Keno, my SPCA-rescued German shepherd, was having a blast while I was freezing my face off. It was March 2005 and while Keno played in the ocean I huddled deep into my jacket trying to keep the snow out. Keno had been in and out of the water chasing sticks a dozen times and on his last dash he let out a blood chilling yelp and collapsed.

I waited for him to stand up but he just floated on his side yelping. Somehow, with Keno on three legs and in a lot of pain, I got him off the beach and in to see our veterinarian. That afternoon Dr. Janice Crook of the Mosquito Creek Veterinary Hospital gave me the bad news: “He has torn his anterior cruciate ligament.”

This ligament (ACL) is the one that holds the knee together and this injury has ended many an athlete’s career (Bobby Orr for example). It took two weeks to arrange the surgery with Dr. Bob Galloway at the Stevenson Animal Clinic and it was two weeks of pain pills and crying.

After the surgery Dr. Galloway was a grim man. “Keno’s knee is very arthritic… He’ll have to be relatively inactive the rest of his life and there is a good chance he’ll blow right knee very soon.” Talk about depressing.

Still, after a few days, Keno’s spirits perked up. He found away to get around, eat with a cone on his head and he still loved to bark at the kids waking by our driveway. Two weeks after his first surgery I called Keno in for dinner. He turned around and in the drawing of a breath he collapsed quicker than the Warren Commission. His right ACL had blown.

When we picked Keno up after this surgery the surgeon warned us that he has never seen a knee so badly pitted. “Keno will have to live a very quiet life and be on anti-inflammatory medication for the rest of his days.” This was hard to take because Keno had always been a dog who loved nothing more than to run in the bush until he was exhausted.

Over the next few months Keno went under the knife three more times (five in total). Along with all of this we spent the days just before last Christmas thinking Keno may have bone cancer; he didn’t, but this gives you an idea of how bad his knees had deteriorated. But in between all of this we found a saviour.

At first Kendall DeMenech didn’t quite fit the saviour role. She is a quiet unassuming lady who carries an air of quiet and calm around her. She operates K9H20 (www.k9h2o.net) which is a full-length indoor heated swimming pool dedicated to aqua-therapy rehabilitation for animals. Although she has helped to rehabilitate swans and miniature horses, 90 per cent of her clientele is canine.

Keno’s therapy started slowly. For the longest time he would swim one length of the pool then stand on the submerged bench puffing. Now he swims fast and hard for 30 minutes. For his sixth birthday we rented the pool for an hour and, in between mouthfuls of cake and corny verses of “Happy Birthday,” Keno swam non-stop for 60 minutes. That night I was shocked when he nudged my arm to tell me “It’s walk time.”

Keno is no longer graceful to watch but he is happy and active and his recovery has been amazing, earning him the title of “The Comeback Kid.”

Tom Cattermole is a North Shore freelance writer. Cattermole@telus.net

Copyright North Shore Magazine Issue Apr - May 08