On a Limb with Claudia

The culprit has been found...

Some random unknown visiting cat is pooping in our yard. Cassie has eaten this cat poop -- which is one of the reasons she's been so ill.

 

via GIPHY

 

...if I ever find that cat...

Gratefully, Cassie and Dottie are both feeling much better.

 

The dogs have the stomach flu, and I'm convinced it's my fault.

This is a photo of Cassie (on the left) and Dottie (on the right) from about a year ago when they weren't throwing up and pooping everywhere. 

For the last few days, Cassie and Dottie have been throwing up and pooping, almost nonstop. Friday night and into the wee hours of Saturday morning, I took Cassie out every hour, on the hour, all night. Exhausted, I finally fell to sleep and she popped on the floor in our hallway. The husband has done the bulk of the clean up because this kind of Dog flu can be Norovirus, something he's not sensitive to, but I am. Our backyard looks like a minefield of dog patties. 

This is what happens around here when the winters are warm. The Canada Geese in City Park poop out a potent cocktail of dog heroin and toxic waste.

We make every effort to keep them from eating the goose poop. They respond with subterfuge worthy of an old school John Le Carre spy. 

Now, they are both sick.

Really sick.

And somehow, I'm confident it's my fault.

I am their primary care taker. I spend all day, every day with them. I am responsible for their food. 

Clearly, it's my fault. Because...

The likely culprit -- the Canada Goose

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I grew up hearing: "Everything was fine until Claudia showed up."

The belief stems from the fact that my schizophrenic mother slipped in to a major rotating-head freak out around the time of my birth. Of course, it had more to do with the apparent murder of her mother just a few months later, my father's bankruptcy, and her father's new, fresh off the Miss California pageant, wife.  Her psychosis in full bloom, she found monsters and liars around every corner. The conspiracy theory she still believes regarding her mother's death shows some of the depth of her psychosis at the time. 

That's not what anyone the family believes.

The family mantra is that my mother was fine until I showed up.

I am responsible for everything that was wrong in my family because everything... was fine...

"Everything was fine until you showed up" has been said to me so often that it's basically the theme song for my life. It's said even today!

These words are one of the last things my father said to me before he died.

My sisters repeat this single statement unconscious vigor. When I've pointed it out to my eldest sister that she'd made this statement, she shrugged and said that "You can't avoid the truth." My youngest sister denied ever saying the phrase until she said it again. Then she just looked at me and said that she was a good Christian, thus never lied. If she said it, it must be the truth. 

Everything was fine...

Even repeated in the safe confines of my head, these words cut me to the quick. My breath stops. My mouth drops open and tears well in my eyes. 

Even today, my siblings believe that "everything was fine until Claudia showed up." So, I stopped showing up. 

Back to the dogs...

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We found Cassie and Dottie on the Denver Dumb Friend's League website. As I've written about before, they had a really difficult time before they came to live with us. They were about six months old and vastly underweight. Dottie was so thin that the people at the Dumb Friend's League weren't sure she would survive. Cassie was bigger but they were both shockingly thin.

It's a miracle that they survived.

Because of this history, they have major food issues. We've been able to overcome their serious prey drive. We've been able to overcome fighting for food. We've been able to overcome all of that. 

Until now.

We're stopped giving them food because they are sick. Their hunger and this thing  in their guts brings their early months of starvation back.

Cassie and Dottie are anxious, upset, and sick.

And I can't shake the feeling that it's my fault.

Certainly, if you look on the Internet, you will see a host of articles about how this type of situation is the pet owners fault. I fed them the wrong food. I gave them some yogurt with human probiotics in it. I didn't give them enough probiotics. I didn't give them this expensive product or that other thing that is vital to health.

The Internet and my family story fit together like hand in a glove. 

That's the problem with the Internet. There's so much out there that you can confirm almost any bizarre theory.

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This morning, Cassie and Dottie were in good spirits and full of energy. They spent the morning helping the husband shovel snow and went to the store with him. When they returned, I fed them some rice and chicken broth. They didn't like it much, but they did eat it. 

They are sleeping now. 

