THE OTHER END OF THE LEASH

So many books, so little time! Here are a few I’m enjoying:

Magnificent Mind at Any Age by Daniel Amen. This is a fascinating book by a psychiatrist who began doing SPECT scans of his patients brains and discovered how many psychological/behavioral problems related to brain function. It’s an inspiring book for anyone looking to improve their health and behavior, and besides being motivated to exercise more and stop drinking diet soda (I know, I know), I find myself thinking about dog behavior on every page. Daniel relates multiple cases of people with behavioral problems (fear, depression, anger, impulsivity) that are improved through diet, exercise, supplements and medications that specifically work on areas of the brain related to those problems. Anyone out there see any dogs who are fearful, impulsive, etc etc…?)

Your Dog’s Best Health by Nancy Kay: The subtitle of this compact, highly readable book is “A dozen reasonable things to expect from your vet.” This book is a great summary of how to have the relationship you’d like with your veterinarian, written by a vet herself. Just as the book above can be extended to our dog’s health, I’d say this book could also be expanded to our relationships with our physicians. This book is short, sweet and full of useful information.

There’s a Dog in the House by Nancy Chwiecko and Amy Fernandez. “A practical guide for creating today’s dog friendly home,” this has got to be the only book out there that looks at your home from your dog’s perspective, advises on dog-proof but attractive furniture, has a chapter on helping dogs with special needs and how to repair the wall that your dog with SA chewed through.

I also just finished Therapy Dogs Today, which I read as part of my preparation for the seminar I’m doing in Naples on January 12 on AAA and AAT. By Kris Butler, this is by far the best book I’ve read on the subject, far superior to anything else I’ve seen. What I like about is especially is her focus on the patient’s and the dog’s needs, (owner/handler–your job is to present your dog and get out of the way) and her understanding that real ‘therapy’ can only occur if a true relationship has been formed between the dog and the receiver. She also emphasizes the importance of observing your dog carefully for signs of stress or discomfort, a common problem I’m sorry to say that I’ve seen often in my experience. If you are interested in ever doing this work with your dog, this is a great book to get.

What are you reading? I always love to hear . . .

MEANWHILE, back on the farm:

Great news about Willie. I’ve put him back on a strict diet w/ no chicken or lamb, increased his greens, got him acupuncture, increased his mental exercise, carefully managed Sushi in a way relaxing to us all and put his hobbles back on when we are out or he is meeting unfamiliar men. I speculated that the hobbles acted almost like an anxiety wrap or thunder shirt, and that taking them off (as I have in the last few weeks) when he was free and off leash was at least one factor in his regression. Think of prisoner let out of jail with not enough time to adapt to freedom. It’s only been a week since I made all those changes, but he’s met several guys (all dog savvy and carefully coached), and Willie has showed no signs of fear or anxiety. He ran right up to all the guys like they were his best friends. Yeah!

The first guys Willie met were all off the farm, then the next ones met him outside the house first before coming inside. Tonight a dog savvy friend (yeah Justin!) is coming over. They met on Monday first outside, but this time I’m going to have him meet Willie inside the house (where Willie was first shocked by the presence of a guy several weeks ago.). It will also be at night, and most fearful dogs are more easily frightened at night than during the daytime. So I’ll go slowly and carefully. I’ll keep you posted. It’s very early in the process, so I’d never say that we are “done,” but I am encouraged at how things are going. I should add that, with dogs like Willie, one is never really ‘done.’ They slide out of balance so easily that one has to always be on the look out for regressions. If you want to read more about my speculations about what’s going on, go back to the earlier post and read my comments.

It continues to be warm and gloriously sunny, although snow is predicted for tonight. What a change that will be! Poor Tootsie is going to have to wear her coat when we go out again. Willie will love the cold weather; he doesn’t seem phased until it’s below 10 F, and it doesn’t look like we’ll get anywhere near that. We’ll have a lovely New Year’s dinner with friends at the farm, and then it’s all about getting ready for the seminars I’m doing in Orlando and Naples.

Here’s Tootsie, showing off her hair extensions (We are developing a story about a poor 5 year old beauty contestant, whose mother bought her hair extensions and elaborate costumes, but was unable to cover up her Andy Rooney eyebrows. Thus, her career was doomed from the start — judges being unlikely to award blue ribbons to little girls who look pissed off all the time.) (She’s not. Tootsie, that is. She just needs a stylist who does eyebrows.)

