Six months of Life with The Biscuit

Day 1: Michael & The Biscuit

It was July 2, 2019 when we popped The Biscuit, an 8-month old male Yorkie Terrier, into Michael’s big Tundra and pulled out of Biscuit’s foster home, ready to start a life together.

We hadn’t had a dog together in the 30 years we’d been married but we weren’t dog novices either. We had taken care of friend’s dogs for weeks, sometimes six months, one time almost two years. We had run an impromptu vet clinic in Mexico and worked with a lot of spay and neuter clinics there too. We just hadn’t made the commitment to take one into our forever home. 

But now that we had settled into Northern California, I had been encouraging Michael to adopt a travel buddy for all those months on the road with his teardrop trailer, The Red Writer.

He agreed, in principle,  but he said he didn't want to formally search and look at shelters. But if a dog picked him, well, okay.

Along came Biscuit. Blues Night on the deck of Rasta Ranch in the Finger Lake. Friends and family gathered to hear Cousin Brett Beardslee play. Wine. Mellow. 

Innocence!

Michael didn’t know yet Biscuit was looking for a new home but he seemed to fit our criteria: Small (only 8 pounds), inquisitive, independent, friendly, seemed to like children, loved other dogs, not aggressive or fearful. Playful. And Michael liked him.

Now, six months later, life with The Biscuit could be its own screenplay.

Biscuit flew home with us from New York to California in his little travel bag, and for the next month he was pure terrorist, a step up from terrier. 

Within hours of getting home he saw a tiny corner of paper poking out of my top desk drawer, grabbed it, went flying around the room like the dog in The Mask, and ate my internet passwords.

It didn’t get better.

He jumped up on the dining room table and cruised across it. No guilt. No remorse.

Peeing in the house? Anywhere he wanted.

Night terror barking to wake the dead.

High energy. No breaks. No naps.

A lot of anxiety and hyperactivity. I could watch him scanning around our home for something to attack, chew, eat, rip up, hump when he started to feel anxious or bored.

Michael stayed with us for the first two weeks, then flew back to NY to start the slow trek back across the country.

A front pack could keep The Biscuit contained

All I could do for that first month was stay home, keep everything puppy-proofed, and train, train, train. 

I didn’t work. I didn’t hike. I didn’t go out evenings. I didn’t write. I just trained the dog. I didn’t have a way to leave him home alone safely. He’d freak out in a crate. Or anywhere. So we stayed home.

Finally, a month into our new life together, regretting the decision to adopt this guy, questioning my sanity overall, I made an appointment with the vet to see if there were pharmaceutical options while I worked on his training. Because one of us wasn’t going to survive.

I couldn’t get into an appointment until that afternoon so I drove us up to the mountain for a hike on the trails. He wasn’t trained off leash yet. But he wasn’t trained to the leash either. So I decided to err on the side of running his little legs off and getting a few hours of peace and quiet.

I pulled into the parking kiosk near Bon Tempe lake on Mount Tam and left Biscuit in the car, engine running so I could leave the AC on for him. It was a safe training moment to see if he could be left in a car. I could see him. He could see me.

All was fine, but then the credit card wouldn’t work in the kiosk. 

Damn. 

So back to the car, STAY, STAY, while I open the door to get some cash for a parking ticket.

Close the door. All good.

I can see him, he can still see me. Parking kiosk works!

Back to the car. 

Doors are now locked. Biscuit has stepped on the door lock, car is running, keys are in the car, cell phone is in the car, we’re on the top of the mountain.

And now I’m REALLY mad. Frustrated. Unhappy. Worried. 

Twenty-five minutes later when I finally get the door unlocked, he’s elated to see me and we head to the trail.

I take him off leash and it’s what I had imagined and hoped for when we adopted him — he’s scampering ahead of me but keeping me in sight, running back to check on me, coming back when called. Great recall! Running alongside the lake, pine needles on the dirt trails, lots of shade and quiet and beauty. WOW! I have hope.

Then we run into the park ranger.

No off leash allowed, for a whole lot of pragmatic reasons, including the danger of bobcats. 

After my hideous morning (and month), I warned the ranger if he gave me a ticket I would start hysterically sobbing and never stop. He said he would give me a two minute lecture instead about why I can’t run my dog off leash up there. It was a fine compromise —- the ticket is probably $250 — and since then I’ve found other legal off-leash areas for him.

Later that afternoon, with advice from our vet, I medicated Biscuit at night for about three nights until he settled in and got used to some local noises, and we both started to get some sleep. 

By then Michael had returned from his travels (after I texted him a couple 911s) and we continued to throw every training technique we could at this little terrorist. After all, this wasn’t our first rodeo.

Consistency. Boundaries. Classes. 

It started to work. We could leave him home alone. We could walk him on leash and off leash. Play time at dog parks. Runs on the beach. We could trust him not to leap up on the dining room table, steal every piece of paper (regardless of location), pee in the house, eat our shoes. Life was getting good. The three of us finally began to peacefully coexist. And we could finally relax and start to love him.

And then he broke his leg. 

A fracture of the femur

Biscuit and I had started hiking with a group of girlfriends each morning at 7 in the hills behind our condo. It was a joyous time for both of us. He stayed right with the pack, running head, behind, chasing, sniffing –– just as dog-happy an experience as could be had. My tribe of friends adored him —- all aunties — and seemed to take as much pleasure in his company as I did.

We met other dogs on the trail, to his delight, and sometimes they would chase the flock of turkeys for sport. No big deal.

On the hike on the day before Thanksgiving, I could see Biscuit was as in-the-moment, pure-puppy-joy as is possible. He raced over the crest of a hill where I could see the flock of turkeys. He would scatter them and come back self-impressed. 

