I am often confounded by the behaviors of human parents, especially when they are hurrying their children away from my little dog, “Gadget.”
Gadget has butterfly ears and a black button nose. He is fascinating to little children and babies and loves nothing more than to be petted by them. When parents out on a casual walk can’t spare even a few seconds to allow the child to delight in something that obviously delights him, well, it kind of makes me wonder about priorities.
There used to be a child in my neighborhood who particularly loved dogs. She was mesmerized at the sight of me walking any one of my pack. But on the child’s walks around the block, even as a toddler, her parents never had time to say hello. As the child grew up she was able to take walks by herself, and once free to do so, she always stopped to visit with my dogs and was highly curious to learn their names, where I got them, what breed they were, and everything I could tell her about them. She also spoke with pride about her passionate love of all creatures, great and small. If she had rented a billboard that said “I LOVE ANIMALS” this girl could not have communicated it more clearly. But her parents had never given her a pet. I don’t know the family well. Perhaps there were allergies involved, or bad experiences with pets or animals, but it seemed a sad thing to me, and slightly ironic. Both parents worked from home. Their job? Running a website on child rearing.
I’ve seen a similar blindness in people’s attitudes about their dogs. There’s a hurry, a perfectionism, and a set of priorities that often strikes me as a bit off. Perhaps it’s an American thing. Or a twenty-first century thing. But sometimes, we seem to have more important things to do than to love.
At first with a new dog, as is in human relationships and marriage, there’s a bloom on the rose and people have stardust in the eyes. If there is an awareness of a problem, it is minimized, or assumed that the somewhere down the line, it will be solved. But mostly, it’s a honeymoon phase. That’s the time when everyone insists that their dog will be a therapy dog because the world must be made to benefit from this magnificent creature, and the dog will be an agility dog because look at the genius way it jumps and plays! These days also, this dog, this perfect four-legged creature unlike any other, will be an Instagram star, and do puzzles and use talk buttons, in between its job of comforting the sick and bereaved and winning gold ribbons, of course. But even when the expectations are more modest, things don’t always go to plan.
A friend of mine recently adopted a new dog. This friend, after previously having had only big dogs, finally adopted a sweet little dog, and was looking forward to having a lap dog as she relaxed and watched TV. But guess what? The dog is not a cuddler. Doesn’t like it. Doesn’t want it. Won’t do it. And the dog has some behavioral issues that make the possibility of adding another dog to the pack pretty slim. So where does that leave my friend? The dog was a rescue, and my friend hated the idea of returning her to the rescue group, but frankly, she was considering it. This friend has been through a lot, and I could see how she might’ve made that choice. But when it came down to it, she realized something: she loved the dog. This little dog, who didn’t cuddle (and would never meet my friend’s original expectation,) was now beloved, and she wasn’t going anywhere.
And it can be a big loss to discover that a dog can’t handle the dog park, or won’t sit with you at a café, or doesn’t like kids. I’ve learned in the very hardest of ways, (stories for another day,) that some problems cannot be fixed. Certain kinds of experts and professionals would consider such a statement an outrage. Some of them have tv shows, their own dogfood endorsements, and claim they can fix any issue, in any dog. And in their defense, dog professionals so often deal with dog people in denial, you kind of can’t blame those who have a certain fierceness of their “can do” attitudes. They’re used to people saying “I tried, but the dog won’t learn,” or, “oh that’s not a problem, he just wants to play,” even as the dog is chewing off half your face. But such over-optimism does a disservice to both dog and human. Fortunately a lot of professionals, and you’ll meet some of them in this space, appreciate the deep pain of a dog problem that can’t be fixed. (A solution can be found, but the solution makes the problem livable, or manageable, but it doesn’t make it go away.)
None of this is to imply that if you are having difficulty, especially anything impacting your dog’s safety or the safety of others, that you should not get professional help and work hard to solve the problem. But as author and animal behaviorist Patricia O’Connell notes, “be sure to find someone who is well-versed in positive reinforcement and who is just as kind to you as they are to your dog.”
O’Connell is an example of a professional who meets the problems of both humans and canines head on with realism, empathy, and wisdom, as evidenced in one chapter title, “When Your Dog Needs Another Home and When You Need a Hug.” These sorts of enlightened dog pros also know that within the crux of a dog’s difficulty may lie that dog person’s greatest moment of opportunity. It is a chance to love and accept the dog as he or she is, while also loving one’s self.