Or, alternative title: Adventures in the Willie Wonka Fear Factory. If you’re cocking your head in confusion, this is about Willie’s recent (and relatively new) fear of men. To review briefly: As a puppy he was pathologically afraid of other dogs, exceptionally sound sensitive and, in some contexts, quick to anger. But he adored people, loved everyone. As an adolescent, like many dogs, he developed new fears, and became cautious around unfamiliar men, but it was easily handled by having guys throw balls for him. I always knew I’d need to manage it and that I could never completely close the book on his fears, but it was easily handled and he usually appeared to be thrilled to meet unfamiliar men after about 4-5 months of counter conditioning.

And then, three weeks or so ago, he barked in terror at a male visitor. He was so fearful he urinated on the spot (the spot being the living room rug–no worries there, it is ancient and god knows how many microscopic particles live within in it, but I mention it just to let you know he saw the visitor, barked in terror and peed his pants where he stood.) A week later he avoided another male visitor, a guy he’s met multiple times and always been friendly around. His fear was overwhelmingly obvious–no barking, but avoidance, tail tucked, head down, eyes round, commissure retracted, weight backward, etc etc.). We had our friend toss treats and that helped, but he never completely settled into what I’d call comfort.

Two questions arise when a behavioral problem you thought was handled pops up again like a moldy piece of toast: 1) What on earth caused the regression?, and most importantly, 2) Now what? I write this out in hopes it will help others follow along if/when their reactive dog slips backwards a few steps. Of course, all cases are different, but it often helps to follow a treatment plan as a way of storing potential tools in your tool box…

Skipping ahead to #2, “Now what?” has already started: Willie has so far had treats thrown by 3 unfamiliar men. So far, all sessions have gone well. All sessions have also been out of the house, and Willie appeared much more relaxed around the guys than he did inside the farm house. Here’s what’s good about that: First, it’s always good to start classical conditioning exercises (CC) at the lowest level of intensity. If and why Willie is worse at the house is an interesting question, but my first sessions of CC taught me that 1) new-guy-at-home is scarier than new-guy-not-at-home; potentially important information, and 2) outside is where we should start because it’s the lowest intensity trigger for him.

After Christmas I’ve arranged for several male friends to come by. We’ll start with Willie meeting them outside, first far away, then closer. Then I’ll have them come inside with food or toy in hand. If that goes well, I’ll ask the next guys to come inside the house before meeting Willie outside. They’ll be asked (okay, told) to avoid approaching Willie, but to toss treas or toys for him. One of my challenges is that Willie’s best CC’er is to chase after a thrown toy. I can’t let him do that yet with his shoulder, so I’m asking guys to toss the toy directly to Willie so that he can catch it in his mouth.

I’ve made other changes too, but to explain those I need to go back to the question of what the heck caused this in the first place. Whenever you have a problem like this, it’s smart to sit down and write out all the possible causes you can think of. You may never know the answer, but it can help create a comprehensive treatment plan. Here’s my list, along with some thoughts about the potential of each to have affected Willie:

1. Isolation after injury and surgery. Seems reasonable, but since the injury was in Feb and the surgery in May, you’d think it would have shown up a bit sooner. He saw almost no visitors for about 3 months after surgery, but after that we did start having people come to the house and he seemed fine. The first sign of trouble was actually at PT about 3 weeks ago, when he barked, for the first time, at seeing someone out the window in the treatment room door. Both Courtney and I were surprised, because he’d never done that before, and he’d been there twice a week since late June. I would have thought this would have shown up at least by fall if that was the primary issue BUT I’d still rate it high on the scale of probable causes.

Implications: Set up more CC sessions with guys I trust to not overwhelm Willie, following the protocol in The Cautious Canine. We have some CC scheduled for next week, with dog savvy guys who actually will pay attention to directions and CC rather than scare Willie. It’s a bit challenging, because the best CC for Willie is a thrown toy, and I can’t do that yet with his shoulder. We’ll use treats and I’ll use Watch and Tug, plus guys tossing treats and toys. I’ll keep you posted.

