Hello Everyone! Sorry it is so late today! Its been a busy day!
Once Molly started to react with thunder storms, our other 2 dogs, who were never even phased with storms were now worried! I am not sure if they were out of sorts because Molly was, and then it caused us to react. I can tell ya, there was a lot of anxiety flying around the house. After about the 3rd storm that season I talked to a few of the vets at my work and we decided to try some meds. She was prescribed Clomipramine ( Clomi-calm). Its commonly used for separation anxiety but also used seasonally for thunder-phobic pups. She was also given acepramazine which isnt really ideal to give an anxiety-ridden dog as it just sedates the dog and offers nothing to help then with the anxiety but it came in handy on nights that storms would rip through in the middle of the night. I remember that year being so bad it was almost every night it seemed and she would freak out so bad...by clawing my legs and jumping on me and I would have bruises the next day all over my legs. If I timed the storms just right, and gave her an ace about 2 hours before..it would kick in and keep her quiet for the night. I felt horrible all the time if I had to give that but It was either the dog slept or I didn't and believe me there was countless nights where I had no sleep at all trying to calm her.
I remember thinking to myself on rides to work after I was up all night and had no sleep that I wasn't sure what I was supposed to do and thinking of what was the right thing in this situation. Everything I ever learned about owning a dog at the point has gone out the window.
My husband started to get concerned of the entire change in dynamics in the household. It seemed now that our lives revolved around a dog and we had 3 dogs and at times it did feel like we were running a circus! We were not getting super results with the meds and before you know it Fall had arrived and I am usually not fond of the warm weather leaving, but this particular year I was dancing with joy that at least for the time being, the evil storms have gone and maybe our lives would go back to normal, at least until the next storm season...although, I forgot what "NORMAL" was.
For the next few months I talked to trainers and behaviorist and read so many books and literature on what I can do differently next year and hoping that this was not going to be our life for the next 10 plus years and there had to be some way to deal with this without going insane.
Molly was obviously brought into our lives for a reason but at that time....I had no idea why. I just knew that with the way her first 8 months went and being tossed around that I was the person that was supposed to help her.
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