What do you think – am I in pain?

Here’s some context to a week day with my family.

During the day I had:

Walked with my dog

Run around after my 18 month old all day

Gone for a walk as a family for about 1.5 hours involving walking about 6 miles, about 50% uphill. I pushed a pram for some of that.

DO YOU THINK I MIGHT HAVE BEEN IN PAIN, BASED ON MY ACTIVITIES?

The answer is – yes! My legs were hurting, because I have issues with my legs as well as other chronic problems.

Would anyone know this based on my daily activity?

Probably not. To help mitigate the pain, I adjusted my stride (I was taking shorter steps with reduced movement through my hips). I altered the way I was weight bearing through my feet and adjusted the position my feet were in when they hit the floor, probably by about 1cm. I was weight bearing more on one side than the other but I was not limping. To anyone other than me, you may not have been likely to notice any of this. I slowed my speed down slightly. None of this was particularly conscious and they are adaptations I am used to making.

Why am I sharing this with you?

When dogs are experiencing chronic discomfort they will still:

RUN

PLAY

JUMP UP

GO FOR WALKS

GET EXCITED ABOUT THINGS

Basically….they will go about their life! Just like I did.

Acute (short term) pain tends to result in more exaggerated responses e.g. yelps and limps (although if your dog is limping or lame then please be sensible and go to see the vet). Chronic pain is subtle and results in small adaptations to enable them to carry on with their life, and activities. Often these changes are seen in behaviour, gait, posture, and so on. Dogs are GREAT at masking.

Please don’t let running, playing, jumping up, going for walks, and being enthusiastic be your markers for if your dog is experiencing discomfort. If they stopped doing these things then this would be quite worrying to me.

Sally Lewis 2025