Four days after having back surgery to relieve a bulging disc, our sweet dog Chloe appears to be on her way to recovery. There’s a lot of sleeping, especially in the hours after taking Tramadol, a pain medication.

For the first two days she was home, she spent most of the time confined to the bathroom on the lower level of our house. It’s really the only space that’s small and allows for a gate in its door. And, she seemed to want to sleep more anyway.

Today, not so much. Husband and I let her come out of the bathroom and lay on the carpet between us while we were watching football. We have to watch her like a hawk though. I wasn’t paying attention when daughter came home from work and Chloe immediately trotted over to see her despite my commands to stop.

It’s obvious she’s feeling better because she spent about 90 minutes gnawing on a rawhide bone, growling what I can oly assume was “Back off if you want to keep that hand” whenever I would get near the bone.

She’s also getting used to going outside only to take care of business, then come back in. The barking of the neighbor dogs hasn’t bothered her too much. Yet. I expect that time will come. Once she can pee without her back legs shaking from the discomfort, I fully expect her to want to so spend more time sniffing out the birds and especially the neighbor’s cat, who I know prowls our backyard at night.

She’ll have to wait at least a month before being allowed to do that though, and I’m sure it will start getting to her (us, too) at some point. But for now, I think she’s just happy to be home and not in so much pain.

So are we.