Time Flies When You're Having Fun!

My goodness! I can't believe how fast time has sped by this winter. Can't say that I'm wanting it to slow down exactly, since the weather here in Texas has been colder than normal. Spring can't get here fast enough!

A quick update on Ms. Tula: She is still looking for her forever home. Seems the right one has not come along just yet. I never give up hope - her family is out there. In the meantime, I'm quite enjoying her company while she's here. She is a sweet soul and as I've come to discover, a bit of clown, too!

Ms. Lisa has made some interesting new progressive leaps in her behavior. Her favorite pastime of scratching has dramatically reduced in recent weeks. Yay!!! In fact, her scratching at her crate pan has completely vanished: she no longer does it in either of her 2 crates. Even, the frequency of her wall scratching episodes has also declined. Now, she will scratch once or twice then, come to me. Of course, if I'm standing right next to her favorite scratching spot before she starts, she just looks up at me and then comes over or follows me as I lead her away.

In other recent Lisa news, her downs have become more consistent. She often would require me to repeat the hand signal a few times before she would lay down, but now we're down to once or twice. One other change has been her willingness to just sit on her own, just cuz! I love it! It's a behavior that she rarely offers and one that when she does I try to reward. If I'm especially lucky, she may even lay down and relax on her own, too! For a dog who never sat or laid down at all, these are huge milestones.

Her health has been great! She's been doing well and completely recovered from her ordeal in December. I did a bit of trimming around her face to allow her to see better and wow! she was like a new dog. It wasn't like I had never clipped the hair so she could see before, I just did it differently so it would stay out of her face. I guess it made an impact. :-)

Lisa's hearing has been playing cruel tricks on her. When the other dogs bark or a loud noise happens, she gets startled very easily, more so than she has in the past. When this happens, she wants to scatter and get away from the area quickly. Perhaps, her increased awareness of her surroundings has also led to this. I combat the situation by going to her, telling her she's okay and petting her a few times in a calm, purposeful way. I don't console, just steady her and let her know everything is fine. A few times now, she's actually turned to me when she's gotten freaked about a loud noise and that's what I want ultimately. Defer to me and I will let you know what's what. Speaking of increased awareness, she still sits and watches the activity outside her crate. Even if I think she's asleep, she gets the scent of me, my husband, or the other dogs walking past and she wakes up and looks around to see what's going on.

Again, all positive signs that we still are waking up even more parts of her sleepy brain!

Photos are of Lisa & Tula sharing a snack as I was refilling the food bin. They took turns each grabbing a bite! Naughty grrrlz! LOL

Exciting Progress

Lisa has come so far in a short amount of months. In my last post, her milestones were documented. Recently, some new consistent behaviors have started to emerge and it's really exciting. Lisa has begun to ask to go out. She has her own way and it takes vigilance in recognizing "her signals", but she is definitely making an attempt at asking to go out. Yay!!! She can't be entirely trusted 100%, but this is a tremendous step in the right direction.

Another consistent behavior Lisa has begun to do more often is sitting on command. Previously, she would do this once in a while. Now, it seems she has gotten the hang of sitting when asked. To help reinforce this command, I've been using treats. This exercise has helped with bridging another concept - the command+action=reward concept. It's exciting to see the a-ha moment!

Lisa Milestones

When I sit back and think of the progress Lisa has made while she's been fostering with me, I am still in awe of how far she's come in such a short amount of time. With mill dogs, I believe in celebrating the small victories. Here's a list so far of Lisa's.

• She freezes less and readily will go with me most places.
• Walks ahead of me through doorways.
• Not falling down nearly as much and can steady herself.
• Faithfully goes to the grass to do her business instead of just going on the concrete.
• She scratches at the walls less often.
• She investigates new things and new ways to get around furniture.
• Uses her mouth like a puppy does to explore the world around her.
• Looks up at you and makes eye contact.
• She goes into her crate on command, doubly fast if you are holding her dinner dish.
• Will sit, not so much on command, but with a little tap on her back she will.
  
• Actually sits on her own more often as opposed to standing or lying down.

