Hi everyone.  We're new here and I've already learned so much and gotten such hope from the stories of your pups with 3 legs.  Our Guiness had surgery on Thursday to remove a front leg and I'm amazed at how well he's doing already.  Here's our boy's story:

Guiness is our foster dog, a 6 year old (guesstimate) Great Pyrenees that came from a kill shelter and into the rescue my husband and I volunteer with. When he came to the rescue back in September, he went to another foster home and the shelter had said he had a limp from an old fracture. His limp got increasingly worse as he started to put weight on (he arrived very thin) and it was discovered that he had a nasty break in his right front elbow that was not healed or healing. We're guessing he was struck by a car, given his fear of any moving vehicle.  Anyway, he had surgery in November to insert a plate to hopefully help the bones come together.  In February, Guiness came to stay with us because the other foster home had too many stairs and we hoped he'd recover better at our little ranch house without stairs to negotiate.  But in April, 5 months after the surgery, the screws were messed up and the plate had to be removed.  The bones still weren't healing and our choices were to try the surgery again (with a slim chance it might work this time) or amputate.  Not an easy decision, that's for sure.  Guiness had been miserable for 5 months in a cast and e-collar and his leg still caused him constant pain.  So we decided to amputate in the hope of alleviating that pain and allowing him to get on with the rest of his life like a normal dog, albeit on 3 legs. 

So he had surgery on Thursday and came home to us yesterday.  I was preparing myself not to cry when I saw him at the vet's as I expected him to miserable and having trouble getting around. But he came hopping out of the back, steady as could be and right to us as if to say "let's get out of here and get home".  Back at home, he hopped right into the house like it was just another day. He was sleepy yesterday and last night but this morning he's back to his normal, happy, goofy self.  If it wasn't for the missing leg and the t-shirt he's wearing to keep him from bothering his incision, a stranger would never know anything had happened.  And he certainly isn't letting it get him down so we're ecstatic for him.  I'm sure he'll be bouncing around our backyard and "protecting us" from the deer in the fields behind us in no time. 

Our rescue won't adopt out a dog with an unresolved medical issue, otherwise we'd have adopted Guiness ourselves already.  So as soon as his sutures are out and he's cleared by the doctor, we'll be making it official and Guiness will really be home. 

Thanks for your wonderful stories and support of each other and the dogs we all hold dear!

Beth (Guiness's mom)