Dogs Archives - Bodyrecomposition

Rehabbing an Injury

lylemcd — Wed, 15 Jun 2016 14:47:44 +0000

After last week got away from me talking about the neural factors in strength performance, I hope to keep it a little bit more brief today. And what I want to talk about is how I specifically worked to rehab an injury in one of my few trainees.

The Injury

The long and the short of it is that during a workout, they got all twisted up during a ball game and their limp on the left side indicated that something was injured. A quick trip to the doctor along with some X-rays determined that, thankfully, it wasn’t an ACL tear. Rather, the hip joint was injured and no surgery was indicated.

It didn’t appear to be too severe but I was told to bring them back if it wasn’t improving after a number of weeks. Painkillers were provided to be used as necessary and the trainee used them fairly continuously for the first two weeks simply to facilitate overall daily activity without pain.… Keep Reading

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Volunteering at the Austin Humane Shelter: Part 10

lylemcd — Mon, 26 Nov 2012 03:59:57 +0000

Ok, time to finish up. In Volunteering at the Austin Humane Shelter: Part 9, I talked more specifically about what I was doing (or not) during the craziness of last year, primarily focusing on the role NORMAN was playing at home (short version: driving me crazy) as well as being selected to move up to Yellow level. Which was good in that it gave me the tools to work with NORMAN (and ALFIE) at home. And bad in that I now had a lot of yellow dogs at the shelter to contend with too (and this was during the time of 2011 when we had a LOT of yellow level dogs).

I would note that I often joked with other volunteers that I often came to the shelter to get a break from my two crazy dogs at home. Because although there were lots of them and a lot of yellow dogs specifically at the shelter, there was the advantage that, after I worked with them, I could put them back. … Keep Reading

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Volunteering at the Austin Humane Shelter: Part 9

lylemcd — Wed, 16 May 2012 12:12:39 +0000

So having talked fairly generally about what was going on at the Austin Humane Shelter during 2012 (with some comments about my involvement) in Volunteering at the Austin Humane Shelter Part 6, Part 7 and Part 8, I want to switch gears into self-indulgent prattling mode and talk about how it was (or wasn’t) affecting me personally. Some of this will detail my time at the shelter, some of it will tie in with stuff about my own dogs ALFIE and NORMAN, who I have written about in their own article series.

Don’t be surprised if this is a little bit all over the map as I’m jumping back and forth across topics. I wasn’t able to find any good flow for this part of the story. Also my system ate what I had initially written so I had to start from scratch (because computers are evil).

Back to Me

As I mentioned in Part 6, I had moved up to full blue BRATT in 2011 and never lacked for anything to do.… Keep Reading

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Volunteering at the Austin Humane Shelter: Part 8

lylemcd — Mon, 14 May 2012 12:37:56 +0000

So in Volunteering at the Austin Humane Shelter: Part 6 and Volunteering at the Austin Humane Shelter Part: 7, I described the insanity that made up merely the first half (or so) of 2011 there. That included the Bastrop Hoarding Experience along with a very special dog that had to be put down, along with the loss of our air conditioning in the middle of a brutal Austin summer. And while those three events might have been enough to deal with, it was only the beginning. We still had four months left in the year and things weren’t over yet. Today I’ll finish describing the rest of the year.

September: Bastrop Burns

Yup, Bastrop again. Because between the drought and the heat and everything else, Austin can become a tinderbox and shit sometimes burst into flames. And there was a really horrible fire out in Bastrop. Like weeks of land burning and people losing their houses kinds of fires.… Keep Reading

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Volunteering at the Austin Humane Shelter: Part 7

lylemcd — Fri, 11 May 2012 13:30:49 +0000

So last time in Volunteeering at the Austin Humane Shelter: Part 6, I talked about my move up to blue BRATT and the start of the year’s craziness which was that Bastrop Hoarding Event. And while that one event would have been enough to exhaust anyone, it was just the start of the absolute craziness that was 2011. We continue with the next big shelter drama, a rare occurrence but one that caused a lot of problems.

