2 weeks of Puppy (or Happy Birthday, Veronica!)

One of the things I am asked often when people learn Kenzie is in training to be a service animal is will I do this again.  Usually my answer is ‘Ask me next year!’  Since Kenzie is our first foster puppy we haven’t had to give her up yet, but yes, I think it will be very hard. 

I have a disability myself.  I don’t work and my ability to do other things is severely limited.  My primary symptoms are pain and fatigue, but I also struggle with headaches, migraines, food insensitivities, Irritable Bowel with severe intestinal cramps, neuralgia, Restless Leg Syndrome, muscle cramps and tremours, sleep disturbances, memory problems and difficulty following directions. Stress exacerbates my symptoms.  One side effect of all of this is isolation.

While we aren’t training Kenzie to be MY service dog, I definitely get some of the benefits.  I have company all day that is willing to nap when I do and usually low stress.  She’s up for cuddling and helps me to relax and manage stress, but she also helps me to be more active and engage with people more often.  While I can and do pick up my own fallen glove, press the crosswalk button, get the phone, sometimes I really do need to conserve that little amount of energy or avoid the pain involved in that movement.  When Kenzie is placed with her person, I will miss her.  She is the vast majority of my social interaction.

But back to puppies and whether we will do this again.  We got Kenzie when she was 4-months old.  Her foster family was moving away and she needed a new home.  Because of this, we didn’t get to experience the new puppy aspect of fostering.  Usually foster puppies are placed with a family at 8-10 weeks old, hopefully to stay with them until they are placed with their person at about 18 months.  So one question we have had in our hypothetical ‘So would we do this again’ conversations was we never dealt with puppy not sleeping through the night, not housebroken, etc. or little, tiny, cuddly, sweet, sharp-toothed snuggler.

Well, at the beginning of December, Sharon and Ryan brought four 9-week old yellow lab puppies from Saskatchewan.  Ideally they would have all gone to their foster homes right away but sometimes (this time!) it didn’t work out that way.  Even though we have Kenzie, we offered to take one of the pups for a couple of weeks, until a permanent foster home could be arranged.  Dec. 4^th, Veronica’s birthday, we picked up the pup that would soon be named Niko.

Veronica was thrilled.  I seriously have tried to ‘borrow’ a puppy for her before.  She was over the moon.  I think he is sweet and snuggly and … I would be the one to be alone ALL day, all week, with 2 puppies.  Because of my health issues there was some concern all around about whether I could manage that.  I managed – here I am alive at the other end – but it definitely wasn’t easy.

Puppy woke up twice the first night.  Veronica took him out to pee.  After that she only had to get up earlier than usual about half the time.

Veronica takes Kenzie out for a walk before she goes to work.  Added on top of that was Niko’s first pee on waking, and then another pee in the 30 minutes after he ate breakfast.  He got in the swing of things over the 2 weeks so that eventually he would pee right away when he got to the grass, Veronica would run with him to the end of the block and back, and then he would poop or pee a again.  Most of the time.  But some times she was out there with him for much longer.

Service dogs are supposed to be trained to pee/poop on command.  They aren’t supposed to look for, or pull you to the place they have selected.  The handler picks the spot and says ’Better hurry!’, the dog can sniff around the length of its leash and then it is supposed to do its job!  With puppies you are just starting the training for this (and everything else) so you try your best to time it so that when you say ‘Better hurry!’ the pup is ready and then you praise and give a reward for success.

The reason: when the dog is matched with its person, that person is not necessarily going to be able to take the dog for a long walk to let it decide when this business will all happen.  The dog may have only a very limited opportunity in time and in location.  Or the person may not be able to pick it up, in which case, ivy or ground covers where it can be left, or somewhere specific it can be managed in another way is necessary.  The dog can’t choose.

The puppy won’t pee in its bed/crate or on your lap.

How do you know when your puppy is going to need to pee/poop:

At regular intervals – ie every 1 to 2 hours (depending on the pup)

Immediately when puppy wakes up

Within 15-30 minutes after eating

Niko’s own particular twists: 2 hour intervals were too long, 1 ½ hour intervals were too long, 1 hour intervals seemed to even sometimes be too long!  Then we noticed – we had been refilling the water bowl an awful lot since Niko arrived.  We keep a water bowl down for Kenzie all the time and it has never been a problem.  Niko however would drink as much water as we put down and then need to pee ALL THE TIME.  So we restricted water (and offered Kenzie water in between) and then the intervals were much more manageable.

Niko also seems to be a double pee guy.  He will pee right away and then again about 5 minutes later.  So if we brought him out to pee and then returned inside right away the second pee would happen in our house.

