In the April 2020 issue, we published an article by WDJ Training Editor Pat Miller, CCBC-KA, CPDT-KA, about fostering dogs and puppies. Pat has often fostered dogs during her long career in both animal shelters and as a professional dog trainer, and she’s also the author of a great book on the topic, How to Foster Dogs: From Homeless to Homeward Bound.

In both the article we published and her book, Pat mentions some of the potential hazards of fostering for the foster provider, and offers questions that a person should ask before agreeing to foster for an organization that is new to them. I had to pull out that article, and review those questions in light of the experience that one of my friends is having right now as a foster provider for an organization that both of us were only vaguely familiar with. The part I wanted to review was this question, among a list of questions that Pat recommends a potential foster provider asks before taking a dog to foster:

* How does the adoption process work? Are you, the foster parent, allowed to be a part of that process? (The answer to this one should be “yes.”) Are potential adopters carefully screened? Do you get veto power if you think the prospective family is not appropriate for your foster? Are the dogs adopted directly from your home, or do they have to go back to a shelter or kennel?

There aren’t necessarily right or wrong answers to these questions – just answers that will help you decide if this is an organization you can work with.

I’ve been fostering for the same organization for a long time, my local shelter. I know and trust the manager of the shelter well, and she knows and trusts me. When I foster a litter of puppies for the shelter, I generally raise them to a certain age, and then they go to the shelter to get adopted; I don’t have any say in who gets to adopt them. I could have input, but by and large, I trust the shelter’s own screening process to ensure they all go to qualified homes. If I were more involved, it would just muck up and delay the process.

But when I foster an adolescent dog or a senior dog or a dog with health or behavior issues, I invariably have the dog for a longer period of time, and form some opinions about the kind of home and person where that dog should be placed in order to thrive and shine. In these cases, I almost always either promote the dog to my own network of friends (and their friends) and work to make sure that any prospective adopter is really suited to the dog and vice versa, or I work closely with the shelter to meet any potential adopter they find for the dog, and discuss what I know and have experienced about the dog with them.

A great foster provider

My good friend is currently fostering a dog with special medical needs. This is what we know: The dog, a little over a year old, came into the rescue with a broken leg. She had a limb-saving surgery that failed and needed to be repeated. She was briefly in a foster home that turned out to be unsuitable; she is young and playful and there was another young and playful dog in the household, and they wanted to play. The risk of her reinjuring the leg and necessitating the removal of the leg was high. So that foster person asked my friend if she could foster the dog post-surgery until she was healed and ready for placement. My friend agreed, as she has experience with rehabbing her own dog following ACL surgery and is currently working from home.

The dog is very sweet. She’s also very energetic and wants nothing more to do than run and play. She had to spend the first few weeks under the influence of calming medications and went outdoors only on a leash. She weighs around 50 pounds and is strong, and knows nothing about good leash manners (or much else), so my friend has been using a harness to walk her, and has been teaching her some basic good manners: to not pull, to wait at doors, sit and down on cue, etc.

My friend has also been working from home, so she can see how bored and restless the dog is, and she has endeavored to give the dog lots of enriching games and food puzzles to play with. She freezes bits of hot dog and cheese in blocks of ice and lets her enjoy them in a playpen on her shady lawn. She moves the playpen from one location to another during the day, giving the dog changes of scenery – because if she’s left outside for very long by herself, she barks and barks. My friend serves the dog all her meals in Kongs and slow feeders, for enrichment and stimulation.

And, of course, my friend has gotten very attached to the dog – but from the get-go, she has been steeling her heart against the idea of adopting the dog herself. She has an older dog who has had multiple lameness issues for years, and she misses having an utterly sound, healthy dog to take on long walks and hikes. She doesn’t want to hasten her own dog’s death, of course, but she also has been looking forward to the day she can adopt a young, 100% sound dog without medical issues or concerns.

So my friend has had the dog for over two months; she’s healed! She hasn’t heard one word from the rescue group, which is strange, but it sure seems like it’s time to make contact. My friend calls the person who recruited her for the fostering task, who is a co-founder of a local nonprofit animal rescue group, and who, presumably, was the legal owner of the dog. She was saying, hello! The dog is doing great, and what’s the plan for finding her a home?

Whoops! That person told my friend that it was another local group who really owns the dog. Oh boy. Okay.

A not-so-great rescue group

My friend calls that group – and it seems to be a minor surprise to them that the dog still exists. Okay, there is a pandemic going on; everyone is a bit stressed. Once they recover, they say someone will get back to my friend. There was someone a while back who was interested in the dog….

When my friend reports this to me, we are both perplexed. If the rescue group had someone who was interested in the dog months ago, why wasn’t that person hosting the dog during rehab? Maybe they work outside of the home and couldn’t provide enough supervision…. But then, why wouldn’t that person want to visit the dog during rehab? Or call and ask how she was doing occasionally? We are sort of mystified, and, of course, concerned.

The next day, a person calls my friend and says she met the dog some months back, when the dog first came into rescue, and she’s interested in adopting the dog. She starts asking my friend about the dog, and my friend describes her: She’s young, sweet, friendly, smart – and she needs some training. She is still learning not to pull on the leash … and the potential adopter starts telling her that this won’t be a problem; the dog obviously just needs some training with a choke chain or pinch collar. My friend is like, “Um, no, that’s really not necessary, it’s not severe or anything; I’m just telling you that she’s a young dog without training, and because she’s only been in physical recovery mode, I haven’t been doing that training. I’ve only been managing her behavior so she doesn’t get the zoomies and start running around!” The adopter insists that there are correction collars that will stop pulling without hurting the dog.

The discussion sort of sputters to a halt. Then the potential adopter asks how the dog is with other dogs. My friend explains that’s she’s super playful and wants to play with any other dogs she meets – and the potential adopter says, “Well, she’ll have to learn to stop that; I have a very grouchy little dog who will tell her what’s what!”  Oh man, another sinkhole of a conversation stopper.

My friend asks the potential adopter more about herself; where will she keep the dog? The person explains that she works all day out of the house, so the dog will be either indoors all day or outdoors all day… and at this, my friend is officially depressed. This does not sound at all like a great home for this dog! And now my friend is saying, “If this is the dog’s only option, maybe I should keep her!”

But those two things shouldn’t be the dog’s only option! A good rescue group would have been checking in on the dog’s progress, and either would either promote her as a special-needs dog in search of a very particular kind of home (lots of supervision, other friendly and playful dogs or perhaps no other dogs, someone with the experience or willingness to teach her basic behaviors without resorting to punishment-based techniques) or at least have a plan to promote her. Instead, it seemed like they just made a call to someone who had expressed a minor interest in her, hoping to just solve the custody issue by palming off the dog to anyone. Ugh.

My friend called the group again, to try to find out who, exactly, is the person in charge of this dog’s case, so she could have a discussion about the plan going forward – and got a runaround. The person in charge is too busy to talk; the person she can talk to is fine with the placement with the choke-chain lady. Or, my friend can keep the dog. Whatever.

Ugh again. I feel terrible for my friend; she’s invested a lot of time and loving care into this dog, and was hoping for the dog’s story to end with a great adoption into a suitable home. Instead, she’s being torn between taking on another not-100% sound dog, for another decade-plus of more-extensive-than-normal medical needs, and just handing the dog over to a home that she’s not particularly well suited for. At the moment, the whole thing feels like a disaster. It’s great that the rescue group found the money for the dog’s medical treatment, presumably saving her life (or at least her leg), but their follow-through has been dismal.

Moral of the story

I was only peripherally involved in all this; while I know all the parties involved, I don’t know any of them except my friend very well. I probably would have been more proactive at communicating with the person who delivered the dog to my door in the first place, to determine the “chain of command,” as it were, before so much time had gone by – and I feel really bad that I didn’t inquire and encourage my friend to learn more about this earlier on in the fostering process. I’ve been distracted and preoccupied, too! All I can say is, if you are considering fostering:

Read Pat Miller’s article on fostering.

Read Pat Miller’s book on fostering.

Before you take on a dog, know exactly who you are dealing with and who is ultimately in charge of your foster dog’s case – and what the plan will be to find the dog a home.

I don’t know how all this is going to end; the rescue group asked my friend to keep the dog for a few more weeks before their veterinarian will clear her for unsupervised activity. I just really hope a more suitable adopter will come along.

If you’ve fostered before, do you have a most-important bit of advice for other potential foster providers? Any cautionary tales of your own?

My sister and her husband used to live down the street from a fire station. At least 10 times a day (often many more), they would hear sirens from fire trucks leaving the station, responding to fires and medical emergencies. Their little dogs would howl every time they heard a siren, which, in these “work from home” times, would have been a huge distraction. But my sister and her husband thought it was cute! They enjoyed the little dog howls; they also had to keep their windows closed at all times, to keep the noise from bothering the neighbors. When I was visiting them, I thought it was mainly a pain in the rear, having our conversations interrupted every hour or so!

