DAY FOUR (Friday): Never underestimate your match

I can't explain how truly beautiful and natural the bond between Twinkie and Zachary has become.  They look for each other and love it when they find each other.   When Zachary went to bed tonight, he asked Joe to leave the door open "in case Twinkie needs to find me".  :)  I know he's mine, but hearing that was just too cute for words!  Since Twinkie destroyed the two special toys for her and Zachary to play with, I went back to Pet Smart and bought two more durable toys.  Truthfully, I think Twinkie needs to be playing with the full spare tire we have for our Trailblazer, but that would be kind of cumbersome to cart around with us each day.  LOL  We'll see just how durable these toys are in the coming days.  

Today was a big day for us.  I got to run with Twinkie on a track, and later in the afternoon we went out on our first community outing to the mall.   Jessa was the trainer who took us out to track this morning.  Joe, Zachary and Sarah (one of the trainers) layed the track, and I ran it with Twinkie.  I was happy Jessa let me hold the lead so quickly...the more practice the better!  At first, you always know where your child goes.  You know exactly where they are going and exactly how they got there.  Your dog not completely knowing your child's scent combined with you not knowing your dog, their tracking signals and body language makes it nearly impossible to go on a "blind track".  At this point, Twinkie has only tracked Sarah's scent for months while training, and now we're transitioning Twinkie to identify just Zachary's scent.  We want her to start running the track and say, "Hmm,  I know Sarah is out there, but this other scent is very familiar, too!  Let's check it out!"  


Since we start tracking by watching where Zachary is going and letting Twinkie watch him walk away for a short time, it's a little difficult to completely trust her nose when we, as humans, process the world so visually.  Where I thought I saw Zachary and Joe walk to from around 200 or 300 yards away, and where they actually wound up was different.  Different as in the opposite direction!  Based on my visual observation, I may or may not have found Zachary.  Truthfully, I probably would not have which is a pretty horrifying thought in retrospect.   I would've been in the general vicinity, but when your kid is lost you don't want to speak in terms of "general";  you want exact locations which is where Twinkie was leading me. From the angle I was looking from, I thought they walked more over to the left.....which they did not.  Twinkie was on to their scent pretty quickly and was definitely pulling and snapping her head to the right as she moved into the scent cone.  Even though I knew this meant she was on to their scent,  I was still trusting my eyes as opposed to her nose.  I guided her more to the left a couple of times until Jessa told me to follow Twinkie's lead since she snapped her head back and pulled me to the right each time I guided her otherwise.  It was hard to release that control and thought process  because in my mind she couldn't be correct....I SAW where they went.  Well, clearly I did not because once I trusted Twinkie and what she was "telling" me, she barreled through the field and found her boy.  Just. Like. That.  It never gets old seeing this happen.  As difficult as it is to have complete trust in this dog that cannot verbally communicate with you and say, "Check it out...this is my gig, and I've got it.", you need to because they clearly do "got it."  


Twinkie is certainly smart, but she does not have the ability to tell the difference between a practice track and Zachary gone missing. It's always the real deal for her, and we need to treat tracking that way without exception.   Each and every time we track, Twinkie needs to think this is THE most exciting thing she'll ever do, and when we find Zachary it is a major PAR-TAY!!!    As a reward for finding Zachary, Twinkie gets a sliced up hot dog and her orange tennis ball which she loves!!   Twinkie isn't allowed to play with this particular tennis ball.  The only time she sees it is at the end of a track since it's so rewarding to her.  Once she locates Zachary, we need to jump up and down in excitement,  hug her, praise her in the most excited voice possible and give her the hot dogs and tenny all at the same time so that she understands that what she just did was THE  BEST THING EVER!!  You look and sound like a complete lunatic at this point, but it is so important that Twinkie knows that she's nothing short of awesome. (Since she already thinks this, you can imagine just how excited we have to be!) LOL   If she doesn't have this level of motivation to track, she simply won't be so eager to do it.  Needless to say, she needs to always be eager to do this.  


Our dogs are trained as scent-specific search and rescue dogs.  They would never be trained nor used in the same capacity as a K-9 drug sniffing dog or search and rescue dog from your local police department.  Our dogs are trained to begin their track immediately and ONLY for their child.   To reinforce this, Zachary needs to hide with someone different each time.  Sometimes it will be me, sometimes it will be Joe.  Sometimes we'll take another kid with us or another parent.  The only variable that remains the same each time is Zachary's scent.  With each track, Twinkie will become more and more confident about who she is looking for which will subsequently make us more confident and not underestimate her ability to find Zachary.  
So.......for all of you who are waiting with bated breath to find out if I had an asthma attack or wiped out as I did with Aubrey, the answer is no, I did not!  (so there!!)  LOL   I'd be lying if I didn't tell you that I braced myself for it, though.  Twinkie definitely showed mercy.  




