What WAS I thinking!?

I had an interesting adventure tonight with my two dogs.  This adventure reminded me a bit of teaching preschool.  Now, I am in NO way saying children should be compared to our pets or that children and pets should be treated in the same way.  Oh, just read on; you'll understand!

I set off on the adventure of taking BOTH dogs to a vaccination clinic.  I figured I'd save a few bucks and have their rabies vaccinations done this way.  Well, for most dogs, this would probably work.  For my special needs dog...who clearly has ADHD, obsessive compulsive disorder, oppositional defiant disorder and sensory processing disorder (amoung other things)...this didn't work so well.  Let's just say he had a few challenges with the idea of waiting in line with 20 other dogs and their owners.  (Just so you know, this dog has been through and passed dog obediance class...)

Yep, so that was my dog barking and jumping around like crazy (clearly in sensory overload)...with the little Chihuahua next to him joining in with the barking.  So, after a near mishap with 2 larger dogs coming up behind us and a kind woman offering to hold the yipping Chihuahua while I corralled the 35 lb. beast that was now going crazy trying to charge at a larger dog; we decided to head home.

At about this point, you're probably wondering how this would ever make me think of preschool!  I'm getting to it...I'm getting to it! 

After we made it home, my initial response was to collapse and call it a night.  I knew if I did that though, the last thing those dogs would remember was throwing a huge fit and then getting in the car, coming home, having dinner and curling up to watch TV. 

The fact that they threw a fit would have worked perfectly for them (oh, yes, do you see the connection with preschool now)!  They got to come home and away from the other dogs, which was exactly what they wanted!  Now, if I had been smarter, I would have realized that this was a poorly planned event and wouldn't have gone in the first place.  But since I had now created this, we had to finish it on a positive note.

So, just like I would do at school, we loaded back into the car, drove back and tried it again!  This time I was smarter and took my smaller dog in, then had the vet come out to the car for my dog with challenges!   (Oh yes, you should have seen the looks I got.)

We made some accommodations, but we made it!  We drove back home and everyone got a treat for doing so well!  (yes, I got one as well...mine just involved people food :) 

So, I guess here's the moral of the story:  No matter how off track things get, regroup, make the accommodations that are necessary for the child (or dog in this case) to be successful, get through the situation with the least amount of stress on everyone and then make sure everyone knows that they did a wonderful job even though it was very challenging...and then, of course, never, ever repeat the event unless your life depends on it!