Engagement Photos

A little while ago, we had our engagement photos taken by Ashley at Grey Sparrow Photography. I wanted to wait a while to share them, because they were used on our Save the Dates (and speaking of which, if you find yourself needing anything of that sort, I absolutely cannot recommend Pear Tree Greetings highly enough) and we wanted them to arrive as a surprise in the mailboxes of our families. Ashley was awesome enough to let me play with the unedited proofs that weren't included in her edits when she gave us the discs with my own editing software, as long as it is noted when shared online who edited what, so that will be noted after each photo. Without further ado:

Editing is mine.

There's a little prologue to the next few photos. Our city has three or four major emergency veterinary clinics. When I was very first working in veterinary medicine, I worked in one of them for about two years and then moved across town. I relocated to a general practice for two years and then left (on very good terms) for a variety of reasons to my third and last clinic, another general practice that directed emergencies that were beyond its scope to the first clinic that I'd worked at, the major emergency clinic.

I had kind of a schoolgirl crush on a male tech over at that clinic. I'd never met the guy, but he had this extremely deep, rumbly voice. I had to call that clinic a lot to follow up on our regular clients that we'd sent over there as emergencies who may prefer to stick with us for follow up care (suture removals, bandage changes, that kind of thing). I didn't get that guy a lot, he wasn't a receptionist, but now and then he'd answer and I'd find myself rather sketchily trying to keep him on the phone longer than necessary. "Oh, could you tell me when that dog's drain removal is recommended?" when I had the faxed report right there in my hand, just to listen to him talk. He obviously considered himself inconvenienced and hassled, but veterinary medicine is a brutal field. Between intense hours, intense physical demands, intense burn-out rates, the notion of a lunch break is a joke, and far too many situations that are heartbreaking, infuriating, or both, and I'll just be real here: this guy had a hell of a sexy voice. A tech's pleasures are relatively few. That went on for months, just on and off, I'd catch him on the phone every month or so and make excuses to keep him there, never think about it again until the next time he answered the phone.

I left that clinic, ultimately, and veterinary medicine as a whole. I had compassion burn-out, I wanted to be able to pay my rent without barely scraping by, I was exhausted by the field that I loved and needed to re-evaluate. I was single, in a decent apartment, about two months out of veterinary medicine, assessing my career plans, just generally reconsidering my entire life, when I was set up on a blind date with some guy who'd also very recently left veterinary medicine. I'd never been on a blind date before, but we'd exchanged several e-mails and this guy was ridiculously intelligent, well-spoken, funny, and charming, so I agreed to meet at Starbucks. We figured out where we lived in relation to one another (three miles apart) by what clinic we lived nearest. "I'm up by Acme Emergency Clinic, where are you?" "Oh, I know right where that is. Are you close to McClinic on McClinic Road?" "No, not quite that far down." That kind of thing. I figured if we hit it off, we could linger at Starbucks for hours, if we didn't, I could finish off my cider in short order and call it a night.

Have you figured out the obvious punchline here yet? Mr. Blind Date was Mr. Sexy Voice. It took me a minute, but lo and behold. We didn't call it a night for five or six hours. We sat at Starbucks and talked well into the night. It was the 3rd of July, and there were fireworks behind him, over his shoulder, and I kept thinking "They say when you meet the one, there are fireworks." Of course, it was the day before Independence Day, there would've been fireworks regardless, but it's true that I knew that early. Love at first sight seems silly, unrealistic, but I'd say that I knew at first sight that I would love him. I kept thinking that the fireworks had to be a sign and not hearing what he was saying, but I was having trouble hearing him anyway. In person, his voice is so deep it's hard to hear sometimes, until you get used to it.

We had a date about every two or three days for the next two and a half weeks. All very proper, gentlemanly, but we would sit out under the trees in front of my apartment for hours after a date. We'd agree on dinner and a walk around the Canal, and it just wasn't long enough. He'd drop me off and the conversation would just continue for four more hours. In his car, in the grass, on the hood of his car. After two and a half weeks, we made it exclusive, though it had been already, really.

