lifeinflux

Moving forward without Mom – Days 24 – 29 (Friday through Wednesday)

// February 16th, 2011 // No Comments » // Featured Post

Coming home without Sunny was pretty difficult, for us and for the puppies. For the first two days after she was put to sleep, the puppies looked for her and we often found them crying at the door to the garage. The last few days I’ve been living in the kitchen with them for the most part. Realizing that we are now THE primary care givers – something we’ve been all along but Sunny’s nursing and constant vigilance was something we’ve come to rely on – we realized we had a monumental effort in front of us. It’s up to this family to teach these eight babies how to be proper, well mannered little dogs. The first lesson was teaching them all eight of them a new command, “leave it”. They all recognize “No!” and sometimes it works with them and sometimes they need redirection. But “leave it” was a crucial command as Sunny had taught all eight puppies to eat their own and each others poop and the increase of diarrhea and worms in the puppies’ stools had us concerned. Friday, Saturday and Sunday we worked with them to understand that puppies do not eat their poop or roll in it or, in the case of Marzi, slam each other’s heads into it. By Saturday midday, our big three had their “ah ha” moments and the rest followed suit with the exception of Duncan and not only pooped consistently on the papers but stopped playing around with it and eating it for the most part.

A huge win for us occurred on Friday. Panda, whom we’ve been concerned with for the past 2 weeks, finally started to EAT! Thursday she half-heartedly poked around the food while keening at the back door for her mom. Panda’s been living off Sunny’s milk for the last few weeks and refusing to eat puppy food. I honestly expected we would lose her and stopped plying her with food all the time, figuring I had to let nature run its course. Well boy, did nature run and Panda ran with it straight to the food bowl. And once she started eating, she did not stop!!! Panda ate four meals a day and begged two solitary meals and we gave it to her. She ate smaller portions than her bigger siblings at each meal but made up for it with more meals per day. We added the calorie-rich nutrigel to her solitary meals as well to get some pure fat into her diet and by Monday she had a little round belly and was starting to become fluffy like a healthy puppy should! Once she started eating, she was slowly welcomed back into the pack. I’m not sure what motivated Smokey, our alpha male, to attack her and drive her away from the others last week but this week, Panda was welcomed back. We continued to – and still continue to – watch her when the entire group is playing as she is half the size of the others; however, by Tuesday she was back in the fray, nipping and biting and playing with the others and being counted as one of the pack. To say that we are relieved is putting it mildly. I’m not sure we could handle the loss of Panda, especially so soon after losing Sunny.

On Monday, we took all eight puppies to our new vet practice. We had such drama with our last practice over the last few weeks, that we were a little scared and nervous going in. The constant message from our old vet was that we were ignorant idiots who took in these dogs when we had NO business doing so. So we were holding our breathe as our new vet looked over each pup, weighing them, checking them and making sure they were socialized properly. He was incredibly kind to each puppy, talking to him or her, getting to know them, asking us questions and after a few moments, we started to feel incredibly at ease. At the end of the exam, he told us “good job!!” and I almost cried in relief. Sure, we may not know exactly what we’re doing but we read, we research, we ask questions and we’re loving these babies and giving them the best start we can and our new vet seemed to recognize that and spent some time with us giving us great advice and some information on how to manage the next steps with our eight angels. It was such a different and warm experience and we left feeling more confident than we had in weeks that we were on the right path and that we were doing the right thing for the puppies more often than not. We really liked the vet techs we met and the receptionist was incredibly nice and helpful and worked with me to come up with a plan for bringing in Bear and Meemsy for their well-Bear checkups. So we were incredibly happy with our experience and are so glad we made the switch! The puppies all got their first vaccinations and were total champs about it and promptly passed out when we got them home. They ate well for both night feedings (one at 5, the other at 11) and no one was lethargic, vomiting or running a temperature, normal concerns for puppies after their first shots.

