Spring is Here!

How do I know that Spring has arrived?

Is it because the calendar says so?

Is it because business has picked up?

Those are good indicators, but as a groomer, the biggest indication that Spring has arrived is that the number of filthy, matted, and/or shedding dogs has increased dramatically. Sure, I see those types of dogs year-round, but the number of each type goes WAY up in the Spring. 

Let's start with filthy. I do this Westie puppy about every 5 weeks. Being a terrier, she basically lives in the dirt - and you can tell. 

By itself, this picture gives a pretty good idea of how dirty she was, but it is in comparison to the after picture that you can REALLY tell how dirty she was.

That's quite the color change, wouldn't you say? By the way, the reason her front legs look partially shaved and funny is because I think the vet removed her dew claws while they spayed her.

Here is another dirty regular of mine. I'm not sure how well the pictures show how dirty he was, but since I see him so regularly, it stood out to me as soon as I saw him how dirty he was.

And here he is after the bath but before the haircut - I forgot to take a picture after the haircut, but this picture still does justice to how dirty he was before the bath.

Even if you can't see the difference between dirty and clean, I think it's neat how fluffy he gets.

Now on to the matted dogs. I'm not sure how many other groomers do this, but for a lot of dogs that are only matted in a few places, I will leave them longer (up to 5/8") where they are not matted and go shorter where I need to in order to get under the mats.

This is a Labradoodle I did recently. You can see how curly she is, but without feeling her, it's hard to say how matted she is.

Here is a close-up of some of the matting. When you spread out a dog's hair like that, you should be able to see skin, not more hair.

The bath and blow dry (non-groomers please note - you MUST dry the dog completely, preferably with a high velocity dryer, for this to work. I do NOT recommend washing matted dogs to non-groomers!!!) usually loosens mats up enough to get a longer blade through - but I don't feel the need to wash and dry non-matted hair when it is SO long, so sometimes I will take my longest blade through the dog where I can before the bath. This is how the dog looked before I washed her.

Note that I left all the matting on the dog so I could loosen it with the dryer and get a longer blade through her.

Here is how she looked after the bath and blow dry.

She was also pretty dirty. Notice how she is less shiny after the bath? That's because she was SO greasy before I washed her.

Here is her after picture. Can you even tell where I had to take her shorter due to matting?

Before I learned this technique, I would have had to shave her nearly to the skin all over her body before the bath. I like to think that even if owners can notice the shorter spots, they appreciate that their dog isn't that shorter (or shorter!) on their entire body. This method takes longer than just shaving the dog before the bath, but I think the end result is generally worth it.

Here is another dog that came in extremely matted on about 1/3 of her body. Can you tell where her harness goes?

How about now?

Here's my PSA for the day - if your dog regularly wears a harness, you really need to take it off and brush the hair under it at least 2-3 times per week to avoid this kind of matting.

Again, much of her body was not matted, so I used my long blade on the parts of her that weren't matted before the bath. I forgot to take a picture of that before I washed her, but here she is straight after being washed and dried.

From here, I try progressively shorter and shorter blades until I find the longest blade that will fit under the matting.

Here she is all done. She was a little wild for her head, so forgive me if it isn't perfect.

Would you even believe that's the same dog? Anyway, if I had shaved before the bath, I would have had to use my shortest, or maybe second shortest, blade to get under the matting. She would have been bald, possibly even pink. I am glad I have learned the skills to send matted dogs home with some hair still.

Now for the shedding dogs. Dogs shed year-round, some more than others. But the worst sheds of the year tend to be Spring and Fall. This Golden was, I think, also blowing puppy coat. Here is how much hair came out with just the bath and blow dry.

Now let's add in the hair that I got out with my brushes and other tools, and you get a pretty impressive final total.

Well, this blog post was longer than I anticipated, so I should probably stop here.

I hope you've enjoyed this glimpse into what Spring is like for a groomer!

Depression, Part 2

Part A, 3-19-13

I had a little bit of a mini meltdown tonight, and my mother echoed back the advice I always give her when something is bothering her: Journal, Journal, Journal.

Since writing my last blog post about depression, I have received SO MUCH support from almost everybody, even total strangers. This can't cure my depression, of course, but it softens the blow to realize how many people care about me and my well-being.

I had been doing okay this week. Not great. Not terrible. Just hanging in there.

The last few days, with my mom's encouragement, I have been forcing myself to do some of the things that I usually enjoy but had given up since becoming depressed.

The automatic advice people give to those with depression is usually "Exercise" or "Do something you enjoy."

There are SO many things wrong with this well-intentioned advice. For starters, this alone will not cure clinical depression. But mostly - doing ANYTHING becomes difficult with depression. With severe depression, you have to pat yourself on the back just for getting out of bed and brushing your teeth. It's not laziness - you really aren't capable of things anymore.