After lunch, we all met at the Fairfield Commons Mall.  We were a sight to behold...9 Golden Retrievers and one black Lab converged on Entrance D with the 4 Paws trainers, and we were off.  Zachary needed some wiggle time and took off with Joe.  He enjoyed walking around, riding the real train around the first floor and getting a snack at Yoo-gurt.  Once they went on their merry way, it was just me and Twinkie (and Jennifer the trainer).  Surprisingly,  Twinkie did better than I would've ever anticipated.  Based on how she busts my chops as frequently as possible back at the training center, we were completely prepared for this to be a nightmare!   Walking into the mall for the first time was very distracting to Twinkie, but girlfriend pulled it together, with a little help from Jennifer, and it was pretty smooth sailing.  She and I walked and  walked and heeled and sat and downed over and over and over again for about two hours.  It doesn't sound like a big deal, but it's mentally draining.  The last thing you want is for your dog to misbehave while in public.  Twinkie definitely had her groove and once again showed me mercy.  So much so that she and I hit the Hallmark store and bought Joe's Father's Day cards.  I was feeling confident enough that she and I hit Starbucks and sat outside of Starbucks for about 25 minutes.  All sorts of people came to talk to her, and she loved every minute of it.  When you know you're as awesome as she knows she is, it's fairly easy to hear people tell you that over and over and over again.  

DAY THREE (Thursday): A perfect match!

Twinkie and Zachary continue to develop a beautiful bond.  He loves her so much!  Now that he's a couple of years older this time around, he is able to and wants to play with her differently than he did with Aubrey. It's certainly not to say he didn't love Aubrey just as much because he did.  I know he still misses Aubrey everyday.  He always asks about her and wants to see her pictures, and it still breaks my heart.  I guess regardless of your age, a significant loss is just that...a significant loss.  With Twinkie, though, he's two and a half years older and is more mature.  They mutually love to play together.  We bought a special toy (Nylabone Happy Moppy) that only Twinkie and Zachary can play with together.  Again, this reinforces the concept of, "God, I love this kid!!" in Twinkie's eyes. Between her Happy Moppy and the special treats, Zachary is a rock star in Twinkie's eyes which is exactly what we want!   


Everything we're doing right now with Twinkie is to foster an emotional bond between the two of them.  The only time we would not correct Twinkie if she does something inappropriate or breaks a command is if she approaches Zachary.  The very last thing we want Twinkie to do is associate him with anything negative.  So, if she were in a "down" or in "place" but got up to sit by Zachary, we would never correct her. At the same time we're fostering a bond between us and Twinkie, but the bond is different with the child as opposed to the handlers.  With us, it's a bond a love for sure, but it's based on respect.  The more respect Twinkie has for us, the more success there will be in terms of service.  Twinkie is most definitely making me earn her respect as much as I'm making her earn mine!!  Her and Aubrey could NOT have been any more different in temperament.  If I corrected Aubrey, she was ready to "off" herself.  When I correct Twinkie, she looks at me and says, "That's all you've got???".  Whew...no two dogs are alike!


We couldn't be happier with Miss Twinkie and the respective bonds we're fostering with her.  Clearly, she knows that Zachary is a very special little boy.  She has a job to do, and she's happy to do it.  This morning while we were discussing our experiences of the previous night with Jennifer (Head Trainer), I was talking about how funny and tough Twinkie really is.  She's the sweetest and most loving little furball, but she is a buster!  She knows her job, does it well, but boy she's making me work just as hard for her respect as I'm working her!  LOL  She continues to spit out the treats she doesn't care for at that particular moment which is a riot.  I can't let her know I think it's funny, but it is funny none-the-less!  :)  Twinkie continues to test me and see just how serious I am while I'm working with her.  She doesn't back down easily and lets me know that I had better work her and mean it since she doesn't have the time for any nonsense.  LOL It's as if she's making sure I'm the perfect match for Zachary instead of the other way around!   As the conversations continued throughout the day with Jennifer, she laughed and reinforced that Twinkie is indeed "a tough little girl" (there's that phrase of explanation again!  LOL), but she's also CONFIDENT and very UNASSUMING.   Joe told me this dog is more and more like me with each passing day.  :)  But, it is true.  Twinkie is confident.  As adorable as her "match" picture was, Joe and I would laugh because she looked like she was ready for work; "I AM a 4 Paws service dog,  I'm focused, and I've got a job to do. Don't screw with me."  Twinkie is very unassuming.  As adorable as her "match" picture was, she IS "a tough little girl", and she's not gonna take any sh*t from anybody...including ME!   There's a pitbull behind all of that fluff.  