Before we figured these things out I swear there was a day or two that he managed to have every bathroom break inside the house even though we took him out regularly.  I would time the hour or hour and a half, be getting my shoes on and I would turn around and there would be a little puddle.  Once, after cleaning up the puddle, I turned back to getting outside and then I thought I could smell poo.  Sure enough, he beat me on both counts.

By the end of the 2 weeks that Niko was with us we had had a number of days with no accidents inside.

The other training we did was to call him by name and use the command ‘come’ and reward him every time he came running.  We also worked on ‘sit’, ‘lie down’ and ‘off’, using the treat to lead him to the desired behaviour.  Sit was his natural choice but lie down we had to gently put him into position the first few times.  Veronica did a little work with ‘stay’.

Some of the other challenges : Sharp little teeth!  Puppies nip.  We both have scratches and bruises.  And even the mouthing or gnawing on your hand can hurt a lot.  Over reacting, dramatizing the pain was the advice we were given to curb this behaviour but we definitely didn’t have as much success here as with bathroom breaks.

Chewing on … the house, the furniture.  Even though Niko had lots of things like toys and special raw hide to chew on, I would still hear the gnawing on the upholstered furniture, the wooden furniture, the house, the floor – any ridge or small piece sticking out.  Mostly distraction was our technique with this one and then passing him a chew-toy.

(We even had less of this than usual because Niko spent a lot of time sinking his little teeth into Kenzie.  We would have had more scratches and bruises if she didn’t take the brunt of it.)

Whining and barking – the barking was only very occasionally and distraction was again the technique we practiced.  Whining however was sometimes incredibly loud.  He whined especially when he was first put in his crate.  Having someone in the room and preferably reaching into the crate to stroke him for the first couple of minutes usually settled him down quickly.  Occasionally he would whine a bit at night.  By the end of the two weeks we could usually calm him just with voice reassurance and shushing.  (The other thing that calmed him was Kenzie sitting outside his crate.  Like I said, having her around was helpful in some ways!)

Exercise for Kenzie was difficult to manage with the pup’s short little legs and not being leash trained yet.  On a walk we couldn’t move anywhere near quickly enough to give Kenzie exercise. The pup also couldn’t go into the park where we usually exercise Kenzie because his shots were not finished yet, so air borne germs or urine/feces on the ground would be dangerous for him.  Since I was getting so tired by the end of the 2 weeks Veronica was starting her day earlier than usual to get both dogs outside and exercised and then immediately on arriving home from work she would begin again with the pup and a long walk for Kenzie, after which the pup would be ready for a pee again.  Hanging around outside in December can make you really thankful for proper clothing in cold weather.

And now for the ways Kenzie wasn’t a help.  For the first two days the two pups were frantic to play together.  By the time V got home from work I was frantic for a little peace.   And after a whole day of that Kenzie was kind of like a kid who has been at the PNE all day and is spinning out of control.

They both distracted each other so much that they would forget to pee/poop if they were taken out together.

Kenzie became convinced that Niko was her puppy and that danger was imminent!  There was a lot of barking whenever we were outside or even in the car.

Kenzie also forgot a huge portion of her training.  We are still hoping it will all come back better than ever.  She had some great practice with the basic commands, especially stay and leave it, under very tempting/distracting situations.

The pup's effort to find everything and anything to chew on seems to have pointed out to Kenzie that you can chew on the edges of steps, any irregularity in the walls and hardwood floors, corners and legs of tables, so now Kenzie is chewing on things that she had never chewed on before.

Both pups got better over the two weeks but still, it was a bigger than usual challenge even to take Kenzie out alone.

So do you recall that we picked Kenzie up on Dec 4, Veronica’s birthday?  Well, through our facebook posts and sharing West Coast Teams posts too, one of our friends decided to get involved and foster a puppy, she went through the selection process and was matched with Niko!  The hand over was the evening of Dec 17, just in time for me to have a solid sleep and no early rising required for my birthday the next day.  So now the joke in our house is ‘For Veronica’s birthday she got a puppy and for Jackie’s birthday she got rid of it!’

Niko's HUGE feet

Snuggles

chewing and chewing and chewing ....

Veronica was very sad to see Niko go but a friend of ours who is a GREAT dog mom saw our facebook posts and the westcoast posts we had shared.  After some emails and conversations (and the pups spot on Global news!) Diana came out to a class with us.  After a week of working out the details Niko moved to her house.  We will still get to see him at classes on Mondays and at occasional social events our crowd will now have 2 service puppies on hand!  Kenzie seems fine with Niko gone but was a little confused at class - every one of the four pups looks pretty similar and she wanted to renew her chewing-love fest with all of them.  They didn't mind but the controlled part of class was harder than usual for Kenz with the puppies just out of reach.  Luckily it hasn't been raining out the last few days so Kenz has gotten lots of big dog exercise.  She's not quite back to her normal behaviour but close.  And we still love her and have her for cuddles.

