Our rescue dog Flossie travelled all the way from Cyprus to the UK, arriving with us two days before Christmas.
She was five months old, frightened and vulnerable.
Although she had stayed for a short time with the founder of the rescue charity, SPDC, she had never lived without the company and security of other dogs. Now, she had been separated from her ‘riverbed’ family and transported to a foreign country to live with two complete strangers.
Thumper paws
Once the pet couriers who had delivered her to us had said their goodbyes, we encouraged Flossie to take a look around her new home. She made a lot of noise when she walked. Her paws thumped across the kitchen as she experienced the feel of the floor tiles.
She sounded like a baby elephant.
She was fascinated by the carpet – it was something her puppy paws had not been in contact with before. We were soon to regret our choice of floor-covering. Apparently a looped wool carpet is ideal for nibbling until a loop becomes loose. Then, long sections can be pulled free so that strings of your once beautiful carpet dangle like necklaces.
It was not a good look.
We quickly bonded
Flossie took to me and my partner Graham immediately, tentatively wagging her tail and showing enthusiasm for the toys we had chosen for her. I realised later how fortunate we were, as her default setting is to be wary of people, especially men.
Luckily, she seemed to know that we were her new family, and she latched onto me, particularly. She quickly became my little shadow, following me everywhere and crying if I left the room, even for five seconds. While this presented its own problems, I am so glad that she decided we could be trusted. She does not feel that way about everyone she meets.
We were careful not to expect too much of her. Graham and I are both naturally quiet and we had planned the next few days carefully. We were spending a low-key Christmas at home so we could be with her and help her get used to her new environment.
Getting to grips with toilet training
We spent much of that first afternoon and evening trying to anticipate when Flossie needed to go to the toilet. Remember that first pungent wee when she arrived? Well, there were plenty more of those, and other, more solid excretions that cascaded onto our carpet. We became experts in cleaning up after her.
The layout of our house was not helpful. The living room and kitchen are at ground level from the front, but the garden is accessed down a flight of stairs to the rear. Our previous dog, Dotty took a while to get used to it when we moved here.
For a half wild puppy from Cyprus, going to the toilet in the right place was a challenge. We are advocates of positive reinforcement, so when she got it right, we praised her enthusiastically. When there was a mishap, we said nothing but directed her straight out into the garden, negotiating the stairs and the carpet en route.
It was a bit hit and miss. At one point, she got so confused, she went upstairs to do a poo outside our bedroom. She knew that stairs were involved – she just went in the wrong direction.
Trying to work with ‘puppy pads’
I had bought some puppy pads in preparation for our new arrival. For those who are not familiar with such things, they are made from nappy-like materials and shaped into flat squares. The idea is that you put the pads down on the floor and they have some sort of scent which is meant to attract your puppy to wee on the pad rather than your floor.
I’d never used pads before and I wasn’t sure why you would train a puppy to wee on a pad when really you wanted them to go outside. It seemed to add an extra and unnecessary step to the training. However, given the challenge of our house being on different levels, I was prepared to give them a try.
I laid two or three pads out in strategic places hoping this would encourage Flossie to use them. It didn’t. Plucking one off the carpet, she ran around the room with it dangling from her mouth. She settled down on another and proceeded to shred it into tiny fragments.
Then she started eating it, chomping on it like it was the most delicious meal she’d ever had. Perhaps it was. This was our first sign of her love of all things made of paper and tissue. In fact, she did everything but use them for their intended purpose.
We abandoned the puppy pads.
Hanging around outside
Like most people with a new puppy or rescue dog, we spent a LOT of time standing outside at all times of day and night waiting for her to ‘go’. It was cold. Sometimes it was wet too. It was December. It wasn’t the best time of year to be doing this.
Add to the equation that the quality of what was coming out of her was, how can I put it, of the liquid variety, the whole experience was pretty unpleasant. And, for the less squeamish of you, I will return to this unsavoury topic, as well as how I tackled and resolved it, in a future post.
As soon as she did go, whatever the consistency, I would do a mental punch in the air, mostly because I was so relieved that I could go back into the warm. I showered her with praise and treats, speaking to her in a jaunty voice as I encouraged her to come back inside with me. She would look at me, slightly baffled. It’s a look I’ve got used to over time. Dotty used to look at me like that too. Like I’m slight barmy.
She was very pleased with the reward though and, after a couple of weeks, we had the toilet training pretty much cracked, despite the complication of the stairs.
The first night (part one)
Flossie was exhausted after her epic journey. When we weren’t trying to master the toilet training or distract her from chewing the carpet, she spent much of her first afternoon napping, draped across the sofa, her long body fragile and thin.
When bedtime came and I’d shivered outside for a while, waiting for her to do her business, I rather naively thought she might go into the utility room, where her bed was, and go to sleep. This was where Dotty had slept. In fact, we’d given her Dotty’s comfy bed and plenty of cosy blankets to keep her warm.
How wrong I was.
We came in from the garden, having achieved the bedtime ablution, I scattered treats in the bed, careful not to make a lot of fuss, and closed the door quietly behind me.
I hadn’t even got half-way up the stairs to the living room when the shrieking began.
It was absolutely ear-splitting.
Graham and I looked at each other, our eyes wide. How could such a piercing noise come from this little black fluffy creature?
We sat it out for a minute or two, thinking, hoping, that she might settle down.
Then she started flinging herself at the door, crying hysterically. It sounded like she was throwing her whole body at it – the crashing thumps reverberated around the house. I was worried she would disturb the neighbours.
It was clear she was not going to settle down.
So, I padded down the stairs, opened the door to this shrieking, distressed little girl, scooped her up in my arms, and carried her upstairs.
We were going to have to re-think the sleeping arrangements.
Read the next post to find out how we all managed to get a good night’s sleep, eventually…
Suzy Pope is a certified copywriter and newspaper columnist specialising in pets, business and lifestyle. If you would like help with a writing project, please get in touch.