Tuesday dawned clean and clear and I had the pleasure of meeting and speaking to the other vet at our new practice. She gently let me know that the puppies had tested positive for giardia and they would need to be medicated for three days this week and again for three days in two weeks. This is a bummer for a number of reasons. First, giardia is highly contagious so having kids around the puppies is not a good idea. Second, we had hoped to start taking the puppies outside into the yard. They need a bigger, better place to play than the kitchen. However, because giardia is so highly contagious we cannot risk exposing our big Bear. Finally, we had hoped to start the adoption process for the six puppies we are going to adopt into their forever families. Also, I won’t lie – I was really, really looking forward to reclaiming my kitchen. That said, we don’t want to send them off with giardia and we do want to ensure they get proper follow-up care. So all eight are with us another two weeks. And we’ll enjoy them and continue working with them on their puppy manners and loving on them and getting them through this. I went online after talking with the vet and read up on how to keep the puppies from reinfecting themselves. The vet gave us some good ideas on how to manage the space they are living in and I immediately dove in to the cleaning job ahead of me. The puppies went into clean rubbermaids and I scrubbed the kitchen from top to bottom. I immediately set up a potty area once the floor was dry and marked it off using their old puppy pen. I then trained the puppies to go into the pen, do their business and leave. I was on perma-loop saying “leave it” constantly. Once all the puppies had used the penned off area once and gotten their rubs and praise, I designated a clean zone in the kitchen, rescrubbed the floor and started the process of bathing each puppy. Clean, dried puppies were put in the clean zone and dirty puppies went into the bathroom for their baths. Everyone did really well with their baths and in less than an hour, everyone was under clean blankets, drying fully and sleeping.

At the 5 PM feeding each puppy was dosed with their meds. Our fantastic vet (both are fantastic in our new practice) had designated syringes by dose and by puppy in separate bags making it ridiculously easy for me to dose each one properly. Everyone kept their meds down and after 2 hours of figuring out how to safely enlarge the poop area for the night, the family crashed after midnight, exhausted and elated that everyone is doing so well and that we’re well on our way to getting them healthy and ready to go to their forever homes. As awful as last week was, what with losing Sunny and the issue with our old vet, this week is a LOT better. We found a new, better vet whom we really like, the puppies are unlearning their destructive behaviors taught to them by Sunny and we can see the light at the end of the tunnel. In a few short days the puppies have evolved from eating their poop and pooping where they like to hitting their second milestone towards proper house training! Hopefully this means they will be easy to potty train once they go to their forever homes. Everyone is at a proper weight and eating well and we’re loving them all very much. It will be sad to see them go but we’re looking forward to the next big step in their lives and in ours. We’re going to be VERY picky about who gets a puppy as we’re completely in love with these dogs and want to make sure they will get the care, love and training needed from their new families to help them grow into healthy, loved big dogs.

The next few days, I’ll be featuring each puppy starting with our miracle puppy, Panda! Stay tuned!

Insanity, escalation, a painful choice and sorrow – Days 13-23 (Monday, Jan 31st through Thurs, Feb 10th)

// February 11th, 2011 // No Comments » // Featured Post

In the 23 days we had Sunny in our home, I only took a few pictures of her. There are a lot of reasons for this. The puppies were growing so fast and I wanted to capture their growth and personalities as they evolved. We needed pictures of the puppies for their adoption pages. The puppies were fun subjects, always moving and so cute. But the real reason I only took a few pictures of Sunny was because I assumed that there would be time to take pictures of Sunny. Our intent was always to adopt Sunny, rehabilitate her and make her part of our family. Therefore, taking pictures of the one dog we knew we would keep seemed a secondary priority and something I could get around to some day. I was wrong.   And now I sit here, a day after Sunny was put to sleep and I’m kicking myself for not capturing the time Sunny was here with us.  Because now she’s gone and, as with so many things you put off for “some day”, her some day will never come.   13 days ago, on some excellent advice from trainers, rehabilitation experts and cattle dog breeders, we decided to start integrating Sunny into our family.    What happened over the last ten days led us to one of the hardest, most painful decisions we, as a family, has had to make.   The worst part of that decision was that we did not receive support from a few key individuals from whom we expected help and support and it threw us for a loop.   On the other hand, the outpouring of support from our rescue, our friends and family and the local humane society helped make this process one we can walk away from, knowing we did everything in our power to try to save this lovely dog, our Sun Bear.  I don’t really feel a need to describe everything that happened over the last ten days.   I think it portrays Sunny in an inaccurate and bad light.  And the thing to remember is that she was not bad. She was impacted by a horrible life and, as a dog, unable to communicate her wants, needs and issues with us the way a human who had survived this kind of nightmare situation could. While our other pets were rescues and had horrors in their background (Mimir came to us pretty feral and Kodi Bear was a hot, non-socialized mess), both pets picked US as a family and wanted to be here. The commonality between Meemsy and Bear were that they wanted to be a part of a family and somehow, in my relentless pursuit to “save” Sunny, I forgot that was the key point in our success with the two of them.

