Tibby Pre

I thought you all might like to see why I took Tibby to the behaviorist veterinarian on Tuesday.  And why we started her on medication.  A lot of people have told me that Tibby is just acting like a dog and I'm expecting too much from a dog.

 The first 2 are the video I made for our appointment - had to split it into 2 for youtube.

The other 2 are videos I made for myself of all the times I could find when Tibby was stressed in a training situation.  There are actually many, many more examples, but the videos were getting super long. 

I hope that these videos will be Tibby's Pre treatment videos and we'll be able to look back at these and see how much progress she has made :)

At 1:12 when she is reacting - she is reacting to seeing herself in a mirror. That is sort of what she does when she sees another dog on a walk. Only multiple that reaction by 10. She screams, lunges, whines, snaps, jumps, paws at the air. It's scary to be on the other end of the leash, because I know she's not in her mind when she's reacting and I'm a little bit afraid she might turn around and bite me.

 

 More staring at 'scary' things. She gets stuck and stares for long periods of time. The very beginning of the video is Tibby being scared of a mitten that fell onto her bully stick. Dhali was playing with the mitten and dropped it.


 

I'm Not Crazy

The appt. was wonderful.  So, so, so, so glad that I took her.  Dr. Duxbury said that Tibby is a classic case of canine anxiety.

It was a lot to take in and a long appt. - 3 hours, but I am very, very hopeful that this will help Tibby to feel better.

So remember my GPS that has been trying to kill me?  Today I turned it on and nothing - black screen, no GPS.  Ooookay.  Luckily I was able to find the U of M with an old fashioned map!

Tibby gave them a very good demonstration of her behavior.  We moved to a larger room in the large animal hospital and there were some dogs barking in the building that made Tibby very nervous - pacing, panting, hiding underneath chairs, shaking, whining and climbing into my lap.

  Tibby wouldn't take treats (too stressed), so we used Dhali as the practice dog for the exercises- u-turn, mat work, hand target, sniff walks (eventually).  Tibby is also starting Fluoxetine (Prozac).  Also, Trazodone for vet visits and when I take Dhali somewhere and have to leave Tibby alone.

  I'm not sure if it's because she is exhausted from the appt. or if it's the first dose working already, but she has been very calm and relaxed this evening.  She does not want to play with Dhali at all and she told him to stop jumping on her  they just had a fun game of chase in the backyard, but other than that she's really relaxed.   She isn't pacing, she's sleeping and she let me pet her and snuggle her without grumbling at me.

Dhali was of course super cute at the appt.  They said that he was very smart - which he is!   He thought the appt. was both awesome - treats!  and boring - yawn, going to sleep here in the middle of the room.  

I got a whole bunch of hand outs to read and a book, Feisty Fido, and a basket muzzle.

I wish I had taken her months and months ago.  Feeling very hopeful! 

Over The Bridge

"Trip, trap, trip, trap who's that walking over my bridge?"

Busy week starting today.  Let's see - tomorrow I'm taking Tibby (and Dhali) to her appt. (our appt?) at the U of M.  Yes, we got moved up from our appt. in March.  Whoo hoo!  And I'm also super nervous.  I not a big fan of driving in the Cities and our appt is at 8:30am, so driving right into rush hour.  We'll have to leave very, very early, like 5am.  Then the appt. - not sure what we are going to do or how it will work.  I want to be able to answer all their questions and get things figured out, but I am so NOT a morning person plus stress of getting to the appt.

Then on Sat. Dhali has his first real show!  Very exciting!  We are going both Sat. and Sun.  Tibetan Terriers show after 2 on both days and it's in St. Cloud for any one that is interested in seeing a dog show.  The entrance fee for visitors is a food shelf item.  There are just under 800 dogs entered on Sat. and over 800 dogs entered on Sun.   There are 7 TTs entered and one of those is Dhali's litter mate Nickle.  Can't wait to see him again and see the boys together.  When I was looking for a TT puppy one of the things that I wanted was to be able to see their family every once in a while.  I don't know why, but that seems kind of nice - maybe because I don't have a big family, I want my dog to have a family?  

