philospher77

My Katie came to me almost entirely shut down. Wouldn't voluntarily leave her crate to eat, drink, or eliminate, would shut down if you looked at her, didn't want anything to do with me, definitely did NOT want to go outside, and would desperately try and squeeze back into her crate if I got her out of it and closed the door. I did a lot of slow and steady work with her, and finally, after about a year and a bit, decided to put her on drugs. Started with generic Elavil (a TCA) and recently switched to generic Prozac (an SSRI). To this day, I regret waiting as long as I did to try the drugs. She is happy when she is on them. Without them, she is often "content", and sometimes stressed. I had to do a washout period between switching the drugs, and it was shocking (and saddening) to see how much she regressed without them to help even out her mood. If you have had Gila 4 months, and she is still spooking to "routine" things, I think I would be considering at least trying drugs. I'd probably also be hunting up a behaviorist or someone with a LOT of experience with spooks for advice on managing the situation and counter-conditioning. Drugs aren't a miracle cure, but they do make it easier for the dog to learn and make new associations. Here's a link to a blog I kept while transitioning Katie from one drug to the next: http://katies-journey-philospher77.blogspot.com/ It's strictly my notes so that I can look back later and see what was going on at the time, so nothing fancy. But you might find it helpful.

Hounds, in general, are not into repeating the same command multiple times. If you can break it up a bit, you may be able to get her to do more: sit, sit, down, touch, sit, spin, down, touch, sit, etc. But yeah, Katie would get to a point where she was like "nope... I'm done for the day!" I just got good at reading her, and, to a certain degree, I go to these classes so that she can get experience with surviving loud, somewhat unpredictable, but controlled environments. So if she is laying quietly by my chair, licking her peanut butter bone, I count it as a win. A lot of the time in my classes is spent with the dogs happily eating peanut butter (or cheese) bones, and a little bit is spent actually working the dogs.

I think I went with Large, but you may want to measure your hound and see which seems to fit best based on the sizing chart. I did get it in the Moonglow Yellow, which shows up nicely at night, but also reflects in car windows, so keep that in mind when you pick a color.

I found that Katie likes to be up close to the driver seat, so I also did the "put the back seats down and put carpet-covered plywood over the footwell topped with a dog bed" route. I do have a seat belt harness for her, which I admit that I do not use consistently, but she does seem more likely to lie down when wearing it. I'm not sure if it's because it constricts her movements somewhat, or if it's a cue that it's going to be a longer trip, since I tend not to use it on the short ones. (I know, I know, bad mama!) I use this one: http://usak9outfitters.com/CCSS.htm and attach it to the ring that the seats latch to when they are not in the folded-down position, since the Scion has few and not-very-strong cargo tie-downs. Doing that does give me the advantage that I can make the leash short enough to keep her from touching the front seats or back hatch, and yet she can still lie down comfortably on the bed.

Katie came to me a very shy, noise-phobic dog. She's taught me a lot about handling a shy dog, and that noise phobias can be a difficult thing to figure out, since we spend so much time automatically ignoring "unimportant" sound... the cars in the road, the wind in the trees, the hum of the refrigerator. She had a very hard time being outside, especially on walks outside the yard without other dogs around. So my behaviorist has me going back to square one with DS/CC, starting at the front door with her on leash and lots of CheezWhiz (cheddar seems to be her favorite). Tonight she actually impressed me by leading me to the gate out of the yard, instead of staying where I wanted to do the DS/CC. So her attitude about walks has much improved. I was tempted to try going through the gate, but figured it was better to not push and possibly undo the good progress that we have are so far. So you might consider doing the same thing, as greysmom said, start off with really short walks. Keep in mind that you are trying to change Slinky's feelings about being on a walk, not get exercise at this stage. If you go 2 feet and he is happy, great, quit, repeat again later! I'm working Katie with Touch while outside right now, so that she has something to concentrate on besides "all those scary sounds and things!" And this weekend is our Meet-and-greet day, and I plan on taking our Target (a bright red dog food can lid) with to see if I can get her to Target it while strangers hold it. I figure I will start with some of the regulars (the rescue people and store clerks that are normally there) so that she can get the idea without it being actual "strangers". Final bit of advice: if you have a generally food-motivated dog and they are not responding in a new situation, up the treat value. I never thought I would ever have CheezWhiz in my house, but Katie loves it and the can makes it easy to dole out in very small amounts, so it stays on the grocery list.