We don’t know much about Sunny’s background.  What we do know is that she was found in a horrible situation, pregnant and alone.  She was malnourished, filled with parasites and terrified of everything.   While this might make some dogs aggressive and mean, Sunny was gentle and non-aggressive.    She gave birth to her puppies in a kill shelter somewhere in Southern California.   She and the puppies were labeled as part pit bull, a death sentence in most states including California.  And that’s where we and our rescue came into the picture.     We brought Sunny up here and started dealing with some of the issues a dog like this brings with them, one challenge at a time.   For the first two weeks, her entire life was about caring for her puppies and she did a great job.   The puppies made it to 5 and 1/2 weeks and Sunny happily let us take over some of the responsibilities while she tried to heal.  The problems began when the puppies stopped being an ongoing distraction.    We went from starting to trust Sunny to realizing that we could not trust her to act like a dog, much less some semblance of a normal dog.   Sunny hated being confined…  in the crate, in the kitchen, in the house.  She wanted O-U-T and would do anything including bending crate bars, tearing through anchored kitchen gates and throwing herself at closed and locked doors to meet that goal. She started to refuse to use the bathroom in the yard unless she absolutely had to go. And to illustrate her displeasure at being confined in the house with us, she started a pattern of escalation that started with her climbing onto our kitchen counters and pushing everything off of them to pooping on said counters to pooping in every room of the house the day she broke through two kitchen gates.

A few people, including our former vet, have accused me of putting our home and furnishing ahead of Sunny’s care and well being. And yes, the final straw was coming home and finding Sunny poop in every room of the house. But it had nothing to do with our stuff being damaged or ruined. To be perfectly frank, I can and am going out this weekend and replacing every single item because I can afford to do that. This is not, and has never been about STUFF. And to any of you who said that, suggested or inferred it or are thinking it, you obviously do not know me at all. The final straw was finding Mimir, stressed out and vomiting because Sunny and the puppies rushed at her and scared her. The final straw was finding parasite-filled poop in every room of the house which compromises my, Jays’, Drue’s, Bear’s and Mimir’s health, not to mention reinfecting our puppies who have finally responded to the deworming medicine and are almost ready for their final worming and first vaccinations. The final straw was realizing that our house, which is NOT puppy proofed since they are living in our kitchen, could have hurt those puppies had I not brought Drue straight home from cello to check on things before running our errands. The final straw was realizing we were missing a puppy and had no idea if he was hurt, or dead and looking for him for hours until we finally found him tucked into my closet. After starting the poop cleaning process, I sat down and called a number of people including two rehabilitation facilities, our friend who breeds cattle dogs like Sunny and our rescue contact. And all of them said the same thing – we could live with ongoing escalations from Sunny until she hurt herself, one of us, one of our other pets or one of her puppies or we could accept the inevitable and put her our of her misery. I argued, I Googled, and, finally, called our cattle dog breeder pal and asked if she would take Sunny. After explaining why she couldn’t – specifically because her puppies might pick up Sunny’s behaviors, I realized that OUR puppies were picking up her behaviors and called our rescue contact back. We agreed that if we continued down this path, the puppies might not be candidates for adoption. So all this hard work and effort would be for nothing and instead of putting down one dog, I’d be forced to consider losing the entire litter. After a few tears, I decided if we were going to do this, it needed to be in a safe, familiar place. So I called our vet and unfortunately, got the one vet we absolutely do NOT like. First the vet refused to come to the phone even though we were obviously in an emergency situation. After begging the vet tech to talk to the vet and explain what was going on, the vet tech put me on speaker and called out to the vet as she was walking by that we needed some advice on this situation. The vet stated she was not going to speak to me, and that she was NOT going to put down a healthy dog because an irresponsible pet owner put her things ahead of her own dog’s well being. I lost my temper then… and anyone who has spent any time around me knows that when I lose my temper, it’s on. The vet tech was incredibly apologetic with me and after realizing that we needed help, referred us to the humane society. After the phone call, I went back into the kitchen and saw the puppies playing with a spray bottle that used to contain a mixture of water and Nature’s Orange cleaning chemicals. I immediately retrieved the bottles and tried to find the spill but it was gone. Realizing that Sunny and/or the puppies drank the mixture, I rushed back to the phone, called the vet, explained the new situation to the vet tech and asked to speak to the vet. She rushed to get the vet who came to the phone and proceeded to rip me and “all the selfish, rich people in this area who treat animals as disposable items” a new one. I finally interrupted her tirade, told her to HELP ME with this situation and when she, who was yelling herself, told me not to address her in that tone, I lost it. And I was right to do so. She did not want to help us; she does not care about the fact that the puppies might have injested chemicals. She was pissed at being interrupted at the end of her day and wanted me to go away. It was easier for her to write me off as a bad pet owner than to find out what our situation was and handle it. I am SO glad we had this conversation over the phone because, while I am not a violent person, I would have slapped her bloody and senseless had she been within reach.