Dogs and people get sick. That's just the very nature of life. 

Regardless of what I believe inside, it doesn't actually have anything to do with me. 

But now knowing they are sick, I'm going to do everything in my power to fix it.

That's the difference between reality and my family story. If there was anything I could have done to "fix" my mother, I would have done it. My childhood was spent trying everything I could think of.  

She was still mentally ill.

Severe mental illness is not the stomach flu. There's no amount of rest or light food that can make it go away. Untreated, mental illness tends to get worse with time, not better.  

Especially, if you and everyone around  you is certain that "everything was fine until Claudia came around." 

Dottie found her tail. #DogPTSD

Dottie found her tail

Last weekend, out of the blue, Dottie discovered that something was following her. She had no idea what it was. She'd probably never seen it before. 

Every time she turned around, this thing was following her. She tried to outrun it. She tried to shake it off. She tried to bite it. But somehow, some way, it was still there.

You're probably wondering why this is significant. Every puppy discovers their tail at some point. 

Dottie is, at least, close to a year old. She also has post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Because she's been so traumatized, she's missed most of the usual developmental stages.

PTSD causes her to simply check out. She is physically present but mentally, she's a million miles away. If she was human, we might say she has a dissociative disorder. 

When she feels threatened, she simply checks out. Sometimes, she has no idea where she is or who we are. Her body is there, but her mind is gone. 

She hasn't been present enough to experience normal, natural development. 

So, she discovered her tail. She recently discovered that she could bark. She was shocked that the noise was coming out of her own mouth. Now, she barks with the sheer thrill of being able to make the noise. 

PTSD is the same for human beings. 

One minute, you're there and the next minute, you're gone.

We have a stereotype of the Vietnam Vet who takes cover when a car backfires. For Dottie, and a lot of people, her triggers are more subtle. For example, if Dottie's gets too hungry, she will check out. If we give her food when she's checked out, she won't recognize it as food. She will leave even her favorite treat alone. Sometimes, her sister, Cassie, has to show her that the food is available.

If you're in a relationship with someone with PTSD,  you can have an entire conversation before you realize that they are not present. If your child has PTSD, he or she can spend an entire day in school and not learn a thing. Children who live in difficult areas go entire years without gaining knowledge. They simply weren't mentally there to receive the lesson.

Anger or loud noises will bring someone to the present. Often, it's a shorthand way to get someone's attention. And it certainly works, at least at first.

With Dottie, it doesn't work for long. Pretty soon, your reaction only sends her mind deeper into space.

How do you teach your dog basic dog manners when they aren't there?

You don't. Period.

It's the same with people. If your friend or partner has PTSD and is checked out, you have to wait to have an important conversation. You can't teach a traumatized kid how to read until their mind is present.

Getting present is a lifelong project. It requires consistency, quality rest, good food, plenty of water, and lots exercise. These are the exact same things a person needs to overcome their PTSD. The more structured, consistent, and predictable their life is, the more time they will spend in it. 

Unfortunately, the space out can be fairly addictive -- for humans and dogs. The emotions create a biochemical cascade that, while potentially unpleasant, it is addictive. Reality will always lack the heightened excitement of these states. 

Love bridges the difference, of course. If your loved one or dog has PTSD, you must practice the patient part of love. With time and consistency, they will return to you. Hopefully, you won't wear yourself out while they're not there. 

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I'm not an expert in dogs. I don't have an advanced veterinary degree or specialized training. I am, however, an expert on PTSD with a Master's in Clinical Psychology and more than 15 years of working with severely traumatized individuals. I've decided to write about my experiences with dogs because this information doesn't seem to exist anywhere. ~~Claudia

The Girls -- Meet Cassie and Dottie

I remember it like this.

The husband came home one Friday singing the song "Sisters" from White Christmas. I didn't think much about it. The husband's older brother had a penchant for musicals and he had seen a lot of them growing up. It's something we have in common since my father sang opera and in musical theater most of his pre-married-to-the-scitzophrenic life. (My mother was too paranoid to let him continue after they were married.)

