So my 6 year old lab tore her CCL and will need surgery. I made a mistake and looked on line and found lots of horror stories. Has anyone gone thru this with their dog? It looks like I will have to keep her calm for 2 to 3 months. I am not sure how this will work since she is usually very active and plays a lot with our other dog. Anyone have any advice?
My dog had ACL surgery for a complete tear on her Left leg in March. She also had a partial tear on her left knee. We had the surgery on her left leg only. She has almost completely recovered at this point. The first month was difficult, but she was 9 years old and suffering with her other leg as well. We don’t regret the surgery at all. We thought we were going to have to put her to sleep immediately after her injury, but we are so pleased with her recovery. Good luck .
They recover better than humans and without the grumbling!
My 11 year old goldendoodle just had her second ACL surgery in June; her first was May 2014. The surgery was worst for me than it was for her, and she bounced back quicker the second time; not exactly sure why! Her first knee is a bit crunchy with arthritic, but no one can believe she is going to be 12 next month; she runs and plays like a puppy at times.
It is true you should keep them quite when you can. Crating or gating in small areas, and floor covers over hard wood floors to avoid the dog slipping. We gated in the den which was carpeted where we could watch her, or she was in her crate when we were not home. The first week my husband forgot to but the gate up on our bedroom door and the dog took off running down the stairs. All my husband could do was scream as he tried to catch her before she hit the bottom of the stair onto the hardwood floors. Dog landed without and issue, my husband on the otherhand slipped on the way down; both were fine 
Leash-walking vs running around seems to have been sufficient for most people I know. I believe @romanigypsyeyes recently had this issue with her dog, so perhaps she can comment.
I have a smaller dog (a Havanese) who had bilateral CCL surgery a couple years ago, when he was 6. We had a choice of two different procedures - one (TPLO) involved cutting bone to change the way they fit together, the other was more like lashing everything together with suturing material. We chose the latter, and the recovery period wasn’t bad. We did not have to keep him calm for 2-3 months; he was cleared to do everything after 6 weeks. Had he been a larger dog, I’m pretty sure the surgeon would have recommended TPLO. I don’t know if the recovery period for one is different from the other. We have two other dogs and they all like to play together, so I ended up keeping him in his crate if I wasn’t there watching carefully. Since he’s small, I could carry him outside when he needed to go (only necessary for the first week or so - after that he’d go out on his own, although I still carried him down the outside steps. I think he was in enough pain at the beginning that he didn’t want to do much so it wasn’t hard to keep him contained. I guess it was harder for him to get around because it was both legs, too. I think you see the horror stories on the internet because people like to tell them more than the stories of relatively easy recoveries.
My 7 year old pit (< 60 lb) just went through this- twice! Once at 6 years old and once about 10 months later (other leg).
Everything went fine but I’ll admit that she’s gotten a lot slower since the surgeries (we’re several months out now). She was an active dog that loved playing with other dogs and lives on a lake where there are ALWAYS other dogs.
The first few days weren’t bad because she was still recovering from surgery. The next week was bad because she was on pain meds and thought she was fine. She was ANGRY at us for not letting her do anything. We had to keep her on a leash attached to us at all times, otherwise she’d try to run or jump or whatever. At night, we had to crate her which was miserable for everyone but we couldn’t risk her jumping off and on beds. (She loves her crate but is used to sleeping with people at night.) After a few weeks, it got better and she realized she had limits and was less angry but we still had to keep her on leash for a while (to grab if she took off around the house). She was cleared after about 8 weeks but we were warned to not let her run quite as much or else she’d tear the other (… and she did so I guess we failed)
Big thing: if you have anything other than carpet, you WILL need to get them pathways or carry them through hard floors. They will slip and it can really screw up their recovery.
Other than that, don’t read the internet! Always horror stories 
Best of luck to you and your furbaby.
My dog was about 60 lbs and about 7 years old when she tore her CCL. She was recommended to have the nylon line suturing type of surgery. Our experience was similar to @beth’s mom. While I wondered at the time whether or not to do it, there really was no other option. Her quality of life would have been so much worse if we hadn’t. The vet surgeon recommended leash walks only afterwards FOR LIFE! I did not follow his advice the first couple of years after she was fully healed, but as she aged she was perfectly fine with leash walks only, and for me it meant she did not take mud baths in the forest!
It was many years ago…my 40-lb lab/terrier mix (mutt) lived to be 16, and was very active - leaping to catch flying frisbees, running rapids (oh, so nice to think about her!)…and she had wrap/suturing surgery on both knees (few years apart). We didn’t throw any frisbees or tennis balls for a long time, but I think she pretty much controlled her own level of activity…as she felt stronger, she did more. She was rarely on a leash - where we live I could just leave the door open - but she also wasn’t a crazed squirrel-chaser, so we didn’t need to control her activity. Swimming is great, if your dog likes it and you have a place to go.
Our now 14-year old Chow mix had ACL surgery last year. We debated about putting such an older dog through surgery, but we’re thrilled with the results. We very strictly adhered to the regimen from the surgeon - leash walking, no stairs, passive range of motion exercises. We’re so glad she’s not been crippled - of course there’s no knowing how old she’ll live to be, but she can run and jump and do everything she did before the tear.
I do believe many of the problems people have are related to not following the vet’s instructions and letting the dog stress the repair too early. I certainly didn’t enjoy leash-walking bathroom breaks in thunderstorms, but you do what you’ve got to do.
We did have to separate our dogs during the day when no one was home and block off stairs for a while.
I have a friend whose agility Golden tore her ACL right after she got home from finishing her PAX2 (dmd knows what that is – it’s a big deal). She opted not for surgery, but for a custom brace which was presented as an option by her vet. She did treadmill all winter, and is now sound enough to be a retired agility pet dog.
I went out to Lowe’s and bought some inexpensive area rugs to put in the hallways that didn’t have them (hardwood floors) and make a "path’ from her crate area to the carpeted living room for our lab when she had ACL surgery.
The surgeon took a look and told us she could only feel slight movement in her knee, so we decided to wait and see. If she ends up doing more damage we will have to do the surgery, but for now, she is ok with only a slight limp. It may get better as time goes on. If not, the feet recommended the TTA surgery with severely limited movement for the first 2 weeks and no stairs for 2 months.