5/8/2004

Maggie loves to go on mountain bike rides. More than anything, she does.

Russ and I went on a gentle ride at China Camp this Saturday morning. We brought Maggie with us since we were going to be mostly on the city side, rather than the state park side.

At about the most central point in that area, we crested a hill very fast, then slowed hard for a left into some tight singletrack. Russ was in front and Maggie couldn’t scrub her speed in time. She slammed into Russ’ rear wheel, getting her paw jammed into the 8” rear rotor of his wheel. Russ was rolling into the slope at the time, so everything was moving and weighted. Confusion and squeeling and chaos. It only took about ½ second to seriously wound Maggie’s foot. We didn’t have to think too long to know how serious a situation we were in. Maggie was bleeding seriously from what was left of her foot. She couldn’t walk and we were about as far as we could be from my car, a phone, or any help.

I threw her onto my shoulder while I was freaking out about what was going on. Russ started dragging both of our bikes as we began to hike back up and over the small mountain. First, we ditched my bike in the woods, and then his as it became painfully obvious that we had our hands full just carrying a 50lb. Maggie. The amount of blood was ridiculous as was the look of her wound. Russ got a tourniquet onto her leg. We swapped her back and forth as we each got fatigued carrying her. Our bike shoes made all this that much harder as we had to spot each other from slipping or falling. She was being so good. She knew she was in trouble and trusted us completely. She stayed extremely calm and hung on the whole time.

After about 25 minutes of this we came out onto the main fire road and crossed some hikers with a phone. I kept going as Russ called Jeanette, having her call the pet hospital ahead so that they would be ready. We still had to get down the fire road and drive across town. We could move quicker, now, descending the fire road, but this added the risk of falling, it was tough. A woman was now helping us get down, but not with the carrying. Russ and I were now super fatigued and Maggie was obviously having a hard time holding on. Blood loss, trauma, exhaustion were the blame, but Russ and I were covered in blood and this was a medium sized dog. Our pace quickened as more worry set in. after about 10 minutes and near the bottom, I ran ahead, got the car turned around just as Russ came off the trail with Maggie.

Russ drove quite fast through town while I was in back with Maggie. She was looking bad. I could see how much she was hurting and she was spaced out. Russ knew just where to go (he has cat stories). We got there. They took here and said she would be fine. They bandaged her up to stop the bleeding, and then proceeded to knock her out so that they could operate. They said that they had to operated on her for a little over an hour and that they needed to keep her on an I.V. for a few hours. She was dropped off around 11am and I finally got her back at 8:30pm.

Poor dog. She lost two knuckles from her small toe and one from the next one up, this on top of some totally severe lacerations. The doctors said that she will be out of action for about a month at least. She is lounging around today. We have to carry her if she has to move to far.

I feel guilty that this happened to my little baby dog, but I know that she loves going on rides so much. I need to be more careful for her.

6/11/2005

Now it's over a year later. All sympathy is gone. She runs faster now, and acts like a jerk. Back to her old self, as if nothing ever happened.