What kind of dog? One of ours had the dog equiv. of, what is it, ACL?? ALC surgery last fall. Had a metal plate inserted into her left rear leg. The top bone and the bottom bone were each cut and then inserted into the metal plate. Poor thing, we thought 8 weeks of cage rest, but it took so much longer. She had the surgery around labor day, and it wasn't until the beginning of january before we were finally able to allow her outside, off leash, alone in the yard, meaning without the other two dogs, to potty late at night. Nearly killed hubby & me, having to walk her each and every time she needed to go out. We didn't keep her completely caged, what we did was hook up an eye bolt to the baseboard and then let her be on a six foot leash, so she didn't feel like she was in jail. Hope your fella feels better soon.