This story is being used with the permission of the author, Donna D'Amico, and cannot be reprinted without her permission. Thank you Donna, for allowing me to use Midnite's story here. After my article on separation anxiety last week, I felt it was important to really give you, the reader, a personal experience. Please learn from Donna and Midnite's experiences.
"As I look back, the signs were there. Those sad brown eyes that touched my heart the first time that I saw them. Those soulful eyes that came to mirror the depth of his disappear. The panic he displayed when we adopted his littermate, Toby, and left him behind. But fate stepped in and his proposed adoption fell through and we brought him home after all, a week later. And slowly but surely the trouble began.
There is a folder in my file cabinet that reads "Anxiety." In the folder are a number of articles: "The Dog That Cannot Be Left Alone," "Separation Anxiety in Dogs," "Diagnostic Criteria For Separation Anxiety in the Dog," "Dealing with Separation Anxiety," "Teaching Your Dog to Be Left Alone," "Stressful Solitude" and "Departure Training," just to name a few. Over the last two years those articles have been read again and again along with what would ultimately become my "bible": The Dog Who Loved Too Much by Dr. Nicholas Dodman.
But for all that, there were times when I was afraid we wouldn't make it. Times when I was almost overcome by despair and doubt. I believe in a lifetime commitment to a dog, but was this really the right home for Midnite? Was I being fair to Midnite, or only trying to save myself the sorrow of letting him go? The adoption agency said they would take him back, but that it might be extremely difficult to place him elsewhere. I didn't want to give him back, was determined not to give up, but was it really the best thing for the dog?
At first Midnite exhibited typical adaptation anxiety. He wanted to be with us all the time and would follow us from room to room, whimpering anxiously at the door if we should leave. Under the stress of his new living arrangements he might pace the floor and was sometimes reluctant to enter the crate. But he quickly housetrained and caught on easily to all the new rules. With his littermate for company he was never alone and soon seemed to adjust well.
It was after Midnite was with us for some time that problems began to develop. (I'm convinced it
