Adjusting to change: reframing our expectations

This is Freckle and Ceilidh waiting for their dinner last week. Is it ever a long way from the food crazed Boxer who arrived in our home in December and believed that she had to flatten Ceilidh in order to get her share of the dinner!

I’ve done a lot of thinking about change and how creatures adapt (or even thrive) when change happens. As they say, “Everything flows, nothing stands still” (Plato quoting Heraclitis in Cratylus apparently). I’ve written a couple of articles about how librarians in particular (I’m a librarian—for those who don’t know me) get through change… also called resilience. [See “The Resilient Librarian" and “Creativity and the Resilient Health Librarian”]. But getting back to dogs… when Freckle came to live with us she brought a mindset that said “when there’s food, be BIG and BAD to make sure you get some!” Ceilidh on the other hand, has always had as much food as she needs (notice I didn’t say “wants”) and so doesn’t feel a need to be big and bad—just impatient. So during the first couple of months that Freckle lived with us we had to deal with the “food crazies.” We had to be extremely cautious, keeping the two of them separated during meals and minimizing treats (poor Ceilidh!) to avoid triggering Freckle’s BIG and BAD response (which was very noisy and quite traumatic for all involved—especially Ceilidh).

One day I came across Freckle reading Plato’s Cratylus and highlighting the Heraclitis quote about how “everything flows.” She said that after some time to observe the routine, it’s obvious that there’s always lots of food… enough to fill her belly, make her sleepy and precipitate a nap. I was pretty impressed. This is just another example of the wisdom of dogs—Freckle has adjusted her response to fit her new situation.

How many triggers for BIG and BAD do you have? Do you still need to respond with BIG and BAD? Just think of the energy you could save if you adjusted your reaction to fit the current situation… which most likely has different circumstances than the one that originally triggered BIG and BAD for you (everything flows, remember?). This week, I’ve decided that whenever I feel BIG and BAD coming on, I’m going to make a point of looking carefully at the situation. Before I act, I’m going to ask myself if the circumstances still warrant BIG and BAD. And I’ve asked if I can borrow Plato’s Cratylus from Freckle, but she says she’s not finished with it yet. I probably won’t have time to get to it anyway.

Morning routine survey highlights part two

Question #3: How late will your dog let you sleep on weekends and holidays?

1:00pm. He is the best!

We usually sleep in..which for us is 6:30 AM

5:30 am… but sometimes they let us go back to bed

5:30 am

Between 8:30 & 9 am.

Absolutely as long as I want – but I make sure they’ve had a good run & playbefore I go to bed

Sleep in? What does that mean?

As long as we want or until we start feeling guilty about letting her out to pee or making her breakfast.

As long as Jenny got a pee after about midnight I’m good until atleast 10 am usually. She’s not too early of a riser either.

They wait for the signal, me getting out of bed – and since we rise early in this household even on the weekends, it isn’t really an issue.

Question #4: How do they tell you that it’s time to get up?

Dakota starts crying when the alarm goes off. Cubby doesn’t tell us.

Dharma stands up and gets her face in mine and gives me a smooch.

flapping ears

Stomping, tapping, whining if need be. Buster is HUNGRY and needs his breakfast IMMEDIATELY.

A wet nose to find me to kiss me awake, then playtime

They’re happy to just lie on the bed – unless they hear something outside

About the only way she’ll rouse(?)us is by barking at some dog going by the house. We’re not sure if this is a ploy to get us up or not.

She stands on me.

Sometimes they sit up in their beds and stare until we get up or they’re told to go back to sleep.

Who are these creatures?

Cubby is a 7-8 year old rescued boxer – we’ve had him for almost two years. Dakota is a black Lab/golden mix. She loves her brother boxer.

Dharma is a wonderful,warm, loving and affectionate boxer. She can be very stubborn. We do “butt heads”. And yes she wins many times. But she is well behaved when it counts, like going to the vets & pet stores.

Buster – rescued brindle boxer boy approximately 10 years old. He’s been with us for 5 years. Extremely mellow and sweet.

She is a Boxer Rescue, 3 years old. She is fawn & white with natural ears, most beautiful eyes ever.

Plato, flashy brindle boxer, natural ears, docked tail. A big boy, 4 years old. Timmy, flashy red boxer, natural tail & ears. A rescue at 10 months. now 2 years old. Super-enthusiastic playmate of Plato. Both boys full of love.

small Boxer, medium Boxer and large Boxer

We have a 5 year old mutt, Jesse and two cats, one 8 and one 12.

My dog is a mini-Australian shepherd and full of love and craziness. Added to this is three amazing cats, all with distinct and at times…loud personalities.

Really cute 65 pound Boxer. Really cute 18 pound Pug.

Dogs and morning routine–survey highlights

Warning: don’t let your dogs read this… there may be some new ideas here that they hadn’t already thought of. Freckle, leave the laptop alone!

 

Here are some highlights from question #1: How much time do you spend in conversation with your dog(s) after rising each morning?

 

Three said “It never stops … I’m home with them all day.”

 

Zero said “Less than three minutes …”

 

Two said “Four to ten minutes, depending on what they have to say.”

 

One said “Sometimes I have to call in sick because they have so much to tell me.”

 

Others said:

 

“We awake at 4:30 and I leave for work at 6:30 … SO we spend about 1 1/2 hours having fun.”

 

“As much as I can fit in before I leave for work.”

 

“Conversation X three dogs takes at least 1/2 to 45 minutes!”

 

“It’s pretty much non-stop until I leave the door for work.”

 

In answer to question #2: How does your dog greet you first thing in the morning?

