Underwater Treadmill Session 14 and other fun and games...

Yesterday I came home from work and drove the girls to the bush track for a gentle stroll in the afternoon sun. Let Kenz out the car and from the moment she got out she was a serious mess. I couldn't work out why she was really quiet when I got home yesterday afternoon as normally she is all over me wanting to do stuff.

Poor girl we hardly got very far at all and most of the time she was lagging behind to the point where when I offered to carry her and she was more then happy to be in my arms. Ness on the other hand was racing around like a mad things charging up the path and turning around impatiently waiting for us to catch up. So very unlike Kenz to be not up the front.

She also had some issues with her LH patella popping out :(. I bought her home and gave her an anti-inflam and put her to bed for the night. I was seriously wondering if I should cancel her UWTM session today because she was really a bit of a mess.

Kenz woke up this morning though full of life and so I went ahead with her UWTM session. Managed to get them to increase the speed up to 2 MPH and she had 1 x 5 min session and 2 x 6 min sessions. No problems, slept a little bit in the car on the way home but hit the ground running and was feral from the moment we got home. All good signs :). If we are going to continue with UWTM Robby has suggested working up to 30-35 minute at a rate of between 2 and 3 MPH. I am not sure whether its value for money at this stage so will give it a bit of consideration over the weekend.



This afternoon we headed out for another walk and she was back to normal. Leading up front just as she should be.

She has also run up and down the stairs a couple of times this afternoon.

Our other "homework" has been to work on the penguin trick. I have finally managed to fade out the hand touch to get the behavior.

Here is the latest effort from tonights training session -

Underwater Treadmill Session 13 and not so great news...

Will start with the not so great news...

Kenz has had a few issues again with her LH patella luxating over the last weekend. I also had an email from John regarding what I had seen the weekend before in relation to both patellas slipping and Kenz ending up balancing herself on her front limbs.

The current recommendations from John are as follows:

Surgery for the right MPL
4 weeks of rest
recheck exam with radiographs
if all looks good, start slow UWTM at 4 weeks post op
recheck at 6 and 8 weeks

By 8 weeks, if all is doing well, we could do the left MPL at that time.

If only my life would start working out and I could afford to put Kenz through further surgery. Never mind the fact we will be facing 4 months more crate rest for the poor girl.

This afternoon was her usual Monday UWTM session. She happily managed 3 x 5 min sessions at a speed of around 1.9 MPH. She looked great once she settled and didn't seem to show any signs of a problem. Particularly hopeful for me considering she has been showing a slight tendency to short striding in her front end over the last few days.


So we are still taking things a day at a time and hoping we can continue to avoid what is looking like inevitable further surgery.

Underwater Treadmill Session 12

Progress - 3 x 5 min sessions at 1.7 MPH - no real sign of struggling and lots of long stretches of nice solid walking. Fingers crossed she pulls up sound tomorrow. So far so good she even made it up the stairs at bedtime for a piece of steak.

Underwater Treadmill Session 11

Today was underwater treadmill session number 11 for Kenz. I have been a little frustrated with her lack of duration but today was the first time I actually felt we might be getting somewhere with the running of it. Pin took her session today and the first thing he said to me was, was she doing 4 minute sessions yet? My answer was no and with that today's session consisted of 3 x 4 min sessions. Her first session started around 1.5 MPH and then by the third session it had been increased to 1.7 MPH.

She was a little ratty today. Having been home alone for nearly 4 hours without any walk this morning meant she was literally bursting for activity. She settled a bit but there was a lot more double stepping then her previous session. I am not totally sure on what benefit the UWTM is having at this stage but I am a little worried about stopping it in case its helping more then I think it is.

Due to the generosity of a lovely bunch of DOL'ers she still has another 3 sessions remaining after today's.

Tracking Training

This morning we were up at the crack of dawn (well almost) to head up to Monarto for the Tracking Club Training day.

Tracking has mostly been a Ness activity and Kenz has very much taken the back seat and certainly only really run a handful of tracks by comparison. Ness did a nice job of her track 3 and then it was Kenz's turn this morning.

An "unknown" to her tracklayer set a track of around ~600m or so (although may have been less) with 2 corners. The terrain was a little rough - through trees, lots of longish grass, rocks, up-hill.

