Toby's Journey

Toby has been enjoying life on three legs.  It doesn’t seem to slow him down any.  He may have even developed a bit of an attitude lately.  I think all the attention is getting to his head. Ha ha. Who could blame him though.  We were walking down a street in a area that has lots of restaurants and shops and someone actually ran out of a restaurant and chased us down just so she could pet him.

I love looking at the pictures of tripawds on the beach or in the mountain and it makes me wish I lived closed to one.  Indy does have some great dog events though so we get some entertainment out of that.  A few weeks ago we went to Woofstock.  They had live music and a ton of vendors from all the animal friendly businesses in town.  Toby got to do a painting, get a tattoo, eat a ton of treats and be just be outside.

Tonight we’re going to a pet parade and costume contest at a local brewery.  They even make dog beer.  (Don’t worry it’s not alcoholic).  We added a peg leg to his pirate costume.  If anyone else is thinking about doing this we just took a paper towel roll and covered it in wood colored duck tap.  I’m excited to see how it goes over in public.

Now for some pictures…

Pirate costume with added peg leg

Today marks 9 years since I adopted Toby.

Nine years ago my ex and I were looking for a dog.  We had gone to the local humane societies and looked online and hadn’t had much luck.   We had given up for the day because we had a flag football game. When we went field there was this adorable puppy laying in between the fields.  Sure enough he was up for adoption.  The foster parents said they brought him there because they wanted him to go to someone who was active.  We immediately went home and filled out an application.  A few days later they did a house visit and left him with us.

Toby has been my partner in crime ever since.

So here are some pictures from the first month… ***Warning – Cuteness Alert***

We’re past the 1 month mark and there isn’t a whole lot to report so I’ll just upload a bunch of pictures.  Because let’s face it my phone is filled with them.

Quality time with my cousin

Trying on my Halloween costume

First step to becoming a pirate… wear a hat!

Hanging out at the park with my buddy.

It’s been a good couple of weeks!  We’re getting back to our normal activities.

Last week we had our first meeting with the rehab therapist.  I really liked her.  She did a complete evaluation of Toby and then we discussed exercises, stretches and massage.  I really like that she didn’t push buying a bunch of equipment and talked about being creative by using things around the house.  We have 4 exercises that we are to work on and she is going to send me a list of more to do.  She did recommend getting a video on how to safely stretch your dog and said I should add fish oil to his diet.  I don’t know if she stretched something out or released some tension but it was the first day he was interested in playing with his toys.  He even wanted to play tug a war with her.  It was good to see my buddy back.

We had some other fun activities lately.  Last weekend I took him to a friend’s house to hang out by the fire pit.  He got to see his doggie buddy.  We didn’t let them play because it was still too soon for rough housing with a big dog but it was good for him to get out of the house.

Then this weekend was the first crowded public outing.  One of the local breweries was having a big release party for their fall beers.  The place was packed but he did a great job navigating through the crowd.  He did what he normally does and seeks attention from anyone that will give it to him. (I know, I know, I never give him any attention at home).  He made lots of friends and I was surprised by how few people noticed he was missing a leg.  At one point he decided he wanted to join another group of people so I ended up talking to them for awhile.  One of the guys ask if I ever thought of having him be a therapy dog.  It might be something fun we could do so I’ve been thinking about it.

I’ve been really bad about taking pictures… sorry! So here are a couple I just took right now, one from when he first got his tripawd bandana and just a cool picture from the brewery we went to.

Today is Toby’s two week ampuversary!

We’ve had some good days and bad days but he seems to be happy and more energetic now that all the drugs are out of his system.  I have been very hesitant about letting him do anything active so we’ve been staying in the house a lot.

I posted in the nextdoor app that I was looking for a children’s wagon to buy.  I family a couple neighboorhoods over gifted me their old wagon.  Every day in the tripawd world makes you recognize and appreciate all the generous people that are out there.  So last night he got his first trip around the neighborhood.  He hopped around for a several houses and rode the rest of the way.  We even visited some neighbors.

Tomorrow he gets his staples out and Tuesday he has his first rehab appointment.  Every day we’re getting closer to getting back to normal life.