Doggy Dilemmas

Time for another seven minute blog post!

Since last I wrote, life took an unfortunate turn.

Two of my dogs fought again.

It was super traumatic. For me and the dogs. I only now feel partially recovered. I mildly injured my hand in trying to break up the fight--just stiff and a little swelling/over quickly, but I'm talking about the emotional trauma. I honestly thought they were killing each other. I knew with certainty that one of them would end up dead. I tried everything to get them apart. I even called 911, who patched me to the Police Department, who said that the Animal Control people had left for the day already. By the time they had called back to check in on me, I had miraculously managed to get them apart.

I'm not re-living the event in my mind nearly as often as before, and slowly feeling a little better every day.

They've been separated for over a week and this makes our home life more stressful. No more snuggling on the bed together. No more lounging in the living room with my loverloverman and all three dogs. Now we take turns sitting with them in different parts of the house, making it so that even the humans get separated from each other for stretches of time. (insert sad face)

At least the rigor of medications is over. Two different pain meds and two different antibiotics, two and three times a day, for two different dogs was crazy insane to go through. I've been to several vet appointments, with still one more to go. Humphrey needs to go in next week to get his stitches removed.

Also next week we start a new kind of dog training. I have high hopes for this time around. We've done others in the past with limited success. Loverloverman is right in pointing out that some of that "limited success" was our fault for not personally training them everyday (in addition to the two training sessions the professionals would come and do each week.) And this training will focus on changing dog emotions--specifically the problem ones: fear, anxiety, aggression.

We will be putting both dogs through training (a first), and both dogs will get personally trained by us every day (also a first). We will be changing around some of the things at home that cause extra stress for the dogs, hoping that will create a way for them to deal with their dislike of each other in less "rough and tumble" ways.

For instance, we will be installing a mailbox at the street. Two of our dogs go completely dire-wolf on the mailman through the window when he or she approaches the house mail slot. Why get the doggy adrenaline going and just cause them to be all fired up around each other? That's a recipe for disaster, right? With a mailbox at the street, no mailman at the house, no doggy freak-out, no running into each other, no fighting. Win/Win.

I'll blog about our training successes (or failures) in the upcoming weeks.

Look here for tips and tricks that might help you in your doggy dilemmas. Let's learn together.