Kenz use to be a very laid back tracker. She would normally barely put tension in the lead and would almost just trot around on a relatively loose lead. Well today was a totally different ball game. I walked her up to the start and she took off. She was very accurate on the track and didn't quarter very much. Even when at one stage when I couldn't see the next track marker and wasn't 100% sure where the track went and I called out to ask but she was right. She had no issues indicating all her articles.

I have been told there is no reason based on her performance this morning that she shouldn't enter the next trial. Not bad considering it was an unknown tracklayer and track 1 and track 2 both normally use a known tracklayer.

The best bit is she was physically able to manage the task and didn't seem overly bothered by her hind end at any stage. She was a little warm towards the end and pretty ready to find the nearest puddle to cool off and get a drink but she didn't end up wobbly.

Maybe there is hope for her yet and maybe she can play at tracking.

A lovely day to be out and about.

Underwater Treadmill Session 10

Kenz had her tenth underwater treadmill session this afternoon. She is continuing to make improvements and quite comfortably managed her 3 x 3 min 15 second sessions. We were able to up the speed a little from her last session and they were quite happy to increase the speed when she was comfortable. No trying to cheat with her front feet on the edge of the treadmill today so we must have had the speed about right.

Here is the video from today's session -



I have also included a couple of photos taken tonight. Justin from RHVC requested a video of Ness so I had to get the camera out to take the obligatory product posing photo for inclusion and the princess hopped up on the bed waiting for her turn for a photo. To cute not to share :). 

Underwater Treadmill Session 9

This morning Kenz had her ninth UWTM session. Its starting to get a little bit frustrating as it seems to take her about 6 minutes to settle into and lose a lot of the double stepping and then its all over before she has barely started. She was able to have the speed raised marginally today up to 1.4 MPH.

Here is the video from her session this morning -



The last few days have not been great. Friday she managed to luxate both patellas while walking in the front hallway and ended up in a huge amount of pain and a bit sooky. It happened again on at least one occasion over the weekend. Very very frustrating. Further surgery is pretty much an inevitability but John is happy for us to remain doing as we are for the moment to try and improve Kenz's comfort and function.

Underwater Treadmill Session 8 - Progress at last!!!!

Kenz has her eighth UWTM session today and while I was thinking it was (and has been) a bit of a waste of time given she had another 3 sessions already paid for I thought I should really let her use them and we would just accept it probably wasn't going to be hugely beneficial.

Well I am a little surprised when reflecting on todays video. By her third session she actually seemed to really get the hang of it and all the double stepping in her hind end seemed greatly improved. By the time the 3 minutes were up of her final session she was really in the swing of things and moving more fluidly then I have seen to date in the UWTM.

Given she has no meds on board for the moment and given she had a walk this morning before her session she came home from UWTM as bored as anything. There was no sign of her being ready for much of a nap and she was keen as mustard when I took her out again this afternoon for another shortish walk.

Next session is booked for Tuesday and it will be interesting to see how she pulls up in the next day or so without the meds.

Back to see John

After last weeks lameness episode on the UWTM and after further discussion with Robby it was decided that Kenz could really use an appointment with John to see what he felt over the current situation (and to make sure there was nothing else now going on).

Kenz had her appointment with John yesterday morning. She weighed in at 13.1kg which is a good weight for her and on that alone over her previous appointment with him she had potentially regained quite a bit of muscle.

The bad news (but not completely unexpected) is that her RH MPL has continued to deteriorate and is now worse then it was in January. The LH still has a residual grade 1 but he did feel her LH had improved over where she was when she saw him in January. Her front end all checked out fine though with quite good muscle build up and there was nothing else to be found going on anywhere else.

John's thought on the RH is that its potentially popping and then when it disrupts the joint capsule she is showing signs of pain for a few days after. Hence the lingering nature of the episodes. He also felt the stair issue is potentially a behavioral issue rather than a pain issue.

Kenz was fine for the rest of the day post-examination (John was curious to know how she got on over the rest of the day) and we are just back from a walk this morning and she seems to be 100%. She was possibly shifting a small amount of weight off her RH when stationary but nothing overly significant.

Now we know what the lay of the land is tomorrow she is back for more UWTM.