Today, they live in a semi-rural neighborhood. If they hear a fire engine, it’s a real cause for concern, not a prompt for a fun little “singing session.” So sometimes my sister starts a session herself. It doesn’t take much, just one or two howls, and the dogs all immediately get to their feet and join in.

Here’s the funny thing: When my senior dog Otto stays with them (when I’m out of town  i.e., not much any more), he joins in with the little dogs, adding his big deep voice to the chorus of little voices. I keep telling my sister to try to get this on video, because at my house, Otto will NOT join in! And I have no idea why! If he’s outside when a fire truck or ambulance goes by, he will howl for a moment or two – but not if I’m near him. He will grow animated, like he’d like to howl, but he won’t do it. It’s so strange to me! I’ve never admonished him for howling, I would think it’s cute, too! But he just won’t do it in front of me!

Otto is sticking to his no-howling-at-home standard

My son and his girlfriend drove up here last weekend for a socially distant visit. I cleaned my detached home-office thoroughly and put mattresses on the floor for them, and gave them their own bathroom to use, and we ate meals and hung out outside together. They spent the days canoeing and playing disc golf at a course in town, relaxing, while my son’s hound dog Cole and his girlfriend’s parents’ dog, Bailey, stayed with me and my dogs. One evening after dinner, we were having the dogs show off their tricks for various bits and pieces of leftover dinner, and my son mentioned that Cole now knew how to howl on cue as a trick – and that little Bailey, a terrier-mix, would join in very earnestly. We turned on the camera to capture the action, and I hoped Otto might join in.

Nope. He wagged his tail and paced and looked like he wanted to join in, but held to his “no howling at home” standard. The big surprise was Woody, who did join the fun, in a surprisingly high-pitched tone. I would have thought such a big, big-chested dog would be more of a bass, or at least a baritone. He’s nearly a mezzo-soprano!

Now I want to practice, and see if I can put the behavior on cue, too, for one or both dogs. (For video of our one-time howling fest, see the Whole Dog Journal’s Instagram page, dogsofwholedogjournal.) What’s your stance on howling? Cute? Or annoying? Can your dog do it on cue? If so, share a video on our Facebook page! I’ll put a post there, asking for your contributions.

There is a trainer I know who posts a lot of short videos of her own dogs and dogs owned by clients of her board-and-train business. The dogs always look very well behaved and lots of people leave complimentary comments on these posts.

I’ve never seen a comment mentioning the shock collars that every one of the dogs wears. (Or the shock collar combined with a choke chain or pinch collar. Always the shock collar, and often the second pain-inducing collar, too.)

Again, judging by the comments, no one seems to be bothered by the subtle signs of stress and anxiety the dogs in training display. If the dog is “behaving,” the trainer never raises her voice, and the dog’s tail wags at some point, it all looks good to most people (apparently).

Now, it could be that some people DO comment or ask questions about the collars and the trainer deletes them. I would put money on a different possibility, though; I’m pretty sure that this trainer so thoroughly believes in and relies upon the collars that if someone DID comment, she would strongly defend their use.

Quick-fix methods can be seductive, but…

In general, I try to keep WDJ as free as possible from negative appraisals of training techniques and gear that we don’t support. I’d rather that we talk about the many reasons we advocate for the techniques and gear that we love. But I worry sometimes that many people can’t tell the difference between what we would call dog-friendly training and training that’s focused on quick, telegenic results.

I know that quick-fix methods are seductive: “I sent her an unmanageable dog who barked at the door, jumped on everyone, and couldn’t be walked on leash, and two weeks later, now look at him! He’s calm and I can walk him without being dragged down the street!”

But my question is, at what cost? What was that dog’s total experience? A dramatic transformation does not happen that quickly without a certain amount of pain and discomfort and lack of initial comprehension.

Note that I’m not talking about the use of a shock collar to deal with a specific behavior that the owner or training has been unable to stop in any other way, something that may well shorten the life of the dog if the behavior is unchecked, such as taking off after animals (not responding to a recall cue off-leash) or failing to respond to a “leave it” cue in rattlesnake country. That’s a separate debate we could have. But what I’m talking about here is the use of a shock collar to teach dogs to perform every sort of sit, down, stay, come, go to your bed, every-day type of behaviors – the same behaviors we can teach 8-week-old puppies to do on cue with a handful of cookies.