Anyway, I've been REALLY forcing myself to do things. I went to a Bollywood party on Saturday, I took the dogs for a long walk yesterday, and tonight I went to a line dance class that I used to attend nearly every Tuesday - and then I had a mini meltdown.

The fact that I went at all is a big win - but I think I expected too much of myself. I really tried to have fun and enjoy myself. I think I even smiled once or twice.

But I was absolutely incapable of letting loose and ACTUALLY having a good time. My brain and body just aren't ready for that yet. I think being in a place where I have had so much fun in the past and being absolutely unable to truly have fun just broke me apart.

I feel like a shell of a human being right now, like somebody used a Shop-Vac to suck out 75% of my soul. It sucks. Who wants to walk around and experience life as just an apathetic zombie? Not I!

Luckily my mom lives nearby and I was able to stop in and see her. We went on a cruise together about a year and a half ago, and when we went swimming with the dolphins in Cozumel, my mom spent a lot of money on one of the photo book packages that they offered.

After I vented to her and tried to make sense of what I was feeling, she said, "I think it's time for the book."

I had no idea what book she was talking about until she pulled the dolphin book off of the mantel.

Looking at the pictures of the two of us in our swimsuits wearing absurdly tiny life vests and interacting with the dolphin always puts a smile on my face. That cruise was one of the best weeks of my life, and swimming with the dolphins was one of the highlights of the week. I love all animals, but dolphins in particular - I even have a dolphin tattoo that I got when I was in college.

So this book is such a brilliant redirect. I am able to look at the pictures and remember a fun time, and what it is like to be able to have fun and enjoy life, and I am able to have better hope for the future that I will once again be able to enjoy life someday.

PS - I danced at the Bollywood party on Saturday, walked for a brisk half hour yesterday, and danced for an hour-long class tonight - all that exercise did not magically cure my depression. I am going to continue to force myself to exercise - but because it makes my body feel better (my back in particular) and the few weeks I had stopped it all have already caught up to me. Exercise is not the magic cure-all those of you who have never suffered from clinical depression.


Part B - 3-20-13

Dragged myself to the gym after work today. Luckily I had a relatively easy day at work. It was the lowest-energy, most pitiful workout ever - but it was better than nothing.

It is 6:24 PM, and all I want to do right now is take a nap...

Tomorrow night, I am going to a book club meeting with 1 person I somewhat know and 8 strangers. This is something that might make me a little nervous under normal circumstances - but my anxiety level is already ramping up. It's so hard to put on a fake smile and brave face for strangers sometimes.

I long to feel normal again.

I am trying to write a grooming-related post...but I really can't promise when I will be able to get one out. Bear with me for a while, and I promise the dog pics will be back soon!

Anyway, thanks for listening to me ramble.

Depression

I haven't had any motivation to write a blog post all week, so it occurred to me when I was driving home from work that maybe I should share with you WHY I have little to no motivation to write blog posts right now.

I don't know if I have mentioned this in any previous blog posts, but I have bipolar disorder. I have had several (hypo)manic episodes, but I struggle much more with the depression side.

Just over a year ago, I was put on a new combination of meds that FINALLY pulled me out of a depression that had lasted, to varying degrees, for about 3 years. I felt "normal" for the first time in SO long.

Unfortunately, mental health is such a fragile thing with this disorder.

I didn't want to see the signs at first, but over the weekend I added up all the pieces and realized that my depression has come back.

Acknowledging depression is a double-edged sword - once you acknowledge it, you can start to get help and feel better. Unfortunately, you are also forced to wonder how far down you'll go and how long you will be down that dark hole. For me, it also reminds me that this is a battle I will have to fight OVER and OVER and OVER for THE REST OF MY LIFE. I usually try not to look at the big picture like that, but a new episode reminds me what a true disease Bipolar Disorder is and that it will be a lifelong battle to try to find the happy zone between depressed and manic.

So now I want to try to describe clinical depression for those of you who have never suffered from it. It's easy for an outsider to say "You'll feel better if you exercise" or "Just stop feeling sorry for yourself," but sometimes those things just aren't possible for somebody who is depressed. I actually WAS exercising - until the depression came creeping back.

Everybody experiences highs and lows in life. There is a certain amount of "sad depression" that a person can expect to experience in a lifetime, like after the death of a loved one. Clinical depression is something different. Clinical depression happens when certain chemicals in your brain are out of whack. This is an actual medical condition and may require medications to fix it. You don't blame somebody with Type 1 (childhood onset) Diabetes for having a pancreas that doesn't produce insulin, so you also shouldn't judge a person who has clinical depression.

Anyway, try to imagine you are suddenly living in a world where you are constantly in neck-deep molasses. Just moving and breathing would become difficult, wouldn't it? The thought of exerting any more physical energy than ABSOLUTELY necessary is EXHAUSTING. It's hard enough to get out of bed in a molasses-filled world, much less exercise.

Your movements become slower.

Your thoughts become slower.

All you want to do is sleep - or you may not be able to sleep at all.

