Dog Tidbits

Fearful (or shy) dogs comprise a class of pets that can tug at your heart strings — and frustrate you to no end. Before our dog Faith came into my life, I considered myself a cat person. I wasn’t even interested in having a dog. But that wasn’t the way things turned out. My wife, Lisa, and I didn’t choose Faith to be our dog. Faith chose us to her her caretakers.

When Faith came to our doorstep as a starved three-month-old puppy in October of 2007, neither Lisa nor I had the heart to turn her away. We didn’t consider calling the animal control officer, either. To do that would have been to pronounce a death sentence on Faith because the local pound euthanizes animals after three days. And we couldn’t take her to the local no-kill shelter because Faith wouldn’t let us anywhere near her.

Initially we thought Faith was just shy and would become less timid once she settled down in our home. But Faith wasn’t a shy dog. She was a fearful dog.

Five Things to Consider

Having Faith in our household has been exciting, rewarding, and pleasurable as well as challenging, exhuasting, and frustrating. If you’re thinking about taking in a fearful dog, you should consider at least five things before making your decision.

1: Caring for Fearful Dogs Can Require a Huge Investment of Time, Patience, and Energy

Fearful dogs aren’t like regular dogs. Something happened to them sometime in their lives that made them scared of something or of numerous things. Depending on the dog, you might be able to discover many of the “triggers” that scare her. But in some cases, you might not be able to discover every one. Faith still surprises me at new things that scare her — such as the gas fire in our living room. Hearing the click of the starter and seeing the flicker of the flames makes her grind her teeth and tremble uncontrollably. We discovered that fear after having had Faith for well over a year.

Desensitizing a fearful dog to things she finds scary requires a huge investment of time, patience, and energy. In some cases, you might see progress in days or weeks. For example, when Faith first came to us, she camped out on the front porch, but wouldn’t let us near her. We began gaining her trust by leaving a food bowl for her twice a day and letting her eat while we watched. But it took two weeks before Faith would take food from Lisa’s hand.

In other cases, though, it could take months before you see progress. In Faith’s case, it took us about four months to get her to go from sleeping on the front porch to sleeping in the garage — she refused to go through our front door into the living room — to sleeping in the basement before she finally ended up sleeping in the living room. But then she refused to leave the safety of the living room, except to go out into the fenced-in back yard to go to the bathroom. We had to work with her for over a year before she would go from the living room into the dining room. That was a huge milestone in her life — and in ours.

2: Caring for Fearful Dogs Can Change Your Lifestyle

If you decide to take in a fearful dog, chances are that you will end up changing your lifestyle. That happened with us. Once Faith got into the living room, she refused to leave. Faith also was afraid of people. So Lisa and I could no longer go on weekend trips because we had no one to care for Faith. We also couldn’t go on extended day trips if it meant that Faith would have to be let outside to pee or let inside to get out of bad weather.

Having a fearful dog can make entertaining a challenge, to say the least. For almost two years, we couldn’t have friends over. After all, the living room was Faith’s safe place. And if we entertained in another room, Faith would bark her head off.

The situation has improved now, after more than two years — and 50 mg. of Prosaic a day (for Faith, not us). Now Faith is better with people. We have a dog sitter, Kim, who can stay for extended periods. Kim even brings her dog, Charlie, who Faith likes. And we have another rescue dog, Mac, who’s become best friends with Faith.

We can have friends over now, too. But we still have to allow a short time for Faith to get used to them even if she’s seen them many times before.

3: Caring for Fearful Dogs Can Be Frustrating

At times, the frustration of dealing with fearful dogs can be overwhelming. Sometimes the combination of enormous investments of time, energy, and patience along with the pressure of a changed lifestyle can stretch you to the breaking point. You don’t think you can cope any longer with the dog.

That happened to us. We got stretched so thin that after four months we decided to put Faith to sleep. But because Faith wouldn’t leave the living room, the vet had to come to the house. And because Faith was afraid of everyone but Lisa and me, she wouldn’t let the vet near her. So our attempt failed.

In the end, we decided that we’d been sent a message to try a little longer with Faith. We did, and the rewards have been enormous. But the frustrations continue as well.

4: Not All the Pointers You Read about Fearful Dogs Can Be Applied to Yours

Lisa and I have read a lot of material on how to deal with fearful dogs. One suggestion always jumps out at me: Take your dog to the vet to be checked out. After all, the dog’s problem might be physical.

For us that pointer was useless. Faith wasn’t some small dog you can pick up, tuck under your arm, and carry to the vet’s. She was a Lab/Rottweiler mix that weighed over 40 pounds.

And she wouldn’t leave the living room. (And even if she would, we couldn’t get a leash on her. And even if we could get a leash on her, she wouldn’t leave the house. And even if she would leave the house, she wouldn’t get into the van.)

So how can you take her to the vet’s? And how can the vet make a house call if Faith won’t let him near her?

But often there’s an answer to everything. In the end, after five months, we heavily sedated Faith while she was in a large dog kennel in the living room. (We’d gotten her accustomed to eating and sleeping in the kennel.) Then a friend and I carried the kennel out the backyard and down to the driveway to our van, which we drove to the animal hospital. At the hospital, our vet sedated her completely. While Faith was asleep, she was neutered, had a check up, got her rabies and other shots, got a bath, and had her nails clipped. (We have a great vet, by the way.)

A year later we did the same thing. Only this time Faith, being an intelligent dog, was on to us and refused to eat or sleep in the kennel. So getting her into the kennel was more difficult.

Lisa and I aren’t looking forward to the next visit. This time Faith will be really on to us. And now that she’s out of the living room and sleeping in the bedroom, where will we put the kennel? If she sees it, she’ll just hang out in a different room. Oh well, we’ll deal with that situation when the time comes.

5: You Might Never Know What Made Your Dog into a Fearful Dog

Different things can make a dog into a fearful dog. Some common causes include:

• Not being exposed to socialization experiences as a puppy, sometime within the third to sixteenth week of its life. As a result, the dog finds every new experience frightening.
• Being abused as a puppy and having the experienced imprinted in its mind
• Being genetically disposed towards being fearful
• Having a medical condition that causes the dog to be fearful
• Going through adolescence, when the dog’s hormones are changing
• Growing old

Lisa and I have no idea what made Faith into a fearful dog. I’ve read that sometimes you might think the dog was abused when it actually wasn’t. But we do think that Faith was severly abused during her first two months. (Our vet agrees with this, too.) One likely theory is that her owners wanted to make her into a fighting dog. (Dog fights are illegal in my state, but they still go on.) Because she was a Lab/Rottweiler mix, her owners thought she would be a good fighter if they could make her mean enough. But Faith wasn’t vicious or nasty and didn’t have the temperament to be turned mean. So her owners dumped her in the woods near our house. (She spent a month in the woods before she ended up on our door step.)

But, as I said, these thoughts are only guesses. We’ll never know what made Faith into a fearful dog. We just know that she is one.

We also think Faith never had a chance to be socialized. Every new experience frightens her.

Rewards and Joys of Caring for Fearful Dogs

The five things you should consider might make you hesitate to take in a fearful dog. But if you decide to take one in, caring for it can bring rewards and joys. I’ll just mention a few:

• Getting Faith to eat out of my hand for the first time
• Persuading Faith to go into the garage, the basement, and finally the living room
• Seeing her pleasure and exuberance when she greets me when I come home from work
• Being thrilled the first time she came out of the living room
• Being thrilled the first night she spent in the bedroom with us
• Knowing I’m making a difference in her life and am helping her to enjoy her life

For me, the rewards and joys far outweigh the frustrations and lifestyle changes I’ve undergone.