Hi all, We are no stranger to labs or big dogs (...or staircases), but this is a new one for us. We're considering adopting a very very sweet 6 year old English lab--she had a safe but not ideal 18 months in a shelter, and gained enough weight that she's estimated to be 20-25 lbs overweight right now, at her current 96 pounds. We have good vets, are home all the time and can provide the right exercise and food, but... here's where I just haven't been able to get good answers. Our house is built into a hill, so she would have to walk up a fairly gentle hill in the yard to get to the front door, then up two stairs. The foster family says that with a little help (which we can provide!) she can handle their two steps in, and out, just fine. However, they live on one level, so that's the extent of their experience with her and stairs. We live on two, and our current dog (and all of our past dogs) sleeps upstairs with us--I cannot imagine leaving her downstairs when we're hanging out upstairs and at night. I am confident we could help her up the stairs with an appropriate helper harness, but I am nervous about down--I'm 5'7 (female) but quite strong, but I weigh 135 and if she were unsteady, I'm concerned I couldn't help her down. I've never had a large dog with an obesity issue so maybe my imagination is just running wild, but does anyone have experience with this? Until she loses weight, will she be able to go down the stairs (upstairs to down, so a full flight) safely, or will she need help? If she needs help, is there a way to do it safely (like the harness/sling for "bumping" them up)? THANK you so much for any insight. We have so much love to give and a great home to welcome her into, but I just want to make sure it's going to be the right situation -- and the stairs are my only hang up. Honestly, if I could move downstairs to sleep I would, but it's not an option.
Hi Caroline and welcome to the forum I think you've stumped us all! (Although I've reread your post a few times now, and the first line always makes me chuckle!) It certainly sounds like a risk to your safety and hers if you try and help her down the stairs. But if she's used to sleeping alone downstairs at the moment anyway, I wonder if it would really bother her so much to continue doing so for a little while longer? And she can start coming upstairs when she's able to physically navigate them herself. Whatever you decide to do, good luck, and do let us know how you get on!
It seems to me that even at 25# overweight a Lab should be able to negotiate stairs, unless he is also way out of condition from having no exercise. Hopefully he doesn't have any serious joint issues. I would think some walking exercise might get him back into shape a bit, fairly quickly, enough so he could do stairs. It's going to take quite a while to get 25# lbs of weight off, and really get him back into condition.
