Dogs behaving, well, like dogs

I’ve spent my entire adult life watching my dogs act like idiots at the vet’s office. Relatively well-trained idiots who wouldn’t make the tech’s lives a living hell, but idiots nonetheless. Five generations of dogs (we'll talk about the sixth generation later) couldn’t make it through the front door of the clinic before the shaking started. Followed by the panting. Eye rolling. Fur shedding. Acting like the world was ending accompanied by vast sighs of canine angst.  

Through the years, my vets and the techs who help them have been, without fail, some of the kindest, gentlest people my dogs ever encountered. 

 

Keep in mind, these dogs were trained for the show ring and had been exposed to all the madness of the human world from day one. Semi tractor-trailer air brakes. Screaming toddlers. PA systems. Live fire. Slick floors, bicycles, errant wildlife, other dogs being jerks and once, a hot air balloon lifting off about fifty yards from where we were training (okay, that was kind of a surprise to everyone). Meh. They’d been handled from nose to tail by me, my family, my friends and complete strangers. Almost without exception, this interaction was met by patient tolerance or enthusiastic reciprocation. (The latter being Raider. He is a firm believer in reciprocation.)

 

But take them to the vet? Dramatics ensued.

 

Sheltie Jess buried his head under my arm and pretended the vet didn’t exist if he couldn't see her. I’m not sure he actually saw any of his veterinary caregivers in his fifteen years on this planet. 

 

Sheltie Connor was a little more chill. He pulled some kind of Jedi mind trick where he slowed all his vital signs at the vet's because he was pretty sure death was coming for him and he was going to meet it halfway. His blood pressure was so low at the vet’s office, techs couldn’t draw from a vein in his leg and had to draw from his neck.

Connor, Phoenix and Jamie

Tervuren Jamie was the undisputed high royalty of drama at the vet. Poor guy. He kinda liked going to the vet until he got neutered. What should have been a straightforward procedure turned into abdominal surgery to find a retained testicle, and that was the end of any positive association with the vet's office. When I went to pick him up after his neuter, his opinion of the situation echoed through the whole building. The tech who went to get him soon returned, pale and counting her fingers, and suggested it would be in everyone’s best interest if I were to go and fetch my own dog.

 

Malinois Phoenix was stoic about the whole vet scene. He played the “Yeah, whatever” attitude card during routine exams and blood draws. Keep in mind, this is the dog who once chased a cat through a rotary hoe. Sort of. Cats can run through rotary hoes. Malinois can not. He abandoned the cat and trotted back to me with an eight-inch laceration across his ribs. He was wagging his tail. Off we went to the vet to get stitched back together. He didn't hold it against her. 

This is what a rotary hoe looks like, in case you were wondering.
It was not in use when the cat-chasing occurred.

 

I think Phoenix liked going to the vet more than he let on. He liked to lick faces, and veterinary care meant there were lots of faces in lickable proximity. The problem was, he usually bared his teeth before he licked. I suspect he took a few years off the life of several techs when he looked at them, pulled his lips back to show a little fang, then gave them a fast tongue swipe.

 

Aussie Banner, who generally likes everyone, gave it the ol’ college try when it came to the vet’s office, but he just couldn't manage it. The dog who will happily let a complete stranger pet him takes a dim view of being poked and prodded in the name of health. He carries on, shaking and panting, but is willing to negotiate for treats. He does not, however, think the number of treats he receives at the vet’s is fair compensation for the indignities he has to endure there. He would like more. As in, all of them. He can see the full container on the counter. He is nobody’s fool.

You will give me the cookies. All of them. Now.

 

Then Raider arrived. The dog who likes everything. All the time. All at once. 24/7/365. When we go to the vet, the wiggling starts the second his paws hit the ground outside the office. Granted, this dog also wiggles at the mannequins in stores. His delight accelerates as we go through the doors. Unlike my shelties, who started trying to leave the minute they arrived, Raider starts looking for people to wiggle at.

 

He is delighted to see the front office gals. Ditto for the techs, his vet, other vets, drug salesmen, clients trying to pay their bills and on more than one occasion, a very annoyed cat in a cat carrier.

Raider at about 5 weeks old.
This is still how he does everything, including vet visits.
Go now, go fast.

When Raid was a puppy, the ecstasy of meeting all these wonderful people often triggered the waterworks. He leaked. If Jamie was the Drama King, Raider was the Peeing King. He didn’t mean to. He was just so happy he couldn’t stand it. P*ss on being reserved and aloof. There were people to meet!

 

It got to the point where we’d enter the office and I’d ask the staff not to talk to him, look at him or pet him, unless they wanted to clean up after him. Life was hard for a few years.

 

I’d like to think he’s finally outgrown this expression of delight in being able to interact with his medical providers. It only took four years—four years during which I think he peed in reception, up and down the hall, on the scale and in every exam room in our clinic. I don’t know how much vet techs get paid. It’s not enough.

 

After the sprinkles, Raider was a cooperative patient. He didn’t care what part required examination, he would happily comply. You want to see a paw? Wonderful! Check teeth? Absolutely! Palpate nether regions? A little weird but knock yourself out. He wiggled his way through routine exams and vaccinations with inexhaustible joie de vivre.

 

The only time he did NOT appreciate going to the vet was an emergency trip when he was young. He came out of his crate in the morning on three legs and went tri-podding around the yard like he’d never had four legs in his life. Off to the emergency clinic we went, where I summarily handed him over and went to sit in the waiting room where I listened to someone’s noisy dog screaming at the top of his lungs for at least thirty minutes.

 

Thirty-one minutes later, a vet appeared and said, “He’s a little excitable, isn’t he?” I decided the “If you’d let me stay with him he would have been quiet” argument wasn’t a hill I wanted to die on. Clinics have their protocols and many pets are, indeed, easier to handle when anxious owners aren’t hovering and raising everyone’s anxiety. Within twenty-four hours, Raider re-discovered his fourth leg and everything was fine. Except my wallet.

 

This fall, my local veterinary practice added a chiropractor, and I began taking Raider for routine appointments. This would be right up his alley, I thought. He was going to love going to the vet’s office for the express purpose of having someone put their hands on him. No needles or probes, just fingers.

 

It took about five seconds for Raid to fall in love with his new provider. She’d just come back from a farm call, and he thought her coverall smelled divine. He was all about the touching until he realized this was touching with a purpose beyond his own selfish gratification. He wasn’t sure how he felt about that. Getting him to simply hold still was asking quite a lot since he is a graduate of the school of “Pet me and I will pet you back.”

Raid does have "indoor enthusiasm" and
"outdoor enthusiasm." He just has "enthusiasm."

 When the restraint and manipulation got to be too much, Raid would break free, ricochet around the room like a demented rabbit, then settle back down to focus on bits of cheese while the appointment commenced. These breaks came to be known as “Raider minutes.” It is now commonplace for his chiro to address a troublesome area, then release him, saying, “He needs a Raider minute.” I think this is a concept we could all get behind. 

THE BOOK

I am soooooo close to being able to share the cover design. But I can't. Not yet. The final tweaks are taking an agonizing amount of time, as these things do.

Still no release date. Thank you for hanging in there and believing me while I keep chanting, "It's getting closer!" I promise!