Goodbye B-dog

I love my dog a lot. I have been crying a lot for the last several days. But today is the day we say goodbye to our beloved greyhound.

We loved him and he loved us. Our house is just not the right fit for him.

I kind of feel like I did him a disservice by bringing him here at all. He should have gone to another family from the beginning. We were matched with Henry only 3 months after we brought B-dog home and had we known we were bringing home a baby so quickly, we never would have got a dog.

But we got him and he came into our hearts. He's a pain in the butt, but we really love him.

It is difficult to explain to Henry that B-dog is going to live with another family. It is tough for him to understand.

My greatest fear is Henry will think we would do the same thing with him.

I talked to the social worker and K is 3 cm dilated, so she could go into labor any time now.

All of this is a lot of change for my little Henry and I am concerned about what his behavior is going to be like. He is not an easy kid to begin with, and all of this turmoil of losing his dog and becoming a big brother is going to be completely overwhelming to him.

And despite how sad I am about B-dog, I can only imagine what K is going through right now. What I am feeling about B-dog can't even match 1% of the emotion that first parents must feel.

It's an emotional time here at our house. We will get through it and things will get better, but right now we are stuck in an emotional sink hole.

I have to believe that dogs are adaptable and B-dog will find a family without small children that will love him well.

We will miss you, dogger.

On Top of Everything Else....

B-dog bit Henry in the face this morning. Henry is fine. We took him to the ER and he got 3 stitches on his cheek.

We have decided that we will have to send B-dog back to the rescue where we got him. We want everyone to be safe. But because he bit someone, he technically has to be in quarantine for 10 days, and that's supposed to be in the town where the incident occurred. In 10 days we will most likely be in FL, and I don't want this to happen again between now and then (though it is unlikely, I think.) I hate for it to drag on like this.

This has been a really horrible day.

I am feeling really sad about this decision, but know it is the right one.

We are doing ok. 

Not a blogger anymore

I'm not sure why I'm not into blogging anymore. I just rarely feel like blogging my emotions and happenings. Occasionally I need to get something out I suppose, but in general it's been feeling like a nuisance lately.

We went to FL to visit my parents. Henry had a lovely time and it was nice and relaxing. We did go to see CC and O. We had agreed (I thought) to meet at around 1pm. I called at 2 an they said they were an hour (!) away, so we had to entertain a busy toddler in the middle of nowhere for 2 hours while we waited for them. We were quite annoyed at how long we had to wait for them, but once they arrived, it all went well. They were happy to see Henry. Henry and O. got along quite well. CC was a little more distant. We got some pictures and they each held him. I was glad that we were able to get together and see each other.

We did discuss the possibility of a sibling while we were with them. They are still interested in doing it, but they want to do it sooner rather than later. Our agency found a social worker and I have spoken to her twice and sent her phone number for CC and O. to contact her and set up a time to talk. I don't know if the talk will really happen, but I will call CC and O. next week to follow up about it. I have a feeling that this might actually happen. I still feel a little tentative about it sometimes, but I still can't think of a reason to not do it. It's still really freaky, though.

Would this child's birth story be too weird?

Me and my H man.

Now that the weather has changed, things with Bdog are much better. The rescue did eventually call, but I told them we decided to keep him. She pushed a little for me to return him, but in the end he's still here. He seems to be doing well.

Bdog

So the rescue totally hasn't gotten back to me and Bdog has been being really good. Even though he drives me crazy sometimes, at this point I am preparing to keep him here.

Today Henry was right next to Bdog as Bdog was eating (H finds the fact that Bdog eats VERY interesting) and Bdog didn't care or even bat an eye.

I had a playgroup this morning with H, an 18 month old, a 3.5 year old and a 4.5 year old. Bdog was excellent.

I think for now I'm going to bring in a trainer to see if we can get a way to teach Bdog to be able to be in a room by himself when there are people home. If I can remove him when he bugs me too much and he'll behave, then I think I can cope.

And I think he can cope, too.

I hope keeping Bdog around isn't a mistake, but I feel like the lack of response from the rescue is a sign that I was having a bad week and most of this was insane cabin fever.

------------------------------

Nothing is happening on the CC and O. front. I haven't heard from the adoption agency yet for info about counseling. I guess I'm going to have to call again soon.

-------------------------------

Today Henry is 18 months old. Happy half birthday, beautiful boy!

I want somebody to tell me what to do

I keep feeling like I'm making a terrible mistake. I feel like B is getting better with time, and aside from the back stairs issue (which will never be resolved unless we redo the back stairs) that I could be making a bigger deal of this than it really is.

B is getting used to not having two walks every day. And when all this snow melts, I'll be able to take him out in the afternoon more often. And the back yard will have more room for him to run around.

He's still not used to having other people in the house, and he doesn't know how to remove himself from the chaos. I am still not sure how I will manage keeping H away from him when there's a newborn that needs attention. I do fear disaster and that is the main reason I'm planning on him living elsewhere. I think Bdog would do better in a house without small children.

But maybe I should make this work.

My fear is that I will try and fail and we'll have to rehome him later, which will be much, much worse for Bdog.