What happens in Puppy Class

Every Monday we head out to Burnaby for Puppy Class.  It is held at Carefree Canines, a dog daycare that donates the use of the space to West Coast Assistance Teams.  There are usually 6-10 dogs with their people for the class.  Most of the dogs are with their foster families/ puppy raisers.  There are a couple of people their who are matched up with the dog who will be their service animal who are still training.  Along with Sharon and Ryan who trained in Assitance Dog training in California, there are usually 2 other trainers there named John and Amelia.  Shelley is the fundraising person and has foster raised and trained many puppies.  She also brings Luna, a black lab service animal who has been retired because she has epileptic seizures.  (Sharon has a service dog but she doesn't bring her to class so that she can focus on teaching.)  Of course, there are usually volunteers, some with alot of puppy training experience, and occasionally people come who are thinking of voluntering or of beginning the process of getting their own service animal.

Often at puppy class a dog will be with one of the trainers for part or all of the class.  Sometimes this is because the trainer is showing the handler how to do something, sometimes the trainer takes the dog to work alone with them for focus, and sometimes the handler just needs a break.  When someone is just getting a break I have heard them say that they actually learned a lot more because they could focus and concentrate on what the trainers were saying instead of being constantly distracted by the dog.

That the other dogs are around is of course a huge distraction and causes great excitability among the dogs, especially the younger ones.   Added to this are the siblings.  There is a sibling group of black labs that are between 18 months and 2 years old.  Kenzie and her sister Didi are almost 9 months old.  Tucker and Maggie are a little younger and are New Zealand Hearders.  Dogs definately remember their siblings, in case you have ever had reason to wonder about this. The collies and the NZ hearders start bouncing off the walls when they see their siblings.  Anyday now we will get to add a couple of 8-week old yellow labs to the group.

So this is what we did that Monday, followed by what I can remember of other classes...

Obstacle course!

The room was all laid when we arrived!  Some stations were for agility and others were behavioural. 

Walking dog through the rungs of a ladder laid on the floor and raised a couple of inches

Walking dog up/down the length of a seesaw

Slalom pylons to practice ‘heel’ and leave it

A carpet to practice ‘down stay’ and handler walks away, practice ‘come’

Approaching a large umbrella, handler opens and closes it near the dog

Approaching a person in a wheelchair, practicing ‘visit’ (nose in lap) and ‘lap’ (front legs up on lap) and ‘give’ (carrying and then releasing an item into the person’s lap)

An empty wheelchair for handlers to sit in and move around with the dog

And of course 6-8 other dogs moving around the course for distraction

OR

Practice ‘heel’

Practice ‘sit stay’ with further distances and moving out of dog’s sight

Practice stay with distractions (other dogs, stomping feet, etc)

Practice ‘heel’ (dog on handler’s left), ‘side’(dog on handler’s right) and turns

Practice proper response for problem behaviours such as barking and chewing on leash

Practice ‘come’ when dogs are engaged in play with other dogs and ‘leave it/off’ to move away from other dogs.

OR

Discussing appropriate behaviours for public access

Practicing public access for instance at MacDonalds

OR

Practicing ‘show dog’ – heeling around a square course (stage), stand stay for a stranger’s (judge’s) examination

OR

Walking around a square with distractions on the ground (balls, treats, etc) to practice ‘heel’, ‘leave it’ and walking past other dogs without reaction

OR

In summer, when it is nice out and the sun is still out in the early evenings, class might include some outdoor work on stay or heel, in the field next door or with a walk around the block.

Usually by the end of class there are a couple of people with individual questions, administrative or care issues.  With Kenzie, her eyes are often irritated.  Sometimes the dogs have intestinal or food issues.  Sometimes one of the dogs needs their nails done.  Often someone needs more dog food or the coupon that allows us to get it for free. (Thank you Go! Natural.)  Ryan and Sharon sometimes provide a different leash, collar, training tools like barbells for ‘get it, hold, give’ or the light boards. Sometimes one of the puppies has grown enough to need a new vest.

Sharon and V giving Kenzie a mani/pedi after class

In general, class is relaxed and fun.  We laugh.  We get support for the frustrations and congratulations on the break throughs.  But it can still be frustrating or stressful because you want your puppy to show everyone how great they are but the puppy is in a very difficult situation with lots of distractions, including other dogs, and lots of stress.  Luckily we are reminded of this often and that Ryan and Sharon know that the behaviour in puppy classes is not the puppy’s best behaviour.