Having said that, our little pitbull LOVES her boy, and here's how we know she IS focused and serious about her job.  Tonight, Zachary went to bed about 850pm. They didn't get a chance to play tonight as they usually do because he was wiped out; training days are long and exhausting for everyone.  For a little more than an hour after Zachary went to bed, Twinkie had been "circling" and not able to settle down in the room.  She was happy, but she just could not stop moving around which is unusual; she was very "busy".  We tried giving her toys, her bone, patting her, talking to her, taking her out to potty all to no avail. She kept breaking commands that we were practicing.  She kept circling by the bedroom door, poking it open then coming back to me.  She even walked into the bedroom at one point and came back out a minute later.  That's when it dawned on me....SHE WAS LOOKING FOR ZACHARY!! (I know I'll have to work even harder tomorrow to make up for this momentary lack of common sense in her eyes!! LOL)  Once I pulled down the covers and pillows that Zachary was buried under and called her on to the bed, she jumped on, circled once more and layed at his feet.  Twinkie fell sound asleep with her boy after about a minute or two, literally, and stayed in bed with him for close to an hour.  ♥  This picture is what it's all about my friends.  This picture is what makes all of the hard work, money, stress and exhaustion 150% worth it.  This picture IS 4 Paws.  

DAY TWO (Wednesday): The Re"match"

So, today was Day Two/Round Two for Twinkie vs Mommy.  It was a whole new day for all of us!  Joe and Zachary slept in which they needed; Zachary slept nearly 12 hours.   I ate breakfast alone, well with the very pleasant company of Jan, another 4 Paws mom, and Twinkie was a little more receptive to obedience and me as her handler.  Twinkie is still the happiest, sweetest most playful pup.  All she wants is to make you happy and be loved....she's perfect for Zachary!  

  

Although Zachary has been a happy, excited guy, he's definitely had an edge to him since we left NJ.   So much so that one of the other mom's noticed how much more at ease he seemed today.  BTW, the moms that I've had the chance to meet here are just lovely!  Everyone is so nice and pleasant to be with.  :)  Anyway, It seems that some of the anxiety about Elfie and Twinkie he was trying to manage has decreased now that Twinkie is a constant; he's no longer concerned that she'll be here and gone the next day.  Knowing the important people in his life are not leaving him and will be there, figuratively, "tomorrow" is very important to Zachary; it's also a major source of anxiety for him.  The only time he became anxious today during training was after he came back from the store with Joe and found that Twinkie was not with me or in her kennel.  She went out to potty, but he did not know that.  You could see the sense of relief come over him when someone brought her back to her kennel.  

Twinkie was excited to see Zachary as Joe helped him get her out of her kennel when we arrived at 4 Paws this morning; the feeling was mutual for Zachary!  :)  It's incredibly important for Twinkie to see Zachary as a 150% positive part of her life at this stage of the bonding period.  She should ONLY associate him with good things; he would never correct her or "work" her as he is not the handler.  They are BFF...period.  So, when Zachary does things like let Twinkie out of the kennel, gives her super-fun toys and feeds her yummy, special treats, she can only see him as the kid that makes all good things happen for her.   Why wouldnt she want to be around this kid??!!  Let's be completely honest, at the end of the day, I'd be your best friend, too, if you fed me Oreos every time I saw you.  Everybody has a price!  LOL   

After a few minutes of playtime with Zachary, Round Two, the re"match" begins.  Joe couldn't wait to watch an adorable, fluffy little Golden Retriever, dig her paws in and work ME over the next few hours.  His on-going support just takes my breath away!  LOL  All of today was spent on obedience and class discussion.  This gave Twinkie and I a lot of time to work together.  Today we worked on the commands sit, down and heel.  We also worked on distraction which is giving the "down" command and presenting the dog different levels of distractions such as food, toys and personal interaction to see if they'd maintain the down position or break the command.  Some of the things used as a distraction are food, random items such as Legos and markers, balls and toys.  The purpose behind this exercise is to ensure they understand that regardless of what's happening around them, the expectation is that they will not get up or move regardless of what's tempting them.  Would you want a service dog running out from under my table to eat a french fry that fell off your plate??  As with people, dogs are more interested in one thing than another.  Twinkie was a lot more tempted by toys than food...there's a shocker from our playful pup!  Food definitely caught her attention, but it was the ball and squeaky toy that made her want to get up.  By some grace of God, Twinkie did not break the command...a proud moment for us, indeed!  :)  

Unlike yesterday, Twinkie was a little more receptive to me as the handler, and even more so as the day went on.  This will continue as she becomes used to us and how we handle her.  She definitely pushed the limits today and continued to spit out treats at times if they were not up to her standard...still a little stinker!  :)  Having said that, Twinkie definitely worked more with me today than against me like yesterday.  Once we got back to the hotel, we practiced down and heel.  She was great and only required minor corrections.  She's definitely less distracted and was more apt to follow my command once we were outside of 4 Paws.  As Twinkie would veer a bit off course while I was working her today, Jeremy mentioned several times that Twinkie was "a tough little girl".  No truer words spoken today!  

