Dog Stories: And then there's Zippy

When I got Zippy, my little terrier (probably a chihuahua-schnauzer cross), I wasn't really up to some of the challenges she would present. We've done okay mainly due to my having limited visitors and not feeling well enough to get out much. But I realize now that I've accepted too much frantic behavior even in my house.

There's no denying that Zippy was a bundle of energy when I got her and she is a bundle of energy now, though she has matured some. However, I've started to view her nervous, over-excited energy in response to anything unfamiliar as something that needs to be changed in order for her to "be all that she can be." Like Rufus, she's a dog who is largely afraid of the world. It's just much easier to manage with a small dog. They're more easily kept indoors and they're more easily managed despite fear when they need to go out to the vet. We also tend to expect small dogs to be nervous.

Zippy can put on a good show of being willing to go out but I've recently realized that she's pretty much terrified the entire time even when she's behaving. Here's how I discovered this.

I watched Cesar Milan's 911 series. I was probably looking for information about fearful dogs and this popped up in my youtube feed. I know there's a lot of controversy around him but I don't personally cringe when I watch him problem solving cases. He takes on the tough ones, though similar tough ones are everywhere. In some ways he's incredibly patient with people, repeating over and over again, and demonstrating over and over again, exactly the same things to new people who supposedly have watched his show before (they knew to call him in) and yet never applied what he's been saying and demonstrating ad infinitum.

I got a couple of things from him to use with Rufus. The little surprise back haunch bump to get a dog out of a negative focus on something (rarely used but was useful) and constantly repositioning the training collar so that it's right behind the ears where it's truly effective. For Zippy, I got "calm, submissive state" drilled into my mind.

One criticism that I'm sure that Milan has gotten is that his pack and his focus is mainly large to medium dogs. I'm sure a lot of smaller breed lovers have thought to themselves, "yeah, sure, let's see you with a pack of Jack Russells." Some of this criticism has undoubtedly reached him because he eventually got some smaller breeds to include and one day I saw a "calm, submissive" Yorkie jump out of his van along with his Pit Junior to help with a case. And of course he's been responding to small dog problems since the early days.

In general, Milan helps people see what's possible for their dogs and to question their own assumptions and behavior. Eventually, I accepted that I needed to try behavior modification on Zippy to see if I could get her to a "calm, submissive," or simply more comfortable, state while even preparing to go out for a walk, let alone on a walk.

I start with her in her crate and the first trial has been to get her to a non-reactive state as I open the door. In fact, it turned out to be even more difficult than that because I discovered that she's in an overexcited tizzy even with me standing near the crate with a leash in my hand. I eventually discovered that I couldn't even look at her directly or face her directly if I wanted her to relax and lay down in the crate. I had to stand at 90 degrees to the crate and a step or two away.

I have to set aside a lot of time for this or abandon the mission if I find myself getting impatient. It can take 15-20 minutes just to get her to not get pushy and overexcited when I approach and open the crate.

Next, there's a half-door between the kitchen, where the crates are, and the living room, where the front door is. She can pretend to be calm in front of this door for about 15 seconds and then she has to go into fits of jumping of flopping on her back. She also has to stay in place as I open the door. This barrier isn't too difficult. She's catching on to it quickly.

Once we're in the living room, though, she's in whirligig mode or is wanting to charge to the door. So I have to scale way way back. With Rufus, I can creep-walk. With Zippy, I take one step and stop and make her sit. If she doesn't face the direction I am facing, then we keep stepping in the direction I have chosen. If she doesn't sit, we back up. The reason for this is that when she is comfortable, she easily sits. She seems like a little dream dog who steps forward and sits so nicely, over and over again. But once the door is open, she's so stressed she forgets to sit and even with some prompting with the training collar gets no response. So we back up until she is comfortable enough to sit.

The first time, we didn't get off the porch. Yesterday, we managed to get off the porch but just barely. She's overstimulated by grass (I'm guessing). Getting her out of her crated, off the porch and back into the house took about 45 minutes. We spent a lot of that time walking past the door because she wanted to swing around to face it instead of sitting in the direction I was facing, which was the hallway. As a result, we spent a lot of time in the hallway. Having the door open was stressful and we had to back up a number of times. In fact, we had to retreat all the way down the hallway and into my office at one point because a neighbor arrived home and made noise. I was hoping no stray dogs or cats would decide to invite themselves in while we slowly made our way back to the door.

Am I crazy? Maybe so. But this process has awakened me to how stressed out Zippy is. It's admittedly very hard to go as slow as she needs to go to stay relaxed enough to pay attention to me and secure enough to sit. Time will tell whether I will end up with a calmer, more well-adjusted small dog that I can take places or whether I admit defeat and just keep her at home except for the annual terrifying visit to the vet.