PTSD in dogs

Mid pant nerves; she stopped panting to listen to footsteps.

Elsa had her recheck last Thursday and received a 4 paws up from her Veterinarian.  Thankfully this whole mouth/face thing is over with; although she will be a long while to completely heal her mouth.  She is feeling much better and is back to herself, almost.  

PTSD - Post traumatic stress disorder.  

About a week before Elsa's recheck, I was anxious to have a look at where her tooth had been removed.  As I went to lift up her lip I noticed that she had some anxiety about it.  I quickly changed my mission into a nice short gum massage and a snuggle.  She has PTSD over the mouth pain that she suffered from this whole thing.  I believe that most of the issues came from being at the emergency Vet. that first day.  I was not happy with the attention that Elsa got and I know that they opened her mouth way too many times, just looking.  

So we are working on good mouth things.  Since Elsa was a very little puppy I have worked on her mouth.  It started with a tooth that was not coming in correctly which meant that I was in her mouth all the time.  From that we went to mouth massaging, teeth brushing and scraping.  She has never minded me in there at all, until now. 

All dogs are different and each will response and react to stimulus individually.  This means that some dogs will let things slide; not giving much concern to anything.  While dogs like Elsa who are extremely intense with a heightened awareness; will not let things go unnoticed.  Things that happen in life have very different lasting impact on each individual dog.  

Her issue is a small one but it is there so I will work on it.  She doesn't act out or anything; it is more a feel and her eyes that tells me she is a bit concerned.  With some great things happening as far as her mouth we will be desensitizing and counter-conditioning.

desensitize - introduction of triggers that cause unwanted response at low level then slowly increasing .    

Counter-conditioning - conditioning a positive response to a particular stimulus where a negative response once was with the use of  'good things.'  

This is where the massage comes in first; short and gentle gum massage followed by treats immediately.  Maybe a quick tooth brush with coconut oil which Elsa loves.  

Highly concerned ears.

We will also be working on her PTSD with the Vet.  Elsa has always been excited to be at the Vets and would follow along happily if taken to the back.  Not anymore.  Since this last ordeal linked to  pain she had her tail tucked as far as it could go for much of her visit.  She still had some wags for the techs and vet on greeting but the tail went under when they wanted to look at her mouth.

I hate to see this but it is very, very typical.  I don't know too many dogs who like to go to the vet after having to stay for a procedure.  Linked with the pain and the stay; Elsa is now concerned about the Vets.  I discussed this with my Vet and told him I'd be bringing Elsa over often to sit in the waiting room.  He then said "sit, have a coffee and ask the girls up front to give her treats."  I like my new vet a lot.  

Elsa's behavior would be classified as "great" from post people.  She is no where near as freaked out as Tilley and Luke use to be.  Luke's response was to be as scary as possible to keep everyone away.  This of course scared everyone and I had to do a lot of extensive canine behavior explanation so that the techs and Vets understood what was going on.  Once he was in the room he was his usually pussy cat self.  Tilley was so afraid to be left at the vets that she very clearly wanted to crawl inside of me.  She sat quietly trembling; clamoring on me and trying to get out the door.  Elsa's anxiety behavior now would be unnoticeable to others.  But I know my girl and I want to help her with any anxiety that she has.   

We will keep the visits short and very positive.  Maybe I'll even take her into an examining room and hang out for a while.  Of course it must remain upbeat and positive for counter-conditioning.  It must also be kept very short time wise; building with the success of changed response.  

Elsa got up on the counter immediately after we left the examining room.  She is very conditioned to treats coming from behind certain counters.  

Treats please.  :)

Elsa adores most people.  She is highly forgiving so this is just a tiny bump as far as PTSD, pain and trust, but it is there.  We will be working on it.  

The act of hiding cues

 

She is always listening, not a word or action gets by this one. 

Stepping off the path, I was laying the ground work for getting some needed distance.  When Luke was a little man, he had an occurring problem with running to greet people and dogs.  If new people and/or dogs arrived at the park; he felt the need to run to say hi.  Not everyone wanted to say "hi" in return so I got in the habit of leashing him when I saw someone coming.  It wasn't long until Luke realized that the "leash" word meant that new folks had arrived.  Upon seeing this response from him I realized that I had to work on the "no cue" giveaway.  To this day, if I say "leash" to Luke he looks around to see who's coming.