I'm trying to convince myself that what I'm doing is in Bdog's best interest, but all I feel is selfish.

I want somebody else to tell me what I should do.

Dog decisions

The rescue hasn't called me back as of yet.

Bdog just made it up the back stairs.

I feel stuck. On one hand I want to send Bdog back to the rescue to find another home while he's still young and pretty rescue-able. I love him and I want the best for him. I fear that once we have a second child I will absolutely not be able to handle him and that if I wait another year or two before sending him back, things will be worse for him. I fear that as H gets more and more active, the dog will have less and less tolerance for him. Bdog has growled at both H and a 3-year-old visitor at our home.

On the other hand, I want to push through this. When the snow melts, things won't be as bad. I'll be able to walk with a stroller again and being outside with Bdog and H will be much more pleasant.

I don't want to be one of those people who takes a dog into her home and then gives it back. I've always felt those people are irresponsible and I consider myself very responsible. I made a commitment and I need to see it through. I should enlist a behaviorist and possibly put Bdog on some medication to make him less anxious.

But honestly, I don't want to put that much work into a dog. It's difficult enough for us to have a child. Why should having a dog be this difficult? I just feel like I want to be free.

I still don't know what I'm going to do.

Dog

The dog now outright refuses to come up the back stairs. I just left a message at the rescue to see what bringing him back would entail. I can't handle having a dog anymore.

Better

Bdog came up the stairs. H is at my parents and I have a full day off. I'm feeling a bit better today.

I still worry about keeping Bdog, but for now our crisis is averted. He's wary of the stairs, but he's climbing them for now.

I love this dog, but I also stress about him. And I stress about the dog way more than I stress about the baby. That seems weird. I don't know how I'll handle the dog with two kids.

But for now, things are looking better.

Bad day

Today is a bad day.

I have to do a volunteer shift at a co-operative play space we joined and I have no one to look after Henry when I'm working. My mom backed and and the neighbor who was going to help is way too sick to come. It will work out, but it's a bit of a pain. If this was my only issue, I'd get over it fast.

Bdog won't climb the back stairs any more. This means I have to walk him around front to get him back in the house. This creates a huge issue for his going out issues. He won't climb the inside stairs, either. I feel like I am doing Bdog a disservice and I feel like it's untenable for us to keep him. He needs a better home than we can provide for him. This is really depressing me.

H is having sleeping issues. He's waking up early(ish) in the morning (for him, and it interferes with Bdog's walk schedule) and his napping is being weird. It's only 2 days, but I'm concerned. He's never had sleeping issues before and he wouldn't go down for a nap quickly today or yesterday and he woke up in the middle of his nap today, but he did go back to sleep. Now I need to wake him up in 10 minutes so that I can make that shift at the play space.

I have 6 bags of leaves from the back yard waiting to be picked up by the town, but apparently no leaves are collected after December 11th in this town. So how I have 6 bags of leaves until April. I don't have any place to keep them until then. What am I supposed to do?

Writing this, it makes me wonder why I feel as distraught as I do, but I feel distraught. Maybe it's the Bdog thing. I really question my ability to care for him every single day. He is so attached to me, but he won't let anyone else care for him. I just don't know what to do now that it seems I can't simply let him out in the back yard. T doesn't really like Bdog anyway.

I just feel like crying. Today sucks.

Tomorrow morning I"m dropping H off at Grammie and Grampie's for 24 hours. We have T's office holiday party tomorrow night. I hope I can relax a little.

Show and Tell: B-Dog

Show and Tell

ETA: Since a couple of people have asked, B-Dog is indeed a retired racing greyhound. And no, he never won. :)

Best friends?

Maybe someday.

Roaching

This is what greyhound owners call roaching. Upside down with arms stretched out, like a dead cockroach.



We went for a long walk this afternoon. I let him run around in the dog park without a leash for the first time. There weren't any other dogs and the fenced in area was reasonable small, but he came to me when I called him. It was a good first for us.

Relaxing

This morning T and I are relaxing. T got up and walked Bdog while I napped. They came home and I fed the dog. We're reading and playing and mellowing out while drinking coffee. I feel like I should get up and go, but really I don't need to. Sometimes I'm terrible at relaxing. I'm trying.

Tonight we're doing a game night with some friends and tomorrow morning we're going to walk Bdog with a bunch of other greyhounds. Hopefully I'll have some good pictures. I'll leave you with these.

Think he's making himself at home?

No excitment here

There's nothing going on. Absolutely nothing. B-dog is definitely keeping us busy. He's definitely helped my mood a lot. He's a delightful dog and taking care of him has really taken my mind off the waiting and the other bad stuff. Adding him to our family has been great so far, and his adjustment has been speedy. He is doing really well.

We still haven't sent our application off to the second agency. We need to have new copies of our book printed up. We're working on that and we have to get it off soon. We're still just spinning our wheels here with our wait.

A co-worker was supposed to come and get our fish and fish tank as I don't want it any more. I don't take proper care of our fish, so I figured I'd give them to someone who would. This is our second try for him to come pick them up and it looks like he's a no-show again. He won't be getting another chance. I hate it when people say they'll do something and then simply don't show up without calling and saying they can't make it. Fine if he can't come, but he has my phone number. I don't have his.

