What to expect after spaying?

[Arron (Shadow)]

Our six month old little girl got spayed today.  I am picking her up from the vet this afternoon and I was wondering if anyone had any advice on what to expect / do for her over the next 24 hours?  2 days?  week?  How long does it take to completely heal?

 

She is a pretty exuberant girl, not sure how I am going to keep her calm for the next few days.

[Michael Gurley]

Haha, my girl acted sooo loopy after her spay. She was 6 months old as well, and was about 15-20 pounds (she's a medium doodle, full grown at 25 pounds). I had to carry her out to the car and pour her into her seat. She slept most of the day, and I had to carry her outside to potty, carry her to the water bowl to drink, and put her back on the couch next to me where she went back to sleep.

 

The hard part was after the first day or two, when she started to irritate her stitches and had to wear the Elizabethan collar, the cone of shame. She HATED the E-collar, and kept running into things. I really wish I had known about other options, but the vet gave me the cone so I used it, and it worked but she hated it. She had to wear it for nearly a week until her stitches came out, and then for another day or so.

 

She kept herself quiet enough since we don't have another playful dog, so she didn't have a playmate to egg her on or anything. We just didn't take her on her normal walks and I didn't take her to friends' houses or to the dog park or to playdates.

[Dot, Maggie and KoKo]

KoKo was spayed at six months also.  She wore a collar for a week and then got it off by herself.  It was at that point I declared her healed.  She didn't mind the collar but she did get stuck under the end table a few times.  She was quiet when she came home the afternoon of her surgery, slept well and woke up with all her normal energy and was she hungry.