sugar's story

I went to the kennel with Roxy and Buster to bring home another foster dog.  We tried one male pitty who Roxy absolutely adored, Thunder.  Roxy and Thunder were play bowing and wrestling in no time, and I thought we were sold on bringing him home.  Then, I brought Buster out to meet Thunder, and, unfortunately, Buster had no desire to interact with Thunder at all.  Buster would growl whenever he came near.  We tried parallel walking and slow introductions, but Buster just wasn't having it. So, we opted to try another dog -- a female -- and hope that worked better for Buster.

Tammy, the foster coordinator and one of the only people I trust to help me introduce Roxy and Buster to dogs at the kennel, came out with a dog named Sugar, a white dog with red freckles and spots who had the most pathetic look on her face.  It was obvious that she had multiple litters of puppies in her life, and she was listed as only 3 years old. I was told she was friendly, and had been surrendered to a shelter without her puppies. The puppies had come in a few days later, but they were all adopted.  Sugar was recently treated for heartworm, and was to be kept calm for the next 4 weeks.

Buster was a much bigger fan of Sugar... his body language was so much more relaxed, he wasn't avoiding looking at her, and he was even sniffing and wagging his tail.  His whale eye was gone, and there were no growls of disapproval.  Roxy tried to play with Sugar, and Sugar just stood there, looking completely lost.... so we took her home for foster.

She spent the first several days asleep on the couch right next to me.  If I got up to go in the kitchen, she followed.  If the other dogs began playing, she would lift her head and watch for a few moments, before putting her head back down with a heavy sigh.

Her body was in rough shape.  She was practically molting, she had intense diarrhea, and her teeth were beyond yellow -- they were actually becoming orange in some spots.  We offered lots of bully sticks and chews, gave her a bath, and brushed her often and her body began to heal.

Slowly, but surely, Sugar showed that she was genuinely a loving dog, who's mission in life is cuddles, snuggles, and kisses.  She started to figure out our routine, and began running into her crate at meal times, and hanging by the backdoor when she had to go out.  She began zooming around and smiling, and was pretty much content to be loved all day long.

We started working on training, and Sugar was thoroughly confused.  She knew how to sit, but not on cue, and it was almost as if she offered a sit when she didn't know what to do, or when she thought she was in trouble.  But she seemed to have no idea that there were things she could do that would be rewarded, that she could alter her behavior to earn treats and other rewards, so I spent a lot of time working on that with her, and you could see she started to understanding that sit = reward.

Then, after a couple of weeks and she had settled in, Sugar started digging holes in the yard.   I approached her to redirect to a toy, and when I reached down for her collar, she literally cowered.  She flinched, sat, and rolled half-way on her back to expose her belly to me.  I felt terrible, knowing that someone had likely mistreated her... so as she rolled over, I rubbed her belly and she wiggled her little tail nub at me while staring in disbelief.  We did this a lot, I "practiced" approaching her and just loving her to pieces and after about a week of that, she stopped cowering and rolling on her back, unless she just plain wanted a belly rub.

Next, I wanted to teach her to target my hand... I called her name and she ran over to me and sat at my feet. I lifted my right hand up, about a foot in front of her face, and Sugar flinched.  Again, here is this literally perfect dog, and she was expecting someone to hit her.  So we worked on that, too. 

Sugar settled in very quickly, and her and Buster became fast friends.  Roxy was a little less tolerant of Sugar's play attempts, but all-in-all, Roxy liked her.  We had gotten very lucky with this dog that no one knew much about aside from being "friendly."  And, in the mornings when we get up and get ready for work, I would often find all three dogs, snuggled up on the bed together.

Sugar accompanied me on a trip to upstate New York, where I met with some of my rescue friends and volunteers from Rescue-a-Bull.  She met many dogs, and plenty of people, and she was fabulous.  By the end of the weekend, she was tired and bit less interested in making friends with the other dogs, but she had behaved ever-so-wonderfully.

