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The Dogs Koa

After about a decade and a half I finally relented to family pressure and decided to adopt a dog earlier this year. Set in stone, my wife, daughter, and I decided that after our vacation in 2020 we would set out to rescue a pooch.

Alas, our vacation fell on the closing down of most everything due to COVID and realizing that a dog was on everyone’s mind we put off the search in our small community for the foreseeable future.

A couple weeks ago, that changed super quick.

Now, I’d say we might not have been properly prepared for a dag. Finding ourselves rushing out for a crate and food and a leash and, “What are those things new puppies pee on?” all because the turn around time was under a day. The reality is that in the grand scheme of things it really wasn’t the material stuff that we were immediately unprepared for. It was the emotional stuff; a new addition, a new personality, a new set of behaviours, expectations, and routines for both our new boy Koa, and for ourselves. And the anxieties that go along with all that jazz.

The reason I went so long with being vehemently opposed to getting a puppy is summed up simply by the notion that you’re adopting someone you’ll probably watch pass. This was a real tall order for me. I didn’t know if I had it in me to lose another dog. I was afriad of losing a friend. And that is a reality with a furr buddy who’s bound to become a pillar of emotional support in a home. However, getting a family addition was bigger than my own fragile emotions. I had to submit to that. This was about the enlarging the love. Not fearing loss.

So one Saturday morning we found ourselves in a small town in the mountains where we were greeted by a dishevelled volunteer who, abiding by COVID social distancing routines, and fuelled by coffee and angst, offered us a little scared dog that looked almost identical to my previous canine bestie. Nearly everything about him was the same. Same breed (we think), same markings and colourings, same temperament, and the like. It was wonderous aside from the fact that I sometimes still accidentally refer to him as Darwin. Subsequently nothing scared me about having a new dog. I knew this guy! He was my hombre.

Having experience with the breed and having experience with such a similar animal, I found all my ingrained behaviours, reactions, commands, and gestures just came back naturally. It felt like normal. It was though this three-month old was matured to a decade already.

For my family, however, it wasn’t as comfortable. How could it be? I was welcoming someone familiar home, and they were welcoming someone foreign. This was new for them.

Now, a new pup comes with a bunch of behaviours that are — well — puppy behaviours. Not altogether welcomed, but not altogether awful. Exciteability, chewing, biting, and of course house training. It needs to be said, there can be real danger in having a new guy half the size of your kid who’s just figuring out that his main hand has teeth. There is the puppy play, the scratching, and the nipping that’s expected, and for a mother and a daughter this can seem a bit scary. I could sense the fear in the reactions they were giving which were quite different than my own reactions. I could sense my own emotions rising with this new sense of dread in the house.

Now, we came out of the gate wrong. We knew what to do to instil good, reassuring behaviours, but we succumbed to bad habits in less than 30 seconds. Because… puppies, that’s why. But it showed.

The first week was notable in a number of aspects. Firstly, it was pretty apparent who Koa fell inline with. Me. This seemed juxtaposed to my behaviours. I was extremely calm, reserved, non-verbal, and not at all reactive. I did not in anyway try to assume a social role. This was habitual from having already assumed a role with my last rescue. It was bad and lazy. On the other hand, my wife, a new mother in effect, was more vocal and overall more anxious and aghast at the puppy behaviours. And to my daughter, Koa was just plain scary. He was running. He was jumping. He was nipping. We found ourselves correcting my daughter’s fear-based reactions, our own, and the puppies wild confusion of both being a playful brat and being sternly corrected, which comes with the occasional pee pee.

This was a problem. Anxiety and disarray in effect.

Now, I know a lot was going on for our pup. Firstly, he barely recognized how his feet work, so his overall grasp on reality was pretty narrow. He was at first trepidations of a new home, and as dogs do, he was trying to find his place in the social order. We, of course, did no favours to him by breaking all our boundaries on crating and training, and all the lovey-dovey stuff like co-sleeping that leads to angst first thing in the morning for everyone. Commands and corrections were half given, and often given with a confusing level of emotion. Love could turn into reprimand in a moment. Play into AHHH!

We understood, we needed to get better at that and we did, but not before we noted one odd behaviour I think says a lot about the reality of creatures.

One thing that cannot be overstated before I continue is this: Koa is terrified of everything. Moths, birds, flies, shadows, smaller teacup puppies, the doorbell, waking up, going to sleep, his tail, and nearly anything he’s come across that is listed on Wikipedia. This was most notable on walks.

The behaviour could be observed from two vantage points. My own. And my wife’s.

Whereas for me walking him was a dream beyond him getting him accustomed to the odd passing vehicle, for my wife he was a nightmare. For me he walked loose-on-lead and obeyed the rudimentary commands he so far knew; for my wife, he would detest, cower, avoid, piss himself, and inevitably flop on the ground once he was outside the fence, defiant to continue.

This went back-and-forth for a couple days. Juggling the different behaviours around the two of us, especially when it came to those behaviours manifesting on the inside of the fence and on the outside of the fence.

