April 2005:
Just a couple of weeks before my fourth birthday, my first family gave me away. They said I bit their toddler. They didn’t want me and thought I should be put to sleep. I sleep every day so that didn’t make sense to me. For the longest time, the Dad in that family was mean to me. He made me scared of men. When no vet in town would put me to sleep, he called Westie Rescue, Houston, and asked them to come and get me right away. He said it was the one bite that made him do it. But they had been not nice to me for a while. They made me feel very bad because I am a good dog and wouldn’t try to hurt anyone.
Foster Mom, Barbara, came and got me. She has a young Westie, Duncan, and had been eager to help Westies anywhere. I was her very first foster dog. Duncan thought another dog (or more) in the house was a great idea. I was very, very scared. I hear that I was like a statue when anyone tried to pick me up. My tail was firmly placed between my rear legs and no one could touch the back half of my body without me growling. I did not let Rob, my foster Dad, get near me. (That made him sad because he wanted to pet me and make me feel at home.) The word to describe me was “traumatized”.
I can’t remember what it was like at that first house. When I got to Duncan’s house, I couldn’t even stand in the grass. It didn’t feel familiar. And Duncan tried and tried to get me to play with him, but I didn’t know-how. Mostly, all I did was a growl and snap into the air.
There were a few problems with my body. The biggest one being that I have cataracts and couldn’t see very well. The vet I used to see said that I did have some vision and that it wouldn’t get worse. (He was wrong. Very quickly I could only see light and dark.) Since I don’t know what’s coming at me, I am scared all the time. That makes me act unfriendly. No one really knows yet if the reason I like to pee on every corner, or doorway, or the furniture, is because I like a little scent trail to find the doggie door. When a piece of furniture is moved or Barbara does too good a job of cleaning it up, I just have to pee some more.
I scratched all the time. It seems my first family had me tested, when I was a puppy, for allergies. Like a lot of other Westies, I am allergic to corn and wheat. Also some grasses and outdoor things. They gave me food with corn and wheat in it anyway. I don’t know why. I also had a yeast infection. I smelled a little “off” and my back end was kind of crusty. There were dark places on my skin. And, boy, was that itchy!
Barbara switched my food (not all at once) to tasty kibble with no corn and wheat. And then she started making me a high protein stew to starve the yeast. I had medicine in cheese ball treats to make the yeast go away. I started having baths a couple of times a week. There was even a special paw rinse, with water, after running around in the grass.
We were all so happy when I was adopted. On my birthday, no less. The new house had two other dogs who had very jingly collars that made a horrible noise when they ran back and forth in front of me. I couldn’t see them. I only heard them and felt them near me. I was startled all the time. I had to nip a few times (and landed a nip, too), trying to get them to mellow a bit. In less than eighteen hours, they didn’t want me either and wanted to bring me back. When I got back to my foster home after less than 48 hours away, I acted kind of like I did the first time I got here. Duncan was so happy to see me but the whole thing had been traumatic and it took me some time to stop growling and baring my teeth. It was all very confusing for him, too.
After that, no one ever even applied for me. I had “no children” and then “special needs” attached to my profile. At least my foster home liked me, even when I didn’t like another foster dog that came here. She and Duncan wrestled and made noises that made me think she was hurting him. I wanted to fight her. So she had to leave.
My skin got much better and now I look mostly white. I still have stew every day and the yeast infection is pretty much gone. My itching is still a problem, though.
Duncan taught me to play with him. Now I can even play fetch. As long as the ball makes noise and doesn’t go far, I can get it! We wrestle some and patrol the backyard together. Duncan runs after squirrels and I run after him because he seems so excited (and then I can smell those pesky squirrels).
I really want to see things like Duncan can. I want to run a long way for a ball and not have him take it away just because I can’t see it twelve inches away. I want to go off-leash on our special walks and not run into twigs and bushes and little posts. Or walk in the wrong direction. I want to beat him to a tree when a squirrel is nearby (and maybe even learn to stalk). Maybe I won’t be so afraid all the time of all those things that startle me now (which is pretty much anything that moves) and maybe then I will stop nipping at people, and little children, and go nuts when I know another dog is nearby. I’m tired of being scared all the time.
My long term foster Mom and Dad (and Kathy, the head of the Rescue group here) are so incredibly excited about me seeing. They are grateful beyond words to the people at WestieMed. I don’t know what all the fuss (and this happy crying) is about. Barbara promises it will be a wonderful surprise. She has a surgery appointment for me on April 27th and says I’ll find out then.
Love, Murphy
Update May 1, 2005:
It’s Sunday, May 1st, and four days since I had my cataract surgery. I can see! I’ve taken to stopping and staring at everything. I’m not really jumping for joy, yet, because I’m not allowed to jump. Or run or play or even get up on to the couch by myself. The special eye doctor doesn’t want me to jostle my eyes too much. And he says “no scratching”, not even after drops are put in my eye, which seems like all the time. For some reason, there is a clown collar or something around my neck. I can’t touch my face or my head. That’s very frustrating.
The word is that I have to keep the collar on and stay in my crate a lot (even when Barbara goes to the store) for another three to four weeks. I’m feeling a little bit depressed right now. But every day is a new day, so “week” means nothing to me. I promise to send another note to the wonderful WestieMed people after the clown collar comes off and I can run and jump and keep up with that wild puppy, Duncan. There’s a whole other life waiting for me!!