Speaking of family:  My Grandma has taken a turn for the very worst.  She was baking cookies, doing mental memorization exercises and took a marching walk around the block on Wed.  Wed. night she started vomiting blood and since then she has been in bed heavily medicated and mostly sleeping.  The Hospice nurse checked on her Friday and prescribed a liquid form for of one of the meds.  She hasn't eaten since Wed. and has only had tiny sips of water for the last 4 days.  My Mom is doing an amazing job taking care of my Grandma.  I hope I can do as good of a job when it's my turn to take care of my Mom.  I have taken a few turns sitting with my Grandma, but mostly my Mom has been doing everything for her.   

A Boring Walk

Hoo-ray!  We had a boring walk.  Tibby wasn't reactive AT ALL.  Zero.  Zip.  She saw dogs that barked at her and she didn't bark at them or stare at them or lunge at them.  She saw men and she didn't growl or lunge or bark.  We just took a nice walk.  The dogs wrapped their leashes around me at every step, so it wasn't a fast walk, but what a nice boring walk.

Now the question is:  Was it because of the 1/2 tab of benadryl I gave Tibby at lunch time (6 hours before our walk) that made the difference?  Tibby has been having some itchies due to those stupid ticks that bit her last week.

"I had nothing to do with this mess."

"I'm just supervising."

"He did it."

"You're in trouble now.  I told on you."

Shoppin'

I took Dhali and Tibby shopping at Runnings (farm store) tonight.  Dhali again, Tibby's first time.  I took them in separately, which I think the girls at the register thought was funny.  Of course, they thought Tibby was Dhali coming in for a 2nd visit!  Yeah, Dhali's getting big, but not THAT big!  

So Dhali really likes going shopping.  He goes right in the doors and isn't shy about anything.  I'm not sure if he's learning to focus on me.....although I was able to reward him for watching me quite a few times.  Mostly I just let him 'browse'.  aaaand he did!  He found lots of little tasty snacks all over the store.  Hmmmm, may need to re-think this shopping as socialization idea.  He found a few pieces of spilled kibble in the dog food isle - our brand even! and some rabbit food and a peanut shell.  I was treating him with his kibble, but I guess free kibble is tastier. 

I'm thinking a few more visits and then we will try doing some tricks.  He did simple ones -sit, spin and nose touch, but I would like to work on other things - 4 feet in a bowl, push little wheeled cart, get up on tippy step.  He sort of looked at what I was offering and then said, "Nah. I'm good looking for snacks on the floor right now.  I don't want to work."  O-kay.  Big breath.  It's o-kay. 

He is really very well behaved though.  Walks right along and looks at people and then looks back at me.  AT THIS POINT I really can't compete with free found snacks on the floor, but soon hopefully with practice  I will be more valuable than an empty peanut shell on the floor. :P

I debated about bringing Tibby into the store - on one hand if she was naughty they might not let us back into the store and on the other hand she might be good.  She was pretty good, although I saw that she REALLY does have a fear of men.  Woman approached her and she was all waggy tail, "Hi there!".  Husband of woman came up and she was, "Ah!  Retreat!  Stranger!"  But she didn't have a reactive episode, so that is a big PLUS in the go Tibby column.  One thing about Runnings - 90% of the people shopping are men.  There was another dog in the store, a big pointer of some kind, but I don't think she saw him.  When I realized there was another dog walking around I made sure we didn't get too close to them.  I didn't want to ruin our up to then good shopping trip.

One thing that surprised her (and Dhali doesn't even notice) people talking in other isles where she can't see them.  She was very suspicious of those invisible people.  We walked through the toy isle and there was a talking gerbil toy.  She was scared of it for a second then when she realized it was a toy she made the funniest sound/head shake - like she was rolling her eyes at it, "Oh, what a waste of time pfffft!"

She was VERY happy that we brought home another croaking frog.  It's a small size one, but she will have to be happy with it.  She broke the big one - no more ribbity, ribbity - that we've had for a couple months.  It is the ONLY toy that she wants to play with by herself.  She carries it around and gets upset when Dhali tries to take it.   Last night she brought it to me a bunch of times to play fetch.  So yeah we had to get a new one!  Even though it is a very annoying noise - I would gladly take a squeaker any day.

Peeing On Your Beach

Oh, yeeeeah Dhali is peeing on the beach.  We took a walk today and it wasn't horrible, so I think we will try it again tomorrow, maybe.  It was Tibby AND Dhali on the walk, so it was not a fast walk!  They sniffed everything and got their leashes all tangled up a million times.  We saw too many things for me to list them all.  Just imagine a lot of city noise - cars, kids, people, dogs plus a football and soccer game.  

