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This dog is absolutely inspiring.

I am blown away by her resilience. Her spirit. Her wagging tail.

If it weren’t for the gapping wound across her upper left side, you’d honestly never know that she just lost a limb.

This afternoon, she was out lounging in the lawn while I weeded the garden. Some friends came over to grab some top soil and compost (hey yo, Cartwheel Farm!). Ursa heard them get out of the car and went racing up the hill to greet them. Tail wagging. Hopping briskly.

I about fell over. With joy. With inspiration. With reassurance.

To see her recover so seamlessly from what I perceive to be a truly life-altering, potentially debilitating surgery centers my heart. It reassures me that I made the right choice. I have given this dog a second chance at a pain free life. Ursa has no concept of mortality. Of illness. She lives for the here and now. And right now, she has been relieved of a pain that has been ailing her since December (if not before).

She’s back to eating normally. Before we discovered the tumor, her appetite had waned and it was a challenge to convince her to finish even one scoop of food. This weekend, she ate voraciously and hovered around the table during meal time, eagerly anticipating the shower of food from Courtland’s high chair.

The first day she was a bit shaky on slippery floors, but now she navigates the hard wood and the two steps from our deck into the lawn with ease. I was prepared for restless, sleepless nights. Whines of pain or discomfort. Baby steps.

Instead, we’re racing after her speedy hop. And the only whining we hear is when she is begging for table scraps.

I’m not going to lie, I was an absolute disaster on the car ride to pick her up from the Vet’s. I was filled with fear and anxiety. I wasn’t ready to see her as a tripawd. But then she appeared, slow and unsure, but hopping on her own (I say hopping because now that she only has three legs her gait is that of a hop, rather than a walk).

I spent the evening fretting over her every move, but she quickly demonstrated that I needed to relax. She had this. James spent the first two nights sleeping by her side downstairs, but it proved to be unnecessary. Our two-legged dependents could learn a thing or two from Ursa’s sleep habits.

The wound is pretty horrific sight to behold, but I am learning not to flinch or avert my eyes whenever I have to hot compress and change her t-shirt. The drains will be removed tomorrow, and the staples in a week. Slowly her fur will grow in and cover this scar.

Her spirit, however, needs no healing. It’s intact. And strong as ever.

Man, don’t we all wish we could be so heart stoppingly gorgeous after major surgery?

And don’t we all wish we had the resilience and guilt-free existence of a dog? I learn more and more from my girl everyday.