One of the things that I appreciate about class is that there are people there who are going to have a service animal.  I consider myself fairly educated about disbility issues.  Being a person with a disability myself, and having worked on disability related projects you pick up alot of info and meet many people with different capabilities and ways of coping with their issues.  Even so, I find it hard to imagine what exactly a dog might do to help a person with different disabilities.  Meeting the people who the trained service dogs will go to really helps me to understand this better.  It also really helps me to feel better about losing Kenzie one day when she is ready to be matched up with someone who needs her.  It is a day I don't look forward to because she is just lovely, even when she's driven me nuts all day.  When people ask about the day Kenzie will leave us, and many people DO ask, I usually say, 'Ask me again next year'.  We'll all just have to stay tuned to see how that one turns out.

Rainy days and Mondays

Rainy days and Mondays,  Tell me why I don’t like Mondays,  Just another manic Monday…  Why are there so many songs about Mondays and why are they all bad?!  For us Monday means PUPPY CLASS!  Here is how our day went last Monday.

Kenzie is a great sleeper and she is also great at NOT having bathroom accidents.  Veronica gets up just before 7AM and takes Kenzie out for a walk between 7:20-7:40.  Some days Veronica is behind schedule and this walk is just once around the block.  But usually they go to the dog park near our house.  Sometimes Kenzie plays with a puppy friend but usually Veronica throws a ball or a stick for Kenzie.

Usually Veronica practices on the long leash with Kenzie in the morning.  The long leash game was originally to help Kenzie to bond, to remember to stay near us, and to remember to keep some attention on us.  Basically we ignore the dog for the whole 10-minute exercise.  With Kenzie on a 30-foot leash, we walk about 20 steps forward and then stop.  Ideally the dog will follow you closely leaving the leash slack and irrelevant.   If they are young or not trained, they will get distracted and not notice or care that you’re on the move.  Eventually Kenzie will feel the pull on the leash, realize we are gone and run to catch up.  And we continue to ignore her.  (The point of this is, the human is the dominant one, you don’t have to suck up to the dog and coax the dog to follow you.  The dog has to pay attention to you and keep close.)  So now we stand still until Kenzie’s  attention wanders or she starts to wander away.  As soon as this happens we turn in another direction and walk 20 paces and stop.  And repeat 10-12 times. Every day spend 10 minutes doing this.  For at least 2 weeks.  (A little tip, if you turn the same direction every time you will move 20 paces in each direction in a square and not travel too far away.)  At first we would be walking most of the time but now we spend more and more time standing, ignoring Kenzie and waiting for her attention to wander. 

This exercise teaches a dog to keep some attention on their handler at all times, with or without the leash.  When you move, they follow.  This might seem a little odd, but staying near their owner is a sign of a well-trained and bonded dog.  Nobody wants to have to drag their dog around by the leash all of the time.  Think of the expression ‘following you around like a puppy.’  We want the dog to want to be with us, so even though the leash is still there for safety the dog follows as though it is not. 

In regular life, I can’t even count how many times a week I end up juggling a bunch of bags, or groceries, with my hands full.  Add to that a dog’s leash that I have to pull on?  For a service dog this is even more important than for most dogs.  Service dogs cannot pull on their leash.  If their person has a mobility or balance issue, or if they are simply smaller than the dog, a sudden pull will pull them right over, out of a wheelchair, or tip a scooter.  (Kenzie isn’t especially big, less than 40lbs but she can pull my 160 lbs scooter over.)  Also there are cases, like in the home, where a leash isn’t necessary or useful, but a service dog still needs to be aware of their person and usually follow them from room to room. 

So – back to our Monday!  Kenzie and V come home. This time of year there are always drying needs for wet and dirty feet, legs and belly. Kenzie is fed and then she comes back to bed with me before V leaves for work.

A couple of hours later Kenzie and I get up and start the day again.  Usually I have breakfast and then some phone, computer, reading or TV time.  Kenzie has a bed beside my desk where she hangs out for this.

If it’s nice out, around 11AM Kenzie and I get ready to go out with my scooter.  We like to walk up to Broadway and McDonald, to do chores or for exercise for Kenzie.  We also like to go to Jericho Park for a run through the woods.  If it isn’t nice out, we usually just walk part of our block.  This Monday it was nice out but we got a call that we would have visitors, so our walk was short.  Kenzie met her favourite dog-treat-carrying postal worker and charmed a 4-year old girl at the bus stop.  Kenzie is usually okay to meet small children now, but not uncontrolled.  I will have her sit and then show the child Kenzie’s dog treats and how I feed them to her.  And then I ask the child if Kenzie can eat a treat off of their stroller or their adult’s shoe.   Sometimes, if Kenzie and the child are both doing really well, I ask if they’d like to give her a treat.  If they say no, I ask the child if their adult should give the dog a treat. 

