Today was a really big day for me. Since I had such a fabulous 2nd quarter, I got invited to the Women's Success Forum in downtown Denver. When I woke up, Newton had some seepage coming from the "Y" portion of his incision. It didn't last long, so I wasn't too worried (it looks like some of the scab had pulled). However, I did want to check on him at lunch just to make sure that everything was okay.

When I got home from lunch, Newton was very excited to see me. There was no more seepage from the incision so all was looking good. To restrict Newton to the first floor, I have set up baby gates between the first floor and the basement and the first floor and the second floor. Typically I can just prop the baby gate against the railing and he doesn't try to go around it.

I'm guessing you can tell where this story is going. So I am up in my room getting ready to head back downtown for the final keynote speaker. All of a sudden I hear the jingle of Newton's tags and then hear him jump on my bed! I thought I was going to have a heart attack. Not only did he go around the baby gate (something he has never done...even when he had 4 legs), but now I was faced with the challenge of getting him back downstairs. My stairs are quite steep and we had 12 of them to conquer.

When I decided to amputate, I started looking into harnesses. Based on feedback from other Tripaw owners, I decided on the Ruffwear harness. I purchased mine from Tripawds.com . I made my purchase from the Tripawds.com site because purchases made from the site help support continuing efforts to raise awareness about canine cancer and amputation as a viable treatment option. Let me just say that I am so thankful that I made the purchase.

I put the harness on Newton and tried to get him to go down the stairs. Since I wasn't sure what to expect, I stood on the side with the banister. I needed some form of support. I could only get him to go down 2 stairs and then he would back up. As a last ditch effort before just leaving him in my room, I called my neighbor, Denise, to see if she could help. She said that she wasn't busy and was on her way over. I went downstairs to open the door so that she could let herself in. When I got back upstairs, Newton must have taken the open door as a "we are going for a walk" signal and started heading down the stairs. Halfway down, he got scared and wanted to turn around. The harness helped me get him moving again and we successfully made it down.

I was quite impressed with Newton's ability to get up the stairs by himself. Although I think the fear he faced going down the stairs has made him realize that going up the stairs may not be the best idea.