Sweet Dreams . . .

I’m really stressed because my dog is having nightmares.  You’d think that with everything I have going on in my own life, my dreams might take on a terrifying theme from time to time, but I rarely dream, and it’s even rarer that I have a bad dream.  But poor Lottie has been having horrible nightmares for the past couple of months, and I feel like I need to fix it somehow.

It started (or at least I noticed it, because I can be a very heavy sleeper) at Camp 1 in June.  She would yelp and cry from a deep sleep.  Sometimes she would jump up and run to a corner, snapping and growling.  I would go touch her and tell her to come get in bed with me, and she would cuddle up closely against me, sighing with relief that I was going to protect her from whatever invisible forces were threatening her.  The funny thing is, she never opens her eyes.  They remain closed during the yelping, the defensive posturing from the Scary Thing, and even when she comes and cuddles up with me, her eyes are closed the whole time.  So it’s almost like sleep-walking, or night-terrors, I guess.  Do people open their eyes when they sleep walk?  I actually don’t know.

So here we are two months later, and it happens almost every night, often multiple times each night. She has bitten me twice when I touched her during her dreams.  She bit me very gently, but last night she yelped and started growling and backing away from the cat, and I’m afraid she might bite a cat or worse, Noelle.  I just don’t know what to do for her, it makes me sad.  She is such a joyful dog all day long, and fearless, and then her sleeptime is so frought with fear.  I hope I can find something to help her through this.

She's Kind of a Big Deal.

Lottie and her new friend, Luke the Picard Shepherd puppy

Lottie blew me away at camp.  Not only did she pass her Dog Scout test, she also managed to get her badge for Obstacle 1 in Agility. I’m honestly having a hard time reminding myself that her sight is so limited, I find myself wondering if her sight could actually be improving?  I have to remember back to when I first met her almost 6 months ago, when she crashed into so many things, and watched the ground all the time, never looking up at me.  Now she looks up towards me, but it’s because we have worked to get her head up into that position with treats.  She still crashes into things when she is unfamiliar with an area.  And I’m finding as I work with having her follow my hand, that she is actually working off of scent and not sight.  But she sure fools me and everyone else into thinking she can see quite well!  Amazing, and a testament to resiliency.

So many things to write about Lottie’s progress at camp, and also about my progress in understanding her, I’ll likely be posting on this stuff for months.  I’m so excited not only for what she has learned and accomplished, but also for how little effort it took on my part to get her there.  I was teaching and managing five other dogs, so I didn’t concentrate on her like I would have liked, yet she still did better than expected.

I was concerned about her DSA test, since we didn’t make much progress by the end of the first camp in June, but by early in the week this time, it was obvious she would be able to pass.  Her “stay” at a distance of 20 feet was something that we worked on previously in classes and at the first camp without much progress, but it was like she suddenly understood what I wanted.  She is very adorable in a “stay” – just lying there, 20 feet away, waiting patiently for me to return. I’ll have to get a picture . . . . anyway, once she understood this, everything else fell right into place. She’s a very smart girl. 

LEAVE IT – I touch the top of her nose.

SIT – two taps on her rump

DOWN – two taps on her shoulder blades

STAY – I touch the front of her nose

COME – I touch under her chin, and then use the palm of my hand to guide her.  I realized that I probably don’t need to guide her with my hand, because I think she is tracking me.  She lowers her nose to the ground to follow me.

HEEL – she starts in a “sit” at my side, and then I use my hand at my side as a target as I walk to get her to follow at my side and turn with me.  When we stop, she sits.

The great and amazing thing Lottie did for me at this camp was to get her Agility Obstacle One badge.  To do this, she had to navigate the A frame, a jump, and a tunnel on the agility course.  She had learned to do the small A frame at the last camp, and she didn’t forget a thing in the 3 weeks between camps.  I took her out to the course, and she went right up the A frame like a pro.  So then I tried her on the larger A frame, but again, no problem.  Up and over.  Even managed to slow her down at the bottom to hit her contact zone.  The tunnel was easy.  She went right through if I sent Tango through first, but to get her to go through on her own I had Angela’s help.  Angela held her at one end; I went to the other and enticed her through with cheese.   Just a few times and she had that.  Then the jump.  Angela and I tried setting her up, telling her to stay, and then I would go to the other side of the jump and “call” her over with a chin touch signal.  She would come, but crashed each time into the bar, not even attempting to jump.  Then we tried her on a panel jump that had small stabilizing bars in front and behind the jump, on the ground about 6 inches out.  She seemed to key off of the bar on the ground, and leaped right over!  I added another panel, so that she was jumping about 12”, and she had no problem.  I need to get some PVC pipe to make a jump like this for home.  She is so amazing and brave. One night I took a shower in the lodge late, and had to navigate back to my camper in blackness.  It was kinda unsettling, feeling my way slowly across the yard in darkness, using my hands and feet to feel for obstacles in my way as I walked really slowly and carefully.  It struck me that Lottie must have times when she cannot see what is in front of her, and yet she never lets it get to her, she charges forward with interest and joy in everything new that is presented to her.  So often she is MY teacher, and not the other way around.

So now Lottie Moon is the first deaf/blind Dog Scout.  Next, we’ll have to get her to pass her Canine Good Citizen test from the AKC.  It is not as difficult as the DSA test, but similar, so it should not be any problem for her.  After that, Therapy Dog.  I understand that TDI has lifted their ban on deaf dogs, so we can now show them how awesome deaf dogs can be.

Resting with big brother Punch
right before going up to get her Dog Scout
certification.  One day she will have
lots of badges like Punch :-)

Seeing Into Light

I called my blog “Seeing Into Darkness,” which is from a poem by Lao-Tzu.  I liked the image of breaking through the darkness born of sightlessness, and helping to bring light into Lottie’s life, as well as my own, through her.  But recently I learned that Lottie’s vision difficulties might actually result from too much light!

When we were at Dog Scout Camp, I met an optomitrist who had recently helped a veterinarian design a vision test for a dog who had had cateract surgery.  She felt that Lottie probably has rods, and not cones, in her eyes, which would mean that she sees better in lower light.  She said that in daylight, things would look whited-out to Lottie, and that only high-contract, larger objects could be seen.  This totally makes sense to me, because Lottie gets very excited to chase shadows in the moonlight, and not so much in the sunlight.  She also seems to be able to see objects at a distance much better at night, as well.  She will alert and bark at trees or buildings at night, and ignore the same ones during daytime hours.  I can totally picture in my mind, too, what this “whited out” vision might look like for Lottie.  You know how on TV or movies when people have near-death experiences and they go to the light, and see dark pseudo-outlines of angels and loved ones who come out of the white light?  That’s what I imagine Lottie must see, based on my new knowledge.  Do I look like a dark angel appearing from the light to Lottie??? Maybe!!

So based on this, I decided to get Lottie Moon some sunglasses.  I figure that if daytime is too bright for her, maybe darkening things a bit might help.  I also would feel better when she is outside in bright sun light for longer periods if she had on some darkening glasses.  She is rarely outside in bright sun for very long, but if she is, I worry about her pale blue eyes and the sun damage that might result.  The first time it was ever a concern for me was at camp when we were out at the pond during the middle of the day.  So for camp #2, I bought her some Doggles.

We haven’t had much of a chance to play with them since they arrived in the mail this week.  I put them on her, and she flailed around a bit and tried to take them off, unless I distracted her with food.  We’ll try them again when we are doing something fun and exciting, like taking a walk, and get her used to them.  Regardless of how Lottie feels about them, I think they ROCK!  I got her the leopard design, which is ultra phat, and looks fabulous on her!