We had lost our darling dog Rose in May, 2015. And suddenly, there was a gaping hole in our lives. Before losing Rose, we'd talked about getting another dog. We'd even gone through the extensive screening for the local Vizsla Rescue.

But we still didn't have another dog. We knew of the intense need for homes for dogs. I am friends with Amy McCracken, who runs the Richmond Animal League, RAL. I hear about animals who need stable, loving homes every single day. I know about abused dogs, old dogs, injured dogs, and even those from dog fighting rings, through the amazing work they do at RAL.

We had this gigantic hole in our lives. We had time. We had a loving home. We could take on another dog. (Note the singularity of dog.)

Anyway, imagine the scenario -- husband singing "Sisters" and the weekend beginning. Because we had been talking about getting another dog, he sat down Friday night and opened all of the dog rescue sites -- every single one. The first one he went to was the Denver Dumb Friend's League.

And he saw the picture above.

You can call it fate or soul attraction or maybe just a little bit of insanity, but he felt drawn to these dogs. Being a scientist at heart, he then spent most of the weekend trying to talk himself out of these dogs.

Nothing took.

His heart had already decided. The girls in the photo above belonged with us. We rushed to the Dumb Friend's League as soon as he got home from work the next day and adopted them.

They were skin and bones when we got them. They had clearly been horrifically mistreated which has left them with a variety of issues including PTSD. They'd nearly starved to death.  They'd arrived out of Santa Fe, NM without a story or even a "where did you come from." The simple truth is that we don't know.

What we do know is that someone found them. Someone fed them, talked to them, retrieved them from wherever they had landed. Someone had put them on a shuttle to Denver Dumb Friend's League.

What we know is that somehow, some way, they now live with us.

Meet Cassandra (Cassie):

Cassie is a beautiful dog. She is smart and funny. She learned right away how to make us laugh. She's also learned all the basic dog stuff -- sit, stay, come, and even does a good job on the leash.

She currently is learning how to help me in the kitchen. This is no easy task for her as she has a huge prey drive and struggles with food guarding. None the less, she has found a spot in the kitchen and works hard to keep me company.

Her coat is black with a brindle of red running through it. When we are out in the sun, people stop to look at her. She's grown in size and muscle since coming to live with us.

She needs so much stimulation and exercise that I've taken to riding with her on my bike. She does really well with the WalkyDog bike attachment.

 

 

Meet Dorothy (Dottie):

When Dottie first came to live with us, she would only respond to the whole saying of her name: 'Dor-o-thy,' like Auntie Em talking to her Dorothy. She has learned her name and how to sit. Everything else is pretty hard for her.

She looks like a small black Labrador. She has the same brindle stripping that Cassie has, but it's on her underbelly and her feet.

She is simple, loving, and very sweet. She loves pretty much everything, but particularly her sister, Cassie, especially if she gets to wrestle.

When we first took her to the dog park, she shivered in terror. She gets lost in her head, so we have to keep an eye on her at all times when we're out. Over time, she's becoming more comfortable. That said, I was confronted by other dog owners recently about my "terrified, lost dog." My assurances that she's getting better didn't help much.

Suffice it to say, Dottie is overcoming her fears and getting stronger every day. She's learning to check in with us, and we're learning ways to ground her when her mind is caught in some PTSD fugue state.

She is very shy, and a total youngest child. She will snatch away a favorite treat or toy just to get Cassie's attention.

Of course, if our tempers flare, Cassie puts her body between Dottie and us. It's very sweet.

The Denver Dumb Friend's League said the dogs were four years old. Our vet says they are not yet one-year-old. They were not potty trained but they are getting pretty good.

They are still growing in height and still getting teeth. They've each gained about ten pounds since they came to live with us.

An animal behaviorist told us that she didn't think Dottie would have survived if she wasn't adopted with Cassie. I'm sure that's true for Cassie as well.

We still miss Rose -- sometimes gut wrenchingly terribly and sometimes just a dull heart ache. That's the way of grief.

And we're delighted to have the chance to love and live with Cassie and Dottie.

Change is life, and life is change. Cassie and Dottie are a pretty great change in our lives.