Poor Liesl. She has been terrorized the past few nights by fireworks in our town. Fireworks are legal here, much to my chagrin. However, this only applies to "Safe and Sane" fireworks. Unfortunately, despite posted warnings by our city, quite a number of people have had, what we suspect, were illegal, professional fireworks, like the kind you fire into the sky. This happened all over our town and included a couple of people on our street. We were sort of used to the huge bangs that rattled the windows and lit up the sky going intermittently until midnight since Thursday. Liesl has been a nervous wreck and has not eaten for the past couple of days from the stress, despite our trying to provide comfort. Last night was terrible though. The fireworks were relentless, and poor Liesl was terrified. It sounded like we were under siege.
I have shared in the past, that Liesl is not a cuddly, sit in your lap kind of dog. She loves to be kissed, hugged and petted, but she is not a cuddler. Last night she was snuggled between us on the sofa, panting in terror. Exhausted, we decided to turn in for the night, but she made sure she was touching both of us burrowed in between us. I stayed awake petting her and trying to comfort her. But she just shook really hard and panted. I think the fireworks continued until after midnight.
Bill and I both got up early to coax her outside to got potty this morning. She was so scared to be outside and kept trying to run back into the house. This is totally not her nature. Usually, she takes her job guarding us and her house seriously and is pretty fearless. It has been so sad to see her with her little head hung with fear in her eyes. It took her so long to go potty this morning. We decided to just work on the yard today to make her comfortable in her queendom again. She finally trotted around, let me give her a bath and a beard trim and is now napping off her busy day. She is still a little jumpy but is overall back to herself, thank goodness. I was happy to see her finally eat her breakfast with her usual gusto.
Despite the noise and trauma, it has been a lovely weekend. We went to a lovely barbecue yesterday and we even got to Skype with Bill's beautiful little bitty granddaughter last night. We got some much needed work done on the yard today. We got so much done. I even got my Adirondack chairs repainted. The weather has been lovely. Not too hot, not too cold. We have had a nice time, just hanging out together.
So we are extra grateful for peace and quiet today. We are grateful that we got to do some much needed work on the yard today and it looks beautiful. Most of all, we are grateful for our little family and that our little furgirl is feeling brave again!
4 comments:
You might try a thundershirt next year for her. It might help.
Stella too. On Monday she walked down five houses, pooped (she never does it on our block, but she's so traumatized she did!), and dragged me back home. I think she associates walking in the evenings with me with the fireworks because last night's walk was similarly short. She is avoiding every street where she was when she heard anything at all like a firework. (We walk her at dusk because of the heat, but the kids start with firecrackers as soon as they can.) Would it be too much to ban all non-municipal displays of fireworks?? Because PA has legal fireworks, we'll be traumatized nearly all summer. :(
I have heard that Thundershirts are a total miracle. Liesl hates wearing anything, but I think I may have to try this next year!
I am so sorry Stella was upset, too. It is so heartbreaking to see them look so scared.
Unfortunately, a tragedy will probably occur before anything is done to stop these fireworks. Like for you and Stella, I think it will be a long, noisy summer. Friday night around 11 pm, I took Liesl out for the last time of the evening. Just as she ventured into the doorway to step outside, a huge bang started from down the block. She ran right back into the house. I was so angry for her. I had to go get her and carry her outside and stand next to her so she would go potty. Her yard is her paradise and it makes me angry to see her scared to go into it.
I was pottering around blogs and found this blog post and decided that even though it is pretty weird to suggest using something in a first comment I would do so anyway as I hope I can help and do hope that you will not see this as spam.
Fireworks are horrid for pets! When I still had a dog I gave her Bachs Rescue Remedy to help calm her down, it doesn't stop the responses completely but does help reduce the stress levels and for dogs that's a big plus in itself.
I'm not affiliated etc. but I have been using it for a long time to help with my stress, pets stress and the kids stress (exams, Christmas etc.)
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