Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Oh Bono....

So, lately we've noticed Bono (our dog) has been acting strange.  It started about a year ago when he would bark at men in public, almost acting like he was afraid of them.  At first since it always happened when he was with me, and I thought he was just trying to protect me.  Then it started happening when Kevin had him out too.   We really didn't think too much of it.  Then, this summer we started noticing that certain things would make him nervous...people on skateboards and rollerblades, trucks, thunder, leaves floating across the yard...basically everything! 

A few weeks before we went to Disney World,we were at home on a Saturday afternoon.  I was upstairs when all of a sudden I heard barking and tons of racket downstairs.  I went down to see what was going on, and Kevin told me he was outside on the porch talking to one of the neighbor kids, when our neighbor's dog came up on our porch.  Bono DID NOT like this at all, and proceeded to go through the screen in one of our front windows.  Luckily Kevin was there and stopped anything from getting out of hand.  We just wrote it off to the fact that he was not happy about another dog being on his territory while he was inside.

When we were on vacation to Disney World and St. Pete, we sent the dogs to "camp".  They go to this great place in Delaware called My-T-Fine Kennels.  Bono and Mullen share a run, and they also get 2 hours of 'playtime' each day in a fenced off area.  When we picked them up, Sue the owner, told us that Bono acted antisocial a few times during playtime, but would eventually warm up and play with the other dogs.

Here's Bono and Mullen together at camp:


Here's Bono looking tentative about approaching this other dog:


Well, basically everything came to a head a few weeks ago we tried to take Bono and Mullen for a walk around the neighborhood.  We hit the end of the driveway and Bono would not go any further.  He was pulling back so hard he almost pulled right out of his collar.  Kevin thought that he would try to carry him a few steps just to show him everything was ok, and that didn't work either.  He was terrified to go for a walk.  This finally prompted us to call our trainer that we went to when both dogs were puppies.  We've gone to two sessions with her, and she's as confused as we are.  She says that she's never seen a dog act quite like this before.  Finally she suggested that it may be best to put him on Prozac temporarily to even him out!  A dog on PROZAC?!?!  Oh Bono, you never cease to amaze me....

Who me??????



On a sad note, my boss Michelle's husband passed away on Monday after a long battle with cancer.  Our thoughts and prayers go out to her and her family....

1 comment:

ethelmaepotter! said...

If the Prozac doesn't work, you might consider taking him to New York City - I hear they have personal doggie psychoanalysts there.