There are many things in our life with dogs that need to have hidden cues.  That means that you don't want to tip your dog off to something.  Let's face it, our dogs are far smarter than we think they are.  So when I do something, I always think to myself  "will Luke and Elsa figure this out?"  The answer is usually yes so I need to implement the action with a day to day association.  If you associate an action to a reaction it can become a cue. 

Cue:  anything said or done, that is followed by a specific action.  A sensory signal used to identify experiences, facilitate memory. 

You know how when you put on a specific pair of shoes; your dog already knows you are going for a walk?  Or when you get out a certain towel, it is bath time?  Cues, they are all cues and it doesn't take much for our dogs to "get" them.  One cue that I am continually working on is distance.  When I am out walking Luke and Elsa and see a dog up ahead of us that I do not want to interact with I get distance.  The act of getting distance can tip them off if it is a cue; so I get distance often and switch it up.   Sometimes distance is just a step off the path for no reason.  Other times we step off and then back on again to say "hi" to a dog.  Mixing it up keeps it from becoming a cue. 

During your day to day, pay attention to the cues that you are creating.  If you've accidentally created cue; you can undo it if you work hard and consistently.  But once a cue is very set in, it can be difficult to get rid of it entirely.  Different dogs will learn cues at different rates.  Elsa is a fast cue learner.  She is a watcher, this girl never misses a thing; so it takes a great deal of work on my part not to set cues.  It is a constant work in progress to try to not let my actions become cues. 

Does picking up my grey running shoes mean a walk?  Elsa might think that it does so I put them in the yard.  Touching a leash can send your dogs into a frenzy; so pick it up and move it somewhere often.  Opening a particular cabinet cues a reward, so change it.  Change the meaning of your actions if you want to get rid of a cue or desensitize a behavior.  Association is everything for dogs; if you think in those terms it is much easier to understand them.  Pay attention to your actions and your dog's reactions.  We create cues on a daily basis without ever knowing it.  By watching your dog's reactions we can discover our own actions. 

More on leash aggression

Yes, I've written about leash aggression over and over again.  But after a trip to the park and witnessing two episodes of it I just have to discuss it further.  Luke, Elsa and I had just gotten out of the Xterra and were on our way to the open area of the park.  It is nice going out with both of them; but it is getting harder for Elsa as Luke slows.  She is very good at walking slowly but you can see her chomping at the bit.  As we rounded a corner I heard the jingling of dog tags behind us.  Glancing over my shoulder to see who was coming; I recognized them immediately.  A woman with her two Siberian Huskies; I see her often, running through the park with her dog.  I like that she runs with her dogs; Huskies need to run and she obviously takes the time to give them what they need.  But on this day as they ran up beside us, I could see their hair going up.  Hmmmmmmm, hadn't noticed this before; perhaps it was because she always runs down the middle of the field. 

They broke their running pace and started to grumble.  Soon it was a frenzied barking and the owner pulled the leashes to a full stop.  She tried to get them under control to go again but she only ran a few yards before they started up once more.  By this time Luke was all puffed up and grumbling himself; Elsa joined in with a bark or two.  The barking became more frenzied when I noticed the prong collar.  I wanted to tell her but there was no way to have a civil conversation among this chaos.  Luke, Elsa and I had never stopped walking; we had not changed our pace and I told them very calmly that "we don't care about this stuff," as we continued along.   She ran off and as she got distance her dogs quieted.  Association, it is all about association for dogs.  The more the dog strained at the leash the more pain he received at the fault of my dog's presence. 

We made our way around the whole park; a big walk for the old guy.  As we came to the end I watched another case of leash aggression unfold in a magnitude I had not seen in some time.  A nice woman with her tiny toy poodle was walking quietly and calmly down the path.  At the end of the path were two Chihuahuas and a small white fluffy dog.  The sound coming from the three dogs at the end of the path was that of sheer frenzied scream barking.  Each dog was held by a human so there were three dogs and three humans there in a bunch.  They stayed on the path which surprised me; moving off and giving their dogs some space would have been a good idea.  As the woman with her poodle approached they got louder and louder and displayed redirected aggression.  Snapping at one another out of frustration; it was an insane situation.  The woman with the small poodle picked up her dog and walked by and on her way. 

