Rosie Needs to Go On A Dog Diet

My dog Rosie, and Aussie Shepherd Mix, looks more like burnt marshmallow these days as opposed to a dog. Seriously. She needs to go on a Dog Diet.

About  a week ago, after letting her inside after playing with the other dogs, she was limping.  She has done this before. Roughhoused too much pulled a muscle, limps for a few days, and then she is ok.

This time she did not get better so off to the vet she went. Come to find out, she has a to ACL! Which is essentially a tear in her knee! Poor Rosie! So what do we do? Well, this is kind of a tricky situation. We have a couple of choices. Either surgery or no surgery. However, because of her weight, she has to lose a minimum of 10lbs before they will do surgery on her! The vet did say though, that we may be able to avoid surgery. HOW ? HOW? I want to avoid spending $1400 or more as well as avoid the painful recovery of surgery for Rosie!

This is what we have to do:

Rosie has to lose a minimum of 10 lbs

She has to be on joint supplements 4x a day

She has to be on pain medication every day

She needs to limit her outdoor activity – leash only outside

If we follow these instructions, maybe, just maybe, we can avoid surgery.

Here are the issues I am facing with the above directions.

Rosie is a food fiend. I have sat back and watched her gobble up her food and then watched her as she made her way to the other dogs bowls. When they walk away from their food, Rosie pounces and eats their food too!

She also loves being outside running with Maggie. But, no more for now Rosie!

So what do I have to do?

I have switched her dog food to a “healthy” dog food and made sure the first ingredient was a protein. I am also very careful to measure what she should be eating for her “ideal” weight, not her current weight. It is much less than I have given her in the past.

Whenever she wants to go outside, I have to go with her. Although I do not put her on a leash, I make sure when we go outside, she just does her business and comes in. If she feels like hanging out, I have to sit outside with her!

So, how am I going to be able to tell that she is losing weight? Since she won’t stand on my scale (pfft..can you believe that?!), I measured around her belly to see how big she was.

She is at 34 inches! WHOA! Each week I will be measuring her to see if my time and effort are paying off. I sure hope so. I don’t want my poor Rosie to be in pain anymore!

Keep an eye out for the Updates for the Incredible Shrinking (hopefully) Dog!