10 months later, I was still not willing to go back to veterinary medicine no matter how desperately I missed it, and was working retail while I got my ducks in a row to start college. We were living together. I was having a terrible day at work when Eric texted me and asked if I'd like to go see Bridesmaids at a drive-in that night. Of course I did. We had a great date night, and when the movie was over - very late, after midnight - he said that he wanted to go walk the Canal. Well, I'd been up since 5am for work, I really had to pee, it was so late...but he was determined. Determined enough to drive miles out of the way to find somewhere still open that I could use the restroom, and buy me some caffeine while we were there. Alright. So we went to the Canal, and it was full of delinquent, kind of scary teenagers. I said that they were making me nervous and I wanted to leave. He was way too distraught about this for something not to be up, so we got back in the car and he said "I have a new plan!" and made me close my eyes for the drive. By now it was probably 3am. When the car stopped, he led me with my eyes still shut somewhere and let me open my eyes. We were at Starbucks - not a 24 one, so it was closed - where we first met, at the same table outside where we first met, and after a minute of very nervous hemming and hawing, he got down on one knee, pulled a box with a beautiful diamond ring out of his pocket, and said "I want to ask you to marry me."

Obviously, I said yes.

When engagement photos turned out to be part of our wedding photographer's package, we decided to go ahead with them even though we'd been engaged for a year. We went to three locations, and one of them was that same Starbucks, where we met, and where we now joke that something fateful happens every single time we go there. "Uh oh, there's Starbucks. Wonder if we'll end up buying a house if we go there this time, maybe meet a real estate agent in line. Maybe when it's time I should take a pregnancy test there."

And that, friends, is the very long story behind the next four photos.

And funnily enough, Brad Paisley's song I Thought I Loved You Then just came on Pandora. If you're familiar with the lyrics, you know why that's funny.

Editing is Ashley's.

Editing is Ashley's.

Editing is mine.

Editing is mine.

Editing is Ashley's.

Editing is mine.

Editing is mine.

Editing is mine - technically an outtake, but I loved it anyway.

Editing is Ashley's.

Editing is mine.

Editing is mine.

Editing is mine.

Editing is Ashley's, slight crop and rotate is mine.

Editing is mine.

(Gorgeous) editing is Ashley's. The wedding is 11-10-12, but we had a little bit of a mishap with the letters, so we made the best of it. I mean, it's still November 2012, right?

Amazing editing is Ashley's.

And there you have it! :) The dogs did not cooperate. Violet was aware of a budding storm that we were not (she has massive storm anxiety). It was nearly impossible to get her to have her ears up or even look, and we couldn't for anything figure out why until it started pouring rain the second after the last sunset picture was taken. Java had budding reactivity that we had yet to really accept/identify/learn to manage, and was fixated on every person or animal walking by, which is why he looks like an aggressive maniac in almost every single picture. All in all the dog situation was a complete disaster, but our engagement pictures wouldn't have been complete without them.

Piper

On Monday, we made one of the most difficult decisions we've ever had to make.

You may not know, because for the most part we've been dealing with it quietly. I've alluded to Piper's reactivity in a few blog posts, but honestly, I never wanted to taint anyone's image as her. I wanted to see her as the dog that I knew she could be, and I never wanted anyone who reads this blog to see pictures of Piper, or hear about Piper, and think of her as some vicious dog when we were working so hard on her issues.

The day we brought Piper home at 7 or 8 weeks old, she tried to attack Violet, and not in a puppy-playing kind of way. I spent 6 years in veterinary medicine and grew up in a family involved in rescue, conformation showing, and breeding, I've heard a lot of misguided clients and pet owners say that their poorly socialized, scared, or simply playful puppies were "mean," when reality was another thing entirely, misunderstood. This was similar to resource guarding, only her "resource" could be the whole entire room, and she would lunge, snarling and biting, at Violet for invading her personal space. Thankfully, we got this under control fairly quickly, but it does not bode well for a young puppy already doing that.