Now, I have to add that this trainer is skilled and experienced. I don’t see the kind of obvious fear that an unskilled force-based trainer induces in his clients’ dogs – the videos posted on social media don’t show dogs who are overtly cringing or flinching. They do show dogs who display more subtle signs of stress: licking their lips, ears back, tucked tails, yawning. In a few videos, it takes a sharp eye, but you can see the reaction a few dogs make when they have hesitated to perform the requested behavior and are being shocked:  a long blink or a momentary grimace before they perform the behavior they have been asked for. You can see it, but only if you know what to look for.

I bet her clients are genuinely happy with the results – pleased to discover that their dogs are capable of being calm and compliant and have learned a few behaviors on cue.

Dangers of using shock collars

There is no denying that in the hands of an experienced trainer – an even-tempered person with superior skills at observing body language and good timing – collars that shock or apply painful pressure to the dog’s neck can teach a dog to perform certain behaviors (in order not to suffer a painful consequence) in fairly short order, and without the appearance of violence. But this sort of training is anathema to me, and to most “positive only” trainers, for many reasons. Here are just a few:

• Training methods that use pain can emotionally scar some dogs. Dogs may learn to perform certain behaviors in order to avoid pain, but many lose trust and interest in having a loving relationship with humans.
• There are certain dogs who respond to pain with aggression. You can’t always predict which dogs this will be, but the odds are higher with dogs who are fearful and those who possess more than the average amount of self-preservation instincts. I would argue that from their point of view this constitutes simple self-defense. But the pain-based trainer will respond to the dog’s aggression with greater and greater pain, because if the dog’s aggression successfully (from the dog’s view) ends the training session, the trainer will fail, so the trainer will feel compelled to increase the pain until the dog “submits.” Unfortunately, if the dog’s aggression escalates enough, at some point the trainer is likely to inform the owner that the dog is dangerous and defective and the dog usually ends up dead – euthanized for behavior that was introduced in response to the training method.
• While the trainer might have good timing, observation skills, and judgment, few owners do. When the dog is sent home with his new shock collar and the remote control is now in the hands of his much-less experienced owner, it’s inevitable that the collar will be activated at inappropriate times: when the dog tried to do the wanted behavior but the owner didn’t recognize it as such, after the dog had stopped doing the unwanted behavior but the owner’s timing was delayed, when the owner is angry at the dog for perceived misbehavior, and so on. As the “corrections” make less and less sense to the dog, and he fails to clearly see what behaviors work to stop the pain and which don’t, his “training” will deteriorate – and so will the relationship between the dog and his owner.

In my view, the introduction of a button that is pressed to cause discomfort that will increase compliance from another living being – just this, alone – would indicate to me that the button-presser should spend his or her time with a stuffed or electronic toy dog rather than a thinking, feeling being of another species.

Again, I don’t like to discuss training methods that we would never promote, but I’m not sure that novice dog people are ever told about the potential for harm that quick-fix tools like shock collars can cause. And when a dog owner with an unruly dog sees the “before and after” videos, many happily sign on, without being informed about the potential for fallout. They probably haven’t been told up front that the dog’s seeming calmness and compliance comes with a remote control – one that they will have to learn to utilize in order to maintain those behaviors. Were they asked if they are willing to continue to hurt their dogs into the indefinite future? Or have their dogs learn to associate them with the pain?

The goal of the kind of dog training we describe in WDJ – dog-friendly training, positive-reinforcement-based training, fear-free training, call it whatever you want – is to cultivate communication with and cooperation from our dogs, not just assert control through superior strength or power. Communication and cooperation with other beings is most soundly built on a foundation of mutual comprehension – and this takes a little bit of time! But if the process of learning about each other is rewarding and enjoyable for both parties (canine and human), the bond between them will be strong, even if communication breaks down at times.

Let’s talk about it

*Please note that this place on the WDJ website – the blog spot – is where my personal thoughts are posted. The word “blog” is short for “web log”; it came into being to describe the sort of sites that were devoted to journaling and other personal posts. This isn’t an “article” about the evils of shock collars; it’s where I am trying to work out my personal discomfort with both the use of the tools and the general public’s seeming inability to detect or understand the potential for quite serious fallout from their use and misuse.

Trainers: Do you have personal experience with using shock collars for training garden-variety behaviors? (Let’s confine the discussion to this.) Do you have experience working with dogs who were shocked by different trainers or owners before you were consulted? If so, what can you tell us about these experiences?

Owners: Have you paid someone to train your dog with one of these devices? Were you told up-front that a shock collar would be used on your dog? What has your experience been? Has your dog seemed different in any way?

Do any of you work in a veterinarian’s office or shelter? If so, what are the words that you wish you could forbid people to say when they walk into the lobby and find that they are the only ones there at the moment? Say it with me:

“Wow, it’s quiet in here today!”

It’s almost guaranteed that when those words are said out loud, within minutes, the phones will start ringing and cars will start pulling into the parking lot and pet-related emergencies will just start busting loose. I’ve seen it happen with my own eyes, many times.

Which is why I feel a little anxious about saying what I’m going to say next: Are the shelters emptying out? Have all the people who are out of work and working from home who have ever wanted a dog recently adopted a dog?

Fewer dogs are available for adoption

My shelter currently has six adoptable dogs. Just six! Often, they have 30 or more!

I’ve also received requests for help with locating dogs to adopt. I’ve heard it again and again: Everyone is going to their local shelters, but there aren’t many dogs to adopt!

I heard this, too, from the West Coast coordinator for the American Black and Tan Coonhound Rescue (ABTCR), a group I have transported dogs for and have helped place dogs through. My local shelter had an American Foxhound that they were having trouble placing, and the ABTCR contacted me, asking if I could transport him to their facility a couple hours’ drive away. No problem! Happy to help!

I expressed my gratitude to the coordinator; since I first met her about 8 years ago, her group has taken in at least a dozen hounds from my local shelter. That’s a significant burden, as she has fostered as many as 30 hounds at a time in her dog daycare/boarding facility for the ABTCR. Her response to my thanks? “I will have him placed in a week; we have way more adopters than hounds at the moment!” WOW. I did a little happy dance at that news!

Since the first shelter-in-place orders went out in mid-March, I’ve had a hand in a few adoptions myself. One was a dog who was pointed out to me by another shelter volunteer; the dog is active and craves attention from people, and her behavior was deteriorating in the shelter. I spent just a few minutes with her and decided to bring her home to foster; she was super smart and sweet and really needed to get out and run! I kept posting photos of her on my personal Facebook page, and after a few weeks of fostering, she found a great home with a young couple, friends of my son who live a few hours away.

Good photos get dogs adopted

Then, a few weeks ago, I spent a couple mornings at the shelter, helping with behavior assessments and taking photos of adoptable dogs. I can honestly say that new, good photos got one of the dogs adopted the very next day. The person who adopted her wondered where the dog had been hidden; she hadn’t seen her photo on the website before! Actually, she had; it’s just that the intake photos were so bad, the woman wasn’t previously drawn to the dog at all.

I helped connect another dog I photographed with an adopter a couple days later. I remembered that a friend who works in rescue locally had told me that she had an adopter looking for a nice, large dog. We don’t get enough people who specifically want BIG dogs! So when I saw this large, fuzzy, super-friendly fellow, I gave my friend a ring. Her acquaintance adopted the dog days later. Yahoo!

Another friend of my son contacted me, hoping I could help him find the first dog he would be adopting as an adult out on his own. He had been raised in a family with lots of dogs, but hadn’t ever had one of his own. He wanted a friendly dog who isn’t too big or too small, athletic but not bananas, not a puppy but not old … and I almost fell over myself with excitement. I had just the dog for him! I fell in love with this little terrier when I met her at the shelter, and was so happy to fix her up with my son’s friend.

For the past two weeks, I have been buried in work, getting the August issue to the printer, and with no time to get to the shelter. So I was thrilled when I saw only six dogs available for adoption. I’ll get over there in the next few days and take some more pictures.

But now I’m curious and anxious and happy, all at once: Are the shelters emptying out where you are, too?

The July 4 holiday is almost upon us – a source of distress for many dogs, with its days and days of popping and cracking sounds of firecrackers and fireworks, followed by one very long day and night of firecrackers, fireworks, and BOOMING fireworks. It’s not actually something I have personally worried about – until recently! I’ve never before had a dog who was particularly concerned about the sounds of fireworks or guns or thunder, but I do now.

Otto is getting more anxious as he ages

Nope, I don’t have a new dog. I have an old dog, Otto, and his anxiety about these sounds has gone up exponentially in the past few years. Last year’s Independence Day was the first time that he got upset enough at the sound of fireworks to concern me. Prior to last year, he didn’t seem to notice thunder and would merely lift an eyebrow at the sound of a gunshot. Fireworks have made him pant and tremble for the past few years, but he would recover within 10 or 15 minutes after the sounds stopped, like, “Whew! Glad THAT’S over!”