I hung up on her after telling her to have our records ready for us to transfer to another vet, called animal poison control, fed the puppies milk, and we watched them closely for 24 hours. And all is well. While I was on the phone, Jason was scrubbing down every inch of the kitchen to ensure they did not get into anything else. Thanks to the vet tech we found out we could take Sunny to the humane society for evaluation. We did not have the paperwork to have her put to sleep at the time which was good; it was a HUGE decision and one I was struggling with. So a night’s sleep (or lack thereof as I tried to find a solution that would not cost us this dog) later, we had the papers we needed and took Sunny over to the humane society to have her put down. Once we got there, I confess… I balked. The lovely person who did our intake asked me a series of questions including:
1. Does this dog come to you willingly? No
2. Does this dog ever show excitement for anything? No. Toys? No. Treats? No. Her own puppies? No.
3. Does this dog ever wag her tail? No.
4. Is this dog comfortable anywhere? No.
5. Are you afraid or uncomfortable with this dog?

I immediately answered “No” for question 5 but when Jays answered “Yes” it made me think. Every plan we had with Sunny would require some form of confinement for months on end to ensure Mimir’s and Kodi’s safety. We never allowed Drue to go near Sunny or the pups without us between Sunny and Drue. Every time Sunny growled at the pups we ran into the room to ensure all was well. I wouldn’t say we were afraid of Sunny but we certainly weren’t comfortable with her nor did we trust her. This means that it might be weeks… months… maybe even YEARS before Sunny could or would be an active, viable, trusted member of this family. The humane society asked what impact this would have on our lives. Would we ever be comfortable NOT having someone in the house with Sunny? How would we do giving up weekends camping, roaming around the Bay Area? What was the impact already on Bear and Mimir? Where the puppies picking up on her behaviors? What did I think we would do if no one adopted puppies with these habits and behaviors? We talked for over an hour, I went through half a box of Kleenex and at the end of it, we signed the papers. Through it all, Sunny laid down next to me and I pet her but there was the same reaction from her – nothing. I could have NOT pet her and she was okay with it. I walked her back to the room where they were going to put her down, handed her over and the vet techs hugged me and told me that we had done everything and more and that we were doing the right thing and to go home and concentrate on the 8 lives we were saving. I will never forget their incredible kindness which was so different from the vet’s self-righteous anger that we would dare disrupt and interrupt her at the end of her day with our “selfishness”.

Our immediate concern over the last 24 hours has been for the puppies. Last night, they all called for her and were sniffing at the doors to see if she was outside or in the garage. It was heartbreaking. So we crawled into the kitchen and snuggled for a bit and finally they drifted off to sleep. Today, no one has looked for her at all and everyone is eating, sleeping, and playing as normal. We’ve already started working with them on their biting, a job Sunny technically was supposed to do but had no idea how to do. We’re also working with them on some of their less appealing habits and behaviors as we work towards raising healthy, well behaved puppies. Sunny lives on in them, in Butch’s coloring and markings, Duncan’s growl, Bella’s and Shadow’s keening whine, in the way Duncan, Rascal and Smokey do their little head nod/tilt action and in Rascal’s and Panda’s markings. Without her mother to nurse on, Panda has started eating FULL MEALS which we are so grateful for. She is still skin and bones and about 2 weeks behind the others developmentally but she’ll get there. We found a new vet in 24 hours, found out we are not the first people to flee our old vet because of the bad behavior of this ONE vet and, while we’re sad that we are leaving behind a practice with two vets we love, are so grateful to never see that godawful bitch again (or have her touch our pets ever again) that we will happily make the switch.