And perhaps the biggest milestone yet, is she kinda has developed her own way of telling you she has to go. It's not a big sign and if you miss it, you might as well get out the cleaning supplies, but she has repeatedly given me a clue that she needs to go out.

Tackling the Challenge, Pt 3

Covering the last three bullets, constructive mental stimulation, deprogramming 11 years of experiences, and how to enjoy life as a dog, shows how we need to take Lisa into a different direction mentally. Pulling her away from her past and bringing her more into the present is the goal. Like the first six sets of challenges, these are not easy, either, but the rewards are astounding. Here is where we see Lisa truly blossom.

Awakening her sleepy brain is something that is essential to long term success. Her life until now has been boring - practically the same thing day after day. For working dogs and most dogs in general, the lack of adequate mental stimulation has been linked to destructive and anti-social behaviors. Can you imagine how dull life must been confined to a pen or cage? The only interactions you ever get is from the dogs on either side of you, that you may or may not even see. Then add, the routine breedings, cycle after cycle. Doesn't sound like fun to me? This life is the life puppy mill dogs live; human interaction is minimal and usually unpleasant.

To tackle the challenge of awakening Lisa's sleepy brain, it was helpful to look back at puppy experiences and use those as launching point for helping Lisa. Exposing her to different sounds, different surface textures, different smells and even different tastes reach different areas of her atrophied brain and encourage new synapse creation. For sounds, the television is useful as is CDs, like "dog show" noise as it has a variety of sounds. Exposing Lisa to different tastes was a fun one. For this, giving her different types of foods to sample helped to accomplish not only different tastes, but smells and textures, too. The food samples were small and always something she could easily digest even with the few teeth she has. Some food examples that were given included oranges, freeze dried fruits, fresh strawberries, beef jerky, chicken, steak, marshmellows, ice cubes, and others. These were not given all at once, but intermittently over a week or two. I used essential oils to help with smells, in addition to just being creative. Textures, just like with puppies, getting Lisa used to walking on different types of surfaces, concrete, grass, tile, carpet and wood flooring.

Deprogramming 11 years of experiences, I wish I could say is easy. It would be nice to sprinkle a little something in her food to make her unlearn all her behaviors from the past. We already know rescue dogs like to forget the past and do their best to put it behind them. Situations put them back into instances where they are forced to "remember". Unfortunately and fortunately, time, patience, and consistency are the only things that will truly help Lisa forget her past. In the months she has been fostering with us, we have seen an slow, but steady improvement. One example, Lisa will walk through a door ahead of me. When she first came here she wouldn't do that and now she does. She has unlearned a past experience and learned that its safe and "okay" to go ahead when told to do so. That, to me, is progress.

Enjoying life as a dog is the only challenge that Lisa will have to truly discover for herself. This life skill is where a dog discovers who they really are as a dog - their own dog, so to speak. Up until now, Lisa's life had been dictated. Yes, she did exist and was still her "own dog", but that's all, she EXISTED. She had no joy, no fun, nothing to celebrate, and nothing to make those gorgeous brown eyes sparkle. Once you've seen that celebration of life in a dog, you can easily recognize it in dogs who don't have it. For example, look at the eyes of a dog who has their prized ball in their mouth; there's enough sparkle in those eyes to power the sun! Or a dog who is rolling on the floor with feet pointing in all directions just enjoying a moment of pure bliss. Lisa and dogs like her don't know what that's like. They have been robbed of those joyous moments.

Happily, I get to report that Lisa is slowly discovering who she is as a dog. Each day spent with her reveals more and more of her personality. As she continues to feel more secure in her environment, she's opening up. One of her favorite activities is roll on the floor. At first, she'd do it where no one was watching her, as if she was embarrassed. She didn't know I was watching her. When she was done, she'd look around to see if anyone saw what she was doing. As time has past, she has lost her inhibition and now will free roll on the floor wherever and whenever she wants. The look on her face is that of pure joy. Brings tears to my eyes to see it.

Tackling the Challenge, Pt 2

Continuing onto the next three bullets, these are primarily all training issues: potty training or housebreaking, dealing with expectations, and redefining the command + action = something good equation.

Starting with potty training, this area is one Lisa has trouble with. I have to openly admit that I had a lapse in my reasoning and began to trust her too much. Subsequently, I got stung by that false assumption. Following the puppy methodology of potty training, we started out doing really well. Then, I let the team down. I falsely believed she was getting the hang of this and tested her too soon. Now, we're back on track and happily, we've not had a true Lisa accident in the house in over 7 days (as of June 15). Yay! I say a true Lisa accident because she had a case of the dire rears and those cannot be counted against the team's overall performance. Poop, especially those of the dire nature, happens. Thankfully and knock on wood, Lisa doesn't have any incontinence issues, although she has done some submissive tinkling here and there. I feel like we should have an OSHA sign up that says how many days we've gone without an accident. Did I mention it was important to celebrate the small victories? It is very important!

As far as the expectations go, Lisa doesn't understand that she is expected to behave in a certain manner when indoors. For this reason, I'm glad she's here with me instead of boarding at a kennel. It would be impossible to teach this anywhere else, but in a home environment. It's probably worth mentioning that Lisa only in the past week has actually started responding to her name. A name wasn't even a concept she even knew existed. I didn't choose her name, the SPCA did in attempt to make her more marketable. To be honest, I don't even call her Lisa; I call her Lise (pronounced like lease for a new lease on life), but for consistency sake, we'll stick with Lisa.

In my house, Lisa does have my dogs to watch, but I've found that she hasn't been paying them any attention when it comes to picking up cues. Yet, one more developmental area she's been deprived in. We all know that a dog can teach another dog something faster than we humans ever could. Still, she doesn't have this basic tool in her toolbelt. That leaves it up to us to teach her not to scratch the walls, not go in the house, when its okay to relax and lie down, etc. Let me be clear, these are not the same expectations we place on children. I don't expect my dogs to be perfect little gentlemen, they're not going to be, because they're dogs. Dogs will do what dogs will do, which includes bark, jump, sniff, chew, eat, drool, lick and a myriad of other verbs all associated with dog behavior. Still, there are certain expectations placed on a dog when they become a part of household. Lisa needs to understand that with the blessing of a new life does come a little bit of responsibility. ;-)

Lastly, redefining the Command + Action = Something Good equation is one that will take the longest to acheive. It will take time and consistency to show Lisa that good things do come from humans. It doesn't always have to be bad. We already have a solid bridge to build upon since she doesn't have a fear of people. She readily walks up to anyone she sees and waits for them to pet her. If you stop, she not so gently reminds you with her paw that you've seemed to have stopped and she didn't give you leave yet. We are so lucky that both mill girls, Penny and Lisa, didn't have a fear of people. While Lisa uses people for affection, Penny, in the beginning, didn't see a need to fraternize with people. Still, one more way mill dogs are psychologically traumatized and handicapped by their experiences. Truthfully, in that environment, you can't blame them for anything; they are a true product of their environment. In the few days she had fostered with me, I already saw a change in her opinion.

While we have this bridge with Lisa, she does have a bit of an alter ego, too, Lady Freeze. Lady Freeze shows up whenever Lisa is concerned, stressed, unsure, or unwilling. This freezing stance is another mill dog defense mechanism. Another of her quirks, she would not go through the door ahead of me. She waits until I go first, then if she feels comfortable which could be 15 or more seconds later, she'll go. While I do my best to accommodate her, I can't leave the back door open and simply wait for her to make up her mind (goes back to the expectations). When the dogs go out, ALL the dogs go out and we go out together. Same for coming back inside - we do it together. Having the option of remaining inside while everyone else is out, is not available, nor is it up for discussion. Areas like this is where you have to be gentle and reassuring, but also firm and insistent. The rules are the rules and again, this still tracks back to teaching expectations. There is a fine balance between empathizing with the dog and where he or she has come from and providing the leadership and guidance all rescue dogs need. It can be dangerous to give the dog, too much leeway because you feel sorry for them. Dogs are after all the consummate opportunists and will capitalize on any situation they can. Give them an inch and they'll take a mile. It's not wrong for them to be this way, it's a survival instinct. However, guardians of these dogs, we have to be careful not to give away the farm.