Everything requires 10 times more effort than before, even things you (used to) enjoy.

I've been so depressed in the past that I couldn't be bothered to brush my teeth more than once or twice a week. Same with showering. Exercise? Forget it!

For me, a depressive episode starts with "Meh." That's where I am right now. I don't really care about anything. I had lost almost 40 pounds - then fell off my diet and exercise program AND DIDN'T EVEN CARE. A "normal" person would probably be pissed off that they were starting to gain back weight that they had lost. I just don't have the energy to care.

I had been going dancing again, 2+ nights a week. That's just too much effort and not enough sleep right now. I LOVE dancing - but right now? Meh.

If I am unfortunate enough to have a depressive episode that lasts longer than "Meh," I hit "Blah." With "Meh," I'm too apathetic to even be sad. I just don't care about anything. Once I hit "Blah," I have now realized how much my life sucks. My self-loathing REALLY ramps up at this point. My life sucks and I have absolutely NO energy whatsoever to try to fix it - which of course makes me hate myself even more. Now I am fully aware how much my life sucks, and I continue to feel worse and worse until I hit "Why?"

"Why?" can stand for "Why me?" or "Why now?" or, worst of all, "Why am I even alive?" "Why?" is the most dangerous stage of depression. I have been fortunate in that I have had very few suicidal thoughts - but when they happen, it's in this stage. I usually wish I had never been born or that I would die, but luckily I almost never want to actively kill myself. Still, wanting to die is a TERRIBLE way to live. This is rock bottom, like sitting in the bottom of a deep, dark well and wondering if you will ever get out and see the light of day again.

I am extremely lucky, though. I have an aunt and uncle that help me pay for all my therapy, psychiatrist appointments, medications, and blood tests. I don't know where I would be without their help. It took ALL of that to finally find a good combination of meds and therapy that finally pulled me out of my last depression. And I am hopeful that I caught this depression quickly enough to turn it around before it gets worse. I had my regular appointment with my therapist on Monday and told her the situation, so she is helping me come up with a plan to cope. My psychiatrist squeezed me into a last-minute appointment yesterday so we could talk about my meds, and I upped the dosage of my Lithium, so hopefully that will kick in pretty quickly.

Anyway, I'm terrified, as usual, about how bad my depression will get. I am pissed off that I will have to deal with this periodically for the rest of my life. But I am also hopeful that I will feel better quicker than ever this time around since I finally have a good support system in place around me.

I hope I have been able to explain clinical depression a little for those of you who have never experienced it before. If you have ANY questions or comments for me, please feel free to leave them here or email me. I sort of feel like it is my duty as somebody who suffers from depression and Bipolar Disorder to reach out and support other sufferers as well as educate those who are not familiar with these all-too-common mental illnesses.

If you are feeling suicidal right now, you can find a list of suicide hotline numbers around the world here.

For more information about depression, try PubMed Health, WebMD, Wikipedia, or NIMH.

For more information about Bipolar Disorder, try PubMed Health, NIMH, APA, or Mayo Clinic.

Hailey and Dillin Cuddling; Getting Groomed

My dogs, Hailey and Dillin, NEVER cuddle with each other. They are best friends, and they love each other, but Hailey just does not like cuddling with Dillin. I have only seen them cuddle one other time, and that was more than a year ago! So I am very glad that I had my phone handy so that I could snap a few pictures of this rare event! 

This is my favorite picture of the bunch, with Hailey resting her head on my leg and Dillin resting his head on her back with his eyes closed.  Looking at this picture, you would have no idea what a rare occurrence this is!

Anyway, I also brought them with me last week to groom them. The cuddling incident, if you couldn't tell by their scruffiness, took place before I groomed them. So here's Dillin before his bath. (He's a Cockapoo for people who are new to my page.)

Here he is after the bath, but before the haircut. I was squeaking a toy to get his attention, so that is why he has such a strange look on his face. See how nicely he fluffs up?

It had been about 6 weeks since I last groomed them. Their hair, but Dillin's in particular, grows SO fast! I took his body shorter than half an inch last time, and look how long it got.

This is the same length I did on him a month and a half ago. I just did part of his haircut and took a picture so that you could really see how much his hair has grown. For the life of me I can't understand how people can go 3 months or more between grooming - for me, 6 weeks is pretty much the upper limit of what I can tolerate before I HAVE to groom them.

Here's Dillin's after picture. I love the Mohawk!

Here is Hailey before the bath. I think she is an American Eskimo/Poodle mix. She doesn't mind being groomed, except she HATES the bath and blow dry. You can tell how upset she is about what's coming based on how far back and down her ears are. She is not a happy camper in this picture.

Here she is after, MUCH happier! I took her ears a little shorter than I usually do, but I think they are cute at this length.

OK, here's one last picture of Hailey and Dillin cuddling. Hailey's head is hanging off the sofa, so she just looks like a furry lump.