Tibby didn't ever have a full blown reactive outburst (like she did last week when we were hiking *sigh*).  At almost the very end of our walk there was a woman with a tiny little dog walking toward us.  I tried to walk faster than the lady, so that we could turn off the sidewalk onto our street and go home.  Unfortunately, they also turned off and followed behind us!  Tibby jumped around on the end of her leash, but at least she didn't roar at the woman and dog.  People get so insulted when she does that.

Tibby was able to walk past lawn signs, which used to be a huge scary thing to her.  She also didn't mind when a guy walked about a block behind us.  She did growl at a teenager, but I'll give her that one.  The teenager had bad/threatening body language - walking straight at us across a street and staring (not in a friendly way - in a rude way).  She's allowed to growl at those weirdos.

"Hold still!"

Faster Fetching Foster

Ellie likes to fetch!  Every time we play, she gets better at bringing it back.  When I picked her up yesterday I asked, "So what kind of toys does Ellie like?"  And I was told, "Oh, she doesn't really like toys.  Yeah it's too bad she doesn't have any toy drive.  We had a flyball home looking at her, but she just isn't interested in balls.  Yeah, too bad."

LOL!!  I think she likes balls just fine! 

Tibby likes having her own personal dog to chase ;)  Although she was lagging waaaay behind when we went out again tonight.  She even sat down and just watched Ellie run after the ball.  Maybe she's a little sore???

We also went for a walk today.  I would have taken pictures, but juggling two leashes, two full poop bags AND a camera would have been too much for me.  They walked together very nicely.  Tibby was completely relaxed - zero reactive episodes or even coming close to having one.  She looked at a jogger that was running up behind us, but wagged her tail at HIM (!!) and was relaxed and happy.  Ellie is cute - whenever we stopped (Tibby sniffing, me changing hands with the leashes), she would sit down and wait for us.

I definitely see the border collie in her and the Australian Shepard.....not so much the lab.  Except she likes water a lot - to walk through and maybe swim???

The only 'issue' has been chewing.  I gave her a Kong and she chewed it in half in 2 seconds.  I gave her a bully stick and she ate it in 5 mins.  I gave her an antler and she isn't chewing it.  So somewhere between antler and bully stick I need to find the perfect chew for her.

I'm just waiting for her to feel comfortable....for the honeymoon to end!  She has been an angel in the crate.  She didn't say ANYTHING for the first 24 hours.....now she's doing a little pouting - Why does Tibby get to walk around?  Not fair!  Hey Tibby doesn't chew kongs in half, baby.

Finders, Keepers

I have been trying to get a good picture of Tibby laying on my lap.  She does this all the time, but it's hard to get a picture of it.  She has to have a pillow to support her head.  If it's not perfect and she isn't comfortable or properly supported then she jumps off.  However, if everything is perfect then she lets me rub her belly!

Tibby wearing her superhero walking costume :P

I had Tibby wear her Thundershirt on our walk today and we had a lot of success.  It's not a miracle cure or anything - I still used the cheese and did our little focus game when there was a potential reaction trigger.  My goal is to keep Tibby from reacting.  I don't want her to rehearse that behavior ( any more than she has already).  Our walk was 100% successful!!

At one point I was basically luring her past some triggers, but it's Ok with me.  If that's what I have to do at this point....that's what I have to do.

The luring part we were walking by - man walking alone (biggest trigger), man mowing lawn, woman standing in yard with arms folded watching us and an off leash dog barking and moving toward us (another big trigger).

Yes I had to lure her past them, BUT she was able to actually eat the cheese and be lured.  It hasn't always been that way.  I almost lost her when the barking dog started to move toward us, but then she came back to me :)  Good thing I crossed the street when I saw the off leash dog up ahead.  She isn't ready for a moving dog right next to her yet.

We also met a nice older couple that wanted to pet Tibby.  I'm not sure when Tibby went from the outgoing/crazy/jumping on every stranger puppy to the shy/timid/ducking an outstretched hand dog.

But she didn't bark at them!  Yay....

Finally, a public notice.  If you lose your balls in front of my house....I will keep them.  Yes, I'm the mean neighbor that keeps the neighborhood kids' toys.  I give them the overnight test.  You have one day, one night and one day to claim your balls.  If they are still there the next night - then they are mine!  We aren't really interested in any other toys....and they only ever seem to lose balls....hmmm?

These are the latest lost toys - a spiky ball and a super heavy purple ball.  The purple one is really heavy - I've never seen a ball like it before.  Yay!  Free toys!

