PNWGrey

Thank you all so much for the reassurance! Twenty-four hours into recovery and he is doing pretty well so far. Hes pretty jazzed about the special treats he gets with his antibiotics and painkillers, as well as the extra tidbits Ive been hiding in his meals to assuage my own guilt.

I am horrified to say that I somehow caught my greys tail in the screen door on our way back in from a walk. His tail degloved (!!!) and had to be partially amputated today. I feel like the absolute worst grey mom. Does anyone else have a tail amputee? How did they adapt to the shorter-tailed life? His tail is an important rudder for zoomies will he zoomie again?

Phew! Thank you all for the reassurance. Guess I needed my periodic nervous mom reminder :-) if he's ok, I'm ok.

I've had my lovely grey boy about 10 months now. In that time, we've had some major unexpected transitions in the house. My partner and his toddler son (whom we have only part-time) moved in and I had major, life-threatening neurosurgery. My boy seems to have rolled with the changes in schedule that this has entailed, especially with my medical recovery. For the first several months we had him, he was alone 8-4 three or four days a week and did just fine. Then I went on medical leave in April and was home (but useless) almost all the time for 6 weeks. I went back to work for a couple of weeks, and now I'm home again more often because I am a teacher and we're on summer break. I work from home more in the summer but I do go to my office part-time just to be a little more productive. Suffice it to say, lots of change and plenty of reason for him to be unsure about things, though routine is returning! When we go to leave the house (which is a much longer affair when the toddler is here...lots of "leaving" cues), he will come to the door like he wants to come along, no surprise there, but if you tell him to go to his bed, he trots right over and lays down. That alone -- laying down while we get ready to leave -- seems to deescalate any building anxiety leading up to leaving. Right before we go, I close the door to his crate, give him a treat, and say "we'll be back" (something the dog trainer told us to do). He watches calmly enough while we leave -- alert, but stays laying down in his bed/crate. When I check him on his camera during the day, he's usually sleeping, sometimes playing with a toy, and very occasionally I hear a roo or two though that doesn't seem to be constant at all. But -- when I come home, he is LOUD. It starts when he hears the garage door (and if I come in the other door and park in the driveway, he doesn't start until he hears the keys, so he is clearly cued by my return and not just being alone in general). He howls and whines and jumps in his crate (which I should say is actually an xpen with a top and fits his slumberball, so he can stand on his hinders when he's excited). I wait until he is quiet and sits down again to go and open his crate, he waits politely for me to say "free," and then he comes out to greet me and run a happy lap or two around the living room before settling down. My non-scientific gut observation tells me that he is getting louder and sooner -- so whereas before, the garage door triggered some whining but the howl wouldn't peak unless I was slow unloading the car, now the garage door triggers full-on howling almost right away. If you've seen my posts before, you know I'm a little paranoid about separation anxiety because my last dog had severe, untreatable SA. It was agony for us and for him. So my question is -- do you think we are treading into separation anxiety territory with the loudness when I come home? It is all-caps LOUD and seems anxious and agitated to me, not just "yay you're home!" but perhaps I'm putting my human feelings on that? TIA!

@4My2Greys will do! Thanks for the advice. @Feisty49 that's also good to hear that some frequency is normal. I just want to find some balance that prevents the poo-splosion before I'm home from work :-)

@4My2Greys I was wondering about that too -- but I've been feeding the low end for his weight according to the bag instructions and his weight has been stable. I agree that it feels like a lot though. Does anyone have experience with how accurate/useful bag instructions tend to be? He goes on two 1-2 mile walks daily on weekdays. Regardless of how long we walk, he poops first thing out the door and then not again until later in the day. Every time he does his business it is a LOT, we're not talking small volumes here. It's possible he isn't empty but...wow. That's a lot of poop. I spoke to the vet today to follow-up about his hookworm treatment plan and mentioned the frequency/volume. She suggested fortiflora. Has anyone experienced that helping with general frequency/volume of otherwise firm poos?

I think it's a lot of poop too! But I wasn't sure, since it's firm and all that. He was on Purina Pro Plan before and had pudding and crazy itchy skin, so this is an improvement compared to that. Fish oil capsules (per vet rec) and switching to Kirkland seem to have helped poo consistency and skin itchies. I also tried Olweo carrots and pumpkin but neither helped with consistency, so I tried the BP and it was magical. BUT I also based serving size on some older GT posts and wasn't sure if it was too much BP either. ETA: poop only got worse as he settled in, hence my search for fiber and the new food. Vet called it "liquid butt" and that was pretty descriptive! He had pudding on the pro plan on a good day.