I've been taking Sugar to adoption events, but we haven't gotten a lot of interest in her, despite her loving personality and adorable wiggles.  I've been updating her pictures, and posting about her frequently, to keep her fresh in everyone's minds.  And, we've been getting more inquiries for the last week or so, so I am beginning to get hopeful that she may be going home soon.  And although I'm hopeful, I'm a bit sad, because Sugar is literally a perfect dog.  Roxy and Buster both like her, her energy level matches theirs, and so does her intensity.  She adores Rob, she is funny, and snuggly, and just a completely lovable dog in all possible ways.  She is going to make someone very happy, that is for sure.  And the difference in her, from the day she came home and pouted while sitting on my deck for our adoption pictures, and now, is pretty amazing:

sonny came home

Week 1 with Sonny

Sonny came home with me the last few days of January. In the 4+ months he has been with me, he has grown and changed so much.  He started out hiding in my bookshelf, then hiding in his crate, and hiding in the closet for hours at a time.  If you touched him, he would cringe and cower.  A few weeks ago, he began snuggling with me.  My boy that spent the 1st day in my house hiding in a bookshelf, the rest of that first week hiding in a closet, and the next month plus in his crate, learned how to cuddle, just before he went to his forever home this weekend.

I can't even begin to describe how much he's grown.  The difference in his behavior from his first couple of weeks is indescribable. I could see it in his eyes; he went from petrified and frozen stiff to pure love and being full of wiggles.

His initial progress was only when he was around my dogs, Roxy and Buster. And once he stopped trying to jump the fence and he was allowed to run and play in the backyard, he made a lot of progress.  He began running, jumping, and playing in the yard.  He was fetching (or at least, chasing) the ball.  He got curious and started exploring things, he began relaxing on the couch, and he was freely jumping up and down the retaining wall in the backyard.  He figured out the routine and began responding to his name and to certain cues, like "Outside?" "Inside!" and "Are you hungry?"  He began voluntarily coming out of his crate and approaching me to play with him, throw his ball, and of course, to give me kisses or collect his dues (treats!).

When Sonny came home with me originally, he spent probably the first month in his crate, pressed up against the back bars so far that when he moved, you could see crate lines on his fur.  When I'd come home at night, I'd walk over and let Buster and Roxy out of their crates and Sonny would ever-so-cautious come out of his crate, but only after I had walked away.  I spent 90% of the time I was home thinking of creative ways to drop treats in his crate without spooking him.  And slowly, I began to notice progress in his face and body language when I would approach his crate.  It started with the fast-paced, only-moving-a-little-bit, still-nervous-and-unsure little tail wag, and it progressed to the full body wiggle and play invitations you see below:

When you work with a fearful dog, the little things are, in fact, monumental.  Sonny is seriously special to me; I adore him to pieces.  And I knew this day would come, where I would have to let him go, but I honestly didn't think it would be as soon as it was.  If keeping a third dog was an option for us, it would be ridiculously unlikely that I would have let this dog go.  Seeing him progress from the semi-feral dog he was, to the dog he is now, has been the most amazing thing to see.  Sure, he'll always be a little special, I'm sure, but this dog is happy, despite whatever previous neglect or abuse he may have endured. He has such a zest for life, it's incredible. He gets the zoomies like a puppy, he squeaks tennis balls while rolling on his back, he chases toys, and he literally bounces around the yard like a bunny. He still flinches when something scares him, but he is recovering faster that he was before.

Our last morning play session on Saturday.

Needless to say, saying goodbye to Sonny this weekend was not the easiest thing.  In fact, it was one of the hardest things I've done.  Despite knowing that he is in a wonderful home where he will grow and learn and be loved, I can't help but worry about my boy. This new adventure will undoubtedly stress him out, but I know it's the best place for him. His new family adores him and wants nothing more than to help him grow into the dog he has so much potential to be.  Luckily for me, his new family has agreed to allow me to visit him, but we'll obviously wait until he has settled in there and bonded to them.  The last thing I want to do is stress him out or confuse him more, so I get the feeling it will be months before I get to see him again. Although, I'm sure I'll get pictures.  But until then, Sonny is home with his new family and despite missing him, I am truly happy for him.

update on bobby

I got an update on Bobby from his adoptive family today!

Bobby is now Brody, and he's doing fabulous!!