Good Little Fluffer

We had a very good walk day!  I thought Tibby would pick this up fairly quickly.

We saw a delivery man getting things out of his truck and were able to pass by him (about 6 feet away) with zero reaction from Tibby.  She saw him - he said 'Hi' to us, but she was too busy heeling and working for cheese.

We saw a few cars - I stop and have Tibby sit and eat cheese while they go past, to eliminate the lunging for cars.  Very successful.

We saw a man using a wheelchair lift to put an elderly person into a van (about 20 feet away) Tibby had a level one/two reaction.  Stiff body language, tail dropped, staring hard at the man.  She stared hard at him for about 2 seconds, ignored me when I called her once, but responded when I started to move away from her and called her again.  She looked back once and then kept walking with me.

I read this post today Flying Dog Press and I think it made a difference in my attitude and our success.

I paid attention to Tibby instead of scanning the world for possible threats.  I talked to her and told her she was doing great.  And she was!  She heeled for 90% of the walk.  Once she checked out to pee, once to poop and once to sniff some bird poop.

I don't ask her to heel, but she seems to think that will get her the cheese faster. 

For day 2 I think she is doing great :)

 

Cheesy

Day one of walking reactive retraining went pretty well.  I think Tibby will figure out this game quickly.  It will also help our focus issues in other areas.  Basically I'm asking her to focus on me and ignore the rest of the world.

We went for our walk as it was getting dark.  I was hoping there wouldn't be too many people out walking.  It was such a gorgeous day that I'm sure the 7 parks (yes 7 huge park, too bad Tibby isn't reliable off leash or she could enjoy them) ,that I live next too, were full of people walking the trails. 

So we saw 2 boys on skateboards and 2 people walking.

I saw the boys coming toward us and I stepped off the trail and had Tibby sit facing me and I gave her lots of cheese.  She saw the boys and was biting me fairly hard, when she took the treats.  When they were about 20 feet away she barked once at them and then whipped back around and took some more cheese.  That was pretty good for her.  No lunging and the leash was loose, because she was sitting.  One bark, instead of a screaming fit.

The people walking she did bark a few times at them.  I couldn't stop and have her sit in that situation, because of the way the trails meet in the park.  The people would have eventually been following us - which she does NOT like.  I was able to keep her moving and give her cheese.  She heeled all the way home, hoping to get more cheese.  That's a first.  Hmmm, I just have to carry a cheese stick in one hand.  Magic!

Work in progress. 

Life project.

Stranger Danger

We had a bad walk day.  I'm disappointed in myself.  Tibby is reactive.  It's pretty decided now and I can't pretend that it's not really a problem.  I have been trying to manage it for a long time - since I brought her home at 4 months old.  Now she's 2 and it's only getting worse.  I've been doing some reading and I guess what I have been doing is not all wrong, but I just need to be more prepared.  And honestly say - this is a problem and it needs to be managed better.

Today she had level 8 reactions to - A boy in a hooded sweatshirt who rode up on his bike behind us and an old man that started following us.  She had smaller (quiet) reactions to a boy on a scooter, a plastic ball in the street and 2 small dogs crossing the street 3 blocks away. 

Right now when I see something that is a potential reaction trigger (like a bike, rollerblader, stroller, scooter, men walking alone) I have her sit and we wait for them to pass by us.  I should start carrying treats again....

I do wonder what is wrong with some people - if you saw a dog that was growling, barking, lunging and snapping at you, would you A) ride your scooter as close as possible to the dog? OR  B) Stop to ask why the doggie doesn't like you?

Ok, I'm mean and bad, but I when people see me keeping Tibby of off the sidewalk and waiting for them to pass and they don't give us any space - I sometimes think about letting her go.  Hmmm....yeah it's wrong, but I'll bet they would stay away next time.  I also wonder what would Tibby actually do?  No we won't ever find out.

I crazy thing is that I think people see a cute fluffy dog and don't realize that she (if you are on a bike, rollerblades, scooter or male) wants to rip you up.  Then they get closer and she lets them know.

The old man walking behind us - I was glad she told him off.  And that's part of the problem.  My problem.  She's alerted me to a lot of creepy people on our walks before.  Or the weird neighbor man that peeks over my fence.  Weirdo.   And I like that she tells me about those creepers.   But I don't want her to be known as the mean dog on the block any more.

So now you know.

Our secret.