Tonight is my niece's 10th birthday party. I think we're going to bring B-dog along. We'll see how that goes. Since it's Sunday night, we shouldn't be there for more than a few hours, so I think it should be okay. We brought him there once before, but that was before he was so comfortable with us. I want to socialize him so I think it's a good thing to bring him.

Nothing else doing. My job is just eh. I think about staying home all the time now. That's not too good, but it is what it is. It's not that bad -- it's just not good.

One day keeps following another. That's how it is.

Weekend goals

Our goal this weekend is to get B-dog to walk up and down the stairs by himself without coaxing. Last night it took him about 5 minutes to walk up the one flight for the first time. He was scared, but so happy to sleep in our bedroom.

I leave you with pictures of sleeping animals.

Saturday in the Park

This was our day yesterday:

T and I went to the park and walked B-dog around.

It was sunny and cool. He met some other dogs and we met a friend who also has a greyhound. We were pleased with his socializing with other dogs.

He had a checkup with the vet. Then we came home. It was a big day and B-dog needed some rest.

A dog's life

I've settled down from my panic. I didn't know I had that kind of panic in me. Boy-howdy that was nuts. (No, I'm not sure why I just said boy-howdy. It just seems to fit.)

I'm sleeping through the night and B-dog is sleeping through the night. He's learning not to bark so much -- it's much, much better. He's such a good dog and is learning more every day. He's a little bit afraid of traffic - loud noises really. But I coaxed him out of the house with some kibble and it was fine.

I've tried to give him all sorts of treats, but he hasn't really wanted anything but his actual dog food, which is weird.

But he loves to lie on his bed, and the cats are getting more and more used to him. He's a sweetie and a good boy.

I like having him here.

It's my birthday

And I'm doing okay. This dog has distracted me from everything.

Yesterday morning I had a breakdown, though. Since we've got the dog I had been in a panic. I couldn't stop worrying. The cats were very upset and I felt like we threw our lives upside down for selfish reasons by getting this dog. I was completely freaking out. I couldn't sleep and I could barely eat, which isn't like me at all. T was worried beyond belief. I really felt like I couldn't do it. I had a therapy appointment and we talked about all this. I cried for an hour, almost hysterically.

I'm feeling a lot better today. B-dog (I know I put his name in here, but I'm going to call him this on the blog now, just to avoid this blog being found in error -- one mention is fine, but tons might throw off searching) is barking less, and he sat on his bed last night while I made dinner. The cats came downstairs and did some sniffing. There was no growling and they sat on our laps like they usually do. Not sure they'll all be best friends, but things are returning to normal.

B-dog did fine while we were at work. He is so, so happy when we get home. He has a long. long tail and it wags in a circle.

I think it's good that I freaked out, in a way. I mean, it's better for me to have freaked out over a dog than when getting a baby. I know I'm a worry wart, but I did not know that I had this panic inside of me. I do think that it was partially because I feel like I know how to take care of a baby bu I don't know how to care for a dog, and I was worried about combining the two.

Plus, if we're adopting a child, I just think it would be so wrong to give back a dog we adopted. That just doesn't sit right. I just felt like I had made a mistake.

But B-dog is getting used to us, the cats and the house. We are establishing a pattern. This is completely do-able. We're also thinking of getting some pet gates, which could double as baby gates. That way we can keep the dog out yet nearby and still be able to put the baby on the floor.

Anyway, just another day getting used to being dog owners. He's a good boy.

It's going

In general, things with Bistro are going well. He is a bit more of a puppy than we had originally anticipated (he is 3), but if we walk him enough he does well. I'm a little nervous about tomorrow as he seems to really hate his crate, but he's not ready to be left alone out of it yet.

1) He's wearing a cone collar thing to stop him from licking a wound on his leg. He needs it. But it makes him really awkward.

2) The cats are still unsure about him -- especially the girl cat -- and I want them to be able to have free reign of the house and to be able to see him and get used to him with a wall between.

3) Because of his 'puppiness' he needs lots of walks and while we're at work we're not going to be able to walk him nearly as much which means he'll be less tired which means more chewing/wrecking type behaviors.

We've had him 48 hours so far, and he's generally doing great. He definitely has some separation anxiety, but it seems exacerbated by the crate. The first night he slept in the crate and I slept downstairs with him and he barked a lot. Last night we let him sleep downstairs outside of the crate and he did great! He barks sometimes, but he mostly seems to bark when he's in his crate, whether we're home or not.

I am the biggest worry wart in the world. I think this is what I've gotten out of all of this. I'm already thinking of what it will be like to have both a dog and a newborn. You know how you can usually leave a baby on the floor in the car seat? I don't think I'm going to be able to do that. We'll have to put the baby on the table.

I'm insane to be thinking of these things. I'm already worried that I won't be able to handle both the dog and the baby. I thought about this before, but I thought it would be okay. Thousands of people handle both a dog and a baby. Why am I any different from those people?

What is wrong with me!?!?

Welcome home, Bistro