The following is from an email that Dale sent to his mom and cousin to inform them of what was happening with Sophie just before she died.
"...we began to notice about 6 weeks ago that Sophie was having more and more trouble with her back legs. She had had surgery 3-4 years ago on her right knee after she blew out her ACL. By the time she was mostly recovered from that, the ACL in her left knee began to tear. We decided against surgery again because the first surgery and subsequent physical therapy were so difficult on her (and us). We opted to manage the knee with Rimadyl/carprofen. It worked like a charm and she had several good years without much trouble in her legs. She even made it through this past winter in good shape, which is amazing considering the amount of snow and ice we had. She was constantly climbing snowdrifts and sliding on the ice. What probably made this work out so well is that we were able to keep her very lean (55 lbs.) When I took her in for her phusical in March, she had somehow managed to gain 5 pounds. We were really surprised because we're so careful, but figured it was her metabolism slowing (she is 11 1/2 years old), and we began to feed her a little less food."
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