In redefining her definition of the equation, I use myself as an her example. I'm teaching her a heel of sorts, by patting the side of my leg, I do this each time I start walking away and I want her to follow. Additionally, I'm careful to do this at her eye level. Mill dogs generally don't look up at people although Lisa again with the help of the "Watch Me" command is making more and more eye contact. When she does follow me and gets close enough for me to touch her, she'll get her reward, praise followed by a minute of pets and affection. Of course, every time I pat my leg, the boys coming running over and try to do a heel, too. We have quite the circus going on at my house!

Tackling the Challenge

In the last post, I described the framework of Lisa's training challenge. In this post, I'll talk about the plan for tackling it. To summarize her challenges;

• Senior dog
• Hearing & Vision Impaired
• Mobility and Coordination Need Improvement
• Has No Concept of Expectations
• Not Potty Trained
• Doesn't Understand Command + Action = Something Good
• Needs Constructive Mental Stimulation
  
• Deprogramming 11 Years of Experiences
• How to Just Enjoy Life as a Dog

While this laundry lists seems long and daunting, it can be broken down quite easily. The first three bullets are entirely physical. The next three are based purely around training, while the last three are a bit ethological.

Starting with the first three physical bullets. There's not much to be done about Lisa being an older dog other than make sure she's as healthy as she can be. Second, her hearing and vision impairments present challenges in training. For a hearing impaired dog, you can't always give verbal corrections, especially when a dog doesn't even know what a correction is or why it is being given. Lisa is a prime example of this. She has a penchant for scratching at my walls. I don't understand the behavior, but she will just walk over to a few choice walls in the house and start scratching away. She will also do this same behavior in her crate and on the floor, too. This behavior is unacceptable in a household environment, so corrections and redirection must be given. Just like with a puppy, you have to physically instruct them first, while providing a verbal cue, i.e. No scratching. Catching the behavior before it starts is even more imperative; I think you gain more ground by catching them a half second before they start. It surprises the dog every time, "How'd they know I was gonna do that?" "Hey Buddy, you're not the only one who observe and take notes around here!" :-)

Conversely, hollering from across the room, "No scratching!" isn't going get very far with a deaf or partially deaf dog. Sadly, shining a light doesn't do much to alert a dog whose vision is impaired. Lisa can see, she just can't see that well, She tends to lose track of people and sometimes where she is. It takes her a second or two to reorient herself. For awhile, I wasn't sure if she could hear at all, guess she's was just practicing that Beardie "You talking to me?" discriminating hearing. Creativity is the key to overcoming both of these obstacles.

Lastly, her mobility and coordination are areas that have been under rehabilitation since she came under my care. Our walks up and down my sloped yard, plus a trip up and down the stairs, intermixed with very short neighborhood walks to build stamina have all worked wonders. Lisa is stronger. She has short spurts of puppy-like running. Her front legs flail up in an almost pouncing sort of way when she runs. It's so cute. To help with coordination, Calvaletti poles seemed like a good idea. After all, it's what we use to train both horses and puppies to learn foot placement. Some balance exercises were also thrown into the mix as were agility exercises. Agility exercises consisted of her trying to keep up with me as I trotted or walked just a foot or two ahead of her. I would snake a few times through the yard around obstacles and such. Her job was to follow me. These I've kept to a minimum as building strength was the first priority. Once the strength has built up enough, then I can focus more on building better coordination and stamina.

The Training Challenge

Training Lisa has taken on a life of its own. Her hearing and eye sight add new elements to an already challenging situation and test my skills as a foster mom. In earlier posts, I mentioned that Lisa and Penny were adult "puppies". In many ways, they are and in equally many ways, they're not. Puppies tend to learn the 'action equals result' equation quickly, not so with Lisa. To look at this through her eyes, Lisa only knows this equation equals bad for her. My husband and I, along with other people Lisa has met, are working hard to change her definition of this equation and show her a different kind of result.

