Anxitity with new dog

Katoom400

From the mind of experience..... Anytime I hear of negative remarks about Pit Bulls I always ask," Have you ever had one"? It's quickly obvious that they don't personally know what they're talking about.

RE: "I was not going to be as diplomatic as you."
Me?? Diplomatic?? :) Can I copy/paste your comment and show my relations?? :B They'll think you've been smokin' sumpthin'..
Thanks for your reply..

If I may relate a "vicious" Pit Bull story. I heard our pit making a fuss in the driveway and ran to check him out. There was the man in brown with the brown truck swinging a box at the dog. I yelled at him, what in Hell was he doing? He was afraid of the Pit and said he was bitten three times. I flat told him no damn wonder, you deserved to be bit to challenge a strange dog on his home territory like that. That's the type the poor bully dogs, and owners have to contend with..

Back to the original problem...... The girl had a bad night last night. Panting, fast breathing. The first since Thursday. I gave her a Gabapenti and a gas-X. I don't know which helped but she soon settled down. I'm almost sure it's food/intestine related. She slightly growled when I touched her belly. By morning she was ok. I've ordered a "slow feed" bowl that should be here this week. She's back on chicken & brown rice. I had started to add a little "Signature" for bulk.I called the Vet to check that it's ok to give a Tramadol for a quicker response for pain. Hopefully I won't need it.. I am convinced that dog/owner/Vet correspondences is critical. No matter how experienced your Vet is he only knows about your dog what you tell him. He doesn't get much dialogue from your dog. My forgetterer is better than my rememberer so I write every thing I think is important in a notebook so when I call, I have facts. I think our Vet is the best in Mesa but he needs the tools/information to work with. This forum is the best and I hope sometime I will be able to contribute an answer to Nandi's problem so I can maybe help another with the same trouble.. DOGS RULE..

Jerrybo66 wrote:

Go Dogs wrote:

TXiceman wrote:
I would not have a pit-bull or mix in any family environment. They are a breed that cannot be trusted.

Ken

Someone like yourself has no business owning dogs, that they lack proper knowledge of.

We don't want this thread to turn into another good/bad Pit Bull debate but I find the iceman's comment amusing :) because of his owning a Schnauzer. In the dozen years we've had the good fortune to have our APBT I can't remember of him ever growling at anyone. One of our In-laws had a Schnauzer that had the most miserable, nasty disposition of any dog I've known. The whole family knew to let him alone when visiting. I think I'll stick with our trusted Pit & Rotti thank you... :)

very well put...I was not going to be as diplomatic as you.

begin rant--

iceman's statement was very ignorant, and spreading that kind of prejudice does nothing good for the "breed" as he put it...

dogs are much like people regardless of breed some will always be bad, usually based on upbringing and environment. I have owned Rotties in the past, and they were Gentle Giants! would not harm a mouse!

my current girl is a bully mix "rescued" shortly after we lost our Rotti to old age (13). My wife was much like iceman...prejudiced by the media and had no first hand experience with bully's at all.

Our girl has a great disposition and I quickly fell in love with her after first seeing her at the shelter. but responsible ownership does not just happen on it's own. you have to start at the beginning and understand that a rescued dog will take some work. you can not just bring it home and expect it to understand what to do or how to act.

my wife and I visited the shelter 4 times before adopting, each time spending time alone with dog and getting to know her, the third and fourth time we brought our kids to evaluate her disposition with children.

when we finally adopted we brought the dog home, and my wife happened to read some negative pit bull press on the internet and panicked. she called the shelter and wanted to bring the dog back....just based on some bad press.

I would say it took at least a full month for her to trust Lily completely, but let me tell you how she went from a skeptic to a full on lover of the pit bully "breed". she fully trusts Lily with our kids and any other kids without hesitation...and she IS one of those people that worries about everything...but not our dog...at least when it comes to people being around her. Other animals are sometimes another story, but we are working on that and it's getting much better.

that being said, the first few weeks were a little tough. My rotty was very independent and didn't mind being left alone but Lily was in a shelter for ~4 months, and the story we got was that she was found locked in a car when her owners were arrested for a domestic dispute...they never came to get her.

at first we when we had to leave, we tried leaving here in our basement which had a doggy door out to the back yard with a fenced in 16 X 40 run. she did not do well with that, so our next effort was to use a child gate and leave her upstairs with access to the basement and doggy door to outside.....strike 2...she did not like being left alone and jumped right over the 3 foot gate.

next we tried a taller 4' gate....strike 3

the solution was to setup a pedestal with dog bed looking out the front window, she see's us leave and waits in that window all day for us to return. We did start out slow...just got in the car and took a 5 minute drive, then 15, 30..etc.. Once she understood we are coming back she's totally calm when we leave. She has also never been destructive in the house....she will chew apart her toys but never touch anything that doesn't belong to her ( I think we got lucky in this respect) She has only had 1 accident initially in the house so far and she's been with us 3 years now.

now when we come home, she is so thrilled to see us...it's like we've been gone for years and she just found us...doesn't matter if we were gone for 10 minutes or 10 hours!

in fact she loves being with us so much that she is the reason we got a RV, we didn't like the idea of leaving her alone in a kennel for a week.

sometimes when looking for new campgrounds to visit, we find that same ignorant sentiment in their rules (no pit bulls, rottweiler or "aggressive breeds" allowed)...it's very frustrating as this is like racism. Can you imagine if the rules said "no "_____" race of people welcome because we heard they are trouble?

breed prejudice has been a problem for a long time, it used to be rotties and dobermans now it's the bully breeds... and it's no fault of the breed but rather irresponsible owners and inner city "thugs" who raise them to be mean....couple that with unfair media coverage and get people like iceman who most likely have no experience with the "breed" but are so quick to condemn it! IGNORANCE BREEDS HATE!

I wish for once the media would air a story about "aggressive breeds" who commit random acts of kindness, because that happens a lot more often than not!...it just doesn't sell air time.

simply put, taking a dog home is not easy for you or for them..it's work, it's time and it's a major commitment. It's finding out what your dog needs, and it's you dog learning what you expect.

Just ask my wife who read something Like Iceman's comment and was ready to give up our girl, but now after giving her a chance...wants to open a shelter and save every one of them!


end rant---
happy girls:



big bully smile (1st week home with us)

Go Dogs wrote:

TXiceman wrote:
I would not have a pit-bull or mix in any family environment. They are a breed that cannot be trusted.

Ken

Someone like yourself has no business owning dogs, that they lack proper knowledge of.

We don't want this thread to turn into another good/bad Pit Bull debate but I find the iceman's comment amusing :) because of his owning a Schnauzer. In the dozen years we've had the good fortune to have our APBT I can't remember of him ever growling at anyone. One of our In-laws had a Schnauzer that had the most miserable, nasty disposition of any dog I've known. The whole family knew to let him alone when visiting. I think I'll stick with our trusted Pit & Rotti thank you... :)

TXiceman wrote:
I would not have a pit-bull or mix in any family environment. They are a breed that cannot be trusted.

Ken

Someone like yourself has no business owning dogs, that they lack proper knowledge of.

I would not have a pit-bull or mix in any family environment. They are a breed that cannot be trusted.

Ken

Why wouldn't you muzzle him to stop the damage initially until he gets used to being alone extending the time a little more each time - I know it doesn't stop the clawing damage but he should be shown and chastised for that, so he knows it's not acceptable. We took a doberman from the rescue society years ago to be a guard dog on our farm that was going to be put down because they couldn't rehouse it due to aggression. My hubby could do anything with that dog, but I recognized to be careful around him and when feeding him, he knew male authority and was hard to break to female authority being me. He served his purpose well till he had a heartache with being overly hyper. My hubby is hyper strict with a new animal of any description and gives them the attention they need at the front end to instill good manners and hopefully retrain any bad traits. Patience, love and a firm hand/voice has always worked for us.

Appreciate this is a puppy and it will be 9 weeks old in a couple more days, which hopefully comes with less history baggage and mental damage than with a rescue but ............

Daughter and fiance just got a GSD puppy at 7 weeks, first week odd pee and accidents, in-between taking her out every hour when she was awake or immediately after eating/drinking (not one poop in the house yet and only 2 on the deck) but I at home with her during the day, scolded and made her know not acceptable and I take her out lots to do her business in our front paddock. We have just completed Night 3 with zero accidents day or overnight, and she asked to go out for her poop this morning by crying at the door. When she wants to pee she comes and sits looking up at me so far and I scoop her up and take her out to the field. If she follows me out through the garage she'll typically pee on the tarmac drive not getting to the field. We disinfect clean every time she's done anything to get rid of any smell immediately to avoid association that it's acceptable.