We were aware of her "issues," consulted a trainer, took classes, sought advice, had the usual medical screening processes done to rule out a medical issue. It was determined that she had a genetic psychological problem, weak nerves, bad reactivity - issues, which we would continue to address and work on. We put blood, sweat, and tears into this, Eric in particular, over the last year.

We realized that we could no longer take Piper places, after a while. In a basic training class at an appropriate age - 10 weeks? 12? - she was a quick learner, but we had to keep a very wide berth. Even then, she tried to attack several other puppies with no provocation. She seemed to dislike white dogs, but it was erratic. We stopped being able to take her to the dog park. If another dog got too close, ran too fast, startled her, touched her in any way, she would lose it, and hold a grudge, taking it out on other dogs that may pass her. There were several incidents at Petco, so we stopped taking her there. There were a few incidents around our own neighborhood, so we restricted the times and ways that we walked.

We thought that we had things under control. We'd learned about her issues, observed her behaviors, identified the things that pushed her over her threshold, decided to maintain her as well as we could. She was perfect with us, was now thoroughly bonded to and patient with Violet, and we'd found ways to exercise and stimulate her safely. We'd talked about rehoming, we'd talked about euthanasia, but it was clear that rehoming was not an option (she only accepted strange adults with our explicit endorsement, and her triggers and restrictions were so specific and obscure that it seemed massively irresponsible to send her to live somewhere else), and euthanasia would not be an option unless it was the only one. She briefly (a week or two) tried living with Eric's brother, who she loved and trusted and who knew her issues in depth, and she couldn't handle it at all. She rebelled massively, having accidents almost hourly in the house despite flawless potty training, vomiting on people's belongings, becoming extremely depressed. It was a no-go.

She started to show some very troubling behaviors with children. She'd charged two little girls, both around 8, but they were strangers to her and we rationalized that they'd both been behaving distressingly, and she didn't know them - she's never very good with strangers. We were very concerned by it, talked to a behaviorist, talked to a trainer, talked to a veterinarian, talked to experienced GSD people, and decided to take it one day at a time, and work our asses off with her.

At the same time, she started some troubling behaviors with us. Occasionally, we would walk into a room, shift spots on the couch, even just turn around, and she would seem to forget who we were for a moment, and charge or lunge at us, barking aggressively. At first, the triggers were not okay, but clear cut enough. If we came in from getting something out of the car, if someone put sunglasses or a hat on. Eventually, it stopped making sense and went from rarely to weekly. I turned around from the stove while cooking one day, and she charged me, even though she'd been watching me cook for half an hour without issue and nothing about my appearance or demeanor had changed. This became a frequent and unsettling thing.

Sunday night, we took her and Violet to a friend's house to watch the Super Bowl. They were friends that the dogs liked, and they had one, small dog. Piper is strangely always fine with small dogs. Unexpectedly, our friends had a friend of theirs stop by with her three year old. All was well, until Piper unexpectedly and entirely without provocation lunged to bite the girl in the face.

This was far, far, far beyond her third strike. We put her in the backyard to collect our things after apologizing to the mother and making sure that the child was okay (she was, thank god), and Piper (for the first time) cleared a 5 foot fence to come to the front door. It was all in all a very scary experience.

We got home and talked for most of the night about what to do. It was obvious that despite our best efforts, we'd been deluding ourselves in thinking that we'd made headway with her - we'd only made headway with learning how to identify and avoid her triggers. We'd been completely pretending that her episodes with lunging at us weren't an issue, and they were. Together we decided that euthanasia was the only appropriate choice.

After a very bad night, we woke up in the morning and called our regular veterinarian to make the appointment. We got a technician who said that we should make an appointment to discuss a plan for rehoming her and that "it would just suck to euthanize right away" - are you kidding me? So someone else can be attacked? So she can make herself sick with unhappiness? Right away? A year of work is right away? Attacking a child's face is not enough? Does she have to seriously hurt someone for this to be the right choice?