I miss Sunny; but for the first time in 23 days, last night I slept. Jays slept. Drue slept. Bear and Meemsy… well they always sleep. And the puppies are fine. No one ever said doing the right thing would be easy. And we’ll always remember our Sun Bear and work to place her babies with good families and even keep one for ourselves. And that will be her gift, her legacy, to us and to others… these amazing bundles of fur and personality who will go out in the world and be good pets and family members and be loved and cared for the rest of their lives. Rest in peace, Sun Bear.

Puppy Steps Forward – Days 7 and 8 (Tuesday and Wednesday)

// January 27th, 2011 // 3 Comments » // Featured Post

Drue holding Rascal with Smokey and Bella

Drue’s face says it all. We love, love, LOVE our puppies (and Sunny, too)!!! Tuesday dawned clear with perfect weather and Sunny took full advantage on her morning stroll around the front yard. Yes, that’s right. Our sweet girl has stopped rushing out, pottying and heading straight back in. She’s actually taking her time, smelling around the yard and using the bathroom out in the yard (as opposed to hiding behind bushes, scared). That was really our only big win on Tuesday as Sunny and the babies spent most of the day sleeping and recovering from Monday’s vet trip. Even when the puppies were up and playing, they were a little sluggish most of the day and Sunny took advantage of it to sleep most of the day away. We finally got them up around 2 and encouraged everyone to eat, Sunny included. However, only five of the puppies ate a good amount; the three smalls (Panda, Carter and Butch) nursed as opposed to eating the mushy puppy food. According to the research, this is perfectly normal so we’re not worrying for now. When Sunny had her evening meal, the puppies were up after sleeping all day and wired for sound. I had my hands full with end of day to-do’s and Jason was out running errands (and buying a new, even bigger and better steam cleaner for the floors – go OCD!) so Drue helped me out by going in the kitchen and playing with the puppies. At one point, when I glanced in, she had puppies pulling at her pants’ legs, puppies pulling on her shirt, puppies piling in her lap and everyone was yipping and barking. Oh yes, didn’t I mention that? The puppies have found their voices and each one has a distinctive bark, yip, whine or call. And boy do they love to use their voices! They even make little yips, groans and grunts in their sleep! If a few of them are “talking” I can tell who is who. When all eight get going, it’s just a whole lot of puppy noise but oh, it’s so cute! All of their “I’m hurt” squeals sound the same but as they get bigger – and rougher – Sunny steps in from time to time if the action moves from playing to all out brawl. Wednesday was a better day for the puppies in that all eight were active and playing during much of the day. They played so hard Wednesday as if to make up for Tuesday and all slept well. I’ve seen all eight kick, flex and yip in their sleep which is fantastic and shows neurological and muscular growth. Some move more than others. Rascal, Smokey, Butch, Carter and Bella are definitely the five who have grown the most physically and mentally. Duncan, Panda and Shadow still nurse and rely on Sunny or me to give them the stimulus the other puppies find from each other. Right now, my assumption is that they are just our late bloomers and if they don’t show marked improvement by our vet appointment on the 14th, we’ll discuss it then and figure out our next steps. Wednesday night, between running errands, taking Drue to volleyball AND then going to Drue’s Science Fair (well Jays and Drue did… I ran more errands), I left the dogs in the pen and did not unlatch the gate. Sunny figured out how to get out but boy did we have some angry puppies when we finally got home. On Wednesday, Jason took Sunny out twice while Bear was in the house. Bear is showing mild curiosity towards Sunny but the aggression has died off as best we can see. Still, we are both trying to reclaim some of our lives and got a little careless in doing so. We’ll have to watch that more closely in the future. However, so far, so good and we’re going to try adding in workouts a couple of days next week. We’ve also gone from takeout for two meals a day down to takeout for one meal a day. I’ve even been able to get in the kitchen and make Drue breakfast most mornings. So while our errors on Wednesday felt like a small step back for Jays and I, we recognize that we, like the puppies, are allowed those backward steps from time to time.