I cannot remember her name, and so apologize for not crediting her, but I took an online class about reactivity in which a guest lecturer expressed this moment of realization beautifully. She was a professional therapist. She had gotten a dog she thought would be a wonderful companion, not only for her, but for her patients. She pictured the dog sitting by her side as she worked, the dog’s calm presence and unconditional love radiating throughout the session, helping the troubled people to open up and feel safe. But as fate would have it, the dog didn’t like strangers, or even people that much. The dog was in a constant state of stress with this parade of newcomers and the dog’s agitation was anything but therapeutic. As the woman came to grips with the situation, she also came to love this dog, this being, for itself, not for what it could do for her. But there was also a sense of loss. When I heard this woman’s story I was in the process of training (and loving) my first reactive dog, and I wept tears of relief as this woman expressed such compassion for herself and her own challenges. (Note: I recognize that some do not like the word “reactive” and actually, I don’t either, and use it here as a shorthand, to be discussed in greater depth on another day.) But by the time I took that seminar, I had spent dozens of hours receiving advice from professionals, both in person and online and in books, (though I hadn’t found O’Connell yet,) and this woman was the first time someone had empathized with my feelings of disappointment and sadness. The course leader had put this guest lecturer up first, demonstrating an understanding that before I could truly do my best for my dog, I must give weight to my own feelings as well.
But it’s not only behavioral issues that challenge us. As I write this, Hayward, my black lab, has a growth right next to his brain. It’s called a “nerve sheath tumor” and it’s way too close to the brain to be operated on. All they can do is a short course of targeted radiation in hopes of slowing it down, but they can’t remove it. We did this treatment just over a year ago. Yesterday, Hayward had a follow up MRI. We drove for about an hour to the hospital, and I cooled my heels in a cute small town nearby, waiting to hear how it went. Finally, the vet called. “No perceptible change.” The tumor had not grown! Tears of joy wet my face and a swell of pride filled my chest. Pride? Yes, for Hayward. What a good boy!
But sadly, we are on the topic of unfixable problems, and I must also share that the prognosis for this type of tumor, with treatment, is two years. That means, statistically, it is hard to type this, we are entering the last year of Hayward’s life. I am planning trips to the snow, lots of visits with his pitbull girlfriend, “Sushi,” and as many belly rubs as he can stand. We recently subscribed to a regular toy and treat box, so I won’t forget to give him new, weirder, squeakier toys and novel treats every single month, and I’m happy to have that reminder because like the hurried parents who rush past Gadget, sometimes I too deprioritize love. And that is my real point here. We all need reminding sometimes, that nothing is promised. This moment, here and now, with this particular pack, it’s all we’ve really got. And that’s OK. Because though it may seem that you got a dog to go running with, or to meet cute girls at the dog park, or to bark if a burglar breaks in, that isn’t the real story. You got a dog for one simple reason: because you needed someone to love.
As the philosopher Seneca said at the end of his letters, “and now I will come to the point and pay you what I owe.” This is the inaugural column of what will be a ten-part series. I am calling it “The Imperfect Dog.” (I’m having a little fun there, because the Imperfect Dog can be called “The ID” for short, and in some ways, a dog can be this Freudian expression of our most animal impulses. The dog who humps pillows and slathers openly at the thought of a treat, and rolls in ecstasy on a pile of something smelly. We all wish we could be so uninhibited!)
The Imperfect Dog will cover all the usual dog topics. You will learn my views on dog parks, whether you need to be more “alpha,” and lots of good tips not form me, but from the experts and wise dog people I will introduce you to. But my purpose will be singular. My angle, my slant, my pitch: until we get out of the business of insisting that life should be as we would have it, and not as it is, we will never know a moment’s peace. And the same goes for man and woman’s best friend. These so-called problems— the throw up on the carpet, the chewed table leg, the staunch refusal to come when called, not to mention reactivity and brain tumors— these are the very moments that will teach us the most about how to love. So here’s the question I promised at the beginning: do you really love your dog? Not tomorrow, not the next day, but right now?
For myself, I don’t have the answer, but I find that remembering the importance of the question usually sends me in the right direction, for dog and human alike.
P.s. one more thing about Hayward. After the vet yesterday, I made sure to have a toy waiting for him in the car afterwards, because even if he is groggy from anesthesia, Hayward likes to celebrate getting into the car with squeaking a toy in his mouth. We people may lose track of what really matters, but it isn’t only elephants. A dog never forgets.
Thanks for reading. Please do share this column with friends, and please don’t pee on the carpet.
Further resources:
Patricia O’Connell’s book, At the Other End of the Leash: Why We Do What We Do Around Dogs.
Though it often shelved in the humor section, one of the most seriously useful dog books I have is a picture book by artist Lili Chin. Doggie Language: A Dog Lover’s Guide to Understanding Your Best Friend has wonderfully simple drawings to help you translate what your dog is feeling or thinking in any given moment.
On a similar topic but handled very differently, On Talking Terms with Dogs: Calming Signals by Norwegian trainer Turid Rugaas explains further about understanding the meaning of various dog postures.
