In defense of Teagan... and me too!

Teagan has her issues but she's getting better. Really, she's not all that bad!

I've been told that I'm a bad dog mom and Teagan has gotten labeled as a bully by some people. I think that judgement is really unfair and wrong!

On the spectrum of dog owners, I think I'm pretty darn good. I walk them everyday. I feed them good food. I play with them and pet them (sometimes until my hands hurt!). I make sure they get to socialize with other dogs at parks and at doggie daycare. I bathe them and brush them. I take them everywhere that I'm allowed to take them and sometimes even to places that say "No Dogs Allowed". They have the run of the house. They have a fenced yard. They don't want for anything. They seem happy.

On the local news here a few days ago, there was a woman walking her 2 dogs and they ran onto a frozen pond after some geese. Then the ice broke because it's been so warm here lately. The woman went into the icy water to save her dogs. The reporter went around asking people who were walking their dogs if they would have done the same. And only about half of the people said they would. I think that's just crazy! Of course I would jump into icy water to save my dogs!

And I don't think Teagan should be labeled as a bully. Yes, she does boss Keeley around but I think that's just because she's a girl. And yes, she is reactive and gets aggressive when she thinks she needs to protect me or some other resource. But she's not a bully. She does know how to play nice with other dogs. I've seen her do it.

At Lake Park, there's a little corgie named Millie that is about the same age as Teagan. They play terrific together. They take turns pinning each other; just the way a game of bitey-face should be. And I asked at doggie daycare if she was having any issues there and they seemed truly shocked at the suggestion. They said she's really good there. They like her and she makes them laugh too.

I think in Teagan's mind, she thinks that she's a really small dog. And that's why she only wants to play with dogs that are smaller than her. She's scared of big dogs and tries to stay away from them if she can and if she can't avoid them, she attacks them. I don't think that sounds like the behavior of a bully. I think I bully would attack the little dogs, not the big ones, right? I think she's only attacking them out of fear. And this behavior is limited to our home so it probably has to do with resource guarding too. Being reactive is different from being a bully.

Teagan has her issues but she also has so many good qualities too. She trusts me completely. She's sweet and smart. She's insanely healthy. She walks like she's on a mission (sometimes never even stopping to do her business until the end of the walk). She loves her family. She has her issues with Keeley but she really loves him too. She never wants to be far from him. If he wants to play with her she'll get up and play with him even if she'd rather be napping.

She's a year old now and I'm not giving up on her! I think she'll only continue to get better as she gets older.

Evil Teagan?

There once was a girl, who had a curl
right in the middle of her tail.
When she was good, she was very very good.
But when she was bad, she was horrid.That's Teagan in an nutshell. When she's good, she's so very good. She can be so sweet and lovable. She listens well and is smart and tries hard to please.

She has good days and bad days. And even on average days, she has Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde moments when everything can change on a dime. It's like something in her just snaps and she turns into some kind of demon dog. She growls at children and attacks Keeley like she wants to kill him. It must be pretty scary because I see peoples' faces when it happens and their expressions range from scared to confused to angry.

I've gotten pretty good at being right there and putting her into an immediate "Easy". It usually only takes seconds for her to get fully easy and relax. And even after I tell her that she can get up, she usually stays like that for a while. To me, it makes me think that she really wants to be controlled, but isn't so good a doing that on her own yet.

One good thing that's been happening is that Keeley has been trying to take back his top dog position by asserting himself more. In the mornings, he tries to hump Teagan. It's not in a sexual way; I'm pretty sure it's just about dominance and Teagan seems to understand that too.

Teagan is definitely a work in progress, but I'm hopeful that eventually we'll find a peaceful balance in our home.

Romare visits for the Holidays

Romare and his dads came to town for a holiday visit with us today. We used to always go to their house for New Year's Eve, but times change and so this year they came to us.
We exchanged gifts. Keeley and Teagan gave Romare a box of Buddy Biscuits and a package of Zuke's Hip Action. Romare gave Keeley and Teagan each two pig ears.

Keeley just loves hanging with Romare. Teagan, on the other hand, not so much. She still feels threatened by him because he's so big. She spent the majority of the time hiding under furniture. Fortunately there were no instances like last time when she attacked Romare. So maybe things are getting a little bit better with her. She did growl at him once but I immediately made her get easy and the moment passed and she acted a lot better after that.

It was a very nice visit. It's always good to see the Romare guy and his dads because they are totally pawesome.

It's Romare!

Romare came to visit us today! He's like the repeat guest star of this dog blog!Remember a couple of months ago, I reported that Romare, who is only 6 years old, needed a double hip replacement? Well, I've got good news to report now: it's looking like he may not need surgery after all! After talking with the vets, his dads decided that they'd first try everything else before resorting to hip replacement. Romare is on a special diet and he's already lost 1.5 pounds. He got medication for the pain and he's also getting a lot of exercise. It seems to be going well because Romare is acting more like himself. He has problems going up and down stairs and needs help to get up on a bed. But hopefully he will continue to improve and these things will get easier with time. So that's the good news!
The bad news is that Teagan continues to have issues. Everytime I tried to love up Romare, she went psycho killer on him. I guess she's just really insecure. I don't know if she was jealous of him getting attention from me or if she thought she needed to protect me from him. Teagan ended up spending the majority of Romare's visit locked in her crate. This is really distressing because Keeley always loved having dog pals over for visits and playdates and such. I hope we can get this problem corrected by March or else I don't know how we'll be able to manage a doggie birthday party if she keeps acting like this.

update

Teagan has been taking her Clavamox antibiotic for almost a week now and there is no longer hardness on her belly around her boo-boo. So I think things are going well. The sore is healing and she leaves it alone. So that's the good news.

The bad news is that Teagan's resource guarding is escalating and my mom has become scared for Keeley's safety. Teagan always did this food guarding thing since I got her but she only does it to Keeley. I can take anything away from her and she doesn't care one bit, but if Keeley even looks at her from across the room she'll go psycho killer on him.

I supervise their breakfasts and mornings are the most peaceful. Their dinners they eat in their crates so that's not a problem either. It's when they have treats that it happens most often. If Teagan finishes a treat before Keeley is finished, she takes the rest of his away and eats it herself. But if Keeley finishes before Teagan and he even just looks at her, then she goes insane.

This week it started happening for apparently no reason at all. Neither one has a treat but for some reason it's like Teagan gets it in her head that he's got something and she just goes crazy. I've had to separate them several times. I don't know what to do so I'm going to have to ask Keeley's SATS trainer for some advice.

On a different topic, Keeley is super ripe! Boy he's a stinky dog! He was just bathed 2 weeks ago, but he's already really stinky and dirty too. The vet says to only bathe him every 6 weeks or so, but everything starts to stink around here in the meantime. Do any of you DWBs have some advice? Do you have a stinky dog too? What do you do to make them not smell so offensive? Plus, when I pet him and then wash my hands, the water is all brown. I don't know how he manages to get so filthy so fast!

And last but not least, my aunt and uncle gave me a new digital camera. Woohoo! This morning we tested it out at Minooka. Here are some of our pictures: