The new year started with a major advancement in Milo’s progress. It came as a total surprise to me. I sat calmly and quietly while watching it unfold. Inside I was jumping and screaming in complete and utter joy. Should I reach for my phone to take a photo? Any movement by me could disrupt the whole thing. And Milo doesn’t like me taking photos of him with my phone. But I had to capture the moment because it was so monumental and awesome:
There is it folks. Mark picked up Milo and put him in his lap. Milo didn’t panic or tremble or wrestle to get down. For a few glorious minutes, Milo stayed in Mark’s lap. I could see the happiness on Mark’s face. He finally, after 3 years, was able to have Milo on his lap.
I have no idea what made Mark decide to give it a try. Perhaps it was because of the progress Milo’s had since giving him CBD oil for dogs. Whatever the reason, I’m just glad it happened.
Read more of Milo’s story in the Fearful Dog series.
Luke’s New Year New Behavior
Luke started the new year with a crazy thing that had to be stopped. He would start whining as soon as I got out of bed. Then he’d get all worked up and really amp up the whining when I started opening their crates. I’ve always opened them in the same order; Milo, Zephyr, then Luke. Then when I opened his crate, he took off barking and going after the other two. All that noise and ruckus was too much because Mark was trying to sleep.
Mark suggested using the water spray bottle like we did when we were attempting to stop other bad behaviors. It was worth a try. Luke would get a spritz when he started whining. After a couple of mornings of getting a face spritzing, Luke stopped whining and calmed down a bit. He’s not perfectly calm yet, but I’m working on it.
Zephyr’s New Year Challenge
Zephyr is his usual sweet self. Not much changes or happens with him. My latest challenge with him is trying to get him not to be terrified of my phone. He sees me coming toward him with it and acts like I’m about to beat him to death. He won’t come near me with it when we are outside. Since he loves treats so much, I decided to hold my phone in one hand beside a treat in the other. Hopefully, he’ll start associating the phone with a good thing.
My New Year Challenge
My new year kicked off with celebrating an achievement. I made it through a whole year without sugar or substitutes. Now the challenge is keeping it going. Honestly, it’s not too difficult of a challenge. There are challenging times, like this past weekend. I went to a birthday party and the food choices were definitely not keto-friendly. The pulled pork and chunks of chicken were already tossed with BBQ sauce. I know sugar is in BBQ sauce because I haven’t found one yet that doesn’t. Salad dressings had sugar in them too. All the sides were sugar-laden. Even the pickles had sugar in them. The choices were sweet gherkins or bread and butter.
Then there is the inevitable birthday cake time. And there was chocolate cake. Oh, how I loved chocolate cake. Then I looked around the room. I saw a lot of overweight people eating cake. Two I know are diabetics. Two had gastric bypass surgery years ago and are now almost as big as they were before the surgery. Several have other health issues. Just looking at them reinforced my determination to stay away from sugar.
My dessert will be cheese, please and thank you.
What new behaviors or challenges are you experiencing with your dog or yourself?
I have a few more but I’ll leave that for another post or two or three. Stay tuned…
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