The deed is done and we've entered the world of having a three legged dog. Maggie's recovery has gone smoothly and the wound heeled pretty well. However Maggie has had moments when she's jumped up and run out or into the room, quite distressed. This made us think about phantom limb pain. While this is recognized in humans, after looking on the internet we found there is differing scientific opinion regarding dogs. Maggie is quite aware that her leg is missing (interesting since only humans are supposed to have a sense of self), I've seen her looking at where her leg should be.  Her stump does twitch and she has licked at it. The twitching is the muscles and nerves reconnecting. Luckily when we visited our own Vet she agreed that Maggie probably was having phantom limb pain and prescribed Neurontin. Maggie has been having this tablet for a only few days but I think there is a change in her behaviour, less of the panic like attacks.
It is amazing how she is coping, I was even brave and let her do some herding on a friends training flock. We make sure she doesn't over do it, while the future is to build up Maggie's strength and let her do more and more.