Monday, July 5, 2010

Poor Lucy...

The 4th of July is over and I can finally have my "normal" dog back. Not that Lucy is normal but that is why we love her. Lucy has always been scared of fireworks but this year was the worst we have seen her yet. In our city, fireworks are legal during the weeks of 4th of July and starting about 2 weeks ago, Lucy became a ball of anxiety. Every evening around 7pm, she starts to breath heavier and once she hears a firework, she is in our laps trying to hide. Now we all know Lucy is not a small dog and 50+lbs of dog in your lap in not fun. So as you can imagine, yesterday was terrible. Lucy hid all day and when she did come out for food or water, she was shaking so much it made my heart drop. We did everything we could imagine to try to keep her from panicking. We closed up the house and kept the AC on (even thought the weather was beautiful), we turned on the TV louder than normal to try to hide the noise of the fireworks, we turned on fans to mask the fireworks and we got out her crate so that she would have a place to feel secure. Unfortunately none of these things helped. Next year, a trip to the Vet will be a must to see what they sugguest to help her anxiety and fear of fireworks.