From the Styx by Peggy Tibbetts

This is Part 2 in the Crazy Bitch series about our Akbash/Lab mix Venus. She has Canine Compulsive Disorder (CCD) with aggression.

Part 1: Tale of Two Dogs

To further illustrate how rapidly Venus changed, in mid-August (2008), I stood by the pond at Dogland and talked for a half hour with Karen J, Jody, and Kim. Between the 4 of us we had 6 dogs, including my own Zeus and Venus. All the dogs were off leash. The 4 of us weren’t paying any attention to them because they were all getting along together and playing, including Venus. Yet within 2 months, Venus had forgotten how to play and was attacking other dogs at the park. She was losing control right in front of our eyes.

The Dog Bomb

During lunch on November 3, I noticed that Venus was chewing on her leg. I examined the spot she was chewing. It looked red and irritated so I put some calendula ointment on it. I wondered if she had snagged a branch or something at Dogland earlier and scratched it.

After supper Tod headed out the door to go to a meeting. Our kitchen and living room are on the second floor of our home. The front door is at the bottom of the stairway, on the first floor. Zeus was standing at the top of the stairs. About 2 minutes after Tod left, Venus walked up to Zeus, sniffed his neck and attacked him. I grabbed a bowl of water and threw it on her head. Zeus made one quick evasive move, but Venus struck again and pinned him against the wall.

Then Lucy, our 17-year old senile Himalayan cat, appeared. Clueless, she wandered through the melee. Venus just ignored her. But I scooped her up and set her on the couch. Lucy’s new nickname became Mrs. Magoo.

After I refilled the water bowl, I straddled Venus’s hind quarters and nudged her with my legs, then dumped the water on her head. Zeus slid out from underneath her. I grabbed her collar, but she snapped at me and got away. She lunged at Zeus and pushed him down the stairway.

Alone, with 200 lbs of snarling dog bomb tumbling down the stairs, I panicked and started screaming. Of course I instantly realized that no one was going to help me.

I ran to the kitchen and filled a bigger bowl (with a handle that time) with water. Zeus howled and Venus snarled at the bottom of the stairs. I had no clue whether they had been injured in the fall. I only knew that Venus was still attacking Zeus and had probably pinned him down again.

I took a few deep breaths to calm myself and glanced across the kitchen counter at the knives. What if the third bowl of water didn’t work? Would I have to kill her?

I had the scene at the bottom of the stairs about right. Venus had Zeus pinned on the floor. I straddled her again, grabbed her collar and pulled up as I dumped 2 quarts of water on her head. She gasped and let go of Zeus.

“Run, Zeus! Run!” I screamed.

He scrambled to his feet and stumbled into my office. I held Venus with 2 hands and both legs, as she snapped and snarled. Slowly I moved her toward the door to the garage, 90 lbs of sheer madness fighting me every inch of the way.

“Calm down. Calm down …” I repeated like a mantra.

I needed one hand to open the door so I had to wait until she stopped snapping at me. She took a breath. Then I grabbed the door knob, opened the door and used my whole body to shove her into the garage.

I shut the door and leaned against it, exhausted. Then I saw it. Blood. Everywhere. Mixed with water of course.

Panicked again I ran into my office and knelt down to see how badly Zeus was injured. He was sitting against the door, shaking. When I touched his neck to remove his collar he snapped at me.

I totally lost it. I fell back on the carpet and wept. Venus was turning my gentle giant into a monster. My dogs were a mess. Eventually Zeus lay down next to me and shoved his nose in my neck. I removed his collar and checked his wound. It wasn’t horribly bloody, just really raw. I treated it with colloidal silver. He stopped shaking.

“What’re we gonna do about Venus?” I asked him.

He just groaned.

So where did all that blood come from? Venus?

I took a deep breath and headed out to the front porch. We have a dog door into the yard from our garage, so I knew exactly where she was. I opened the front gate and sat down on the chair. Venus’s glassy eyes seemed unable to focus as she bounced up and down whimpering. Not a whiny whimper. More like a crazed yelping whimper. She had blood smeared on the right side of her head. I went back inside to get some baby wipes. (Helpful hint: Baby wipes work great for getting blood, dirt, even cow poop, off white dog fur.)

I cleaned off the blood but I could only find one small scratch on her nose. I observed her for a little while. She was anxious as hell – still bouncing around nervously, panting and whimpering. I thought maybe I could calm her down if I just sat there silently. I thought about how bizarre it was that while she was viciously attacking Zeus, she didn’t touch Lucy. I thought about how different she was than the Venus who played in the park with the other dogs in August. Nothing made any sense.

I was soon distracted by the fact that my right foot felt wet. I was wearing flip-flops. I looked down and there was blood all over my foot. Uh-oh. My leg was bleeding.

I retreated inside to the bathroom and cleaned myself up. I had two bites on my right leg and a red paw print and toenail hole on my left ankle. The paw print matched Zeus’s back foot exactly. The teeth marks matched Venus. None of the wounds were serious.

It’s important to pause here for an explanation. When I say the bite wounds were not serious, that doesn’t mean I don’t take aggression seriously. It just means what it says, the wounds were not serious. Venus’s aggression was and is totally unacceptable. However when any human or dog has been bitten by her, the wounds have not been serious. That is a significant aspect to her breakdown. In other words Venus wasn’t out to kill me or Zeus or anybody. I don’t believe she knew what she was doing. She lost her mind. She went postal. She turned into a dog bomb.

Many experts will say you should never break up a dog fight. But I don’t know how else you stop them. I’ve had dogs all my life. I know what I’m doing when I step in. It’s always best if two people step in. One for each dog. And of course, I prefer not to step in alone. I didn’t have any choice. What saved me was that Zeus didn’t fight back. Water helps. If you have access to a hose and/or a broom, that’s even better. If you have to step in, stand over the dog, straddling the hind quarters with your legs if you can. Grab hold of the dog’s harness or collar and pull up as you dump water, just as I described. Keep your hands away from the dog’s mouth or you will get bit. There is a way to release a clamped jaw by sticking your hand in the side of the jaw toward the throat, but I don’t recommend that with the big dogs. Above all it’s important to move quickly with authority.

After a fight, never give affection to the dogs. That’s like rewarding bad behavior. Aggression can’t be cured with love. I didn’t even give Zeus affection after the attack. I simply cleaned up both dogs, observed them and then cleaned up the mess they made in the house.

Needless to say we kept the dogs separated that night after the attack. Neither Tod or I slept very well. We had shut Venus in the garage so naturally she yelped and barked when she wasn’t sleeping. Images of the attack haunted me. And the question. The one I didn’t have an answer for.

What’re we gonna do about Venus?

Stay tuned for Part 3

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