dog on pain pills = nightmare!  

The vets all say to cage them. Personally, I don't have the heart to cage an animal. They look so sad and pathetic when they're caged, although I did have to cage a kitten we had that somehow managed to break two of her legs (jumping from something high, I suspect... we didn't see it happen). She had these tiny little casts on her legs and learned to run all over the place with them on. She trid to jump up on the furniture but always ended up falling again so I had to put her in a cage.

We took her out as often as we could and played with her on the floor or held her as long as she was content with that, but would have to put her right back into the cage afterwards, until the bones had healed, anyway.

The only thing I can suggest is that you spend as much time as you can with your dog, petting her, brushing her, whatever she likes that will hold her still. Other than that, I couldn't say, because I know the vet would say to cage her. (That's their "generic" answer for a lot of pet problems.)

I noticed my little girl feeling a lot better a day or two after her surgery (she was spayed and had a hernia repaired) and didn't need pain meds, so maybe you could cut back on the amount earlier than what you were told. She moved around rather gingerly for awhile but was pretty much back to normal in two or three days. Dogs heal fast! I wish we healed that fast!

Good luck. I'm so happy to hear that she came through it okay! I had a 12-year-old gal who needed surgery a long time ago and the vet said she had a 50/50 chance of making it through the surgery. She came through with flying colors. I think they're a lot more resilient than anyone gives them credit for.

what I would do is buy a crate and crate her. or get an area in you home where you can keep the dog safely confined but has room to move around. I'm sorry but those are the only suggestion I have I haven't had to deal with surgery yet and I'm going to have to soon so I'm thinking about what I'm going to do and I know I'm going to talk to my vet about it.

I would concider finging a crate tp put in your house. that way when she does get like that you can put her in it to let her know right now that behavior is unacceptable... And if shes that hyper as you say she is she will defiantly not like going in that cage so mabey shell calm dow after being in the cage a few times...

So pleased that your dog came through her surgery well. My only suggestion would be to maybe halve her dose of pain pills to take the edge off but to remind her that she has just had surgery and to slow down a bit. My boy was fairly good after an operation. He would jump up but he visibly winced when his stitches pulled and would slow down.