Why my bulldog has spent his life wanting his butt scratched and what I'm doing about it.

Big Poppa, our bulldog and the most stubborn creature I've ever known in all my life, is like a totally new dog.  You remember his "issues"? 

My friend Jess, who I've referred to as a dog whisperer, because she is magically brilliant in understanding dogs' communication, is actually a doctor unlike any veterinarian I've ever met.  (If she ever sees patients, I'm taking my animals to her and so should you - but anyway)

She came to consult with me about Pops, whose peeing and barking had put him squarely on my "naughty list." It turns out he has some dominance issues, which surprised me for some reason.  He's kind of passive-aggressive (this is my non-professional assessment), so he is bossy but with a kind, innocent look on his face all the while.  I had thought 100% that Mabel, my tiny little Maltese-mix was the boss around here.

Pops likes his butt scratched.  This is the whole reason we bought Mabel.  Not to scratch his butt, but because my little dog Fifi died and I had doggie-snuggle withdrawal and all I could ever achieve for affection from Pops was the arse-end of him offered for a scratch.

Come to find out, this is dominance.

Jess showed me how to lean over his back when he offers me his "poppa" (this is Russian for "bum" - something we learned in Ukraine, when our friend asked what the dog's name meant, because in Russian Big Poppa means "big butt," which also is very appropriate for him).  So now, I pat his face, then when he turns back-to, I lean over him.  He dislikes this and licks his nose, and sometimes he'll just wiggle out and then turn his butt back to me again, so I do the all-fours walk to lean over him again.

But even the first day of our new "homework" routine, Pops changed.

The goal is for him to let me pat his face, to know that I will have conversations face to face.  And he's starting to get it.  The first evening, the very first one, he began to stay facing me for pats!!!

This, friends, is near miraculous.  For six years, I have only ever had the invitation to scratch his butt.  Do you even know how happy his foolish face makes me!?  I had tears in my eyes.  Truly I did.... This dog has aggravated me to no end with his peeing and barking and his big bulldog butt, and now he's showing me that he can change.  And that he's not hopeless and that we can work our relationship out in a new way.

It reminds me of something my dad used to say sometimes about relationships between people:  That people are always "responding to" us.  And we have this amazing ability to change dynamics in our relationships by changing what we do, which can create a new response.

It's really powerful stuff to consider that we can affect change in our relationships.  There is something very hopeful about dogs.  They live in the now, they want to please, they are so forgiving.  I think that loving a dog moves a part of our hearts that spills over a gentleness and a hopefulness into the rest of our lives.

Pops still may be wanting to pee on the sofa.  I don't know this for sure.  As much hopefulness as spills over from his behind not continually backing into me, I still am not ready to let him near the couch. I probably need to be the "pack leader" with my leaning-over-his-back exercise a bit longer before we go there.  I'm sentimental about Poppa, but it has limits.  We'll get a good week or so of face-to-face chats before we try opening up the den again.

Bulldog Drama: The Notorious P.O.P.

(I couldn't resist the "Big Poppa" reference in the title.  If you were a 90's teen, you have that song stuck in your head.  If not, just never mind.)

We've had a week of bulldog-related drama here.  Good heavens, it's been crazy.

A week ago, I was about to lose my full mind (MY FULL MIND) because Big Poppa barked for almost an entire 4 hours.  If you need to break a person down mentally, just play a recording of a bulldog barking for 4 hours.  They will do ANYthing to make that stop.

If I had thought clearly enough to record him, I could have sold copies I'm sure.  For parents who've run out of constructive or effective discipline techniques, they could say, "Because you did such-and-such, you will now listen to 4 hours of bulldog barking," and I guarantee their child will never do said offense again.  It's torturous.

So, my hubby and I decided to try one of those electronic collars that zaps Pops a little every time he barks.  We had one years ago, because this in not a new problem.  I think Pops has so much neck-flab that he was able to shake it such that the zappy-thing was not on his voice box, rendering it useless.
(He's not as dumb as he looks.)

And because his neck is actually wider than his skull, I think he wrangled out of it and possibly chewed on it in an act of utter contempt.

Thus the new collar. The most expensive one they had at Petco.  I'm a frugal, penny-pinching girl.  But I was also desperate.

When Pops saw the collar he flattened himself out on the floor.
(I think he remembered the first one)

I put it on him, and not a single bark emerged from his mouth.  Not one.  He sat, jowls hanging, crooked underbite peeking out from below the tip of his tongue, which was sticking slightly out of his mouth.  This is the face he makes when he's not impressed.

The next day, I put the collar back on him, and he was very good all day.  Except at one point in the afternoon, Pops emerged from a nap in his crate unable to bear weight on his left hind leg.  He'd favored that leg at times but had always limbered up and walked normally again, but he's now been one week unable to put weight on his back leg.

Last Friday, after seeing his leg had been bothering him for a full day, we took him to the vet.  Taking a bulldog to the vet is not a one-woman job.  My husband came home to help, because bulldogs are not very agile creatures.  He's shaped a bit like a cinderblock (the dog, not my husband), so he's not so good at hoisting himself into the back seat in a pickup truck.

At the vet, Pops was admired by all. I've never seen a more mellow dog, really.  He has perfect behavior in public.  No one would guess that at home he is a chronic pee-er.  (This is a whole 'nother story.  Basically if it's fabric - ie. blankets, his bed, a bag of clothes for Goodwill, a throw pillow, even one certain cushion on the sofa which now needs to be taken to the cleaners - he will pee on it.) But at the vet's office he was a champ.  He politely introduced himself to all the other dogs, he lay with his floppy cheeks resting on the floor, tongue halfway out, eyes up toward my husband who is Pops' sweetheart.  Not a single man passed him who did not confess to always having wanted a bulldog.

In the exam room, he was fine.  But it was funny to hear all the staff just a few feet away, in the back of the office trying to get him up for a leg x-ray.  It took 3 people to get him to the machine.  And when he had to go back for shots, he walked just far enough that we could see him register that he was heading to the area of not-fun-stuff, and he turned abruptly toward my husband and screeched to a halt.  He is a stubborn guy (the dog, not my husband).

So Pops, as it turns out, has a torn ACL.  I don't know how that happened, but it seems pitiful enough that we returned the expensive bark collar, because we felt like maybe he was barking because his leg hurt.  We also suspect that if we just put a regular collar on him, he may think it's capable of zapping him for barking which might cure the problem for cheap (which is my preference).

Today, our friend and local dog whisperer is coming to give us a consultation on the peeing situation.  Because that is not cool, friends.  It is entirely not cool.  Jess is my ray of hope that Pops might not piddle on every blessed soft surface he can lift his leg on.

So I can't wait to know what my friend Jess will teach me about the peeing issues we're having at our house.  And she's one of the most fun, intelligent, interesting women I know, so I am really looking forward to spending some time with her.  We hung out and rode horses and chilled with her goose, Gertrude, and her sheep Daisy this summer.

Daisy must have just said something witty. 

Gertrude ("Gert-chert" as my 4yr old calls her)

Wish me luck, friends.  And keep Pops in your prayers, because he's a nutty old guy, but we love him to bits around here.  It's hard to see him not feeling like himself.