He does not whine. He does not limp. He still empties his bowl. And yet something is off: he lies differently than he used to, he waits until you are at the top of the stairs, he no longer comes to the door when you get home. Recognising pain in a dog is hard because a dog almost never lets you hear it. He shows it. Very quietly.

Below are the signals vets look for, grouped the way they actually turn up in daily life. Thirteen in total.

Why your dog hides his pain

An animal that shows weakness in a group puts itself at risk. That reflex is still there in our dogs, even the one on your sofa. Whining costs him more than gritting his teeth.

Something else is at play. Chronic pain arrives slowly. Your dog adapts to it bit by bit. You adapt along with him without noticing. You have been lifting him into the car for months without giving it a thought. That is how the difference disappears from view.

The trap is called "he is just getting old". Old age is not a diagnosis. It is an age. What you are seeing is usually something specific: worn joints, a back, a set of teeth.

Behaviour changes before the walk does

This is the part owners miss most often, because it looks like personality. Six signals:

• He no longer greets you at the door. He lifts his head from the bed and stays put.
• He is restless at night. Shifting, sighing, wandering around at three in the morning. Pain gets louder when there is nothing to distract from it.
• He picks a different sleeping spot. Away from the busy part of the house. Or much closer to you than usual.
• He has a shorter fuse. Growling at a touch or turning away from a child approaching him is, in a gentle dog, almost always a pain signal.
• He keeps licking the same spot. A wrist, a hip, the inside of a hind leg. The coat there turns darker or thinner.
• He pants when it is not warm. Panting at rest, without any effort, is a classic sign of discomfort.

Small movement changes you only see once you look

Limping is the final stage, not the first. This comes before it:

• He stretches before he takes his first step.
• He gets up in two stages: front legs first, a pause, then the rest. There is more on this in old dog struggling to get up.
• He no longer jumps onto the sofa or into the car in one go, but places his front paws first.
• He takes the stairs one step at a time or stops halfway.
• His stride gets shorter. The hindquarters swing along. Or he puts both hind legs down together like a rabbit.
• He sits crooked, with one hind leg out to the side instead of tucked underneath.
• On a slippery floor he walks along the wall or stays on the rug. That is learned caution after slipping on a slippery floor once.

What joint pain looks like and how it differs

A dog with joint pain has a very recognisable rhythm. Bad when getting up, better after ten minutes of movement, worse again after a long walk or in the evening on the sofa. Cold, damp days make it more obvious.

Acute pain works differently: it is there straight away and warming up does not shift it. Belly pain gives a hunched back, a dog that will not lie down or that goes into the "praying position", front legs flat and rear end up. That belongs at the vet the same day.

Not sure whether this is wear and tear? The early signs are listed in recognising arthritis in dogs.

Look at his face too

A dog in pain has a tense head. The chewing muscle above the cheek is tight, the eyelids are slightly more narrowed, the ears sit lower or held stiffly back. The look is there, yet it is also somehow not.

A practical trick: find a photo of the same dog from two years ago and put them side by side. Differences you cannot see day by day jump straight out of two photos.

Two weeks of notes beat one single moment

At the clinic your dog is excited. Adrenaline makes him temporarily supple, so the consultation paints too rosy a picture. What does work: a short log.

For fourteen days, score four things from 1 to 5: getting out of bed, the stairs, jumping, playing. Do it at fixed moments, morning and evening for example. Film him twice while he walks from his bed over to you.

Bring that to the appointment. Vets use standardised questionnaires for this themselves, such as the Canine Brief Pain Inventory. Your two weeks of scores fit right into that and later make it visible whether a treatment is working.

When you should not wait

Call the same day for any of these:

• He suddenly puts no weight on a leg.
• He yelps at a touch or when lifted.
• The belly is tense or bloated.
• He holds his head low and will not turn his neck.
• The hind legs suddenly give way or drag.
• He eats nothing for 24 hours.

Important: never give painkillers from your own cupboard. Paracetamol and ibuprofen are toxic to dogs, even in small amounts. Medication for a dog comes from the vet.

What you can do at home while the diagnosis runs

You do not have to sit and wait for the appointment. These four help with just about any form of pain in the musculoskeletal system:

• Weight. Every extra kilo goes through the same joints. This is the cheapest and the most powerful thing you have.
• Movement in smaller blocks. Three quiet twenty-minute walks beat one full hour.
• A warm, soft bed out of the draught. Thick enough that the elbow does not touch the floor.
• Grip under the paws. A dog who has to correct himself on a slippery floor tenses exactly the muscles that already hurt.

About that last one, let me be honest: non-slip dog socks do not take pain away. They are an aid for grip, not a treatment. What they do is take out the sliding and the fright, so your dog dares to load his legs instead of creeping. Which size he needs is based on the width of the spread paw print, which the size calculator turns into a size for you. More home aids are covered in arthritis in dogs: what helps at home.

The short version

A dog in pain does not complain. He does less. Look at what he has stopped doing rather than at what you can hear. Compare with last year instead of with yesterday. Spotting three or more of the thirteen signals? Book the appointment and bring your two-week log. That conversation goes very differently from simply saying he has slowed down.

Frequently asked questions

Can my dog be in pain without limping?

Yes. That is actually the normal picture. You only see limping when one leg is clearly worse than the other. With wear in both hips or both knees your dog spreads the discomfort evenly, so he does not limp but does walk slower, shorter and more carefully.

Can I give my dog paracetamol until the appointment?

No. Paracetamol, ibuprofen and aspirin can cause liver and kidney damage or stomach bleeding in dogs. Half a tablet is not safe either. Call the vet if the pain cannot wait. Your dog will then get a painkiller made for dogs.

How do I know whether it is pain or simply old age?

Old age on its own makes a dog calmer, not stiffer. If your dog needs a few minutes to loosen up after getting up, if he avoids stairs or no longer jumps, that is not an age but a joint. Only a vet can say which joint and how bad.