But last year, in the days leading up to July 4, he came running to me, shaking and panting, every time he heard a firecracker go “Bang!” – and he’d stay in that clingy, panicky state for hours. And on the night of the 4^th, we spent a fairly miserable night with all the windows closed, all the fans in the house on high, and the sound on the TV turned up VERY high, trying to drown out the sounds: the far-away booms of the town fireworks, the much closer and smaller fireworks show put on by a local casino (less than a quarter mile away as the crow flies), and the absolutely illegal and dangerous crap being set off in the driveways and yards of neighbors all around us (we live in a rural area where the fire danger is VERY high). I ended up sleeping (or trying to sleep) on the couch with Otto, trying to comfort him well into the wee hours of the morning as he jumped off the couch with every occasional “bang!” and trembled and panted for 10 or more minutes after each episode.

It’s not too late to get help for your dog (or, wait, it might be)

So, this year, I vowed, I was going to act early to see a veterinarian and get a prescription for something to help him get through the 4^th without trauma.

I called my vet’s office on June 2 to schedule an appointment. They didn’t have an opening until June 10 – no worries. That should be fine.

The trouble started when I discussed with my vet – over the phone, from the vet’s parking lot, after her examination of Otto, as per post-Covid-19 standard practice – what sort of medication I wanted to get for Otto. I have heard from any number of dog-trainer friends and dog-owner friends that the newish drug, Sileo, works wonders for their thunder-phobic or fireworks-averse dogs, and so that was the medication I was hoping to get for Otto. But my vet told me that it is her practice to prescribe a combination of Acepromazine and Trazodone for dogs who freak out at fireworks.

For years and years, “Ace” was the go-to drug prescribed by many (most?) veterinarians for dogs with severe anxiety, including dogs with a history of panicking in the face of fireworks. But in more recent years, veterinary behavior experts have learned and taught that dogs who are dosed with Ace may actually experience a greater sensitivity to the sounds of fireworks – but they are unable to move or react. Using the drug in combination with another drug sounds more effective, but also introduces more possible adverse side effects into the equation.

My vet mentioned that she’s familiar with the active ingredient in Sileo – dexmedetomidine – and uses it in her practice as a pre-anesthetic. But she hasn’t used the drug in the oral form used in Sileo; it’s a gel that is applied to the dog’s gums. She mentioned that she didn’t see anything wrong with prescribing it for Otto, but that her practice doesn’t carry it, so she’d have to give me a paper prescription that I could have filled elsewhere.

Filling prescriptions online can be tricky

Here’s where things started to get tricky. I immediately took that paper prescription to the pharmacy at Costco, which is literally next door to my vet’s practice. The pharmacist looked through three supplier catalogues, but handed the prescription back to me, shaking his head. “None of our suppliers carry it, sorry.”

I got home and called a friend who has reported using Sileo for her thunder- and fireworks-phobic dog. She said, “For goodness sakes! I have gotten it from my vet, but I generally get it for a lower price from 1-800-PetMeds.com. I also have friends who have gotten it from Chewy.com,” she told me.

I already have a Chewy.com account, so I pulled up that website and started an online order. With online pharmacies, you can either mail your veterinarian’s paper prescription to the pharmacy, or click a box indicating that you’d like the pharmacy to call your veterinarian to confirm the prescription, to speed up the process. I clicked that box. It was June 10, already. Let’s get this ball rolling!

A few days later, I received an email from Chewy.com. I was fully expecting a shipping confirmation, but what I received was, “We haven’t been able to reach your veterinarian; please call us.” Given that my veterinarian is a 24-hour, 7-days-a-week practice, I thought that was unlikely. I called, and a representative told me, “Sorry, that was a stock message; it doesn’t really fit this situation, but I’m glad you called. Your veterinarian’s office told us that they don’t work with online pharmacies and won’t confirm the prescription; you will have to mail us the paper copy.” Ack! Now * I * was feeling a little panicky, like I might run out of time before the medication arrives!

I mailed the prescription off that day. About five days later, I received another email from Chewy.com, indicating that they received the prescription and will be sending Otto’s medication to me soon. It arrived on June 23.

There are drug-free ways to help your dog

Long story, short: If your dog could benefit from pharmaceutical intervention to get through the July 4 holiday without having a nervous breakdown, act immediately to get veterinary help.

Also, here are some links with terrific ideas for other interventions that may be helpful:

https://www.preventivevet.com/dogs/get-your-dog-ready-for-4th-of-july

https://www.preventivevet.com/dogs/why-you-shouldnt-use-acepromazine-for-cats-and-dogs