Day ONE (Tuesday): We met our "match".

So today was THE day......Zachary and I met our respective "match".   :)  Zachary woke up at 55am stating, "Mommy, I'm awake."  (Thank you master of the obvious!  LOL)  He had some ups and downs and was on edge at times this morning but held it together.  This is a really big day for everyone involved; it's an even bigger day for kids like Zachary who don't so easily manage the element of surprise.


We arrived at 4 Paws at 930am.  Zachary could not wait to get into that building and find his girl.  He found Twinkie's kennel and his world became a better place.   It's amazing to see how quickly and easily Zachary's world falls into place at 4 Paws.  It's as if he knows that this is one of the few places that he'll be with people who implicitly understand him and won't judge him.   I also think Zachary is cognizant enough about the challenges he faces that he KNOWS this is the place that helps him.   


So, a little after 10am things got going and the first dog was brought out.  Zachary was VERY stressed when he realized Twinkie was no longer in her kennel.  She was behind the partition waiting to come out to him, but he didn't want to hear anything about that.   He's got so much anxiety about Elfie being gone when we return to NJ that finding Twinkie was "missing" did not make him happy.   This little bump in the road didn't result in a meltdown, thank God, but it reinforced the level of anxiety Zachary experiences and why Twinkie will be so good for him.   After a few minutes I was able to capitalize on Zachary's distractibility and offer him cookies if he came and sat down to wait!  :)  Then, much to his delight...Twinkie was the second dog to come out, and Zachary met his "match" for the first time.  It's always so exciting and emotional.  This was definitely more emotional for me than it was the last two times.  Zachary was so happy to meet Twinkie; we were happy (and relieved) to see him so happy.  Twinkie is just the cutest thing, and she is such a happy girl!  It's interesting to have the perspective of going through this process before.  Although it's only been a couple of years, Zachary seemed to appreciate Twinkie in a different way this time around. 


Zachary spent a lot of time on the floor with Twinkie patting/hugging her, giving her treats,  giving her bone and generally wanting to be involved with her.  A lot of this he did independently but was also receptive to anything we asked him to do with Twinkie.    I think the highlight for Zachary was that she loved her new Nylabone.  Truth be told...seeing Twinkie act like a dog and chew on a bone like a dog was a highlight for Joe and I.  After you deal with a non-dog like Elfie for so long, you forget how a real dog actually behaves!  LOL  The rest of the morning was dedicated to introductions and discussion by the trainers.  


We decided to stay at 4 Paws for lunch.  We packed lunches and played outside with Twinkie for more than an hour which was awesome!  The weather is beautiful in Ohio.  Twinkie has a WHOLE lot of energy....all she wanted to do was run and play outside.  She loved her new ball.  But, oh boy!  Goldens clearly need time to run and play; she didn't want to stop!  She was a riot.  She barked and "growled" and rolled around and played fetch...she's such a real dog!  When we went back inside and began the afternoon session, Twinkie definitely started to give me a run for my money.  It was at this point that I realized I had just met MY "match".  It is important to understand that it wasn't really until this point that I started to put some "formal" obedience into place since I knew it's what I was supposed to do when she wasn't listening.   Twinkie was clearly more interested in a playtime free-for-all as opposed to obedience training...and me.


It was game time for Twinkie, and she had no problem letting me know that she was going to try to establish the Alpha role in our relationship.   She would "sit" when I would say "down".  She would go in a "down" when I would say "sit".  She would turn around and walk away when I corrected her and put her back in "place".  She would also spit out the treat I gave her if she wasn't pleased with the positive reinforcer I provided her with....what a little stinker!  :)  When Joe saw me becoming frustrated, he told me it was like dealing with me.  I then put him in a "down" and walked away.  Anyhoo...Aubrey was so terrified of everything on Day One that she was not up and about and interested in ignoring me or playing with the other dogs; she wanted to sit on my lap and pretend she wasn't really a service dog.  Elfie was...well she's just Elfie.  So, the concept of Twinkie basically giving me the finger and doing what she wanted to do all the while being the cutest little fur ball on the training floor took me back a step.  Don't get me wrong.  it's wonderful for a lot of reasons that I've gone through this process before.   I certainly understand what I need to do and, more importantly, I understand that Twinkie knows what she needs to do.  Having said that, it was a little conflicting and even frustrating many times because I was working Twinkie as if we already knew each other, and we simply do not.  She is a new dog with a new personality.  In kind, I am a new "leader" and have a new personality.  Put these two variables together, and at the end of the day, I'm still at Day One.  


I have no doubt in my mind that Twinkie and I will work through this, let's say, "misunderstanding".  I just doubt that it'll happen by the end of the day tomorrow!  :)  


Stay tuned...