He has been getting much more confident and well-behaved on the leash! His favorite things to do outside are smell pee (pics 9 + 10), roll in pee (pic 8), and roll in dirt (pic 7)
Today is officially one year since I brought home my first cat and my best friend, Onion! He got a kitty kicker and a new flower for his collar to celebrate (picture 1), which he's been absolutely loving!
Now to get a bit sappy; I just have to say that this cat has changed my life in monumental ways, and I'm so grateful to get to come home to him every day! I first met him at school for my vet tech program (picture 5 is the first day I met him). I was actually supposed to have a different cat to look after, but last minute it got changed to him, and I truly think it was an act of fate. I didn't have a lot of experience with cats before school, so it was a lot of learning for me, and he'd never been indoors before, so it was a lot of learning for him too. He was the first cat I ever did a blood draw on (which I still think he's holding a grudge for), I vaccinated him myself, and I was there to help him recover from his neuter. All this over 3 weeks, and then we said goodbye. He went back to the shelter to go get adopted, and I carried on and finished school.
I wanted to adopt him so badly, but at the time I was still in campus residence, and then moved back home with my family who did not like cats AT ALL. Then, in August last year, while on a vacation, I had seen that he was posted as the cat of the month for the shelter. I was in shock because how could such a beautiful, loving kitty still be available for adoption months later?? Well one impulse decision later, and a lot of asking for forgiveness not permission, I have my cat that I have always dreamed of, and he is everything I could've wanted and more!
He is so affectionate and smart, and he quickly won my cat-hating family over. He greets me everyday when I get home from work, snuggles with me in bed, and is yet to be disliked by anyone who has met him! He filled the silence in our home after losing our soul dog the prior year, and he has somehow even become friends with our crazy new puppy. He is genuinely the light of my life, and I know this is all so cheesy, but he really has changed my life for the better. I love my cat!! Happy 1st Gotcha Day Onion!! (also looking back at these photos is crazy to see how much he's toasted lol)
Hi all! My little demon dog (heeler x) is just about 7 months, and I'm wanting to start looking into a good, properly fitted muzzle for daily use for him.
He's got pica, still trying to figure out if it's medical or behavioral, but either way I think he's going to have to be a muzzle dog due to his reactivity. I've already muzzle trained him with a temporary baskerville muzzle, but for his health and my sanity, he needs a better muzzle.
He eats literally everything and anything he can (mud, rotten food, toys, tissues, etc), so I need a muzzle that protects against scavenging, but he's also leash reactive (screaming and lunging) so I want one to keep others safe/deter people approaching. I don't think he's a *huge* bite risk, as he hasn't tried to bite anyone aggressively yet, but I worry with his temperment/breed, and just want a muzzle that will prevent him from biting to be safe. (The optimist in me is hoping he'll grow out of it, but he's a heeler so let's be realistic lol)
I've been looking into Mia's Muzzles and Muzzle Movement lately, but I'm just kinda looking to get some insight from those who have used muzzles with dogs of similar needs. I'll probably wait a bit longer to order one just in case he does grow any more, but I'd love all the advice I can get beforehand to be prepared for when I do get one!
Biggest minecraft set I've built so far, and I absolutely love it!
As the title says, my family got a heeler x collie puppy about 3 months ago when he was exactly 8 weeks old. My family has had a heeler before, who was fiercely loyal and easily our soul dog, so we figured another heeler might be nice. We live in a small city, but have a decent sized backyard, and figured we could handle another high-energy herding breed. Oh what fools we were!
The whole thing was sketchy from the start, with this dog being from an unplanned litter on a farm, the people selling him trying to get us to take him at 6 weeks, and them telling us his grandparents are siblings as we're leaving with him. His dog momma was also less than a year old when she had his litter, and had zero interest in being near them or socializing with them. Big yikes, I know.
The issues started about a week after bringing him home. He's constantly jumping up and latching on to our arms, clothes, and literally anything else he can get his teeth on. I know puppies bite, but this dog is excessive. He's drawn blood numerous times on both my parents and I, and nothing we try seems to help. He's finally mostly past the teething phase, but still bites us relentlessly. Its not even a lot of ankle biting, like we expected from a heeler, it's the jumping up and biting that's the biggest issue.
He's also incredibly reactive to any sort of change in environment. New sounds, new smells, new people, new places, everything. We took him to some puppy classes (before they kicked him out) and he would scream the entire car ride there, and then would scream and lunge at any of the other dogs when they'd move. We have a bunch of small kids in our neighborhood, along with my cat in our home that I am especially worried about him with.
