Red Sox game for the final 15
years of his career) or possibly a torn ACL. The ACL is the anterior cruciate
ligament in the knee, which is commonly injured by professional athletes who
typically tend to be human. Some notable
athletes who have suffered and successfully recovered from ACL injuries include
Tom Brady, Maria Sharapova, Rajon Rondo, and Mariano Rivera, although I have to
admit that I was mildly honored to have Hannah now possibly included in that
esteemed group.
I have since learned that ACL injuries are actually quite
common in dogs, particular Labrador retrievers.
While Tom Brady was recovering from ACL issues in 2008, for instance, Kona the Labrador retriever from Scituate
was also recovering from ACL surgery although the fake news media predictably failed to give Kona equal coverage. Although Tommy John surgery might still be
necessary for Hannah somewhere down the road, I was instructed to try two weeks
of anti-inflammatory medicine and extreme rest. Extreme rest sounded
easiest. After all, resting is what
Hannah does best. After weighing the two options, with surgery priced in the
range of $5,000 and rest being, well, free, I was completely on board with Hannah’s
usual preference of attempting to sleep it off.
Although Hannah snoozes an average of twenty-three hours a
day, her ability to immediately wake up and dangerously run around at full
speed is unprecedented, and that’s without a cup of coffee. Suffice it to say, I’ve learned that it is
actually hard to get a dog to rest.
Since suffering the injury, Hannah has gone from relying on
three legs to limping along touching the ground with an occasional fourth leg to
touching the ground with her bad leg about every other step. Roughly a month later, Hannah still has a
visible limp when she is running, although she seems quite normal walking as long
as she is moving slowly (which happens to be her favorite speed).
Today I took Hannah to the beach for what was her first
actual walk in nearly a month and she hardly missed a beat. She did not run
around in large concentric circles as she usually does on the beach instead
appearing to be cognizant of the potential physical risk involved, deliberately
slowing down with a dog-like intuition letting me know that she is at least considering
the possibility that she might need to close out her career as a designated
hitter.
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