Swimmer Puppy Syndrome- NO MORE

Hi All,

I want to share our home's victory. A MAJOR victory. One of Tara's puppies (Katy) didn't develop right. She wound up laying on her tummy too much, and was unable to get her feet under her. So she got to the border of swimmer puppy. We made a brace for her chest and braces for her legs, and got her onto egg crate foam immediately. Two weeks later, and we can't catch her. Yesterday, she discovered a toy elephant that she carried through the living and dining room so fast that I couldn't get a picture of her other than a blur. Her humans were there for physical therapy. But she doesn't even need that anymore. And her brother Sherman will be there with her forever because as her female human was working with her, her male human was falling head over heels for her brother. And we finally got Annabelle to realize they aren't her puppies, so she isn't growling at the other dogs (including their actual mom) anymore. Victory 2!

 

The breeder who is mentoring us had two puppies about twenty years ago, and she was able to give me the name. The three vets in our practice had never seen it, so we were on you tube looking for help. The Boston terrier Mick helped us a lot. We found out about the egg crate foam- which is ESSENTIAL! And the chest brace idea came from a video somewhere in the far East. The only word we could understand was Akita. But the video was very detailed, and we stole the idea. It is basically that the brace is round and somewhat padded, but since it is round, the chest can not lie flat against it. And we rolled her on her back and massaged her legs, and made her do bicycles. And if she fought, we let her fight because that is using those muscles. She and Sherman were both big puppies for us. As in- more than twice the weight of their mom at birth, so we think maybe her muscles just needed to catch up with her size. But she is all go and play now, BABY! And trust me- no one will ever put her in a corner. She is 2 lbs of pure attitude.