From his new mom:

"He's just the happiest most playful boy and we adore him. We take him to obedience school on Sunday and he is the star student. The trainer is helping us work on some of his bad behaviors like barking and jumping when people come over."

He's got some allergies that they are working on with the vet, and hopefully they get them resolved soon.

I was, and still am, seriously in love with this dog and I couldn't have asked for a better home for him.  They love him, and he looks so incredibly happy.  Here he is, with a tug toy in his mouth, of course.

Sometimes we see some awful things in rescue, and updates like these give me the warm fuzzies I need to keep going, despite it not always being easy.

rescue-a-bull, a new and improved way to rescue

http://www.rescue-a-bull.com/

http://www.facebook.com/pages/RescueaBull/123909674342653

sonny

Meet Sonny.  Well, don't meet him. Don't try to talk to him, pet him, feed him, or cuddle him. Sonny is a fearful dog, and people are his kryptonite.

Since Bobby has a good looking meet and greet tomorrow, I'm exploring to find my next pet project dog.

Sonny is a very dog-friendly Pit Bull, but he is terrified of people.  He army crawls on the floor when people walk him places, unless he is with another dog.  Then his whole body perks up.

This picture was taken of him at the kennel, where I'll be working with him.  I have yet to take any pictures of him myself, seeing as he's terrified of people.  I don't think he needs a scary person with a flashing box pointing at him, so I'll wait on that.  It may be a while before I can get a better picture.

And I've only "met" this dog once, but I love him already.

bobby

Meet Bobby.  He's a year + old pit bull at my local rescue organization.  I fostered him back in March for about 2 weeks.  He was adopted very, very quickly, especially for a Pit Bull.  This dog is such a love, it's unbelievable.  The family that adopted him had 2 kids, and Bobby was kid-tested and approved.  The guy was used to having Rottweilers, so he seemed to understand the importance of taking extra care of a dog whose breed is stigmatized.  I spent a lot of time with this family to make sure it was the right fit.  And the family loved this dog, or so it seemed.

Three months after he was adopted, the guy called me and said they needed to return Bobby.  I was dumbfounded because I hadn't heard from them in 3 months despite giving the guy my phone number and telling him to call me with ANY issues, that I could get him in touch with people that could help if I couldn't.  He told me that Bobby was too dog aggressive and he was scared for his family, despite him showing NO aggression towards any people.  He refused to understand the difference between dog aggression and people aggression, which are vastly different things.  Anyway, I offered to come down to his house 1x a week until they were back on track with him, but he told me no way, that he'd tried everything.

Anyway, it turns out that they had been tying Bobby up outside for long periods of time.  And Bobby has a lot of barrier frustration issues, so this only exacerbated the problem.  So eventually, Bobby broke off of his tie-out and attacked a small dog, injuring it badly.  The small dog's owner took the family to court, and Bobby was deemed a dangerous dog (supposedly) and required to be walked on a muzzle and a prong collar. This, I know, is a lie.  The law does not dictate that a dog must be walked on a prong collar.

So the guy tells me that Bobby is too dog aggressive for him to handle anymore, and he needs to return him.  He tells me he tried the muzzle and prong collar, but he couldn't walk him because Bobby was so reactive and aggressive.  So he just stopped walking him.  Then he complained that Bobby was trying to jump through windows to get out of the house. Well yea, DUH... the dog needed exercise.

Whatever.  It's better he was returned to us, obviously that guy had no idea what he was doing.  So Bobby has been back with us now for 6 months or so.  I've been working with him a lot on his barrier frustration issues, self-control issues, and manners, but because he doesn't get exercised daily, which is what he needs, it's been a struggle, to say the least.  But I love this dog, and no one else takes him out of his run except for me.  The kennel frustrates him, a lot.  It's can be a very anxiety-causing place for a dog, especially a high-energy dog who doesn't have an outlet for that energy. But the moment we get away from the kennel, he is a totally different dog.

Interesting to me is that, since he's been back, he's shown very little, if any, dog-aggression.  He may be selective, and he can get over the top during play but that's because he doesn't get regular exercise. After he's been exercised to a normal degree, he can be around other dogs without a problem.  In October I had him at a Halloween parade for dogs, and he was walking amongst hundreds of other dogs, large and small, and he was an angel. Yet another reason I know this adopter just plain failed at life.