Gadget has butterfly ears and a black button nose. He is fascinating to little children and babies and loves nothing more than to be petted by them. When parents out on a casual walk can’t spare even a few seconds to allow the child to delight in something that obviously delights him, well, it kind of makes me wonder about priorities.
There used to be a child in my neighborhood who particularly loved dogs. She was mesmerized at the sight of me walking any one of my pack. But on the child’s walks around the block, even as a toddler, her parents never had time to say hello. As the child grew up she was able to take walks by herself, and once free to do so, she always stopped to visit with my dogs and was highly curious to learn their names, where I got them, what breed they were, and everything I could tell her about them. She also spoke with pride about her passionate love of all creatures, great and small. If she had rented a billboard that said “I LOVE ANIMALS” this girl could not have communicated it more clearly. But her parents had never given her a pet. I don’t know the family well. Perhaps there were allergies involved, or bad experiences with pets or animals, but it seemed a sad thing to me, and slightly ironic. Both parents worked from home. Their job? Running a website on child rearing.
I’ve seen a similar blindness in people’s attitudes about their dogs. There’s a hurry, a perfectionism, and a set of priorities that often strikes me as a bit off. Perhaps it’s an American thing. Or a twenty-first century thing. But sometimes, we seem to have more important things to do than to love.
At first with a new dog, as is in human relationships and marriage, there’s a bloom on the rose and people have stardust in the eyes. If there is an awareness of a problem, it is minimized, or assumed that the somewhere down the line, it will be solved. But mostly, it’s a honeymoon phase. That’s the time when everyone insists that their dog will be a therapy dog because the world must be made to benefit from this magnificent creature, and the dog will be an agility dog because look at the genius way it jumps and plays! These days also, this dog, this perfect four-legged creature unlike any other, will be an Instagram star, and do puzzles and use talk buttons, in between its job of comforting the sick and bereaved and winning gold ribbons, of course. But even when the expectations are more modest, things don’t always go to plan.
A friend of mine recently adopted a new dog. This friend, after previously having had only big dogs, finally adopted a sweet little dog, and was looking forward to having a lap dog as she relaxed and watched TV. But guess what? The dog is not a cuddler. Doesn’t like it. Doesn’t want it. Won’t do it. And the dog has some behavioral issues that make the possibility of adding another dog to the pack pretty slim. So where does that leave my friend? The dog was a rescue, and my friend hated the idea of returning her to the rescue group, but frankly, she was considering it. This friend has been through a lot, and I could see how she might’ve made that choice. But when it came down to it, she realized something: she loved the dog. This little dog, who didn’t cuddle (and would never meet my friend’s original expectation,) was now beloved, and she wasn’t going anywhere.
And it can be a big loss to discover that a dog can’t handle the dog park, or won’t sit with you at a café, or doesn’t like kids. I’ve learned in the very hardest of ways, (stories for another day,) that some problems cannot be fixed. Certain kinds of experts and professionals would consider such a statement an outrage. Some of them have tv shows, their own dogfood endorsements, and claim they can fix any issue, in any dog. And in their defense, dog professionals so often deal with dog people in denial, you kind of can’t blame those who have a certain fierceness of their “can do” attitudes. They’re used to people saying “I tried, but the dog won’t learn,” or, “oh that’s not a problem, he just wants to play,” even as the dog is chewing off half your face. But such over-optimism does a disservice to both dog and human. Fortunately a lot of professionals, and you’ll meet some of them in this space, appreciate the deep pain of a dog problem that can’t be fixed. (A solution can be found, but the solution makes the problem livable, or manageable, but it doesn’t make it go away.)
None of this is to imply that if you are having difficulty, especially anything impacting your dog’s safety or the safety of others, that you should not get professional help and work hard to solve the problem. But as author and animal behaviorist Patricia O’Connell notes, “be sure to find someone who is well-versed in positive reinforcement and who is just as kind to you as they are to your dog.”
O’Connell is an example of a professional who meets the problems of both humans and canines head on with realism, empathy, and wisdom, as evidenced in one chapter title, “When Your Dog Needs Another Home and When You Need a Hug.” These sorts of enlightened dog pros also know that within the crux of a dog’s difficulty may lie that dog person’s greatest moment of opportunity. It is a chance to love and accept the dog as he or she is, while also loving one’s self.