Panda tries to eat Carter's tail

Also, on Wednesday, after trying to impose a feeding schedule on the puppies, we realized that, right now, we just need to make sure that there is food available to Sunny and the puppies in order to give Sunny a break from nursing AND to ensure the puppies are getting their nutritional needs met. I’ve been charting their eating times, play times and sleeping times again now that all eight are eating the mushy puppy food and nursing occasionally. I still think we will settle on a 6:30 AM; 2:00 PM and 10:00 PM eating schedule once all eight puppies are eating more than they are nursing simply because it is an even feeding cycle AND it allows us to meet our work, school, activity and social obligations and needs. But until our three holdouts – Duncan, Panda and Shadow – transition over where they are eating as much as they are nursing, it is better to free feed to keep everyone growing and healthy. Sunny is regulating her own food intake which is very UN-lab of her. However, she has more of a cattle dog body and look/feel (except for her eyes and eyebrows – that is ALL lab). As the puppies nurse less, she eats less. Her water intake is high and the puppies are starting to drink water as well. Nature and nurture are both running their proper course and we are confident that all eight will be weaned by week eight with no problems. Sunny is no longer skin and bones, either. All the good food, occasional treats and TLC have finally started making a difference. You can no longer see her hip bones and she has a nice layer of padding over her ribs. I figure another five pounds and she’ll be perfect. Then we will start addressing the sad condition of her coat, although, that has made a bit of a comeback as well. The puppies are starting to play harder and faster now and have discovered each others paws, tails and personal bits. The occasional fight breaks out (I’m looking at you, Carter) as the puppies try to figure out who is dominant and they occasionally hurt each other. Sunny occasionally has to step in and is desperate for time away from them. Unfortunately, until her parasites clear up and she gets her shots, she cannot be out in the house or back yard. So we’ve started penning up the puppies for a little while each day to give Sunny a needed break. As she continues to show interest in the outside world – and continues to trust us – the plan is to encourage her to take small walks with us. So far, she has been resistant to leaving the front yard. We’re hoping with time – and as she continues to look for ways to get breaks from her eight babies – we’ll be able to convince her that fresh air and exercise are just what the doctor ordered!

Rascal noshing on puppy food mush

As the puppies start eating more solid food, and now that all eight have been dewormed, they are transitioning from soft mushy poops to small solid poops. It took until Wednesday night for all eight to reach that point but now that they are here, Sunny has stopped cleaning up after them. To start them on the right foot for house training – and to ensure they don’t soil their bedding – we’re taking up the training pads as soon as we see them soiled and replace them with clean pads. This ensures they don’t step in, play in or try to eat their poop and keeps the bedding and kitchen cleaner overall. All puppies get pets and praises for using their papers and we’re slowly leaving small areas uncovered and moving puppies to the papers for them to do their business. This Sunday, I’m going to try to designate a play/food area vs a pooping area and spend Sunday afternoon in the kitchen gently teaching the puppies where to go vs. where to play. Nature’s Orange cleaner has been a lifesaver budget-wise, sanity wise and has enabled me to continue using my kitchen to prepare food in. And thanks to the lack of chemicals, it does not tear up the skin on my hands since I scrub the kitchen floor, cabinets, appliances and counters down several times a day.

The puppies are 4 weeks as of Wednesday which means we only have four weeks to go. To be perfectly honest, I want the puppies to go to people I know and trust. The thought of just sending them out there into the ether with no updates or contact much less the knowledge that they will be well cared for is something I’m not prepared to face. I recognize logically that I may not be able to adopt them out to people I know… but the hope is still there nonetheless. I don’t know how people who foster ongoing or run rescues can manage not to get attached and just hope and trust that the people they allow to adopt – because really, background checks only get you so far – are going to care for these dogs and love them as much as you do. And that part, more than anything else, is the one thing that holds me back from saying we’ll foster again. At this point we love all nine of these dogs so much. And while we recognize there is no way we can care for all nine of them ongoing, letting them go is going to be very hard for all of us. Well okay… maybe it won’t be hard for Kodi Bear and Mimir but for Jays, Drue and I, it feels unimaginably difficult to let these babies go. Logically we accept what will happen in a few weeks. Getting our hearts to align with our minds is going to take longer than that, I think.