Often when I go to pet her, she'll squeeze her eyes tight and wince. My Tedi used to do the same thing when he came here a year ago. I tell Lisa the same thing I did Tedi, "Sweetie, we don't hit here." It also reminds me to start petting her under the chin or on the sides of the body FIRST. Eventually, they learn that motions towards the top of the head aren't going to be painful. It's a reflex; in addition to being hit, Lisa was grabbed by the scruff to be pulled from her cage. This method is common handling practice for mill owners when moving the dogs around to different pens. When "directing" Lisa, I've been careful to use very light pressure on her collar to encourage her to move in the direction I need her to go.

Since Lisa does not understand the concept of receiving a treat as a reward for a desired behavior, I've had to be more creative in this area. Lisa loves to be petted, so instead of using treats as a reward, we're using praise combined with a good lovin' on. Using affection as a reward instead of a treat is no different than using a toy on a dog that's toy-focused. Eventually, I'll be able to bridge the treats in, but for now this works. I'm careful to not push her too hard or expect too much from her. Mill dogs are almost feral in a way and operate somewhat on instinct. Lisa has survived by being stronger and more adaptable. She's gotten this far in life with the skills she has. Now, we have to take those skills, whatever they happen to be, cultivate them and expand upon them. Additionally, we need to deprogram her. Deprogramming 11 years of behavior and bad experiences won't happen overnight. It will take time, patience, understanding, and above all love.

A Journey of a Thousand Miles

As Lao-Tzu said, "A journey of a thousand miles begins with one step," so is my journey with Lisa. Her growth continues to impress me. Each day, I'm tickled when she doesn't do something she used to do before or does something entirely new. One of her cutest behaviors is rolling. She will pick a spot either on the tile floor or the carpet, flop down and roll on her back. She'll spend anywhere between 10-15 or more seconds kicking her feet up in the air and do what I call "giggling" all the while. It is absolutely the greatest thing I've seen her do, but don't let her catch you watching or she'll stop. If she sees me watching her, she'll flip back over and get this look on her face as if to say, "ignore what you saw, you didn't see me do that." I love seeing her act like a dog and enjoy something so puritanical as rolling on her back.

Lisa has become quite expressive with her face. I've noticed her scowling when I get her to do either something she's not sure about or something she outright doesn't want to do (i.e. go outside because it's hot out there). Her scowling look consists of her furrowing her eyebrows. Of course, I've seen the stressed look more than I'd care to. That wide eyed look with a mouth stretched in an almost fake smile-like pant is hard to see on a full coated dog, but on a shaved down one those signals ring out. She does wag her tail when she feels like it. The ears perk up once in blue moon; they mostly hang down or go back depending upon the situation. I try not to put her in stressful situations, but through the course of the day she's bound to run into them. Continual assurance, lots of love, and understanding are what will get us over those rough patches.

Rehabilitating Lisa

Rehabilitating Lisa has been and is a rewarding challenge. She continues to amaze me. Her personality grows a bit more each day as she discovers who she is for the first time in her life. It's wondrous to see.

In preparing to do serious rehabilitation work, I looked online for some help. The site I mentioned in an earlier post, A New Start On Life (ANSOL), has helped give me a foundation to build upon when working with Lisa. On the outside, Lisa seems well adjusted. She doesn't hide, run, or pee submissively. However, that is on the outside and to the casual observer. Lisa has a big problem: she doesn't know what she doesn't know. When working with Penny, the first mill dog, I referred to her as a 6 year old puppy. In actuality, it's much worse. Penny, Lisa and mill dogs like them are "special needs" dogs. Not only are Penny and Lisa physically weak, they're developmentally weak. Their brains have never been exercised and like muscles in the body, if you don't use it, you lose it. In their case, they never had to begin with which makes matters that much worse. It just compounds the challenge that we've already begun.

