Banksy is feeling great! She’s ready to play, play play!

She’s going to visit a neurologist in San Jose next week, but aside from her right flippy foot failing at the proprioception flippy tests, I think she is perfectly fine and ready to GO!

Failing at cp tests though, still suggests the deficit. Which means still the possibility of something bad lurking in the spine or brain which you don’t mess around with if you want permanently good back legs for walking and running. So we’re paying mind to the deficit.

I’ve taken her off strict house arrest and increased her slow leash walking every day, as I’m only seeing improvement doing this. I put a handful of cookies in my pocket, and all of us go slowly down the street. We started by walking to the corner, then added on to the alley. Then to the further down alley. These were pretty good places to walk to because of, Oh the Smells You Find in the Alley! And sometimes cool things!

The cookies help the remembering to walk slow and not do things like RUN. Snails. Our mode right now is to move like snails, and we’re up to even further than just around the block. Approximately two-three-ish blocks. If you lived in my neighborhood, you would see why blocks aren’t really blocks. The Circles twist and turn and spit those without good directions out alive. I think we’re walking a good amount right now, not too far and not too near.

There is still no running in the house! SNAILS! No dogs running in the house! NO RUNNING! That shit gets shut down in a flash. Nobody runs nowhere. No how. No way. No playing unless it’s quiet bitey face. Much use of puzzle toys with cheese shoved in them while I enjoy a beverage. Basically, we’re all on snail rest.

Her toe drag started to improve on Monday. My theory had been scratching her from all the agility trials she was entered in would start improvement. That seemed fairly scientific and has proven correct! As long as it’s improving, we keep walking. A happy Friday the thirteenth today where I heard the least amount of toe dragging of all week!

The deficit though, remains. If I stand her and turn her foot upside over, she doesn’t jerk it back into place. Which she definitely does on the rest of her feet. Jerks. Fast. Don’t FLIP the FLIPPIN’ FEET! So that’s still a remnant of the neurological event, whatever it was, that foot feeling stuck. But My vast knowledge of dog neurology tells me that if the toe drag is getting better, the flippy problem will as well.

I know her leg is stronger, when she came back from the hospital she couldn’t support herself on it at all, it would slip out from under her and drag every step. Last week it stopped slipping out from under her but would drag on a regular basis, not every step but many of them. This week the dragging seems to get better every walk to where I don’t think I heard the drag until we were past the next door neighbor’s house this morning! And I’ve seen her stand to pee on it, because who wants to pee like a girl dog when you can pee like a boy dog?

Makes for very exciting walks. Walking as slow as grandma snails and counting toe drags. I’m glad I don’t count Otterpop’s toe drags. Her toes have dragged for years since her back legs don’t really work. For Otterpop, they work ok. She gets shoved in a backpack if her back legs hurt to walk too far or up hills, and she gets delicious drugs to eat with breakfast so they don’t hurt too much. For Banksy, we would like better back legs than this. So waiting and crossing fingers she is back to normal soon!