Feedings and 1st Vet Visit – Days 5 and 6 (Sunday and Monday)

// January 26th, 2011 // No Comments » // Featured Post

Rascal ponders the aluminum pan

Sunday morning marked our fourth night of limited sleep and I was desperate to figure out how to switch Sunny’s and the puppies up time from 2 to 5 in the morning to 2 to 5 in the afternoon. We decided to take the leap and put the puppies and Sunny on a schedule and, after confirming with the vet that we could add Esbilac to their diets, decided to add a feeding or two to their normal day.  We decided to watch Sunny and see if she was showing any signs that she could use a break (or two) from feeding eight little mouths and use that as our cue to step in and offer an alternative.     As exhausted as we were after being up at 2:15, 3:45 and 5:15 with Sunny, we were elated to see that most of the puppies were leaving the pen to potty on the training pads and made an official decision to only coop them up (door to pen closed) when we were changing out the puppy pads and scrubbing down the kitchen.     Jays ran out to get some breakfast while Drue and I played with the puppies and wore them out.   We needed them sleeping as much as possible because we had a HUGE task upon us that required immediate resolution.   Friday night,  Jays discovered white fuzzy stuff on the ceiling of the garage.  Our dryer is not properly vented and in good weather (which we have 90% of the time), there are no issues.  However, the combination of back to back laundry (we’re up to 4 loads a day) and all the rain from the last two months created the perfect wet, warm environment mold needs to grow and flourish and we knew we had to address the issue immediately.  Not only is it a general health hazard for us and the animals, we use the garage loft to store our holiday items, suitcases and extra baking supplies.   Any thoughts of having a pleasant, semi-relaxing weekend went out the window.

Sunny, Carter, Duncan and Shadow contemplate the aluminum plate

Once the puppies passed out, Jason and I went outside to pull every item from the garage. Not only was the loft full but we had the entire floor of the garage filled with freecycle items that needed to go. By the time we pulled everything out and separated it into three piles (stay, recycle and freecycle), it was time to head in and feed the puppies (around 2 PM). Sunny needed to go out which means we lost our opportunity to feed them as the puppies latched on to her the moment she returned to the kitchen. We agreed to try, try again that evening since she was willingly to feed them and decided to set her feeding time back to 9:30 instead of 11:30 and to feed the puppies right after at 10.  We did put a clean aluminum pie plate (our feeding bowl of choice for 8 mouths) in the kitchen and spent a few moments taking pictures of the puppies smelling it, attacking it and moving it around.  In between brief breaks to play with Bear, help Drue with her Science Fair Project and board, walk Sunny, feed Sunny and Bear (5:30) and run out and eat dinner (7:00), we managed to get the entire garage emptied, all of the items freecycled and the roof of the garage sprayed with vinegar to combat the mold. After dinner, we helped Drue finish her board and get her to bed while the garage aired out thanks to four or five fans. We dragged all the keeper items back in to the floor of the garage, finished a few loads of laundry and then collapsed on the living room sofa, exhausted.   Drue spent her Sunday fetching items (and many bottles of water) for Jason and me and finishing her project.  However, the bulk of her Sunday had her in the kitchen with the puppies, playing with them and loving on them in between their long naps. We ran into one issue at 9:30 when I took Sunny out for her walk which showed me how far Sunny has come in trusting the family. We were outside and Sunny was doing her business when a woman in a van pulled up to pick up a freecycle item. She approached me to chat and I was polite, saying hello, and asking her to not approach Sunny as she was a rescue and scared of people. The woman immediately responded with “oh I foster cats. It’s okay.” and tried to approach Sunny again. Sunny immediately cowered behind me. I moved Sunny by the door and away from the woman and started asking her about her cats, in an attempt to have her focus off Sunny. After a few minutes of hearing her talk about all the cats in her life, I told her I needed to get Sunny inside and back to her puppies and asked if she would please go stand by her van so I could take Sunny in through the garage. She did not move; instead she kept talking and asking to pet Sunny. I finally had to tell her point blank to please get her things and leave so I could take care of my dog. It was ridiculous, especially given how obviously scared Sunny was. The woman looked at me for a moment, told me that because she was a witch, cats were obviously the only animal who could handle the power of her aura and moved over to her van to start loading freecycle items. I was finally able to take Sunny back in and calmed her down. Next time, I think I’ll skip straight to rude if someone does not respect my dog and let us care for her the way we know how. Seriously.