I cannot remember her name, and so apologize for not crediting her, but I took an online class about reactivity in which a guest lecturer expressed this moment of realization beautifully. She was a professional therapist. She had gotten a dog she thought would be a wonderful companion, not only for her, but for her patients. She pictured the dog sitting by her side as she worked, the dog’s calm presence and unconditional love radiating throughout the session, helping the troubled people to open up and feel safe. But as fate would have it, the dog didn’t like strangers, or even people that much. The dog was in a constant state of stress with this parade of newcomers and the dog’s agitation was anything but therapeutic. As the woman came to grips with the situation, she also came to love this dog, this being, for itself, not for what it could do for her. But there was also a sense of loss. When I heard this woman’s story I was in the process of training (and loving) my first reactive dog, and I wept tears of relief as this woman expressed such compassion for herself and her own challenges. (Note: I recognize that some do not like the word “reactive” and actually, I don’t either, and use it here as a shorthand, to be discussed in greater depth on another day.) But by the time I took that seminar, I had spent dozens of hours receiving advice from professionals, both in person and online and in books, (though I hadn’t found O’Connell yet,) and this woman was the first time someone had empathized with my feelings of disappointment and sadness. The course leader had put this guest lecturer up first, demonstrating an understanding that before I could truly do my best for my dog, I must give weight to my own feelings as well.
But it’s not only behavioral issues that challenge us. As I write this, Hayward, my black lab, has a growth right next to his brain. It’s called a “nerve sheath tumor” and it’s way too close to the brain to be operated on. All they can do is a short course of targeted radiation in hopes of slowing it down, but they can’t remove it. We did this treatment just over a year ago. Yesterday, Hayward had a follow up MRI. We drove for about an hour to the hospital, and I cooled my heels in a cute small town nearby, waiting to hear how it went. Finally, the vet called. “No perceptible change.” The tumor had not grown! Tears of joy wet my face and a swell of pride filled my chest. Pride? Yes, for Hayward. What a good boy!
But sadly, we are on the topic of unfixable problems, and I must also share that the prognosis for this type of tumor, with treatment, is two years. That means, statistically, it is hard to type this, we are entering the last year of Hayward’s life. I am planning trips to the snow, lots of visits with his pitbull girlfriend, “Sushi,” and as many belly rubs as he can stand. We recently subscribed to a regular toy and treat box, so I won’t forget to give him new, weirder, squeakier toys and novel treats every single month, and I’m happy to have that reminder because like the hurried parents who rush past Gadget, sometimes I too deprioritize love. And that is my real point here. We all need reminding sometimes, that nothing is promised. This moment, here and now, with this particular pack, it’s all we’ve really got. And that’s OK. Because though it may seem that you got a dog to go running with, or to meet cute girls at the dog park, or to bark if a burglar breaks in, that isn’t the real story. You got a dog for one simple reason: because you needed someone to love.
As the philosopher Seneca said at the end of his letters, “and now I will come to the point and pay you what I owe.” This is the inaugural column of what will be a ten-part series. I am calling it “The Imperfect Dog.” (I’m having a little fun there, because the Imperfect Dog can be called “The ID” for short, and in some ways, a dog can be this Freudian expression of our most animal impulses. The dog who humps pillows and slathers openly at the thought of a treat, and rolls in ecstasy on a pile of something smelly. We all wish we could be so uninhibited!)
The Imperfect Dog will cover all the usual dog topics. You will learn my views on dog parks, whether you need to be more “alpha,” and lots of good tips not form me, but from the experts and wise dog people I will introduce you to. But my purpose will be singular. My angle, my slant, my pitch: until we get out of the business of insisting that life should be as we would have it, and not as it is, we will never know a moment’s peace. And the same goes for man and woman’s best friend. These so-called problems— the throw up on the carpet, the chewed table leg, the staunch refusal to come when called, not to mention reactivity and brain tumors— these are the very moments that will teach us the most about how to love. So here’s the question I promised at the beginning: do you really love your dog? Not tomorrow, not the next day, but right now?
For myself, I don’t have the answer, but I find that remembering the importance of the question usually sends me in the right direction, for dog and human alike.
P.s. one more thing about Hayward. After the vet yesterday, I made sure to have a toy waiting for him in the car afterwards, because even if he is groggy from anesthesia, Hayward likes to celebrate getting into the car with squeaking a toy in his mouth. We people may lose track of what really matters, but it isn’t only elephants. A dog never forgets.
Thanks for reading. Please do share this column with friends, and please don’t pee on the carpet.
Further resources:
Patricia O’Connell’s book, At the Other End of the Leash: Why We Do What We Do Around Dogs.
Though it often shelved in the humor section, one of the most seriously useful dog books I have is a picture book by artist Lili Chin. Doggie Language: A Dog Lover’s Guide to Understanding Your Best Friend has wonderfully simple drawings to help you translate what your dog is feeling or thinking in any given moment.
On a similar topic but handled very differently, On Talking Terms with Dogs: Calming Signals by Norwegian trainer Turid Rugaas explains further about understanding the meaning of various dog postures.
