Dog walking hurts - lead suggestions?

Cherryblossom

Hi all, I have some arthritis in both hips for about 4 years. It isn’t too bad luckily but is progressively getting more painful.

My new puppy tugs on the lead a lot (much more than our older dog) and it is causing me to hurt more than normal. We will train him to slow down, but in the meantime as he is v young, does anyone have any tips on what dog leads / harnesses are best for me to use to minimise the impact on me?

Our lead is quite short so I am going to try a longer one, but too long he will get tangled as he is a rummager!. A harness rather than a neck collar and so on.

I wish I had spring soled shoes to help absorb the impact!

any tips very welcome from anyone who may have more experience of this than myself:)

Thanks in advance!

N1gel

My first thought as a dog owner myself is that a longer lead will just allow him to build up a head of steam before he's pulled up short, which would certainly be more jarring!

I would stick to a short lead so that he gets constant feedback, dogs can be incredibly empathetic. My terrier always pulls when anyone else has him on the lead but if I'm on my crutches he doesn't pull.

Kneepain

I know exactly what you mean - it's really difficult. Dogs are really empathetic - mine knows exactly when I'm feeling poorly and tries to make me feel better. He's also realised that I can't walk as fast as I used to before my knee became so bad. However, he totally forgets that if he gets excited - today he yanked really hard of the lead when he saw a particular dog and this hurt my knee so badly that I started crying. Anyway, I find that a longer fabric lead works better as I can either let it go longer/or shorter to control him. I used to have one of those super long extendable lead but found that when it was extended a lot that I couldn't easily pull it back in the way that I can with a fabric lead.