Sometimes Kenzie will bark which usually startles the child.  I tell Kenzie quiet and give her a treat (for being quiet) and then explain to the child that barking is how she talks but it can be a bit scary and she’s still learning not to scare people because she is a baby dog.  And maybe we will show the child a speak command.  Usually with the speak command Kenzie only barks quietly or makes some other funny noise so the child is more comfortable.  All this to get Kenzie comfortable, quiet and calm around children, which needs to be done, and hopefully to get the child more comfortable with her, which is just a nice bonus.

Speaking of children, our visitors for lunch were my parents and my niece Sydney who is 1 ½ years old.  She thinks Kenzie is pretty great, fascinating but preferably not close enough to touch.  Our other niece and nephews were making good progress to being comfortable with Kenzie, but they moved to an area where everyone has dogs.  Every walk they go on, dogs are being walked and running up to the fences barking.  So it has gotten harder, not easier, to visit them.  Dog wants to check out children. Dog barks (while wagging tail!) Children see dog.  Children jump, scream and run.  Dog barks, jumps and pulls towards them.  And it all escalates from there.

Within a few minutes of coming into our house, Sydney wants to give Kenzie a treat.  And treats on Gramma, then Grampa, then Sydney’s foot.  Sydney is also in the parrot phase so she likes to imitate the noises Kenzie makes, making the speak command even more fun.  Syd also likes saying ‘Pull! Pull!’ for Kenzie’s favorite game with her bear-on-a-rope.

Towards the end of the visit Kenzie and Syd had a bad moment.  Syd was at the table having finished eating. Kenzie got her front legs up on the table and pulled on Syd’s sleeve.  Syd was fine with that until I corrected Kenzie.  That made Syd think, ‘Oh no!  Maybe I am hurt?!!’   When we start saying ‘Kenzie pulled your sleeve!  Pull, Kenzie, pull!’ and Syd thought it was all fun again.

After all the excitement, I have an afternoon nap.  And since I am napping, Kenzie naps too.  Her crate and her bed (separate) are beside my bed.  We lie down for 1-2 hours.

Four o’clock is time to gather our stuff and leave to drive east to get Veronica from work.  If she gets on the bus to come west at 430 as she usually does, we would have to leave immediately to drive east to the puppy class.  If I pick her up instead, we have time for dinner before driving east and going to puppy class at 7PM.

I accidentally left Kenzie’s treat bag at home, so I had to turn around and go back.  V has her own treat bag but I suspected she didn’t have it at work.  Always having treats is pretty important when you are training, for distraction and reward.  At puppy class someone would bail us out, but for the dinner stop, treats are necessary at this point.

Lots of times I manage to arrive early to pick up V so Kenzie and I can have a little bit of time at the park.  We also have a spot by V’s work where we can play ball while we wait without there being danger from cars. We want Kenzie fresh for the puppy class but not so fresh that she’s crazed.  And she’ll behave better at dinner if she’s had a bit of a run.

This week we decided to have yummy Middle Eastern food at East is East on Main St. for dinner.  The tables are low for sitting on cushions so this was a new thing for Kenzie - no space to fit underneath the table.  Even laying down her nose could reach our food.  In some ways this was harder to keep that nose out of our dinner.  In some ways it was easier since Kenzie she is very much within reach.  Kenzie got lots of coo-ing attention from the servers.

There was a couple with a small baby a few tables down and that baby was not very happy.  The parents were working hard to keep the baby calm enough to finish their meal.  This is one of Kenzie’s difficulties, children in general but especially children in distress.  But Kenzie was a trouper and looked over there regularly but didn’t try to go over there or bark. 

And then we left for Burnaby, along with rush hour traffic.  We are spectacularly late on occasion but this time outdid ourselves through no effort of our own.  We got off the Highway with 5-10 minutes drive west to class and ON TIME.  Then the main road was completely blocked off by police cars and the detour sent us back west again.  We made it to class 30 minutes late and because of the drive, Kenzie still needs a pee break.

Now I will leave the rest of Monday – the puppy class – for the next blog because it’s been a long enough day already.  As you can see it all makes for a pretty jam packed days, which is hard for me because my health condition requires alot of rest.  But it is also rewarding, not only from Kenzie but from getting out more and seeing more people.  Every one (and their dogs too!) want to meet us when we are out.  So far it is definately worth the effort and occasional frustration.