... Bertie has had the op.
We are fortunate in where we live. A much-lauded young veterinary surgeon in Bordeaux has been operating on cruciate ligaments since 2006, when he started at UCL in London. That's the year before Noel Fitzpatrick carried out the same (experimental at the time) op on Smudge. So our "young" vet can't be that young, he just looks it. And he speaks perfect English, so communication was easy as he drew diagrams for me showing what he was going to do and Tod and Bertie took no notice, neither of them wanting to know the details.
All our lives have been turned upside down and will be so for the next two to three months. Thursday, we collected a subdued and slightly wobbly Bertie wearing a plastic cone to keep him from licking, with a back leg that looked like a plucked turkey's and a page of strict instructions: cage rest, five 5-minute walks per day on a short lead, no jumping, running, twisting, slipping.
We have an extraordinary number of large cages from our Airedale days - one huge one which Smudge had for the same op and two big ones, probably for when Vita and maybe Clara and Rosie were adolescents - Airedales don't stay small for long. So we thought we were well set up for Bertie's convalescence: the huge cage in the kitchen during the day and the big one in the lounge for night and the other big one in time to be used in the garden so he can watch us work. This, of course, assumed that he would settle - Smudge did and Vita had been known to.
All the advice is "let them cry it out" - so on our return, we let Bertie, in the huge cage in the kitchen, cry, howl, whimper and pant as we tried to carry on our normal daily lives against a barrage of unhappy noise. THREE HOURS LATER, I phoned our vet in despair - the "cry it out" strategy was not working; indeed, quite the reverse, since his distress was far from restful and healing. She suggested when there was a brief break in the noise and he stopped to draw breath (by this stage he was having a full-on barking temper tantrum) to take him out of the cage and keep him by us on a short lead. (I've tried calling it a crate to make it sound better, but Bertie, he of the rescue centre in Cahors, knows in no uncertain terms that it is a cage).
The moment he was out, all the noise stopped and, now exhausted, he slept.
But he has to be in his bedtime cage in the lounge at night in order to be safe - otherwise he would be jumping up onto the sofas. I got three hours sleep that night as he leaned against me with all of his weight in the doorway of the big cage and then protested loudly as I forced the door shut. I watched hours of rubbish TV as he grumbled and whimpered. I imagined designing elaborate enclosures with the lounge furniture and then decided the big cage was not big enough or comfortable enough for him - he banged the metal bars with the plastic cone every time he turned round. So I dragged the huge cage into the lounge (thank heavens for wide doorways) opened it up and attached it to the merely big one, to make a small run. That was an improvement as it now meant Bertie could move between the two as he whimpered and panted and refused to settle. I sat on the ground with my back to the cage reading. Suddenly it all went quiet. Great, I can now go to bed. The moment I moved away the protestations started again.
So, sofa cushions were put down as an improvised mattress. I rolled myself in a duvet alongside his cage and finally we slept.
Last night, there was progress. Much grumbling while I got myself ready for a second night on the sofa cushions. The moment I lay down - blessed silence. So tonight? The huge cage will be in the bedroom and he will go in it as I go to bed. And for the rest of the day? The kitchen is his domain, with doors closed and openings gated and he has his usual corner where he tucks himself down. The only drawback? One of us has to be with him all the time with his lead to hand. So all my plans for all the gardening I was going to do this autumn while he was (happily - huh!) caged have gone out the window.
He's snoring contently in his corner as I type this. Even in these couple of days he is getting stronger and more confident. The new knee is still kept folded and he lops along on three legs as I walk him (briefly) round the park in town with all its enticing other dog smells to keep him diverted.
We will all get through this, just fine.
