I have often lamented about Carli’s lack of enthusiasm for going on walks with me. I thought I was starting to make some progress this week but I think I may have set her back a bit today.
I had a beautiful 15 mile bike ride today with this group of women
I returned home with 4 bags of groceries and faced the dilemma of whose bladder needed to be dealt with first. Carli was in her kennel. She gets so excited when I walk in that I feel compelled to get her out first. So outside we go and I had her off leash expecting she would pee and want to go right back in. However she decided to go for a bit of a walk. We walked across the grassy area to the parking lot per our usual when a dog I had never seen before came running at us dragging his leash. He was not far away and Carli took off at the speed of light. I was still in my cycling shoes and somehow the dragging leash tripped me up as I was trying to take off after Carli and I went down on the ground. The teenager that had the dog outside paused to ask if I was OK and took off after the dogs. I got up with just minor scrape on my hand and took off in the direction I saw them go. I have trouble running with my bad knee and the cycling shoes did not help. By the time I got to the end of the parking lot in the direction they had gone, there was no sign of either dog or the teenager. I called for Carli but only got responses from a couple of other dogs that were inside.
I decided I needed to go put on better walking shoes before I took off exploring the property looking for Carli. As I got to the stairs to the second floor, I could see Carli sitting outside the door to our unit. I was relieved and amazed that in her state of panic she evidently knew enough to just go home. She was pretty shaken. I picked her up and she put one front leg on either side of my upper arm and held on. She did not want to be put down. I sat with her a few minutes and then needed to get the groceries in the refrigerator. After that, I tried to take her back out – this time with harness and leash and she would have none of it. She has become quite a moaner and she gave me her distress moan so we stayed securely inside for a couple of hours before I carried her outside to take care of business.
I often need to carry her out to pee right before bed because she refuses to go out and I hate dragging her. We also have developed a control drama about going back to the bedroom at night. This was not a problem at all for the first couple of months. She would happily follow me to the bedroom and jump up on the bed. For the past couple of weeks when we come in from outside, she goes to her blanket on the sofa and stays there until I pick her up and carry her to the bedroom. I have not trusted her to come wake me up if she needed to go out and it felt punitive to put her in her kennel. So last night I decided to see what happened if I just let her stay not the sofa. I was reading in bed and after abut 20 minutes I heard her come into the bedroom but she didn’t jump up on the bed. I didn’t hear her leave so after about 10 minutes I went out to the living room and she was on her blanket. So I left her there. About 90 minutes later, she came back and woke me up but did not want to go outside so I put her in her kennel and we both had a good night sleep.
Tonight I left her on the sofa and after about 20 minutes she came back and jumped on the bed with me. I suspect before long she will be in the kennel again – perhaps she likes it more than I like putting her in it. We will see…….
It is just 8 days until my appointment with the dog behavior therapist – I can’t wait to see what I can be doing better.
Tamara Unleashed 