dogs that poop in the house | Grass Oil by Molly Field

Dear Diary,

It’s me, Charlie, the puppy here at the human’s house. Today, the lady gave me a bath. She was all alone or there would be humiliating photos of me with suds on my face and me sitting in the kitchen sink (i peed in it just to get back at her) looking like a wet rat.

Instead, she waited until the towel she put on me could hold no more water and took me outside for a picture. Here I am looking like an electrocuted wet rat:

She gave me the bath because I experienced the misfortune of placing my head under Murphy’s penis while he watered a plant this morning on our walk. It was my fault, I own it completely, but I did not like the bath. I did not think I smelled that bad. When the lady gave me a bath, I made sure that her shirt got very wet and that she got very cold because she ignored my dagger fangs on her wrist and my calls to any nearby wolves to release me. Serves her right. The lady kept on giving me treats while she scrubbed me; she thinks that will eventually make me like baths.

She is stupid.

Murphy said to just go along with it because the suds, the treats and the massaging are excellent.

This is Murphy, he is very cool:

He plays guitar with his tail.

When I run around this house and I try to steer, my feet slide on the floor and I slam into things at full speed. My fluffy hairs do not provide traction. The humans make sounds like they are having trouble breathing whenever this happens.

About four weeks ago, I was rescued from a hole in the ground in South Carolina. The lady and the man who have brought me here to run their home said that they did not plan on bringing me here at all but that the man saw a picture of me where I fell asleep in my food and he had to have me.

I do not know why this picture is what did it. I think I look like an idiot. I am embarrassed by this image; I have no self control.

I like this one better where I’m super cute. I was faking sleeping:

But “people are stupid; there’s no accounting for taste,” says Murphy. He is cool, so I believe him. He lets me knit with his tail hair. I know he likes it because he moans when I do it.

Since coming here, I have taught these humans how to do chores properly. No one understood the point of a dishwasher. I do.

It took many days for Murphy to warm up to me being his boss. He tries to act all big and 83 pounds, but we know that’s just a phase. The lady was so sad when he succumbed to my authority, she spoke into a small plastic box and shouted into it, “They’re getting along! They’re playing!” I do not think she understood what was going on. I was not playing. I was having a private meeting with Murphy expressing my domination; I have determined that hypnosis is best. Look into my eyes… You will do what I want…

I feel this photo is like one of those sensitive moments captured by White House photographers when JFK was in the middle of the Bay of Pigs crisis. Why did he not like the idea of a bay of pigs? Mud and bacon. What is not to like?

The lady tells Murphy not to drink from the white bowl in the small room. She growls in a stupid way, it sounds nothing like a dog. Murphy laughs at her and does it anyway. Here he is teaching me how it’s done. I can not reach the bowl. One day I will. She says, “Charlie, do not pick up that habit.”

Instead, I picked up this habit while I wait to get tall:

Here is Murphy pretending he is the boss:

On second thought, he looks very scary there. I will remember this picture. He does not like it when I try to eat his food when he is eating it. The lady feeds me last. That is mean. She says something like, “You are not alpha. I am alpha. Murphy is above you. You are Mu or Sigma….” Mu. That is stupid. But I try anyway.

It snowed here a couple weeks ago. I had a great time sitting on Murphy in it.

I am doing well. My mom, brother and sisters are living nearby. When the weather warms up, we will get together and have fun, the lady says. I have put on almost eight pounds since living here. Every time I wake up from a nap, a boy here says I have gotten bigger.

This is me, about to take a nap, so I can grow:

I have gotten the lady to do tricks; every time I sit down, I get her to use a clicker and then she gives me a treat and pats me on the face. She also does this when I decide to lie down and I have just started to go after things and then leave them alone and I get her to give me a treat. She also gives me one for taking a nap in my box. She is stupid.

I got a treat for this:

She keeps saying, “STAY. STAY… STAAAAAY.” I do nothing, and then I get her to give me a treat. Humans. They are so easily trained.

I like to think of this place as my toilet. The lady does not like that, so she has started to feed me off the floor.

Now I do not want to pee there so much anymore. But sometimes I forget. So now, she “wears” me by attaching herself to me wherever we go. It is funny, I never thought she would want to go where I get her to go.

I am glad I do not live in a hole in South Carolina.

Thank you.

When we have a dog, we usually endeavor to train the dog to sit or stay and reward the dog for the obedience. After repetition and praise, we all are successful. (Don’t bother with cats. You are their staff.)

When we call the dog and the dog comes, we reward the dog with a treat or a loving, non-aggressive response, and the dog feels safe and sometimes this safety is enough to feel rewarded. After repetition and praise, we are all successful.

When we do this with a horse, the horse gets a carrot or treated kindly with love. Request, praise, repeat.

When we do this with a dolphin, the dolphin gets a mackerel. Request, praise, repeat.

This is called conditioning. This is called training. This is also known as positive reinforcement.

What about when we have a dog that does something we don’t like? Say your dog poops in the house. When we discover this, usually a while after the poop deposit, many people will chastise the dog, shove the dog’s nose in the poop and think they’ve trained the dog to not poop in the house.

Not so fast. They’ve trained the dog to stay the hell away of the person who just called the dog.

When we do this with our children: when we discover they made a mess hours or several moments after it happened and we call them and scream at them for messing up, we are conditioning them to fear us when we call them. If we do this enough, those kids will be afraid to move and will think everything is their fault. And when they get their chance: they’re vapor.

When we tell the child that their grades are unacceptable and that they are lazy, they learn that only negative behavior gets a response. So they keep that up.

“Leave me alone!”

When we freak out and get upset that a child or a dog or a horse or a dolphin doesn’t stay out of our things, or doesn’t mind their own business when we are on the phone or when they take something that doesn’t belong to them, we are training that child or mammal to not only respect our @)(*%@ privacy, we are training that child or mammal to stay away. The mammal learns fast. The mammal learns that even the remotest bit of toe-dipping into our pool of existence becomes one of trepidation.

We are turning our intrepid, innocent, loving, wide-eyed and imaginative children, or mammals into reactive, fearful, apprehensive and unsure beings. We want our privacy, our things, our stuff respected, our “zones” of existence to be so separate and different than theirs. We get so much privacy that they never want to come back for fear of a negative response.

Children and dolphins and dogs and horses aren’t born afraid. We teach them this.

We beat them down emotionally or otherwise to a point that we get so much privacy that they condition themselves to just stay away. Mission accomplished, right?

~ ~ ~

If you are an adult child of a parent who wanted, craved and demanded privacy or who abdicated their parental obligations to a nanny or other surrogate and today you have a rocky relationship with that or those parents, don’t despair. You were trained to give space. You were trained to defer. You were trained to not get involved. You were trained to stay out. Could your reactions now as an adult be that you are riddled with guilt and sadness for how things could have been if only you’d been a better kid to be invited? I will recommend that you let it go. Don’t sweat it, move on. But that’s tough too. But if you give yourself the gift of remembering that you weren’t born to fear or resent or to feel guilt, you will remember that you were conditioned. We are not formed in a vacuum.

But if you are an adult who craves your privacy and your “me” time and all the rest so you can be your creative best self, be careful of what you wish for. You want privacy? You want your things left alone? If you train enough, you just might get it and you’ll be left alone. Now no one will disturb you. Ever. So when you’re 85 in a rocking chair wondering why no one comes to see you, remember this post. You created this dynamic. And again, if you’re the kid of a parent like that: you were trained.

The good news: this can be reversed at any age. But we all have to be willing to allow it. Pride screws everything up. Get out of your own way.

thank you.