So last season was amazing, Sixx went Grade 5 and I was really enjoying running the 5-7 courses. I love a challenge and Sixx runs so much better when I don't have time to think and put her off!
At KCI she felt a bit off, I put it down to her being a bit tired and mostly down to me having had some negative remarks from someone that I thought had probably affected my confidence and handling.
The next show she still wasn't right, knocking poles and coming out of the weaves early almost every run which she would never normally do. I decided to give her a break and get Dave to treat her. That was in September.
Dave treated her, said she was really, really tight in her back and she definitely needed a break. Dave wasn't able to carry on treating her so I decided to take her to Theravet for physio. Physio showed she was tight in her back but also her shoulder and hip so we started treatment for that. After a few months she showed a big improvement so I gradually began to do some little bits of training with her. She seemed fine and after 6wks of gradually building up her training we had a lesson with Dan. She was still only jumping on medium at this point. Omfg she was AMAZING that first lesson back! I was so excited! The following week, however was not so good. She was measuring on a couple of jumps and when I put her over a very small extension grid she crashed the last jump. Sixx has been doing grids since she was four months old (puppy bumps) so I knew straight away that something had to be wrong for her to do that.
Dave had another feel of her and said he thought it could be that she had a bulging disc and for safety's sake it was best not to do any more treatment until we knew for sure. Well I'm not insured so it meant waiting till I had the money to get the MRI done (anywhere from £1-£3,000).
Finally in March we got to do an MRI - it was clear! What a relief! But also, what was causing her pain? I hadn't been able to afford the dynamic MRI which would show if a disc was bulging in extension so there is always the possibility of that :(
On the plus side she wasn't showing any signs of pain or discomfort in day to day life and never been lame (despite one vet telling me she'd torn her cruciate! WTF?!).
So another treatment from Dave at camp and then a treatment from a chiropractor recommended by a friend and still no progress. Then someone recommended a different physio. I'd already decided not to go back to Theravet, The girl that had originally treated Sixx was leaving. Sally had treated a lot of friends dogs and they all thought very highly of her so I thought it was worth a shot.
I've never seen Sixx so happy and relaxed being treated before! Sally has a really calming effect on her and Sixx really seemed to trust that Sally wasn't going to hurt her. As a result Sally was able to find things that no one else had. Her pelvis was 'out' and she had some pain in her back, shoulder and mainly hip. Sally thought the main culprit was sacroiliac dysfunction, causing off loading on to the left foreleg giving overuse spasm in the dorsal thoracic sling muscles and compensatory posture.
Maybe finally we had an answer?! We're two treatments in - Sally seems to feel quite confident that the issues can be resolved. As for a return to agility, well we have stretches and strengthening exercises to do, and I guess the only way we'll know is to try and see what happens. The best news is that I know she can be pain free. If she can be a pain free agility dog it would be awesome but that would be the icing on the cake :-)
