Catching up

Sorry it has been so long since I have last posted a blog entry. Things have been very busy for me.

Spice has been to the chiropractor twice more since his first visit. The chiropractor noticed some swelling on the outside of the elbow joint on the second visit. She said to watch it and it was smaller on the third visit. I will mentioned it the surgeon next week. I have been using cold therapy more often which may be helping.

Spice got his second massage since his surgery a couple of weekends ago at one of the trials Taari was competing in. Next week he goes back to his regular vet on Wednesday for another cartrophen shot and on Thursday back to see his surgeon.

He is improving and putting more weight on his front right leg. I have noticed that he still turning his front left leg in a bit but I think that it is less than before. This is mostly likely due to him shifting his weight to his left leg.

As well as ladder work I also bought some fit discs and a Bosu. Last night he got all 4 feet on the Bosu by himself (I was lifting him up previously). He was also turning on it. I have been putting the fit disks close together and getting Spice and Taari to put their two front feet on one and two back feet on the other. Definitely a balancing act when I tried it but it may help having 4 feet instead of only two.

I have been letting Spice do stairs occasionally. He does them slowly otherwise I wouldn't. I noticed in the past day or two that when he goes down the small set of stairs he wasn't two footing it down but striding. This indicated to me that he is comfortable putting more weight on his right leg.

We are up to 20 minutes on some walks. In the morning he doesn't want to go too far so I don't make him. I wonder if he doesn't want to go far because he knows he gets cookies when I leave for work! Speaking of which he is still in an X-pen when I am at work.

Just last night I noted how much happier he seemed. He is improving but not 100% yet. I think that it will take time for him to regain his natural stride and be "even" again.

Taari and I have been having a great time at training and going to fun matches and trials (when it isn't storming outside!). This past weekend she had a really nice Steeplechase run. She was more than 12 seconds under time and it wasn't a perfect run so I estimate that we could have been around 15 seconds under time.

I started using stride regulators to help her with her A-frame. I didn't realize it until examining video that she wasn't putting her back feet down after jumping the apex and she was walking down on her front feet a step or two. The stride regulators have helped. If I can figure out how to slow down video for YouTube I will put up some clips.