 

“Cubby looks up at me with disdain and then goes back to sleep. After my bathroom routine, he lets me kiss him and rub his belly before he finally agrees it’s time to get up. Meanwhile, his sister, Dakota, is downstairs crying for us to come down.”

 

“Dharma usually puts her head on my arm or chest and just watches me, as I pretend to be asleep.”

 

“Dancing, lots of dancing.”

 

“Tap tap tap of toes on hardwood floor … at 5:30 am even on weekends when the alarm doesn’t go off at that time. Stomping and huffing into the bedroom.”

 

“Kisses, kisses, and more kisses, then a mad dash to go potty.”

 

One or other or both just come up and lie on the bed.”

 

“The ‘I’m hungry’ nudges from Princess. Kidneybeans [a special kind of Boxer dance where their bodies wiggle and bend into a kidney bean shape—repeatedly and at high speed!] and barks from Britany and ‘I love you’ kisses from Major.”

 

“Jesse sleeps in her basket in the living room (we have to block the bedroom door off as she’ll come in and steal the cats’ food). She’s usually still dead to the world when I get up and greet her. I get a little wag from her tail (if it’s not stuck under her) and that’s about it. I’m more energetic than she is in the morning.”

 

“She wags her whole body so hard, sometimes she falls over. She doesn’t have any problems, she’s just literally wagging herself to the max.”

 

“Pooch #1 [that'd be Freckle] slides up to the bed quietly and snuffles and licks my face. She then slowly sneaks up onto the bed and lies down, more often than not, right on top of me. Pooch #2 [that'd be Ceilidh] pounces on me full body (luckily she’s the smaller one) and proceeds to lick my face.”

 

 

Watch for highlights soon from question #3 & #4: How late will your dog let you sleep on weekends? and How does your dog tell you it’s time to get up?

Ceilidh is under the weather

Poor Ceilidh is feeling punky. The night before last her tummy started to feel unhappy and she spent the entire night wandering around the house and asking to go outside every hour. It was a long night for all of us. After several bouts of diarrhea and vomiting yesterday morning, off we went to see our vet—Dr. Janet Adam at Granville Island Veterinary Hospital. Ceilidh knows Janet well. Janet was there when Ceilidh (at age 6) suffered a twisted lung lobe and couldn’t breathe. She was also there four months later when Ceilidh suffered bloat! Ceilidh has been around the block and does tend to get a bit wound up when she has to visit the clinic. But really, yesterday’s visit was a piece of cake—no scary symptoms (or procedures) other than an exam for the tummy upset. We picked up a prescription for Metronidazole and returned home to rest. Last night we were up only twice and today Ceilidh enjoyed a teaspoon of Gerber’s chicken baby food for breakfast… with great lip-smacking and a grin that indicated she’d like the entire jar, please!

For creatures who live in the moment, feeling punky is baaad! As one of the humans in the house, I strive to live in the moment, but also know that what I’m experiencing right now will change. It will pass, get better, get worse… but it will always change. I wonder if creatures know that what they’re experiencing in the moment will change. Are they aware that what’s happening in this moment—as crummy or as wonderful as it might be—will be different when it becomes another moment? I don’t know. Any thoughts?

What dogs see

   This morning I settled in on the couch (I should say the  dogs’ couch) with my laptop to read email. Freckle stepped up on the footstool and slithered in beside me, resting her chin on my arm since I wouldn’t let her put it on the keyboard. As I moved the cursor around on the computer screen and began opening browser windows, Freckle followed with her eyes. When a new window opened, her eyes grew big and she watched with obvious interest. She tilted her head and tried to sniff the screen. Ceilidh has never been interested in the computer monitor, but she will bark at animals (even cartoon animals) on the TV, causing us to wonder how blind she really is. Anyway, this morning I began to wonder just what Freckle was seeing.

I Googled “what dogs see” and found the “Catalyst” website. It’s an Australian science TV program and in 2003 they did a program called “Dogs’ Eyes.” Apparently veterinary scientist Paul McGreevey had been wondering the same thing … what DO dogs see? He said that he found it odd that the textbooks said that dogs all had the same eye structure and that they all saw the world the same way given the diversity of dog sizes and shapes. McGreevey researched different breeds, checking the size and shape of their skulls and noses. He began collecting eyeballs from dogs who had passed away so that he could measure them (shades of Michaelangelo’s research here!). He found that yes indeed, eyeball shapes vary depending on the breed.

McGreevey’s collaborator in Perth, a neurosurgeon named Alison Harman, was examining the retina behind the eye and found that different dogs had different retinas. Some dogs have the type of retina with a “visual streak” meaning that they have great vision, including terrific peripheral vision. But some dogs have a retina with “a dense, area centralis” instead. The “vision cells” are arranged in one spot rather than in a “streak.” This means that like humans, dogs with the “area centralis” see clearly what is in the middle of the field of vision but … the edges not so much.

Now … here’s where the story gets really interesting! McGreevey and Harman say that their research indicated that a dog with a short nose had an area centralis with three times the density of cells found in a visual streak. According to the TV narrator, “It means that short nosed dogs with their area centralis see in much higher definition than other dogs.”

Referring to short nosed dogs, McGreevey says, “So when they’re looking at the owner’s face and different nuances of the owner’s expressions, maybe they’re getting a bit more information than a long nose dog. This is perhaps a way of explaining how attentive and charming short nosed dogs are.” [emphasis mine]

I knew it! Before you know it our girls are going to be asking for their own laptops and High Definition TV. Anybody know of a support group for short nosed dogs living with high definition vision?