The day of the surgery can be very hard on both the dog and on the owner. Most of us have very close relationships with our dogs and hate to see them in pain. It is very important however to keep a positive attitude and not to let your dog see any worry in your face or actions. Dogs are very perceptive in picking up the energy of their owners, so if you have an energy about you that presents worry or fear, this will likely have a negative effect …

Just like any surgical procedure, knowing that you’ve got to send your dog in to undergo an invasive surgical procedure can be very traumatic for both you and you pet. It’s very important that you try to keep things “normal”, or as normal as possible prior to surgery. Your dog will obviously know that something is wrong by the lack of use, of the leg, and probably from the restricted activity, but it will be very important to keep everything else as normal as possible. Same feeding schedule, same sleeping …

As with ACL tears in humans, CCL tears in dogs can be sudden and very noticeable, or they can develop slowly over time. When a person injures their knee and suffers a torn ACL, it is normally going to be very painful and the joint will feel very unstable and in most cases, will not be able to be used. The same will hold true for dogs when they injure their CCL. When our dog tore her CCL, she immediately stopped bearing weight on the leg.
Our dogs CCL was torn …

We live in Southern California, so the beach is a fun and easy way for us to take our dogs out for exercise. We’re able to just walk along the shore and let our dogs run off the leash and do what they want, it’s far more relaxing than having to worry about taking them anywhere on a leash.
So we were out at the beach and our two dogs were our running around doing their own thing. Roxy (our 5 1/2 year old American Pit Bull Terrier) and our pitbull …