Maisie will walk again!

Maisie is a 3 and-a-half-year-old dachshund/beagle mix. On March 3rd, she started having trouble walking, and by the end of the evening, she could not use her hind legs at all.

My wife took her to the overnight emergency vet, though they could only give her pain meds. The next day at our primary vet, they confirmed what we already knew, Maisie had a serious back injury. Maisie was basically paraplegic.

Fortunately, we lived not too far from one of the nation's premier veterinary schools at the University of Illinois. The staff there are impeccable. After an initial examination, the vet suspected she had a ruptured disc in her back. Further scans were needed though. We left Maisie there and waited for the results.

It got worse before it got better. She didn't have 1 ruptured disc, she had 4. In any case, surgery was still her best and only bet. A lot could go wrong, and there was a chance that it might not even work, but thankfully we had the best vets to take care of Maisie for the surgery.

Maisie made it through the surgery, but she was far from out of the woods. She couldn't quite walk yet and she wouldn't be released to us for nearly a week. Even after we got her back, she needed to go back for another week of rehab. It was quite a lot for Maisie!

Can she walk now? Yes...sort of. The vet called it a "drunk walk" where she kind of stumbles a bit and doesn't walk in a straight line. Will she get better? Only time will tell, though it's unlikely she'll even be 100% physically what she used to be.

Never thought we'd be those crazy pet parents that would pay anything to make their pup better, but here we are. Maisie ended up staying at the U of I vet clinic for 2 separate weeks. She's had to be on crate rest since. We have to supervise her anytime she's not in the crate. No more just letting her outside to go potty, but keeping her physically calm so as not to agitate her injuries.

We got Maisie as a puppy from a rescue organization. She came from a hoarding situation and all they knew was that her mother was a dachshund. We had 2 senior dachshunds at home, so we thought Maisie would fit right in. She did, but as she grew...she kept growing. She quickly became taller than the older dogs. Thankfully she didn't get Clifford big, but big enough that, along the way, we forgot that she was still part dachshund.

Dachshunds are prone to back issues. We always carried our older dachshunds up and down the stairs, but as Maisie got bigger, she could do so much more than the older doxies. We didn't see a dachshund, so we didn't even think about her back. It kills me to think that I allowed her to do things that would hurt her back. On the same note, there is no way of truly knowing what cause her discs to rupture. She could've injured herself playing, repeated jumping up and down, or it could have just happened. We can only go forward at this time. So, for now, the focus is on Maisie's rehab.

To that end, we could genuinely use some help with the expenses with Maisie's care. I believe in transparency, so here's the breakdown of expenses directly related to Maisie's medical care.

Emergency vet: $234.40

Our regular vet: $70.13

U of I vet clinic: $7396.57

Total: $7701.10

That total does not account for the time we took off work, nor the 4x round-trips down to the U of I vet clinic (about an hour-and-a-half each way).

If by a miracle of chance, we both meet and exceed our goals, we'll use that extra money for Maisie, new bedding, follow-up vet visits, etc. If by an even BIGGER miracle, we go WAY over the goal, my plan is to donate excess funds to Pet Central Helps, the 501(c)(3) no-kill animal rescue where we got Maisie when she was a mere pup.

Thank you for any help you can give. Expect to see plenty of pics of Maisie as she recovers!