2. Effects of anesthetic. I’ve seen several dogs in my practice who did indeed change after surgery (also noted by a thoughtful comment from JH in the comment section) and have often wondered about the effects of anesthetic on certain physiologically sensitive dogs. This is possible, but again, it seem less likely because the problem showed up relatively recently. The dogs in my practice became hyper-reactive early on after surgery.

Implications: Doubtful it’s a cause, but never hurts to think about a dog’s internal physiology. He had another acupuncture session last night, this time for calming and soothing. We discussed potentially using laser acupuncture versus needles, given how sensitive and reactive Willie is.

3. Effects of surgery itself. Not sure what to say about this, but given what a huge assault a major surgery is on the body, it has to be considered. However, again, the regression seems so far after the fact that it seems unlikely.

Implications: Same as above.

4. Presence of Tootsie. Tootsie had been at the farm for about two months before the first signs of trouble appeared. As I’ve written, Willie was clearly not comfortable around her for the first few days, and they still (still!) work hard to ignore each other, but he seems to have adapted to her as the new normal. He still gets lots of attention from me, and has learned that she’ll never challenge him for anything, although she’ll try to squeeze in when he’s getting petted. I suspect he’s learned that although he’d rather not have to compete, life goes on even with a pushy, tiny little princess in the house. I don’t think just her presence is a factor; just guessing here, but I’m bet some serious money on it.

Implications: Tootsie is here to stay, so I’ll go back to CCg him with Tootsie’s name (I did that for about 3 weeks, “Where Tootsie?”).

5. Tootsie’s barking. This one has a higher probability in my mind of having an effect on Willie’s emotional circuits. Tootsie came as a barker–she barked in the morning to get let up on the bed, she barked for her dinner, etc etc etc.  We’ve made great progress, none of the above happens anymore BUT I still can’t leave her either in her crate or loose in the house if I leave it without her barking. I’ve done lots of management around this, but about a month ago I got lazy and would leave her and Willie in the house if I had to run outside and do something quickly in the yard or barn. She’d stand at the window and bark like some crazed, operatic mouse, and I think listening to it was hell on earth for sound sensitive Willie. It didn’t happen very often, but I am sure it wasn’t helping anything. I also had to ask myself if she barks in her crate when I’m gone. I’ve snuck around quite a few times, creeping back to the house and every time she appears to be sound asleep and quiet, so I doubt this is the problem. I’ll keep my eyes (and ears) on it though.

Implications: I never leave him anymore in a situation in which Tootsie will bark while he’s beside her, and I’m working hard on teaching Tootsie to not bark in a crate or if left alone in the house when I leave for a few minutes. I’ve learned I can toss a handful of kibble on the carpet, leave the house with Willie and return to find Tootsie sleeping in her bed in the living room. “Quiet in the crate” when I’m elsewhere in the house is going to take more time, but I’m working on it and carefully managing it at all other times.

6. Change in diet, addition of chicken and lamb. About a month ago I found myself with lots of chicken and lamb scraps. I’ve avoided feeding those protein sources to Willie because of Chinese Medicine’s suggestion that they are “hot” foods and not good for reactive dogs like Willie. But all was going so well, and it pains me to throw food away, so I started giving Willie some of each for a period of about a week. I have no idea whatsoever if this was causal, but it’s easy to change, so I did.

Implications: Easy — Willie is back on beef, beef liver, fish, duck and pork as protein sources. And he’s getting even more cooked greens than usual (mostly kale and collard greens, some parsley, some celery, spinach, broccoli).

7. Sushi: Sushi as a source of stress for Willie ebbs and flows. I’ve written about it before, about his obsessive desire to herd her and his inability to see her as anything except a small, hoofless livestock representative. We worked through it well years ago, but the combination of less exercise and Sushi being in the house more because of winter has caused the problem to increase. He tends to be on edge when he gets obsessive about Sushi, and I would put this high on the list as one potentially contributing factor.

Implications: This is a tough one, obsessive as it is, as we’ve all discussed in previous blogs. It’s complicated by the fact that my allergies to Sushi continue to worsen, and I feel badly that Sushi can’t cuddle with me like she used to. Right now we are managing things and I’m working hard on keeping Willie occupied with something non-Sushi related. All alternative behaviors (sit, lie down, go in your crate, get a toy) act as secondary reinforcers, so it’s not easily fixed.  I’ll write more on this later, but it’s a big topic and better saved for posts in the future. At the moment it’s being managed relatively well, but it’s on my list for things to make even better in the future.