Hi GT'ers, Since my last post and all your reassurance, I've stopped worrying so much about my boy when I'm at work. On the camera, I see he sleeps in a few different places and occasionally runs a few zoomies. He's doing greyt! But -- we do have one issue that has cropped up -- he sometimes poops by the door to the yard (not the one I leave from) when I'm at work. I can't see that door on the camera so I don't know the timing but I suspect it's an afternoon thing. I hired a dog walker for my first week back at work (I'm a college prof) and he was super, no potty issues. I'm trying to get him to adjust to all day alone if possible and so went to every other day with walker last week. He was fine on days she came and pooped on the two days she didn't. No pee accidents inside ever. Some notes about his #2s: he's gotten nice and firm now on Kirkland salmon with a little beet pulp added (I'm a horse person so I've got it around). Is the BP making him go more? His by-the-door poops are also firm and one neat pile, so it doesn't seem to me like SA. My last dog with entrenched SA had runs all over the house and/or crate if alone... We're still fighting the hookworm battle though -- can that be messing up his frequency? Here's his normal schedule: 6 - up, PP in yard, then breakfast (2c kibble + scant 1/4c BP; he's 72lbs) 7 - walk, PP 745 - I leave for work 430-445 - home, out to yard for PP 6 - dinner (same as breakfast) 630 - walk or yard to PP 8 - yard or walk to PP (either 630 or 8 is a walk depending on weather, but not both, though he PPs both times regardless) 830 - brush teeth, milk bone, bed So he's normally going 4x with me and the occasional 5th poo in the house when I'm gone... Lots of poo but pretty firm, big improvement from when I first got him last month. He's gated into the first floor of the house and wears a muzzle when I'm out. On weekends he often gets a midday poo because we're on some outdoor adventure or other, so no weekend problems but I realize I'm also messing with his schedule in a potentially-unhelpful way. I know the obvious solution is to hire the dog walker for every day but that's really prohibitively expensive for me as a very long-term solution. I'll figure that out one way or another if there's no other solution but I'm hoping your experience and creativity will spawn a few ideas :-)

GeorgeofNE I certainly appreciate your concern. The cat can only go into the fenced yard which I can best describe as a bunker. The fencing is high and completely solid. So, I feel safe letting her do that. I have blocked the pet door to be way too small for the grey to get out during the day and otherwise they are not out together unsupervised (though so far I have been impressed with how sweet he has been to the cat even outside). Thank you all for the vote of confidence. I think I'm being a bit paranoid because my last dog was a giant schnauzer/standard poodle cross with extreme SA that didn't ever improve much with all the professional and medical intervention in the world. He passed on a bit ago and I still miss him, but I can't deny some relief in not fighting the SA battle every day (for his sake more than anything). He came with SA so I don't have much experience with SA-in-development and am trying to be extremely cautious not to create that issue with my grey.

Thank you all for the reassurance! Maybe I'm the one with separation anxiety

Hi all, I've perused the many threads on separation anxiety but haven't found exactly the answer I'm looking for. I adopted my first greyhound about 2.5 weeks ago. From the beginning, I have left him alone for some amount of time every day (hugely variable -- short outings and a few longer outings up to 6 hours. I am a college professor so my summer schedule is variable but I've been forcing myself to leave enough to teach him a work day schedule). He is gated to stay in about half the house and wears his muzzle when alone because I still don't trust him 100% with the cat (who can come and go in the whole house and to the fenced yard). So far no accidents, incidents with the cat, etc. Often he follows me to the door when I leave, but not always. I have a video camera to check on him when I am away and I see that while he spends most of his day sleeping on various pieces of living room furniture, he also gets up a few times a day to check the front and garage doors (I leave out of both) and whines for maybe 30 seconds (occasionally a little longer). Then he settles himself back to sleep on a couch. Here's my question: is the intermittent whining/door checking indicative of something starting with separation anxiety? Or am I just being a nervous new mom? Will he simply adapt to my being gone and whine less? I don't mind the whining/checking in theory, but I want to be sure he is doing ok!