But as I crested the hill, I didn’t see him. Nor did I see the turkeys.

I started to call him, looking around for this high energy, happy pup to return. Nada.

I called some more and looked down the hillside to see if he was racing back towards me.

Nada. 

Called again. Finally, I could see him laying below the cliff.

At that point my brain wasn’t computing. Why is Biscuit laying down now? And down there?

I called again and he raised his head, then tried to get up. And couldn’t.

I dashed down the cliff side on a safer trail, telling him to stay. I didn’t know what the injury was yet, but it was obviously bad.

I scooped him up in one arm (grateful for an 8-pound dog) while I made my way back up the cliff.

I had my girlfriend call Michael to meet us nearby with the car to head to emergency, then she helped sherpa me back down the hill. I held my trembling dog in one arm, and used my other arm for stability on her shoulder so I wouldn’t slide or fall on our way down the rocky, slippery trail.

Biscuit had fractured his right rear femur and the doctor said he had to have a steel plate surgically attached to his femur. We knew the other options; amputation or euthanasia. The next morning we took our poor little hurting puppy home with his steel-plate femur with a warning from the veterinarian to keep him inactive for the next 10 to 12 weeks. 

Uh oh. 

We were now homebound again because of The Biscuit, another hiatus from life. He couldn’t be left alone for at least the next six weeks to make sure he didn’t re-injure himself. We would take turns sitting with him in the solarium while he slept, keeping him calm with one hand laying on him, reassuring him we were there. Carrying him outside for his pee breaks, then carrying him back up. 

The first two weeks were 24/7 stress, always exacerbated by worry. But we survived. We had the sutures out. We felt a nanosecond of relief.

The fracture of the steel plate

Then the next night he re-fractured his original injury, actually fracturing the steel plate. We wish we could un-hear the screaming of that injury as his hind leg once again hung limply from his body. 

The doctor showed us the new injury on the X-ray, asking us ‘how did this happen?’ All we could say is, ‘You tell us. How DID this happen?’

Another surgery, a stronger steel plate, a much more difficult recovery, another 10 - 12 weeks of inactivity, a lot of sedatives to keep him still and calm.

A bigger plate and a pin

We put our life on pause, one more time. The other options were unacceptable so we tried to make it as easy on all of us as possible. We were in it for the long haul.

Biscuit can’t jump up or down on the furniture, which for almost any small dog is challenging. They prefer to be up high on the backs of chairs and couches, understandable for their size. So this time we figured out if we took all the legs off the couches and chairs, it would lower everything almost ‘Biscuit-proof’. 

No running, which his only speed. We keep him on a leash in the house when he isn’t sleeping to keep him calm(er). 

No playing with other dogs, which is what Biscuit lives for. He is the most playful pup I’ve ever known and most dogs love him. When he started to walk after the first surgery, he dragged me around the neighborhood looking for all his favorite playmates. But everyone had been warned to please stay away. Too much excitement.

We learned during the first injury and surgery that crating him still wasn’t a safe option, so I slept on a futon on the floor for the first 10 days with Biscuit on a leash on my bed.

A lot of sutures and an unhappy pup

But after the second surgery, we bought a mattress to put in the living room so Michael and I could sleep together (and both care for Biscuit) and Biscuit wouldn't hurt himself jumping up or down on our bed.

Next week we finally get an x-ray recheck and we will have a momentous celebration when the doctor tells us, in another four to eight weeks, that Biscuit can have his life back. And we can too.

Keeping him calm and quiet

But there have been a lot of surprises and lessons in all of this for Michael and myself that would have never happened without being forced to re-evaluate every day life.

We’ve discovered we love sleeping in our living room. It’s like a little cabin in the woods with a spectacular view of San Francisco Bay. We now think of our condo as a studio apartment with two offices and a guest room. We think we’ll make this a permanent change.

Whatever it takes to get him to eat

And who knew we would love having all our furniture at floor level, something my fitness mentor Katy Bowman has been prescribing for years. We get a lot more healthy movement, the condo feels more spacious, and we even get a better view out our solarium window. 

So we’ll keep our ‘new’ furniture too.

In the meantime, despite my years of being an organic, drug-free vegetarian, I’ve been reduced to buying Biscuit a bacon cheese burger just to get some food in his belly before he takes his next pill (he’s a very picky eater). I had to give up my version of what life should look like while I help get him healthy.

One of the hardest parts of his recovery for me is having to lightly sedate him each morning so he sleeps part of the day. Medically induced inactivity.

I hate putting this brilliant little hyperactive dude into a somnolent state, like Jack Nicholson in “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.”

But the reality remains pretty simple: medicate him, keep the leg. Don’t medicate him, probably lose the leg. If that also requires a bacon cheese burger, oh well. 

Another surprise — maybe because of all the meds, Biscuit has decided he prefers the crate for sleeping, rather than sleeping with us. Another miracle. He has crate-trained himself and given us all more options.

As he gets better and a bit more time elapses between doses of his meds, I watch him get perky and alert and playful and I can see the Biscuit is still in there. He steals a shoe. Shreds a piece of cardboard. Scratches on the wall with his inscrutable message of “I want….” when he’s already been walked and fed. I think, oh thank God he’s still there. He’s still The Biscuit. 

As hard as it’s been —- and it’s been HARD —- I’ve finally come to absolutely adore this tiny, lovable, wicked smart, playful terrier. It’s time to resume a normal life, normal activities without living in fear of the consequences. I won’t mind a having little fun and having life get a little easier for a while.  Neither will he. And then we might even get back to the original dream of his being the best little travel buddy in our Little Red Writer.

Someday back to the beach and more travel adventures!