8. Electro stimulation in physical therapy. Willie had 2 sessions of this right around the time he first reacted to seeing people out the window. Could this possibly have affected his nervous system in a negative way? I suspect it’s doubtful, but the health care professionals I asked say no (3) and yes (1), and I wouldn’t say it’s impossible.

Implications: I have no idea if this had any effect on Willie, but we stopped it just in case. Luckily, he didn’t really need it anymore anyway, his muscles in his shoulder began relaxing again so that he could do his stretching exercises.

9. Acupuncture session right around the time he began regressing. I’m doubtful that this was causal, given how often he’s  had acupuncture, but he had a new practitioner this time, and who knows? I had one acupuncture session in which I was miserable for a month afterward. Anything with the power to do good has the power to do harm.

Implications: His new acupuncturist, Carrie and I discussed this last night. I cautioned her that with Willie, “less is more,” and to use the fewest, thinnest needles she could. We also discussed laser acupuncture next time as I mentioned above. I’ll probably put him back on either Shen Calmer or some kind of homeopathic remedy for fear and anxiety, but I want to spend some more time thinking about what would be best for him.

I’ve written all this out in hopes the structure of 1) thinking about causes of a regression and 2) designing a treatment plan around it, is helpful to anyone else out there whose dog has gone backward a bit. I think it would be extremely helpful to other readers if you wanted to share your own program for if/when this has happened to you and one of your dogs. Needless to say, I could write about so many aspects of Willie’s behavior and treatment that this blog would turn into a book. I’ll stop here, and enjoy letting others add their own methods.

MEANWHILE, back on the farm:

Here’s Willie (or rather, his nose), in the middle of an acupuncture session with his new acupuncturist, Carrie Donahue, DVM. He’s not a fan of the needles, but Carrie is extremely gentle and patient, and Willie sits politely for her as best he can. You’re just seeing his nose because it was dark outside and I couldn’t get a good picture of him looking at the camera without eye flash, so the heck with it, I just focused on his nose. “Do what you can”… a good perspective any time, including with photographs, and treatment plans for that matter…

We woke up this morning to another surprise snow. It won’t last long, and it’s only a little over an inch, but still, it was gorgeous when Willie and I went up the hill (too wet and cold for a hill walk for Tootsie).

I thought the image below would be a lovely way for Willie and I, and all at Redstart Farm, to wish you and yours some peace, warmth and love this holiday season. It comes with my gratitude for the community that has grown up around this blog. Thank you all for joining me in an inquiry about our miraculous relationship with dogs. Body wags to you all.

CAN DOGS GET ANGRY? Yup, I’m here to say that they can. Do they get angry as often as humans? Nope, and thank heavens for that. If they did, I doubt we’d live with them, given that they have carpet knives in their mouths. Just like people, they vary tremendously in how often they experience or express anger. I’ve known some dogs who appeared not to have an angry moment their entire lives. More commonly, I’ve worked with dogs who, on occasion, are clearly frustrated at not getting what they wanted or expected. And rarely, I’ve worked with a small number of dogs who appeared to live in a state of ‘road rage’ for weeks, months or years on end. So even though I would never say that anger in dogs is an exact replica of anger in people, both in its frequency and how we experience it, it is a basic biological fact that dogs are capable of experiencing anger. Here’s why:

Anger is as primal an emotion as fear, and if an animal can experience fear, then one is wise to assume it is capable of experiencing anger. The two, it turns out, go hand in hand. Both are mediated primarily in the amygdala and both evolved to protect us. Fear is the emotion that signals the body that it is in danger, and motivates us to take some kind of action to protect ourselves. Anger is the emotion that backs up fear when being on defense is not enough. Roger Abrantes tells a compelling story of when he was about to be in hand-to-hand combat as a young soldier. As he stood in a trench, watching the enemy soldiers run toward him with bayonets drawn, he was initially terrified. But at the last minute, just as the soldiers were within a few feet of him, he was overwhelmed with a burst of rage. That’s the emotion that poured energy into his body and allowed him to move forward to fight for his life.

