My dog recently broke her leg and has to be crated a little more than normal. She seems to be getting bored. How can I help her?

I have been a religous reader and user of your website articles and training DVD's. I recommend them to all my friends and family that have dogs. I have been able to train my 2 year old GSD to listen to me and follow my instructions and I have had many people comment on how well behaved, albeit excitable but still well trained puppy she is.

Unfortunately about a month ago, she broke her leg in play. I blame myself since she jumped too high to catch a ball I threw and landed on uneven ground. She has had the surgery that the orthopedic surgeon recommended, and I am required to keep her calm and as much off her feet as possible for 8-10 weeks from surgery. She has been on sedatives to keep her calm. She is crated, which she usually is anyway even before she broke her leg. However, because she has been crated for longer periods since the surgery, I have been noticing she will get bored in her crate in spite of the fact that I will leave a bone or toy for her to play with. I know that you recommend putting away all toys since she doesn't OWN any of her them and I am supposed to take them away after play time. I try to switch it up by giving her an everlasting treat ball or a holee roller or some other such toy she enjoys playing with during play time. How do I know she gets bored? I'm only assuming this, but she'll be sitting calmly in her crate and when I take her out to go outside, she'll get extremely excited. She'll sit and stay when I tell her to, but she's still acting VERY antsy and just about ready to jump if she were allowed to. I'm afraid she may injure herself again if she doesn't calm down since this is happening while she is sedated - she does listen to me when I say sit or down but she's ready to run if given any sign to do so.

While I am not having trouble controlling her at all, I just want to see if there is anything else I can do to make sure she's calm and "busy" while crated so she is not as excitable when she gets out. I don't want her to be on sedatives, but it's what the doctor recommended so she doesn't jump around in her crate when I'm not there.

Normally, before the surgery, I would walk her for about a total of 2.5 miles a day and play with her in my backyard for about 30 minutes until she let me know she was done. Now she is getting NOTHING like that.

Any recommendations? Am I doing something else wrong because I know that training dogs is more about training the people how to act with the dogs.

Thanks again for your help with this!

Nivedita