Post Traumatic Shep

We've been tempting fate by leaving Shep out of his crate alone in the house. We started with hour-two hour increments on the weekends while we were out running errands. He rocked it! Last week we tried a half work day. Nope. Work day mornings are particularly anxious times for Shep-he spends the whole morning hunkering down hiding under tables to avoid being put in his box. I think I totally threw him for a loop last week by leaving him out of his crate and exiting the house, leaving him unsure what to do with the anxiety. So, he promptly ran upstairs to our bedroom and chewed on our wooden bed. He could have chewed on our bed at any point while I was gone, but if I was a wagering gal, my money is on it was done in the first 5 minutes we were away and stopped once he realized being alone was like every other time he had been alone.

Shep is a very active sleeper--tail goes crazy, cries, growls and "runs" in his sleep. The other interesting development is that about once a month Shep has been, like a little kid having a nightmare, wetting the bed at night. Our bed. When we wake up to him jumping out of bed because he's had an accident he hunkers down in the corner, ears flat, tail between his legs. We give him some love so he knows we aren't mad, Jeremy takes him outside while I clean up and get us re-sheeted. We've got it down to a science. As an aside, we have had him checked out by his vet who has indicated there is nothing physiologically amiss.We realize most people would kick their dog out of bed after this happened once, but we've also realized we aren't most people. What happened to this dog before coming to our home was not his fault and we refuse to punish him for it.

The good news is that Shep's trainer is officially no longer on the Techtmann payroll. She does check in with us from time to time to see how Shephard is doing. She happened to send me such an email the day I came home to find the chewed bed. I shared with her the same info in this post. She mulled it over. She got back in touch with us and suggested an unconventional route: treat Shep, via herbal remedy, for Post Traumatic Stress. At this point, we've got nothing to lose. Its totally safe, and we have seen him respond well to herbal remedy's we've tried for anxiety. It's go time.

Are we officially crazy dog people? Yes. Would we trade him for the world? Nope.