I had a choice at that moment, to go pass or not.  I chose to walk pass, but with a great distance between us and the frenzied pack.  They never stopped their barking once the woman had passed by them.  They were far too worked up at this point and needed a huge intervention to be able to stop.   When we got close enough for me to see what was going on, I was shocked.  Each person was hitting the dog they had on a leash.  There was yanking, hitting and yelling coming from the owners of these dogs.  When I saw the one with the fluffy dog take a magazine and hit his dog I stopped dead in my tracks.  I could not go by without saying something; but could they even hear me?  I made sure that Luke and Elsa were calm; it was a very stressful situation so I didn't want them freaked out by it.  Elsa was sniffing around and Luke was just calmly watching. 

"You are making the situation worse," I yelled to them.  "Every time you hit your dog you are creating a negative association to dogs being near you," I tried to yell at them.  One girl heard me and stopped hitting her dog.  "Don't hit your dogs," I said loud and clear.  Now all the owners were facing me, listening.  I explained further, although I'm not sure how much they could hear.  I told them if they continued like this that their problem was going to become much worse.  They seemed interested as I tried to explain how the dog's brain works.  I told them about rewarding minute moments of silence with food treats.  But with the frenzied barking ongoing it was difficult to get anything but "don't hit your dog," across. 

Leash aggression is very, very common.  The more aggression that your dog hears as they walk by other dogs the more apt they are to display themselves.  What you do with that display makes all the difference in the world.  Yanking, yelling and even hitting is a human attempt to stop the behavior.  The dog takes all of these displays from their human as a very negative situation.  The human is stressed which stresses the dog further.  The yelling, yanking and hitting creates a hugely negative association to the presence of other dogs. 

If you have a dog with leash aggression:

Don't stop walking, do not slow, just keep going.
Stay calm, even if you have to pretend.
Do not tighten up on the leash; if you have to, do it so that your dog cannot tell that you are.
Give yourself and your dog space.  Step off of the path.
If you have to change direction or turn around, do it calmly.

You can either make it worse, or better.  I opt for the "we don't care about these things," approach.

Talking to dogs

Do you talk to your dogs?  I do, all the time.  All day long I talk to them and they listen very well; better than most humans I might add.  There are times when I just chat away knowing full well that they are only picking out a few specific words that mean something to them.  Then there are times when there is great meaning in my words.  When dogs understand a wide range of words or verbal cues, they tend to listen more.  I have always taught my dogs the meaning of many words and try to teach them new ones all the time. 

Over the years I have seen dogs that have a blank stare when they are talked to.  Nothing except the rare "cookie" or "walk" word means anything to them.  No one talks to them; at least not like they are expected to understand.  Repetition is the key to teaching new words.  I am in the process right now of teaching Elsa the names of her stuffed toys.  I say their name over and over and over again.  Why?  For the same reason that we teach children, it makes them smart and capable of learning more. 

Elsa has recently learned the joy of not destroying her stuffed animals.  For a while nothing was lasting more than a few fleeting moments.  Once Luke got a hold of the softy, made a hole and started to de-stuff; then Elsa would finish it off covering the entire living room in fluff.  Hmmmmmmm.  But after the arrival of Jeffrey, things changed, Elsa loves Jeffrey.  I have to make sure that Luke does not get a hold of them though and create the initial hole.  Elsa fully enjoys her stuffed guys now and is learning who is who. 

Along with teaching more words, switching the words up and using them in new ways helps the learning process.  Having been away from home for a while now; everything we are doing is new.  New, in that the environment is new.  We are still walking, sleeping and eating but the surrounding environment is entirely different from what they are use to.  Being able to communicate with Luke and Elsa with words that they understand really helps them to acclimate to it all very easily. 

We have a lot of steps here in OR which is a challenge with Luke.  Many times when I take them out to pee; it is easier to take one at a time.  So after taking Speedy Gonzalez Elsa out, it is Luke's turn.  I tell Elsa at the top of the stairs "just Luke," and her ears drop.  She clearly knows what that means.  She is not happy about it but waits patiently for us to return.   Once we get back into the house she gives Luke his greeting and all is good again. 

Elsa is an intense listener; Luke was also but his hearing is bad now and he misses a lot of what I say.  This is why signal communication is so important (past blog).  In his younger days, Luke was an amazing listener.  As you all know he is a fussy pants when it comes to eating.  But one word alone would get those giant ears of his up and interested.  That word is "butter,"  oh yes, he loves him some butter as does his Mom.  :)  He would turn his nose up at his meal until I said "do you want some butter on it?"  He would immediately change his tune "okay, I'll eat it if there is butter on it."  What a guy.