I will say that one of the things that has helped Katie, and that I have found a lot of fun, is clicker training. I may be anthropomorphizing, but I think Katie got a lot braver and willing to try things when she realized that her actions could MAKE good things happen, and that the world wasn't something that just did things TO her. I could be giving her too much credit, but who knows what dogs really think about things.

According to my trainer, it's officially known as a "sloppy sit". Katie will do that, and she will also do a very strange one where she has her butt tucked under her, so her back feet are pointing forward like in the pic from OwnedbySummer, but with the paws up in the air!

From an owner of another very shy greyhound, I can say that training classes were very helpful. You do need to be careful and pick the right class. Interview the trainer, ask what their experience is with shy dogs, their training philosophy, and see if you can watch a class or two before enrolling. You want to know that the class you pick is not going to overwhelm your dog and make the situation worse. And be prepared to go slow. My first class with Katie, she curled up behind my chair and did her best "I'm not here, you can't see me, lalalalala" impression. The second class, I was all excited because SHE ATE CHEESE! Still curled up against the wall, but not entirely behind the chair, and at least she ate. I think it was the third class before I got any motion out of her. But she has done better with each class, and I've had her in lots. I do put her on Xanax for classes, to take the edge off her nervousness so that she can learn easier and make more good memories. And her general anxiety level is such that I have her on Prozac, which does help her be happier and more outgoing. One idea that I am going to start working on is from _Control Unleashed_, where they suggest teaching shy dogs to touch a target. Once they are reliably doing that, you can then start asking people to hold the target, so that the dog can go touch it and come back to you for a treat. That way you reframe the situation from "go greet scary stranger" to "go play the target game, which just happens to be held by that person". And the dog knows that it LIKES the target game, so going to the stranger is much less stressful. But you will need to work up to that. Hope this helps!

I've been making dried sweet potato for Katie (slice sweet potato relatively thinly, put on pan, cook at 250 for around 3 hours or until dry and hard. White sweet potato seems to dry faster than orange). The other thing I make that she just loves is peanut butter balls. This is actually a human breakfast-food recipe, so you can feel free to eat it too! 1/2 C peanut butter 2/3 C corn flakes, crushed 3 tbsp honey 1/3 C powdered milk Mix it all together, form into logs, balls, or whatever shape you think is handy, and eat. I generally store them in the freezer and take a few out at a time. They will be firm, but still breakable and eatable within a small amount of time to thaw.

I'll also add that you might want to try finding some other steps to practice on. I'm thinking that 5 is going to be an awkward number, because it's short enough that they have the "getting on the stairs" transition and the "getting off the stairs" transition, and not much "actually on the stairs" work. If it were my Katie on those stairs, she would probably just try to jump to the bottom, and not mess with them. So I would try finding some longer sets, and maybe try starting outside. For some reason, Katie would trot up and down outside steps with no problem, but it took us a while to get her to do inside stairs, which just baffled (and slightly frustrated!) me. I'd be like "these are stairs, you treat them exactly the same as the 500 hundred steps we have gone up and down on the way to this building!"

Update on the situation: She got a clean bill of health at the vet this morning, so that's ok. I let her go Thursday without the Prozac, and she was a bit "brighter" at dinner, and pretty much back to normal the next day at breakfast (after which I put her back on her daily dose), so I think I may be dealing with the double whammy of "lack of appetite" and "lethargic/depressed", the two most common side effects of the Prozac. Or possibly just observer bias, since she has seemed to be happier and eating better even after going back on the drug, so it might be just me. I will now go discuss whether we need to tweak her dosage, or just keep with how we are now and see how things go. Last night she was playing with her favorite treat-dispensing toy, even, so she is well on her way to being back to normal.