Sunny, Panda, Bella, Carter, Smokey, Butch, Rascal, and Duncan

By this point, it was time to feed the puppies. Sunny had been gone awhile so they were eager to nurse. I quickly made up the Esbilac and we put down the two pans. Sunny immediately approached the first pan and started lapping up the pablum mixture; the puppies watched her for a moment and quickly followed her example. Rascal and Shadow figured out that Esbilac was fun to walk through and some of the puppies started nudging their siblings into the pans in an attempt to get them out of their way. A pan and a half of Esbilac was consumed by all and we deemed the feeding a complete success! All the puppies went to Sunny to get a quick drink from their Mommy and this gave me time to clean out their pen, exchange their bedding and get their toys cleaned. We let Sunny back into the pen and immediately closed it off so we could wash and cuddle each puppy. And boy did they need the bath! Esbilac was dripping from paws, tails, ears and noses, not to mention the streaks of Esbilac drying into their coats. I cuddled each puppy, bathed him or her, dried them and then handed them off to Jason for additional cuddles before he placed them in the pen. After all eight puppies were washed and cuddled and asleep, we scrubbed down the kitchen, lay out new pads and pulled Sunny’s food in the hopes of limiting the middle of the night bathroom trips.   We then opened the pen door and hoped for the best as we had yet to give them carte blanche access to the kitchen over night.   A few puppies were still playing in the pen but most had settled down.  It was 11 PM and Jays and I were so tired we could barely move.  Between caring for the puppies, getting them on a schedule, adjusting Sunny’s feeding times, helping Drue with her project, cleaning out the garage and our first feeding of the puppies, we were completely wiped out.    My last remarks to Sunny as we turned off the light were a plea to just give me five straight hours of sleep.   And boy, did she deliver!

Smokey (left side), Bella, Carter, Rascal on top of Shadow, Butch, Duncan (center) and Panda (right side)

Monday, I woke up at 2 and again at 4 for a brief moment to listen for Sunny. When I did not hear anything, I immediately fell back asleep. I woke at 5:45 after 6 hours and 45 minutes of wonderful, blissful sleep and woke up to find puppies playing and Sunny peaceful. After making sure Panda did not eat Carter’s tail off (but first documenting it) and weeding through the swarm of puppies trying to eat my toes, I took Sunny out. We had another successful feeding that morning and after cleaning up the kitchen and getting Drue to school, it was time to get all nine dogs to the vet for their first check-up. Our immediate concerns were getting Sunny to trust that we weren’t taking her somewhere in the car and leaving her. The second was how we were going to get eight puppies safely to the vet! Jason packed the puppies up in a tall box lined with training pads and I coaxed Sunny to the car after moving her bed to the back. It took awhile but we took our time getting the dogs into the car, and then getting them to the vet. We have a wonderful vet practice where we take Kodi Bear and Mimir  and were confident that they would work with us to make Sunny as comfortable as possible. Two hours later, after a few tests, weighing and deworming all the dogs, many treats and lots of cuddles, the puppies walked out with a clean bill of health and Sunny walked out with medication to treat intestinal parasites, including tapeworm. A few hours later we got the call – Sunny is heartworm free! – and Jason and I both breathed a sigh of relief. Vaccinations and Sunny’s check-up are scheduled for three weeks (Valentine’s Day) and we were given permission to move the puppies to Esbilac 2nd Step and, if all went well, to soft puppy food 24 hours later. Home again and everyone crashed for a few hours. Sunny woke up hungry at 5:00 and after feeding her, I had the “pleasure” of getting her to take her medication. If ever a dog was going to bite someone, it would be while some person’s hand is down their throat forcing two pills down. But Sunny didn’t. Sure she fought me and did not want her pills (even coated with peanut butter) but we got them in her. The puppies received Esbilac 2nd step that evening at 10 PM and after a change of bedding and puppy pads, puppy baths and cuddles, the day ended with everyone, including the people in the house, were asleep by 11:00.

Good night, puppies.