He is quite loyal though, and hates being away from us, (i.e. he'll scream if we leave him behind the baby gate to go pee or whatever), and he's smart as a whip with tricks for food. He also picked up potty training with hardly any issue. He just doesn't have any manners. Like he doesn't know how to be a dog, and he can't regulate himself at all. Once he's wound up there's no stopping him or calming him down until he finally tires himself out (usually after biting us numerous times and lunging at us and my cat). Redirection does not work.
I came to the realization about a month and a half back that I don't think we can give this dog the lifestyle he needs and deserves. All three of us work regularly, and he's in a crate for 2-6 hours a day (which he does really good with, but I know is not fair to him). I'm a vet tech, and would normally love to work with/train a dog like this, but with starting a new job I haven't had the time I would've liked to work with and bond with him, and I lose my patience with him when I come home from work and he charges at me.
The final straw for my parents was last night, when my dad tried to leave the dog with a bully stick chew while he cut the lawn, and came back (30 minutes) to find this dog had gotten into the garden bed, dug a shit ton of holes, eaten a bunch of the flowers my mom had just put in, and tracked mud EVERYWHERE. They are now talking about rehoming him, which I really don't want to do, as I do love this dog (somehow), but I also know in my heart that it might be better for him.
With my background, I have experience with reactive/behavioral dogs, and I know in theory what things would help him, but my family can not seem to keep things consistent. I know me being home more would be more helpful, but I've told my parents all the things we should try (which are the same things they paid a trainer to tell them!), and they just don't do any of it. I've pulled out old textbooks for them to read through about canine behavior and how to raise a successful puppy, but they just don't seem to care. My dad especially, will react with anger and "dominance" when this puppy acts out, which makes me incredibly frustrated and sad. I've seen him scare this dog so bad he peed, then got even more mad at him for messing in the house. When he bites, he'll curl the puppy's lips onto his own teeth so that it hurts him and he cries, which is not teaching him not to bite! He'll scruff the dog and drag him around when he doesn't listen, hold him down by the neck to "teach him a lesson". He has also said if the dog ever has health problems he's just gonna let the dog die.
My parents also just leave this dog unsupervised, then act shocked when he gets into mischief. They don't remove his access to things he's destroying, they just expect him to not continue destroying it after they tell him no (like rugs, shoes, beds). This dog has eaten so many sticks, dirt, rocks, toys, bags, etc and has somehow doged a foreign body for now. I know its only a matter of time though, as my parents have given up on discouraging him from eating things he shouldn't.
I know a lot (probably most) of this poor dog's issues have been caused by our household, and I know I'm not free of blame either, but I guess I'm just looking to get any advice possible to hopefully be able to keep this dog in our home. I have been trying so hard since we got this puppy to discourage my parents from using force and punishment, but I dont know how to get through to them. The trainer was helping, and my parents did actually sort of listen to them, but now he's been kicked out and we don't know what to do. We'll rehome him if we have to, but I don't want to give up on him when he has so much potential.
Hi all! As the title suggests, I have been experiencing pretty severe numbness and weakness after trying the dexcom g7 sensor!
For reference, I've been using the g6 since my diagnosis (~3 years) and I've also been using the tslim autosoft90 sites for the last 6ish months, and have never had this issue before.
A couple weeks ago I decided I was going to try a g7 sample I received from my endo a while back, and pretty much since it's insertion the arm I put it on has been numb and weak. It's lasted the full 10 days of the sensor and has continued even after I've removed it and am back on the g6 (getting close to 20 days of numbness now). I'm not super strong normally, but I can't even lift a bin full of medications off a shelf without almost dropping it now. It feels like I've just done crazy arm workout but only on that one arm, which is unfortunately my dominant arm. It also has a weird numb sensation, where I can't really feel contact with the arm, unless it's like intense grabbing or pinching. Any contact I do feel also feels like it's being done through multiple layers of clothing, like there's something between my skin and the form of contact, even when it's direct skin on skin contact (i.e. someone poking me with their finger).
Could it just be a pinched nerve or something? I keep my sugars pretty in range and it's only that arm, so I don't think it's neuropathy related, and I measured the cannula on the g7 sensor and I don't think any broke off in my arm. I'm just wondering if anyone else has experienced something like this or if I'm going crazy and something else/more serious is going on? Any advice is appreciated!
(I will also mention that I think the sensor was a couple months expired, but I was running late for work that day and didn't look too close before throwing out the box.)