That’s what anger does: it floods the body with energy, increases the heart rate, pumps blood into our muscles in preparation for action. Anger demands action; that’s why it can be so problematic. Have you ever done something you wish you hadn’t when you were angry?  If not, please consider either offering life coaching sessions for the rest of us, or ask your parents if you actually are an alien. Anger, at varying intensities, compels us to do SOMETHING, anything, and thus… we sometimes do something we shouldn’t and get ourselves in hot water until we learn to take a breath and let our emotions settle. The same thing can happen to dogs. If you’re interested in following this thread, I write more about the biology of emotion in For the Love of a Dog.

Dogs have all the same wiring (and external expressions) related to anger as people. They just, as I said, don’t seem to experience it as often as we easily-angered primates do. (Ever seen chimps lose their tempers? It’s common, and it’s not pretty.) Of course, like all emotions, dogs exhibit a vast range of intensities of experiencing anger, from being slightly irritated, to being truly frustrated, to downright mad to being in an out-of-control rage. All of those are manifestations of anger, just at different levels, and all are within a dog’s capability.  Of course, dogs don’t have the same complexity of cognitive overlays as we do; their experience of anger has got to be different in many ways than ours. But that doesn’t mean that we don’t share the basic, fundamental emotion of anger. As I’ve said before, glass half empty or glass half full, both are equally accurate.

Here’s a photo of a dog illustrating what I claim is an angry emotion. Note the furrowed brow, the offensive pucker and the hard stare. Any one of those things by themselves would not be enough to suggest an internal emotion of anger, but without the fur and black nose, this is exactly the face of an angry person.

ANGER MANAGEMENT? Here’s something else we share: a need to learn how to handle being frustrated or angry. Many of the behavioral problems I’ve seen in my practice relate to either dogs who have never learned how to handle being frustrated and lose their tempers when they don’t get what they want, or owners who, uh, have the same problem.

Dogs need to be taught to be patient and polite (the basis of the Feeling Outnumbered program), and we need to learn to take a breath, or two or twenty, before expressing anger or frustration at our dogs. I needed this advice just recently: until recently Willie had stopped harassing Sushi with his obsessive indoor herding, but after his long, long period of inactivity and Sushi now being inside more because of the weather, the problem cropped up again. I found myself starting to get truly frustrated about it, until I put on my behaviorist/trainer hat, took a breath and put Willie in his crate when I found myself unable to do anything constructive. (Things are improving again, whew.)

I’d love to hear your thoughts: How do you interpret the dog above? What are your best coping strategies for dealing with your own frustrations, and helping your dog through his or hers? Never happens at your house? Ever? Really? Wow. Can I come over?

MEANWHILE, back on the farm. Well, two steps forward physically, and four back behaviorally. Willie’s shoulder is doing well, really well.  As I said earlier, I’ve adjusted to a new normal, and have accepted that his shoulder will never be sound, but given that, he’s doing really well. He can play with his current favorite toy (Flappy) without any sign of regression, so that’s just heaven for both of us. However, last week he literally peed his pants (okay, he didn’t have any on, but you get the idea), barking in terror at a man he didn’t expect, standing in the kitchen. Granted the guy is tall, has hair like Einstein and was standing stock, staring, but still… Willie has never, ever reacted to a person like that. He became somewhat nervous around unfamiliar men when he was an adolescent, but it was easily countered by having guys throw ball for him every time we could arrange it. Willie has always adored people, guys especially, but as you may know, has had a lot of fears over the years, but primarily toward other dogs. A few days later another man came over. I asked him to sit down before I let Willie out. Willie didn’t bark as he did before, but he was clearly frightened of the man (who he’s seen at least 15 times over the years and always been fine with.)

I’ll write next time about the factors that could be contributing to his behavior (our hermit-like existence after his injury clearly being one of them, but I doubt that it’s the only one). There are at least 4, maybe 5 I can think of… I’ll discuss them, and our treatment program, in the next post.

Here are the noses of Barbie (on the left) and Butterscotch, one of the ewe lambs we’ve kept from this year’s breeding. It looks as though she did get bred by King Charles, so stay tuned to see if we have a teen0-aged pregnancy (that’s a good thing in sheep). The sheep must be loving the cool but not cold weather; who knows though, maybe they are yearning for snow?