I am constantly searching for new words to teach Elsa.  It is all about repetition and association.  Association must be there for a dog to "get it."  That is our job; create the association that our dogs will understand.  The association must be meaningful and useful for a dog.  Elsa's favorite stuffed guy right now is Jeffrey, she adores him; although I started the naming with her pink monkey which was her favorite before Jeffrey arrived.  I would cheer each time she had her pink "monkey" in her mouth; repeating "monkey" over and over.  Before too long I could say "go find monkey" and she would. 

"Find" is another word that is very useful.  It is a word I used with Tilley all the time.  Being an intensely driven retriever; we often lost whatever it was she was retrieving.  She may have missed the throw or it landed somewhere that it shouldn't have.  I would tell her to "find" it and her whole body changed.  She would put her nose to the ground and begin the "finding" process.  Elsa has now learned what "find" means as well.  I love it.  The other day we were out doing some retrieving and she missed the throw because she was watching some dogs in the distance.  I told Luke to find the ball as he had been watching and he ran and got it; much to Elsa's displeasure.  She had begin to look for it as well but Luke already knew where it was when I asked.

Talking to your dogs is never a waste of time.  Not only is it nice as far as having a great listening companion but they learn.  Sometimes it may seem that they are not getting it; but if you watch closely you will see some signal letting you know that they understand.  Of course there are times when they will simply ignore; just like we tend to do.  I love those sideways eyes they give us that let you know they are actually listening.  Luke is the King of sideways eyes.  Talk, teach and use verbal cues; the more the merrier.   

Positive reinforcement/association

Reaching down to grab the very wet and disgusting ball out of Elsa's mouth I realized how far she has come.  She never use to want me to have the ball because that meant that our game was over.  She would turn her head but eventually hand it over.  She of course still does not want the game to end but when I say "drop" she gently opens her mouth for me to take it.  Why the change?  Because she gets a treat.  That and because she knows that I might just start the game up again at any moment. Positive reinforcement is so vital to canine behavior and keeping it...well, positive.  It is all about association; the link between two behaviors.   I take the ball in the end, but she gets a treat for giving it up.  Plus I make sure that I throw the ball again at some point during our walk.  That way the game hasn't truly ended until we leave the park or as they say, the fat lady sings.  :)

Positive reinforcement or association can be added easily to your day to day.   Elsa trots along nicely by my side once she gets her ya ya's out.  She knows that when she walks by  my side that treats will appear.  They don't come out often but it is worth her while to hang out there for when they do.  This is positive reinforcement. 

Positive association is a bit different but the same, sort of.   I have used association for nails.  Neither Luke nor Elsa enjoy having their nails done;  not too many dogs do.  But when I bring out the grinder, both circle with excitement.  They know that treats follow nails and I will continue this always.  As soon as their nails are done they get treats; not just one, but a few to make good and sure that it remains a positive.

Positive reinforcement is the act of linking a behavior to a reward.  This, ups the possibility of the behavior being offered again.  Once the behavior is learned you put the reward system on a random delivery schedule.  Perhaps you wait for the best or fastest behavior that your dog offers to reward.   Then you cut it back further to just every so often.  Complete elimination is up to you.  Depending on the behavior is how I factor that in.   Some behaviors should be rewarded once every so often, others don't need to be.

Positive association is creating a positive feeling around a negative activity, like nail cutting or grinding.  There are many things that dogs can baulk at throughout the day so you need to choose which of those need a positive association to.  Positive association can be done with our own behavior; you don't need treats for all associations.  Sometimes your  positive behavior to a situation can turn it around.  Take a little yapper (small dog) for example; who is going off on yours as you walk by.  You can either fuel a negative by pulling your dog away and getting upset or you can create a positive by chirping away happily while you pass them.

Plucking ears (for those who have hairy ear breeds) is another negative activity.  Treats are a must for this one unless your dog is not into treats of course.  Teeth scraping, bathing and the weekly physical; when you have a good look see.  Almost anything can be turned from something your dog doesn't want to do; to an activity that they tolerate due to the reward at the end. 

Don't get frustrated, associate.