Feeling like a monster, I called a clinic that Eric had gone to before we met and made the appointment. I got there, and was crying fairly profusely before I'd even checked in at the counter with her. They had a lobby full of clients, and Piper was well-behaved. It would've been much easier if she hadn't been. The appointment before ours was a maybe four month old GSD puppy, and as we walked to the exam room with Piper at a perfect heel, the owner commented to his dog, "See? That's how you're supposed to act, like that dog." Before the door was closed, I absolutely broke down.

I talked to the veterinarian at some length, explaining in detail everything that had happened since the day she came home. He unequivocally assured me that this was the right decision.

It was the hardest, saddest day of my entire life. I stayed in the room with her for a very long time, before, during, and after she was sedated, crying and telling her how much we loved her and what a good girl I know she tried to be. She died peacefully at around 5:15 on Monday evening.

I don't know what it says about me that I have never grieved like this before, even for a human family member. Eric is handling it differently, he's grieving but stoic, and very out of sorts, having never not had a dog before. He'd seen this as an inevitability before I did - he's known GSDs for his entire life and has seen this story play out more than a few times. I think that he will be considering a dog to fill his time with before long - Piper was primarily his. Violet is doing poorly, she's visibly depressed and troubled. I hate seeing it. She's never done well as an only dog - she needs a friend. I called in to the daycare and missed a class, it was all I could do to maintain even at home yesterday. I feel like I desperately need a week off to recover from this, and after I get through mythology tonight and math tomorrow morning, I'll have a few days. Tomorrow will be a very gloomy birthday.

The whole house feels wrong without her in it.

Rest in peace, Piper.

Dog park.

We took Piper and Violet to the dog park, and Piper was perfect. She's never been aggressive at the dog park, or we wouldn't have her there, but she can be uneasy at times, and has been known to growl when other dogs overstep their bounds. With her, we just can't write that kind of behavior off, so we've worked quite a bit on that issue. She was grounded from the dog park for a little while so we could work on her stability and trustworthiness without taking any chances. She's been doing excellently in a variety of on-leash situations, and on-leash reactivity is usually her issue, so she got to go today, and she was flawless. She was friendly and outgoing, her body language stayed good the entire time. She and Violet befriended a Schnauzer/Poodle mix (whose owner, admirably, did not call a Schnoodle) named Olive. And by befriended, what else could I possibly mean but herded relentlessly? I think that little Olive will be sleep well tonight. She was the one, lone sheep to two high energy herding breed dogs. My birthday's coming up, along with Violet's, and we've put in a word to Eric that what we'd most love is a trip to Dogwood Farm to give sheep herding a go.


On the Violet/training note, I don't know how to transfer her crazy training energy/focus out of our house. I'm admittedly a very novice trainer, and of the two of us, me and Violet, I'm the idiot with the most to learn. I've come to love clicker training and positive reinforcement training, and every time Violet learns something new I'm awed and thrilled all over again. At home, she has eyes for no one but me at the first sign of a clicker or the first hint of a training session. I have her full attention. She won't look away if the house is on fire. Anywhere else - like, for example, the awesome agility training area that our dog park has, which I would love to be getting some practice in on before we can take a class in the spring - she's distracted, understandably. I can sometimes get a sit out of her, or a touch or paw while she's looking the other way and grumbling about it. Anything beyond that is a no-go. I'm sure I'm missing something very obvious, or expecting too much, but I'm not sure how to start moving her training intensity out of our backyard.


Anyway, pictures!

The beginning, middle, and end of her interest in agility equipment today.

Poor Olive.

They were quite friendly about it, but that dog was not going anywhere without their okay.

Violet is a smart dog, but her problem solving leaves some to be desired. She gets "stuck" in the agility enclosure. It's a huge pen with one gate, and finding the gate is just beyond her.