I do think that the Prozac is contributing. I didn't give her her pill this morning, and she was more interested in food, and did actually eat everything. I do get a bit concerned about the amount that she has been eating, because she has maintained pretty well with around 2.75 cups of food (fluctuates a few pounds up and down depending on activity level, but pretty consistent), and now she's only eating around 2 C. But the other thing I noticed this evening, that does make me think that there is a potential physical issue, is that tonight, after she stopped eating, she did this peculiar thing where she stuck her neck out straight and made this sort of huffing sound. It reminded me somewhat of how a donkey looks when they bray, with some very distinct jerking of her adams apple. After that, she finished off the kibble that she had dropped. Which makes me think that there may be something wrong in her neck or throat. If it turns out that there is nothing physical, well, then I can adapt to how she is. Right now it's the "it could be so many things, or nothing at all" that has me stressing. That and the fact that the most likely thing I think of when she starts acting like this is stress, but if that was the cause here, I would expect her behavior going outside (the largest source of stress for her) would be much less confident than it is now. But all of her other behaviors are improving as would be expected with the new drug. But, as has been pointed out, this could be nothing. And I do have the vet appointment, and she IS eating, so I might as well not stress over these next few days!

To those who say that she should be "able to enjoy meals like a regular dog"... she does get bowl fed in the morning. But even that she is not eating with gusto like she used to. As to the "maybe she doesn't want to have to work for her food"... Katie has always LOVED being handfed. It's our bonding time. She's clicker-trained, so it's when I teach her new tricks, we play hide and seek, go chasing after toys, identify the various furniture, etc. It's play time, with food included. She'll be in there, eager and waiting to see what I want her to do, and to try and get me to reward her for offering up behaviors that she knows. The hardest thing for me has been trying to keep up with her desire to learn new things! So you have to realize, this change is the equivalent of a dog that comes running up when they hear a leash because they LOVE walks suddenly deciding not to get off the bed when they hear the leash. I'm pretty sure that you would be trying to figure out what has changed if that were the situation. The complication with this is that she IS eating, but that could be because she has to eat to stay alive, not because she wants to. But, if the vet rules out any physical issues, then I will try the tough love approach, and see if that gets her back into eating well.

She is a spook, and I have been transitioning her from Elavil to Prozac, under the vet's guidance. She ate fine on Elavil, and during the washout time. Prozac is known suppressor, but she was also on Xanax to help with the anxiety during the switch, and I am currently weaning her off it. It is possible that the appetite-stimulant effect of the Xanax masked the effect of the Prozac, but the vet seems to think it shouldn't be apparent now, since that tends to be a temporary issue at the start of the drug. I was thinking that this might be stress related, since it started at Solvang, and she was very cautious about eating at her normal dinner place at home but ate well when the food was close to her safe place, but I would think that would have resolved by now. It's a bit hard for me to tell whether she is still hungry or not. She had been a very food-motivated dog, and now seems much less interested in food. I did think at first that she might just be being a snot about the food, so I cut it back from 2.75 C a day to 2. She is not eating all of the 2 C, and will leave kibble in the bowl or on the floor, which she never did before. So she isn't acting like she is hungry, but she is getting less food than she has in the past, so it seems like she SHOULD be hungry. She is more likely to eat it out of the bowl than she is out of my hand, which is counter to her behavior in the past and points towards stress, but she will not even touch her treat-dispensing toys, which she used to be crazy about. And at the same time, she is motivated (i.e., willing to seek out and work for) by high-value treats (cheese, liver paste, Wellness Wellbars, blueberries), but is not vacuuming up the Wellbar crumbs like she used to. And when I added in a new kibble from a sample I got, she started off eating eagerly, but then went to picking out the new kibble, and then just stopped eating like in the video. Which has me puzzled over whether it's like me eating ice cream but not salad when I have a toothache, because I like ice cream enough to put up with the discomfort, but salad isn't worth it? Or is it simply that she is being picky? So hard to tell when they can't talk!

