Days 9 & 10 (Wednesday 19th & Thursday 20th February) - Getting Better & Dizzy's Gotcha Day!

It's been a few days since I last updated & I'm amazed at how well Dizzy is doing. It's been a bit of a busy week, with quite a lot of progress! 

Back on 'Day 9' (last Wednesday), Dizzy was on his 4th day without pain relief and walking well - he's still limping but is much steadier than before and putting a bit more weight on his bad leg. He's now also standing on his bad leg and cocking his good one to pee, although he is having to drop his good leg down mid pee, it's still progress! 

Here's a little video of him going for a stroll on Wednesday:

Day 10 (Thursday) was Dizzy's second "Gotcha Day" (the two year anniversary of us bringing him home for the first time - as Dizzy's a rescue dog we don't know his Birthday, so we celebrate "Gotcha Days" instead). He's a pretty spoiled dog all year round, but we always try to do something special on his Gotcha Day. Normally, this would involve at least one new toy, an extra large rawhide bone/chew & we'd take him for a special long walk on or around the day (somewhere other than his usual daily walking spots). This year, special walks are off limits and we're not supposed to be giving him treats to avoid weight gain while he recovers...

But we couldn't let the day go by without doing anything! So he had a cheeky-one-off-tasty-treat:

And a new food bowl & matt, which I love - there's no doubting this dogs position in our house!:

We did have a bit of an unusual incident when Dizzy was eating his bone on Thursday - he has never been in any way food aggressive in the two yeas we've had him, in fact he's a soft as anything! You can take food or treats off him without a problem and many a foster dog in the past has wandered over and helped themselves to his dinner - to which Dizzy has responded by backing off and watching them from afar with a sad look on his face. 

But on Thursday, while he was wedged between me and Matt on the sofa, I was gently stroking his head while he ate and suddenly, he let out this throaty, snarling sound - something I have never heard before. I stopped stroking him and Matt went to scratch him just under his ear, to see Dizzy's reaction - he turned his head towards Matt's hand and again snarled a nasty snarl. 

This is so out of character for Dizzy and we have no idea what caused it - we are wondering if either he hasn't had a treat in a while now so he was going to protect this one at all costs or maybe (and this is probably more likely in my opinion) he felt vulnerable because of his poorly leg and was warning us that now was not the time to mess around. Whatever the reason, it has worried me quite a lot and is something we'll be keeping a close eye on!