Thursday, May 12, 2005

Dogger needs a licensed professional

Dogger has now exhibited fear of:

Pine Trees
Large Shrubs
Overhead power lines
Audible bird noise
Low flying planes
Vaper trails
The sky.
Being touched by children, it makes her shimmy like a back up dancer.

We went for our walk yesterday and it became clear just after we left the house that I am going to have to get her a tread mill. Girl friend dog is not making it easy. She had been doing so well. I mean she had been doing better then before we visited my parents but not as well as she had been doing the prior two years when she appeared to be afraid of nothing and a friend of everyone.

Now? Now she tried to dig a hole to China while we were in the middle of the street because she was going to have to walk past a house with a large shrub and even worse, there were over head power lines! And the sound of birds and a crowd of children! Dogger was in a bad place. I finally got her to get up off the street and up on her feet and drag her past the shrubbery and the children when she noticed that those over head power lines were not going away and were indeed going to follow us for the entire time we were outside.

After she was thoroughly adored by the kids she seemed a little better or at least less acutely in the midst of a full blown freak out. Maybe it was good for her know that she to be outside and not be at the mercy of the winged demons that haunt her waking hours. Everything seemed okay. Almost normal. We kept going. She was mildly hurried at the rec center but she might have needed to use the grass and was in a hurry to find the right space. This is okay. She stayed pretty intense about leaving the park while we were there but she was at least not trying to hide under the turf – I took this as an improvement over the melt down she had earlier in the walk when she was being tormented by the evil door blocking shrub and the nasty over head power lines.

We went through the newer neighborhood where there are no over head lines. She looked for them though and switched her anxiety over to the pine trees. Damn them for being so tall and giving comfort to the winged demons!

She did even better as we headed up the home stretch. The power lines were back but they were hidden from view in the trees - not pine trees and she was okayer. She still picked up the pace as we got closer to the house but she may have just been hungry.

We got home and I fed her. After dinner I thought that I would take her into the back yard so she could run around. Yeah. Run around in the back yard. I put her in the yard and she ran behind the shed. I made her get out and put a tomato brace in to block her entry to the behind the shed area – so she just sat by the gate. The whole time she was out there.

I went online. I would think that somewhere on the internets there I would be some explanation of her sudden fall into Lake Sybil - but there was nothing. I did find a forum dedicated to the Victims of Paranormal Rape – odd, since I was searching for “signs of mental illness in dogs”. Maybe dogs are the primary victims of paranormal rape, I didn't stick around long enough to find out. I didn’t want to spend any more time there then I needed to. I spend enough time on forums dedicated to TV shows, I do not need to spend even more time with crazy people.

I guess its time to call the Vet. That’ll be a fun phone call…

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