It's helpful. I have hand fed her for most of the time that I have her, but for the last few months I have given her breakfast in a bowl. It's at chest height, and I had just raised it up about two inches from its previous height. She doesn't seem to have any issues with that. When it was a little lower, she did sometimes "inhale" her food to the point where she would gag/cough a mouthful back up, and then eat that off the floor. Haven't seen that since I brought the height up a little. She is being fed Taste of the Wild kibble, which is what she's been on for the last 6 months or so (since California Natural got bought be PG). But the other issue there is that I wet her food in the bowl, so it's probably softer and more fragrant. The thing that I am really noticing is that her zest for food is missing. Katie is a dog who would come flying down the hall when she heard food hit her bowl, and would work like a dickens to get me to click and feed her. Now, I have to take the bowl of food into her room, show it to her, and then she may, sometimes after a bit of a wait, decide to come out and eat it. And that video is the most eager that she's been to hand feed in a while. For most of this week I have been forced to put it in her bowl to get her to eat. This is how she has been about food for the last year: I see a huge difference in how she is there, and how she is now, and I do not know why. I am skipping the medicine today, since it is known to be an appetite suppressor, but the vet said that that would normally show up in the first week, and resolve in the second, and we are in the third week of it, so it seems odd if that's the cause. The only other thing I can think of is that she has, in the past, gotten food stuck up above her teeth, which totally freaked me out the first time since it makes a hard lump under her eye. So it might be dental. I am grateful for anything to discuss with the vet.

Hi! I need some advice on whether I am just imagining things, or if something has changed with my Katie. She has been "off" in her eating habits recently... not that she's not eating, but that she is eating oddly. She's always been a chow hound, but for this last week has been reluctant to eat, often leaving anything that has dropped on the ground. I thought at first it might be stress, or the new medicine she's on, or that she is tired of the food. However, she has had a relatively stress free week, I bought new food today with only a slight change in the behavior, and will try skipping the medicine tomorrow (at the vet's suggestion). It's really hard to pinpoint what seems off to me, but I did get some video and have included it to give people an idea of what I am talking about. I almost get the feeling that she _wants_ to eat, but for some reason finds it physically uncomfortable to do so. Brief description of video: Katie starts out eating pretty much normal. At approximately 0:30, she does some odd chewing motions, sort of jaw clacking. At 40, you see the other thing I've noticed... she's dropping food more than normal, and a little hesitant to pick it back up. And then at 1:20, she drops her mouthful of food, puts her nose in my hand and leaves it there on top of the food, and I can feel her jaw quiver, but she doesn't eat. And after that, she will pointedly turn her head away when offered food. Now, in the past, she NEVER refused food. We'd stop when I ran out of the meal, but if I went and got more, she'd be ready, willing, and eager to eat. So this stopping while I still have food, that she had been eating with gusto just a few minutes before, makes me wonder if there is a physical problem. Thoughts? I do have a vet visit scheduled for Saturday, but wondered if anyone else had run across this, or if people think I'm just being paranoid. Link to video http://youtu.be/qrOkqA-Cduw Rebecca

As Patricia McConnell put it in one of her many books, dogs don't think like us. We think a dog that is housebroken understands "Pee outside only", when it's quite possible that they have learned "do not pee inside THIS house". So yep, taking them somewhere else can mean all bets are off.

Just a comment about the Xanax. You are a lot more likely to see "puppy playful" rather than lethargic/tranked behavior on it, at least in my experience. Katie can get incredibly hyper about two hours after taking it, and it can actually take some work to get her to calm back down. So I wouldn't be worried about drowsiness!

