Lessons from my Dog
Part 2
This morning, my dog sat in the grass and cocked her head to listen to the birdsong. A full 5 minutes (one for each year of her life of captivity/abuse/neglect) of simply sitting, attentive. She has not been exposed to any external stimuli before coming to live with us, so pretty much everything is a new experience for her. You can see her taking it all in. Sometimes it’s overwhelming. She heard birds before in her nearly 4 months with us: the noisy seagulls overhead with their raucous cries (which frightened her to begin with) the rooks and crows with their loud caws, but she’d not heard sustained birdsong, loud in the post sun-up morning quiet. Interestingly, her taste for music does not extend to our singing (she goes into apoplexy if either my husband or I sing along to a song!) so we must be a cacophony, compared to the dawn chorus.
Our doggo does not delay gratification at all: meals are wolfed down, play is enthusiastic, as are demonstrations of affection - full on lean into you and lick. She always goes for it full tilt boogy. They are arguments for waiting for us humans, no doubt, but it doesn’t hurt to be reminded that we should ‘seize the day’ and enjoy life whilst we still can. I have no idea what dogs remember or if they have any concept of time. Our dog had a horrible past and I’m sure she has no idea about the future, so she’s living her best life now.
She is becoming more herself by the day: more dog, more characteristic of her breed. When we collected her she was small, cowed, shaking. She didn’t bark, she didn’t play, in fact, she didn’t really know how to do anything typically dog. Over the weeks and months she has learnt all manner of things. She is still traumatised and overwhelmed by the world in many ways; lots of things still scare her, but she is fundamentally a trier. She is scared of people, but wants to be friends with them at the same time and her lovely nature is winning out. She learnt to zoom at the end of last year (run around the garden doing zoomies, not take audio visual calls). She discovered tug a month ago and she learned to dig last week. Digging is her new favourite thing and a sand pit may be incoming. She doesn’t sleep all day now and refuse to go for walks. She’s enthusiastic about the idea of going for a walk, even if the actuality is still very scary (especially if we meet other dogs). She is growing into herself and is more comfortable and confident in her own skin. We’re only 4 months in and there’s still a long way to go, but the progress she has made is incredible. It took me 50 years to be comfortable in my own skin. It’s a very good lesson to learn and the sooner the better. The more joy comes our way when we grow into ourselves and learn self-acceptance.
I’ve been away this week visiting family and it’s the first time the dog has been left for more than a few hours without seeing me. My husband reported that she was ‘sad’. She refused to go for a walk, her play was lack lustre and she spent many hours sat in the hall, awaiting my return. I got back yesterday teatime to a rapturous welcome. She was beside herself - so excited she couldn’t stop bouncing and wagging her tail. The welcome went on for the best part of half an hour. Her breed do suffer from separation anxiety and her version is acute due to her trauma, but even so, her greeting was completely OTT. She didn’t hold a grudge, she didn’t look for apology, she didn’t withhold love, she simply went with her delight at me being back home. I’m sure I would be a better person if I were more dog, less grudging, more joyful at simple pleasures.
It’s such a privilege to have a dog in our lives and a special privilege to be fostering one who’s had such a bad experience of humans so far. The fact that she trusts us is priceless.
As ever I am unable to disclose names or share photos due to a pending court case, but one day I’ll be able to.