I've told Rob that, if we move and Bobby is still not adopted, we will need to try to integrate him into our home and take him.  I won't leave him behind. I sure hope he's not still there when we move, though... we won't be leaving for at least a year and a half. It will break my heart if Bobby is still there then.

agility

With all of Roxy's progress, I started taking her to the weekly walk-in agility class at Pawsitive experience in Rockaway.  This is the training facility that my local rescue uses.  Honestly, I'd never take a dog there to do any sort of actual training.  Although they have banned prong collars from use inside their facility, they still do a lot of correction based training (read: non-humane training) and I will not do that type of training with my dogs, or any dogs I foster or work with at the kennel.  But this place is 5 minutes away from home and has literally done wonders for Roxy's training.  Now that it's getting colder, there are fewer people to encounter on walks, and fewer dogs to practice ignoring, and fewer stimuli in general.  So this once a week course has been great.  Plus, I think it's important to mention that the instructor realizes Roxy's issues, respects what I choose to do to train her, and doesn't suggest that I give her a leash correction for barking.  She gets it, and we have a mutual respect for one another, despite the fact that I think their ways of training are, well... outdated and can be pretty barbaric.

We started a couple of weeks back and Roxy was pretty reactive the first couple of weeks.  The instructor said it's pretty normal for a new dog to act that way, because there is a lot going on, new smells, new dogs, lots of movement of said new dogs, new people, etc.

Anyway, this has become a great place to practice Roxy's self-control and do a lot of focus work.  Plus, she really seems to like agility.  The instructor was very impressed with Roxy's first class, especially being a fearful dog.  She struggled with the tunnel and the chute the first class, but did everything else without a problem.  At the second class, she was going through both the chute and the tunnel with ease.

The other great thing about this class is it's a "no-touch" class for the dogs.  No dogs are off-leash and no dogs are wandering around or getting in Roxy's face.  But I get the opportunity to mark and pay Roxy for calm behavior while there is a lot of stuff going on.  And there are tons of people there that think Roxy is just beautiful, so we get the opportunity to meet lots of dog-savvy people who ask before they give her treats and ask before they attempt to pet her.  We've been going through our "go say hi" protocol and it's been working great.  There are some people she likes almost immediately, and others it takes a little longer, but overall she's doing really, really well and I am so proud of her.

buster

We finally did it.  We adopted our foster boy, Buster.  He's some sort of lab mix, we're guessing.  But him and Roxy are such a pair, and Buster is truly an amazing dog.  We just couldn't let him go.

You see, Buster has 4 legs. But his front left leg was injured some time ago.  He was found as a stray and the injury was already there, so we really don't know what happened to him.  He's seen multiple veterinarians, including an orthopedic vet who previously fixed a dog with a similarly broken leg, but they said there was nothing they could do to fix his leg because there was too much nerve damage.  But, they said he's in no pain, and we began fostering him a few months ago to help determine if amputation might be necessary.  After a few days, we could see there was no way they could take Buster's leg.  He uses it so much, for balance, to play, to climb into your lap, to bring his ball closer to him, to hold toys, and, when he runs, he still balances on that elbow. Taking his leg would probably be more detrimental... 

So anyway, we initially had no intention of keeping a second dog.  And we had gotten a few applications on him, and only one was worthy of such a great dog, but things changed on the potential adopter's end so they were going to have to wait on getting a second dog.   We actually had one family say they wanted him because he only walks on 3 legs and they figured it was okay to not exercise him and he could be left alone, outside, in an unfenced yard because he can't run away.