I'm sure she might have an odd mistake moving forwards but she has been day time clean for 5 days with zero accidents and night time clean for 3 nights. We are very routine and make sure she is exhausted through play before bed at around 10pm and then out at 5.15am when fiance leaves, and out again at 7.15am when I get up.

First four nights she cried (got less each night) due to anxiety being locked on her bed in the utility room - she got soothing the first night, but after that I told them to ignore her or they'd make a rod for their own backs. We don't allow pets on our furniture or carpeted areas but spend time playing with them, and they come out doing chores with us. We are very strict when they are puppies so they don't become obnoxious or a PITA adult dog. My beautiful retriever that passed two years ago this Sept I miss like crazy = she always greeted me coming home, would turn away when we sat down at the table to eat, never went on our carpets or up/down stairs. We would leave chicken on the lower counter in the kitchen, chocolates and snacks on the coffee table in the front room and she'd never touch anything. If it was on the hard floors in kitchen, hall, utility area floors it was hers and fair game. If you told her not to touch a treat she'd drool and not until you told her "go on". Any dog can be trained over time with consistency, learning to read their signals and most importantly being strict at the front end - they are pack animals and need to know they are not going to become the Alpha dominant in the household.

We even have a horse he's now 16, that when we got him at 4 was head shy and we found out he'd been nastily broken by a cowboy with a metal rod after the fact. It took a long time it felt to gain his trust, for him to know "this is my space, this is your space" when working around him and so on. He is the most dynamite family member we could wish for.

I truly believe any animal with patience, kindness and strictness regarding respect and what's expected of them, and reading their signals we can train to become a pleasure to have around. Some unfortunately are so mentally scarred we have they require a lot more attention and patience or some leeway in certain respects until ....... However, the proviso is, we shouldn't take on the task unless we commit to the time and attention needed to do so.

If I had to guess - I'll bet Zeke suffered from separation anxiety from the get-go? Which is why he was a stray in the first place (probably dumped by the previous owner). Yes, a dog who suffers from anxiety can do a TON of damage in a short while (my son took in a Red Siberian Husky, who shredded the kitchen floor and walls while left alone).

Sounds like Zeke's foster home is a perfect place for him!

Update...
Zeke has been returned to his former temp. home. He tore our G/D house apart twice and that was the straw that broke the back of his forever home, I think for the best for Zeke. The new folks have a small farm type home and Zeke took off happily playing with their Rottweiler. He then started running with one of the horses that he buddied with before. After about 12 years I think I know APBT'S are intelligent and I may be over francizing but I think his actions against our G/D was aggression towards them because they took him away from the home he preferred. Rottweiler & horse playmate, and room to run. Our G/D & SIL immediately got attached to the dog but there are many super dogs that need homes and they can adjust. As far as Zeke, maybe he couldn't survive a few days in the pound with his history. It would be another sad loss. High fives for Zeke, another misunderstood APBT.. :)

I work with the Animal Rescue and this is pretty common. The dog is experiencing separation anxiety. The dog has been abandoned once and now it wonders if the owner is coming back every time he leaves. We had a lab with a horrible case and it took her years to get over it. Some suggestions:

Start by leaving the dog alone for short periods. At first just go outside and come back in two or three minutes. That way the dog will start to realize that you aren't leaving it forever.

Crate Training. This works for some dogs. Our Ridgeback destroyed the crate, so it wasn't good for him, but some dogs feel more secure in a crate.

They make a drug for pet anti-anxiety called Clomicalm. It didn't work for our Lab, but many people found that it works very well.

I found that taking the dog for a long walk before we left her alone helped a lot.

What finally worked for our dog was getting another dog. We already had one dog and it didn't seem to help. When we got a third dog it helped the Lab calm down and the destruction eventually ended.

The real cure is a lot of love and patience. You don't know what the dog has been through.

This has nothing to do with the dog being a pitty mix. Anyone bringing a non-vetted, anxious, stray dog into their home, without the proper experience is risking trouble. What if this dog had been exposed to rabies, parvo, distemper, fleas, intestinal parasites, etc.?
Take this dog to the shelter. It may face a gloomy future at the shelter, but this family does not need this kind of trouble. A nervous, stray Chihuahua can bite a child-and cause a lot of damage.