Sadie passed her vet check with flying colors. No doc wars overnight-- silence is good.

Her current daily schedule is "Wake up and out" for about 20 minutes, in for the mad romp sorting out 3 brekkies, 20 minutes in the dog corner to eat it. This gives F the longer time he needs to chow up and me the time to get my AM stuff going. Then there are either several hours hanging out time with me/us for the rest of the AM with training time included, or outside time in the dog yard with F unless it's frostbitten-ears weather. That whole time is repeated in reverse in the evening. In the afternoon she has a second hanging out/training time, and a nice long nap with Faulkner. She has increased her living room naptime, sleeping through or ignoring distractions, long enough that sometimes I can get in a chair nap with them, too.

The cool thing is that Sadie knows and responds to the structure. Time in the dog corner-- with or without a companion dog (R or F)-- is no longer lonely-panic time. She cheerfully heads to the corner on her own now because she anticipates what comes next. Ruby never did make that adjustment. It's been interesting-- observing the difference between a brain chemistry that can learn, and one that can neither learn nor settle if there is any distraction to re-spark the preference to go back to solitary mode.

No housebreaking has been needed, but she still has not revealed her "wanna go out" act to me; so her time in the main house is in short stints to be sure all wettings are outside, until I see how she will let me know when she needs to GO-OUT-NOW.

So we're focusing on other training behaviors. I am still discovering what commands she "knows," and reinforcing these, while adding necessary commands, behaviors, and reinforcements one or two at a time.

All this of course has upped my activity level as well as Faulkner's and Ruby's, which is good for F and painful for Ruby. Coincides with my long-awaited knee rehab/recovery.

I discussed Ruby's impending euthanasia with the vet yesterday-- hate that!

The BEST death for Ruby would be to go to sleep in the middle of playing with other dogs-- the humans in her equation are not her must joyous factor, though she likes us fine. I just can't figure put how to give her that, and I'm stewing about it because I feel like we owe it to her. Oh well-- on the day she makes it clear that it IS the day, I hope to be having a smart day.

But I am very glad that F has bonded to Sadie, before That Day. He needs his own dog. And so do I.

~Susan