Lisa's physical condition has returned to what it was before the surgery. She's gained some weight, about a pound or two and she looks better overall. She doesn't look drawn like before. Her rib cage is still distended, but at least when you run your hands over her there's a little something between the skin and bones. My physical therapy exercises are beginning to pay off. Lisa's gaining strength in her limbs. Her muscles felt like jelly before, now they're starting to feel a little firmer. I rotate around what exercises we actually do. Sometimes, its reps up and down this slight incline in the yard. Other times, it might be a leisurely stroll down my driveway. Now that the stitches are out, I've added stair work which also meant training a completely new concept. This feat was accomplished with the trail of treats strategically placed on the treads. Teaching her to go up was easy - to go down, not so much. Although, if you actually watch a dog go down a set of stairs like those in most houses, it's really a controlled fall down them. All of this we're taking very slowly.

Two Weeks Later

Two weeks following Lisa's brush with death, she continues to do well. Her incision is pretty much healed and she's got a spring in her step like I've never seen before. You can tell she really feels better. I was slow to wean her off her pain medication since she had both mouth and abdomen procedures done I didn't want her to be in any discomfort. Unlike us 2-leggers, our 4-legged companions prefer to suffer in silence and never let on that they're in pain.

In observing Lisa, I noticed she would sometimes fall. Not just fall down, it was like someone ripped the rug out from under her feet. Splat! She would go crashing down on the floor. At first, I thought she wasn't getting any traction on my tile and wood floors; she did slip a lot and it wasn't all the time, just once here and there. However, that changed and it became a little more frequent. When she fell outside on the grass in the same manner as she did in the house, I scratched my head. Hmmm....ear infection, perhaps? She had been scratching at one ear; again, not enough to warrant another visit to the vet. Prior to her surgery, she had been seen by 2 vets in the past month (both my own vet and the SPCA's); no one ever commented about her having an ear infection even though it is extremely common in mill dogs. The ear didn't smell bad; it smelled like an ear should. It also was relatively clean, a little waxy, but clean, nonetheless.

As I continued to observe her, I noticed her trembling just prior to falling. I also watched the manner in which she fell. Of course, these were instances when I could not come to her aid and prevent it from happening. Being the knowledge junkie that I am, I get on the Internet and start doing some research into canine vestibular disorders. Vestibular disorders are nothing new to me as I was diagnosed last year with both Meniere's Disease and Migraine Associated Vertigo. Lisa kind of acted the way I do when I'm feeling dizzy or off balance. Regardless, her falling episodes kept getting worse. Instead of the 1 or 2 a day, it would be 5 or 6 a day. She still wasn't scratching at her ear other than just the occasional scratch.

Her follow-up appointment at Angel Vet was due and she needed to have the staples removed, so I figured this was a good opportunity to ask the vet about this. While we didn't meet with Dr. Hassler, we did meet with Dr. Lane. Dr. Lane did a full neurological exam on Lisa; he even took her outside to walk so he could get a better idea of what she was doing. He spent a lot of time with us. I talked him through her situation and we discussed various diagnoses, ear infections, pinched nerves, brain tumor, etc. Our conclusion was she possibly had an inner ear infection; that combined with the lack of muscle tone and poor coordination skills were making it hard for Lisa to keep her feet under her. Ear drops were prescribed and Dr. Lane did a geriatric blood panel on her. The results of the blood test which came back a day later were fine.

Dr. Lane suggested Lisa do underwater therapy on a treadmill. While in any normal situation, his suggestion would make logical sense. However, try as they might, most vets and their staff don't understand puppy mill dogs - not really. It's not their fault. How could any reasonably sane individual who has a true love for animals understand puppy mill owners and what they put those dogs through? Keeping a dog in small cage for its entire life, never allowing it to run, jump and play and be...umm a dog? It's unconscionable! Despite numerous pictures of these horrid places, my brain still cannot comprehend the concept. I digress. Getting back to Lisa and the underwater treadmill, my first thought was probably not a good idea for her - perhaps when she's rehabilitated more and understands that nothing bad is going to happen, maybe... Right now, we'll just keep walking in the yard. ;-)