Hiatus done

We're back!

I didn't expect to take such a long Hiatus, but it was needed.

Back in October Trophy was injured.  I thought it was his back.  He had chiropractic and massage care and some rest.  Unaware of the severity of the injury, we kept training.  He had an agility trial in December and did well, earning his Novice Standard Agility Title (NA).  We then had a flyball tournament the following weekend.  He threw up several times on Saturday so he was pulled from Sunday racing - i don't think this was related to his injury, but I have no idea.

Novice A Dog Done Right.  If we go back to agility
we'll be in Novice B now.

Then he started refusing contact equipment in agility class and I made the decision to pull him from everything.  We had x-rays done at our primary vet in January, and everything looked good.  It wasn't a back injury and he doesn't have hip dysplasia (yay!).  Fearing a soft tissue injury, he went on "bed rest" (I couldn't truly crate rest him, but he wasn't allowed to run or play) for almost 4 months when i finally booked him an appointment with a sports medicine vet.

While she believed that he had pulled an iliopsoas muscle, he also appears to have a degenerative nerve disease in his hind legs.  She said if it weren't for how active he is, I probably never would have known for several more years (he turned 6 in May).  It affects his right rear leg more than the left at the moment.   She didn't believe it warranted further testing at this point, and because I had crate rested him for so long, the iliopsoas strain had healed.

After being given a regime of stretches and exercises and being given the OK to *finally* return to being a dog and running around outside and playing with his siblings, we have slowly returned to flyball.  One sport at a time for my Trophy and we'll go as long as he's able.

After months off, he finally returned to the flyball lanes over Memorial Day.  He raced 3 heats each day and was *very* happy to be back.  He was running just slightly slower than before he was injured, so that was exciting news.  He is on the roster for the July tournament and will run a half spot, sharing with another dog.

While all of this was going on, I just didn't have the heart to talk about dog sports with my other dogs, but now that Trophy is doing better I'm much more in the mood to blog.

I think I'll save some updates on the other dogs for their own blog posts.  We'll see you soon!