Just another random thought... why NOT take her out every 2.5 hours in the evening, until she settles in and learns the routine? Pre-empt the peeing inside, praise lavishly for peeing outside (I've had Katie almost 2 years now, and she STILL gets told "good pee" and "good poop" for going outside!), and then as she gets more settled, start stretching out the time between the trips outside until you get her on a schedule that suits you both? And yeah, their signals can be very subtle and counter-intuitive. Katie's earliest signal was to come stand by my chair and look out the window. Since she was a very shy dog, and standing by my chair was her general way of asking for attention, food, etc., this was not at all obvious. Her counter-intuitive one is when she starts playing with a great deal of excitement. To be honest, I am not sure if that is a signal that she wants to go out, or if needing to go out is a side effect of the vigorous playing, but when she does that, I try and make sure she gets outside at some point in it!

If I understand the situation correctly, it's made by Novartis, which is having troubles with its manufacturing plant. Mix ups in what goes in what bottle, essentially. So they have the plant shut down while they do fixes. Here's their latest news release on the situation: My link

I hate to say it, but I would lean towards "terrified". My Katie is the same way. When she is stressed, she trembles so bad that you can see it across the room and hear her nails rattling across the floor. You say that you have him on Prozac. Does this mean that you are working with a behaviorist or other professional? If so, can you get some video of the situation so that they can take a look and give advice? The bad thing is that it may be a partly learned response by now (I go on walks, where there are scary noises, so I am going to be scared whenever I go on a walk, since there will be scary noises...) and it may take a lot of work to counteract it at this time. One of the things you have to ask yourself is "is he really willing to come along" or is it that he is more terrified of being left behind? If he is getting a lot of his comfort and support from the other dog, it is possible that the thought of being left alone in the scary world is worse for him than being on a scary trail. Just some things to think about.

I second the "throw rugs on bare floors" approach, in case it's just the change in surface that's bothering her. If that's not the issue, this is a case where I might consider a short case of drugs in order to bring her stress levels down so that she can learn that the house is a safe place, and then take her off of them once she has settled in. Definitely lots of counter-conditioning if you go with the drugs, and you may want to try that before the drugs if you want. Basically, reward her for any brave act she takes toward the spooky areas. Give her treats while walking her through them, that sort of thing.

My first greyhound, Trinkett, had some LS and a slightly bulging disc in her neck (the result, I think, of being attacked by a Great Dane). She was acting like your dog... dragging her feet slightly, and just "not right". I managed her condition with Adequan injections (for the neck issue), acupuncture (which she really liked and handled well... the assistants liked working with her because they basically got to sit around for 30 minutes ), physical therapy (to keep the range of motion, since once they get into a habit of walking funny, it makes the other muscles work harder and that sets up a chain reaction of things getting more off), and hydrotherapy to keep up the strength (the underwater treadmill, which she also loved. She'd walk in there, they start filling it with water, she would promptly lay down and then slowly start getting into sort of a crouch so that she could keep as much of her under water as possible as long as possible), and laser therapy, and t ice/heat. That all seemed to help. There are risks associated with long-term use of steroids, so I would hold off on them for a while if I were you and see if more conservative treatment helps first. Having said that, I do have one of my cats on it, since it's a quality of life issue for her, and in human years she's around 95. As someone said, at that age, what's long term? I will say that one issue I ran into with LS is that it disguised the osteo symptoms that Trinkett had. If a dog with LS starts walking funny, it's really easy to say that it's the LS flaring up, and not go and get things looked at. I will always wonder if things might have turned out differently if I had done that, but such is life.

I am also finding that there are nuances to how she does this that can clue me in on what she wants. For example, in this video, I had slept in late, and what she was really wanting was breakfast. You can see that her touches are a bit diffident: yes, you can pet me, but it's not really high on the list of what I want to do right now. Reinforced by her knocking over the camera at the end so that I would stop filming and go give her breakfast! Then there are days when she will move her head to my hand, but not actually touch it: I would like to be petted, but am very sleepy. So I give her some long, slow, gentle strokes and talk gently to her as her eyes slowly close and she drifts off to sleep. And then there are the days when the nose dives into my hand, along with a tongue lick or sniffing along the hand and up the arm: Oh yes, please pet me! I will even roll over so you can do my belly, and don't even think of stopping until I get enough! It's really been a very helpful skill to teach her.

Yes, I do tend to interpret that as "OF COURSE I want petting!"