Buster is such a great addition to our family.... him and Roxy are great little buddies, he's so cognizant of her moodiness, and because he loves everyone, he takes a lot of pressure off of her when we have people come over.  Everyone is busy loving on him while Roxy gets to sneak in her sniffs while they're not paying attention.  He gives her confidence, and the chance to explore for herself, which is a pretty big deal.  Plus, Buster is the only dog that Roxy has ever let cuddle with her. It was meant to be.

a little bit of background on our adoption

We decided we wanted a dog.  Well, I decided I wanted a dog. My boyfriend wanted a cat. But seeing as I'm highly allergic to cats, a dog it was, as long as he got to choose the breed.  He wanted a German Shepherd; it didn't matter to me. I wanted a fuzzy, 4-legged companion.  We inquired about a shepherd mix at a local rescue... but got a call that she had a pretty severe bite history, so we nixed that one.  But they were having an adoption event that weekend and my boyfriend insisted we go to meet some dogs. I was only mildly interested in going, I was pretty sure they wouldn't have any other German Shepherds available.

We drove to the pet store event, and as we passed the store, the dogs were outside. I wish someone had gotten a video of me.... I had both hands pressed against the window, one on either side of my face, mouth wide open, pressed against the glass. There was a beautiful brindle dog laying on the sidewalk. I wanted her. I knew from that instant that I wanted her.  My boyfriend parked the car and I jumped out and ran across the lot before the car was even off.  I approached the dog head-on, pet her head and face, and she shut her eyes and just enjoyed every second of it. This dog was meant for me. This was MY dog.

The volunteer told me her name was Bonnie. And she never acts like that, she's just a little shy but will warm up in no time.... Something that, at the time, I assumed was a sales tactic. "She's shy, but she already loves you! It's meant to be, take her home!"  We spent about an hour with her that day... they told me she was a Plott Hound mix, she came from a family in Georgia who had to give her up because they lost their home.  She lived with a nice family with two kids, she loved everyone, but she was a little shy.

We picked her up the next day.  It was June 28th, 2009.

We went to the pet store, where she followed me up the down the aisles as I looked for toys and food and treats.  We tried to go down the aisle with all the rawhides and dog goodies and about 1/3 of the way down the aisle, her eyes got wide and she panicked.  Her legs were moving as fast as possible, but she was getting nowhere.... until her paws got tangled in her leash and she fell flat on her face.  She stood back up without skipping a beat and dragged me down the aisle to get away.... After that, she downright refused to walk down any of the other aisles so we had to ever-so-cautiously meander along the wall to approach an opening, where she would safely walk.  Now, I didn't think much of it; it had been a very stressful day for her, finding her forever home and all. But that should have been my first clue that I was dealing with something a bit bigger than I thought.

I named her Roxy. I took my first picture of her, and sent it to my friends.  One told me she looked like a Pit Bull.  I said her paperwork said Plott Mix, but I didn't care, she was mine and I loved her.

The first few days were wonderful.  She loved me, and warmed up to my boyfriend fairly quickly.  Looking back, I regret not documenting her progress from day 1, but at the time, I was not aware that when the girl doing our adoption told us she was "shy," that they really meant she's "fearful" and that means she's a special needs dog.  I've come to notice there IS a difference between shy and fearful, at least by my definition.  A shy dog just needs a little bit of time to warm up, and then loves everyone. A shy dog needs to get the first sniff when meeting people.  A fearful dog needs a lot of time to warm up, and loves some people. And a fearful dog may get spooked by unexpected noises or movements, or falling tree branches, dropped kitchen utensils, babies crying, objects that are not in their normal places.... a fearful dog needs training, and knowledge of learning theory. Things that, at the time, I had minimal knowledge of.

I started noticing that she seemed shy of strangers, nervous around children, iffy with some other dogs, and overall, she spooked easily, but it didn't click until later on that I needed help with her. I had no clue what I was doing, and quite honestly, I'm still confused how the rescue I got her from thought telling me she was "shy" was enough of a description of her behavior in order for me to understand her issues.

I found out later that she had been at the kennel, rather than in a foster home, so I sort of assumed no one really knew about her behavior.  But, after spending time at the rescue's kennel as a volunteer, and talking to more and more volunteers, I learned that people were aware of her fear issues.  Someone told me she would jump back and hide from falling leaves while on walks.  She would crouch and hide at the back of her kennel when people were around.  She never approached people.  There were a few people that got close to her and would spend time with her, but not many.  Because she was fearful. And she looked like a Pit Bull.