I think a younger, more ostensible me would have come to a pretty quick conclusion. He hasn’t found his place in the social order. He thinks he’s the leader, or at least above my wife in the pecking order. He won’t follow my wifes instructions, because he thinks he’s above her. So he won’t walk. Why, though, is he doing so even if she’s doing the majority of the obedience training?

It didn’t make sense. I didn’t really have any problems with nipping, walking, or otherwise housetraining him, and as such didn’t much need to do anything but correct his behaviour around our little one. But running that through my head on the long peaceful walks I was having I came up with something a tad obtuse.

Koa indeed hadn’t found his place in the social order. In his head it went me, him, wife, child. Of course, this didn’t work for us, but for him this worked pretty good on the inside of the fence… maybe. Inside the fence knew to give me what I needed regardless of my demeanour and equally he knew to push the boundaries a bit more with them regardless of their demeanour.

But on the outside of the fence, it got pretty confusing for all of us. When he got out there with me, he knew he had someone in charge. Me. There were no expectations of him. Just follow along. “This dude Jesse, he seems to have it covered. He’s not afriad of the cars, the dogs, the shadows. If I’ve learned anything from inside, this dude has it. I can just walk. Peace.” But when he got out there with my wife, boy he sure felt conflicted now didn’t he? He became acutely aware that the world is big, and scary, and loud, and filled with cars, and dogs, and shadows, and he was supposed to be the leader. He was supposed to take this on. He was supposed to be in charge. Right?

Wrong.

The perception of himself did not match the reality of himself. He was and remains in his puppihood grossly incompetent to navigate any reality either alone and especially at the head of a pack. He lacks the smarts, the agility, the basic knowledge of basically everything, and especially the confidence to do anything of consequence either for himself or for others. Any honest person could see that day in and day out.

An overinflated sense of self.

This is simple, midbrain stuff with a simple, executive function fix. The small behavioural things we neglected for Insta pictures and cutesies were really a disservice. To him. To me. To my wife. To my daughter. To his walks. To his development. To his progress of becoming a fully developed companion. And mostly to us having a fully functioning new family unit.

We got over the puppy love, stopped letting him sleep on the bed (mostly), got him properly acquainted with his crate, and the like, worked with him on furniture, being let out, and eating properly. Very — minor — things.

The temprature of the entire household came down. Walks became easier for everyone. Nipping and biting is no longer a fear. Obedience training and house training became a dream. Most importantly, Koa felt far, far more comfortable knowing that someone bigger and wiser and competent and not out of their depth was in charge of him and his walks, no matter who that someone was. His overt displays of anxiety and fear dissolved inside the fence and outside the fence. In this dog now I see confidence and strength and moulding into a healthy assuredness that will make him emotionally sound and rightfully vigilant in the matters of our home.

Now, this isn’t a story about a fucking dog. If you unzip this quaint tale with cute puppy pictures with a modicum of insight, you see how every person (and dog) plays a part and acts accordingly around only a single emotion: fear. Read this whole thing again and it’s all fear. Fear. Fear. Fear. Fear. Fear. Fear.

Fear, and how when driven by it, and without proper boundaries, shit can get out of hand tout de suite.

In 2020 there are no shortages on Koas on the safe side of the fence. Scared, unsure, biting. They think they’re the boss. They would “totally be a boss” given the opportunity. But the reality is they’re not. Most of us aren’t. Most of us are scared. Most of us need guidance. We need help. Some of us are scared of a few things. Some of us are scared of many things. And some of us are scared of nearly everything you might find in Wikipedia. Scared of change. Scared of new ideas. Scared of cars, and dogs, and foreign places you can’t find on a map, and different looking folks that did made up stuff. Scared of almost everything. Just plainly terrified. Like puppies. You can see it in them. In their incoherent ramblings. Their false bravado. Their nipping at the ones closest to them. Their big talk. Their no action. Their cowering when faced with the walk.

So, which dog do you want on the outside of the fence with you? The one that pisses themselves with fear, or the one that walks with you nicely and hopefully may even lead when you’re not around? That’s it. The whole thing.

Now, you might be thinking “Maybe I’m reading too much into this…” I’ll stop you there. You’re probably thinking the exact right amount into this. That’s why it’s brief. And it’s callous. “Are you suggesting that people and/or leaders are all dogs to be trained?” Well, not so much. We all have a part in what happens inside and outside the fence.

What we learned quite quickly was that proper structure for all parties concerned, us and him, brought everyone’s fear and anxieties down. This wasn’t really about training a dog, as much as it was about training ourselves. To make the good, sometimes tough decisions, to understand our own fears and anxieties, to be individually responsible, and to have solid expectations for our new family member and what it would bring to our home. And because of that, he’s great now. We’re great now.

The flip side to this is that we could have carried on the way we were going. Driven by fear. Blind to circumstance. Unwilling to change. And what would we have had then? Cleaning dog shit off my own front yard for the next so many years because your dog was too afraid to leave the fence.

P.S.

Caesar Milan should be a politico.

How To Learn Anything You Want Fast

The Dogs Koa

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