Early August: A Dog Gets Put Down

I mentioned in the original series that the Austin Humane Shelter is a no-kill shelter. That is, the shelter doesn’t put down dogs as a matter of course. In reality this means that dog euthanasia is kept to 10% or less; it’s also only done on a dog by dog basis. It’s never done for time (i.e. if a dog is at the shelter for too long) and it’s never done based on breed.… Keep Reading

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Volunteering at the Austin Humane Shelter: Part 6

lylemcd — Tue, 08 May 2012 13:04:38 +0000

So since it’s now been forever since I did an update, and since I apparently still can’t think of anything to write about diet, training, etc. I figured I’d do an update on my time at the Austin Humane Shelter. I’ve now been there a full year and a half (I started in November of 2010 as I was crawling out of my depression, as I detailed in Volunteering at the Austin Humane Shelter series) and quite a bit has happened since then.

I’ll be mainly focusing on 2011 since, frankly, last year was crazy almost from start to finish. Actually, it wasn’t crazy, it was pretty much a disaster. Things started off quietly enough, the first couple of months were just normal times at the shelter. I was deep into my winter training grind and volunteering regularly. We pick up in Februrary, 2011.

Working Blue

By the time I had been at the shelter for four months, I have moved from a newbie Green BRATT through Blue Dot and then had taken a special full blue BRATT class (that was put together for 5 of us who had forgotten to get into the main class). … Keep Reading

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My Dog Norman Part 4

lylemcd — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 16:39:13 +0000

So finishing up (for now) from NORMAN! Part 3, I’m going to talk today about some of the issues I’ve dealt with (or am still dealing with) in terms of training not only NORMAN but also in working with the two of them. As I mentioned on Tuesday, dealing with a two dog household was pretty much more than a doubling of effort in terms of training because I had to deal not only with them individually but in terms of their various interactions.

Unfortunately, most of what I had learned at the shelter had left me unprepared for this since we don’t do a lot of dog interaction stuff outside of very controlled playgroups (and I’m only now qualified to be involved in those). So basically I was making it up as I went along, asking friends with dog experience, and doing a whole lot of Googling. Many of the higher level BRATTs at the Austin Humane Shelter also have multiple dog households so I picked their brains constantly as well.… Keep Reading

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My Dog Norman Part 3

lylemcd — Tue, 01 Nov 2011 17:54:32 +0000

In NORMAN! Part 2, I had gotten approval to foster NORMAN after the dog introduction (which had started a bit rough but then settled down sufficiently). I had gotten a crate and the other necessary stuff and it was time to take him home. He was acting a little bit stressed in his crate but that’s fairly normal. The one thing I should have done in hindsight was kenneled ALFIE! so that I could let NORMAN! run around the house and sniff a bit first before they interacted. Maybe I’ll get it right for dog number three.

The Second First Impression

When we do dog introductions at the Austin Humane Shelter, it’s effectively neutral ground (I’m not sure that any of the shelter dogs really see the shelter as their ‘territory’). But it was different bringing NORMAN home to the house since this was ALFIE’s territory and he’d been an only dog going on a solid 8 months (and we’d been in the house since January).… Keep Reading

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My Dog Norman Part 2

lylemcd — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 15:04:19 +0000

So in NORMAN! Part 1 I wrote up an introduction that you can probably guess the punchline to but I’m still walking you through this the long way. In short, by sheer accident I had been in the clinic when we got a new puppy named NORMAN! with a messed up back leg. We all sort of fell in love with him and I was the first to walk him. I had been considering getting ALFIE! a playmate as it was and NORMAN! seemed like a good choice.

At this point, NORMAN! had been put on kennel rest. He was limited to the runs, no walking in the field, and basically would get 4 weeks of this until his leg healed and he got the follow-up X-rays to see if he’d need surgery or not. That meant he was limited to his cage, going out to potty and whatever time/energy volunteers could give him beyond that. … Keep Reading

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My Dog Norman

lylemcd — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 16:57:11 +0000

So I’ve been sort of sitting on something for about the, oh, last 10 weeks or so. Something that I had sort of wanted to write about but got distracted by the absurdity that was Why the US Sucks at Olympic Lifting and then I needed a break to just run short, non-serial types of articles.

But since we’re entering the holidays and nobody cares about diet or training advice anyhow (anybody but me notice that the Halloween candy was out 6 weeks ago and Christmas stuff is already out?) it’s time to run this. Yes, you can probably guess what this is about by the title and topic but, well…I’ll just get to it.

Spending Time at the Shelter

As most sort of know, I’m generally of an obsessive mindset and it’s pretty clear that, due to the impact that Volunteering at the Austin Humane Shelter had on my life, I’m currently applying that obsession to my volunteering there. … Keep Reading

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