No, seriously. And so do you. No kidding. I’m so interested this, a relatively new discovery about what’s called the Enteric Nervous System, that I wanted to write about it today. I’ll get back to emotions in dogs soon, but I’m in the Oh Wow phase of this information, and wanted to share it. (Granted, this is not new information to the researchers who have been studying what’s called the ENS for decades, but the information does seem to be leaking out slowly. No pun on ‘leaky gut syndrome’ intended…)

Here’s the deal, and here’s how it relates to our dogs and their behavior. It turns out that there is a vast network of neurons–that’s right–neurons–in your intestines. 100 million of them. Of course, your brain has 100 BILLION, but still, that’s impressive.  Neurons were supposed to be nerve cells that only existed in the Central Nervous System (CNS), the brain and the spinal cord. But it turns out that there is a network of neurons in the gut designed to integrate the outside world with the inside of a mammal. As you remember from Biology 101, every mammal is designed like a doughnut, with surfaces both external and internal that are in contact with the “outside” world. Your skin and respiratory passages interact with the external world on the outside of your body, and the inside tissues of your stomach and intestines interact with things from the external world on the inside of your body.

It appears that the ENS is actually the origin of coordinated nervous activity. It links directly to the emotional aspects of your CNS, and is believed to actually be the precursor of it. Thus, your gut and your emotions are indeed linked directly together, as a way of helping the body make decisions about its behavior. All this relates to our lives and the lives of our dogs in two ways. First, “comfort food” really is comforting. Your ENS communicates directly with the emotional centers in your brain, and certain types of food really do make people feel less stressed and more calm. Studies show that high fat, energy rich foods reduce stress in lab mice, and that people feel soothed by mac and cheese even if they don’t know what they are eating and it is placed into their stomach via stomach tube. Bottom line: What mammals eat directly effects their emotions. Thus, perhaps some of us are not so crazy to feed our problem dogs selectively?

Here’s the big question related to this that I have for blog readers, which relates to the large number of dogs I’ve worked with who had both gut and emotional problems. How many of you have seen dogs who have digestion problems who also have behavior problems related to emotional control (especially fear). Willie is the perfect example: He came as a young pup with projectile diarrhea, a pathological fear of other dogs and a dysfunctionally high level of  sound sensitivity. I can’t tell you how many dogs I’ve seen as clients who had both problems, and whose treatment ended up effecting both systems.

One of the treatments for Willie was to put him on probiotics, and the article that got me thinking about this topic (Psychology Today Dec 2011) relates research that has found that probiotics reduce anxiety in some types of lab mice.  They do specify however, that it might be specific types of lactobacillus that were effective, so we don’t know yet that generic probiotics are always useful. I can say that I suspect they helped Willie, not just with his gut but with his fears, but that’s just speculation.

What about you? Have you seen a link between dogs with emotional problems and dogs with intestinal challenges? Do you have a dog that fits that description? If so, what have you done? For Willie, I used probiotics and switched him to what are considered to be cooling foods in Chinese Medicine. Of course, one obvious problem for some dogs are food allergies, which also have to be considered (but did not seem to be the case with Willie.) I’d love to hear your feedback on all this. I’d write more myself, but I have to go eat some mac and cheese.

MEANWHILE, back on the farm: Cold but sunny, such a joy! No snow, which is unusual but not rare. In 2008 we had 16+ inches by now, in another year just a few. But no white winter for us so far, and going to be cold cold cold Friday night (high of 6). I wish we had snow to protect the plants, but that’s just the way it goes. In the interim, I’m loving the sun.

Good news with Willie boy: After a set back last weekend (limping pretty badly after he got up), I decided to drop all his exercises as an experiment to see how he’d do. He’s doing great! I think I’ve figured out which exercises cause him pain and will talk about it today with Courtney at UW Phys Therapy. Even with no limp, he doesn’t use his left leg normally, he hikes up his shoulder too high, but that mechanical issue doesn’t seem to cause him any pain as best I can tell. So this morning he got to play free with his old, beat up plastic disc. I don’t throw anything for him, may never again, but still, he was sooooo happy. Me too!

Tootsie is doing great on her recalls. I’d say 90%, which I think is great for a Cav after less than 3 months. After a number of mouth-open, shiny-eyed recalls this morning, I ran back into the house for the camera to take a picture of her with her ears flying as she runs to me. I got the ears flapping, but such a serious look on her face!.