A Girl’s Best Friend

That big guy’s name is Journey. I brought him home when he was a little (big) puppy. From those first weeks he has been another child to me. I’ve always loved dogs, but he was my first as an adult. He was my hiking buddy, he was the one that I hung out with when the kids weren’t home. I’d wanted a Newfoundland since high school, he was definitely a dream come true to me.

Our lives have changed drastically in the past few years. He’s gained a canine sister, another feline brother and more people who love him. We’ve moved and have gone through a pandemic.

His arch nemesis is the UPS truck. He loves the cold and snow. If there is water near he will find it. He is one of the most stubborn dogs I’ve met. He isn’t afraid to let you know that he doesn’t want to do what you just told him to. He doesn’t want to be any where if it isn’t near his people. He loves meeting new people and animals, but walk past the house and he’ll be barking, loudly.

He will be five at the end of June, but two weeks ago he started limping. We were outside, nothing of significance happened, but while he was walking back to come into the house he was visibly limping. He’s a very big dog. It’s not like he hasn’t limped before, but this time it felt different. We didn’t rush him to the vet. We still had hope that things would get better. I did reach out to a traveling veterinarian. My husband and I have to lift him into the car anytime we take him somewhere. He also doesn’t like not being on solid ground. So we felt that the traveling vet would be our best bet without hurting him more. During my conversation with her it was determined that she was fairly certain he had torn his CCL (ACL in humans).

We decided to give it some time to see if it would get better. Hind sight is 20/20 as they say, and now I wish we hadn’t waited. This last week on Wednesday I got him to go outside which was becoming more and more of a struggle. He collapsed while urinating. I broke down. Seeing someone you love in pain like that is heart wrenching. He’s always been so strong, so stubborn and independent. That was a rough day to say the least. I started searching for Orthopedic Veterinary surgeons in our area.

Thursday night after my husband got off of work we took him in. They kept him over night, sedated him and ran the tests they needed to determine that he does in fact need surgery. However, he needs it on both legs. Friday was spent making him comfortable. Saturday he was doing a bit better because of the pain meds. We got a call from the Veterinary hospital asking if we would be able to bring him in for surgery on Sunday. The surgeon was coming in on the Sunday of a holiday weekend just to do Journey’s surgery.

We brought him home yesterday morning. My poor boy has been fairly miserable even with the pain meds. Whenever he would start whining I would sit on the floor and cuddle him until he fell asleep. At one point we both napped. I know he’s going to be ok. Better than he has been actually. I’m excited for that, but knowing there is a second surgery coming, worries me. We’ll make it through that one as well. They didn’t want to do them both at the same time given his size.

The fourth book in the Second Chance series released in the middle of all of this. I didn’t post anything about the release. I didn’t even really do anything special that day because the only mental capacity I could muster was being spent on my Journey. I am a little over half way through the prequel to the series that I’ll be working on. If you haven’t ordered your copy of “Circumstance of a Second Chance” you can do that here:

I’m super excited with where this book took Aaralyn and Damien. It was so much fun to write!! I hope you all enjoy it as much as I enjoyed writing it!

Now, I’m going to go soak up some of those sleepy doggy cuddles.

Much Love,

J.S. Wik