Just celebrated the 3rd anniversary of my 11 year old Brittany spaniels accident . i use the word celebrate because at the time of the incident it was a simple decision between life and death and now looking back with the benefit of hindsight we can see that we made the right decision.

Gelert our dog lost his rear leg in a freak work related accident and was lucky to survive with the blood loss. my wife and I and our friends and family shed many tears in the weeks following the accident as we watched him try to adapt , he suffered injuries to both his front paws also so that didn,t help. Wheeling him around the park in a wheelbarrow and holding him up whilst he strained to relieve himself broke our hearts and we wondered if we had made the right decision.

I had a heart to heart with Gelert and told him to either make an effort and deal with it or give up ! he seemed to understand and with the help of a custom made wheelchair he began to regain his mobility. As he gained more confidence his wheels became a bit of a liability and we would be racing around flipping him over when he had rolled and was lying "turtle"!

We then noticed that when we parked the car at the start of a walk ( we also have a young springer who needs plenty of exercise ) he would shuffle of before we could strap him in his wheels and i would end up carrying them for the first half of the trip until he began to tire.

We then bought a four wheeled gardening trailer that we would drag behind us and he would sit in like Lord Muck , much to the amusement of passing walkers ,this "vehicle " however suffered from cornering problems and we finally shook all the bearings loose on the coast path !

A new evolution was soon on the cards when i discovered on the web a 3 wheeled baby buggy designed for mothers who wanted to take their toddlers cross country jogging ( surely not a highly lucrative market ? ) . After shipping it from Germany and a day of customising we were off out again.

Gelert's new mode of transport allows him to either sit or lie down with a great vantage point out front , he has excellent off road ability despite only being one man drive ! and he  has become an expert at the flying dismount !.

He will regularly cover 5 to 8 kms at weekends more on three legs than three wheels and his quality of life has reached a similar level to that of three years ago.

I hope that this simple story will give inspiration to those owners in a similar heart wrenching position that my wife and i were in three years ago .It took a lot of adjustment and commitment from all four of us but then a dog is for life and not just for Christmas . I just hope that someone will push me around if one of my legs drops off !