[This is the story of Cleo, a rescued Great Dane my husband and I adopted in 1992. This is an excerpt from a story-in-progress of a Great Dane we adopted from Japan, after Cleo died in 1998. I am posting the story as I write it on a blog called Xanadu: Gift From Japan at this site: http://xanadugiftfromjapan.blogspot.com/2011_11_01_archive.html
Cleo was my husband, Doug's, and my first rescued dog. A veterinarian, Marlene Smith, in the close-by city of Campbell River had contacted me after finding out that I'd had Great Danes for many years. Cleo had been brought to her veterinary clinic to be put down because "nothing could be done with her". Apparently the son of an elderly man had dropped the dog at his house when the son could not bear to watch his roommate's continual abuse of her. The dog was in a constant state of terror and she was severely emaciated. One day she had escaped the house and attacked a small dog. He then brought her to Marlene's clinic, believing that the best thing would be to put her down.
Cleo was only a couple of years old and a very pretty brindle dog. Marlene talked the man into agreeing to let her find someone to adopt the dog. She had until the following Saturday to find a home for Cleo.
Although Cleo was a very small Dane - weighing about 70 pounds - no one wanted to take on a Great Dane, especially one in need of special attention. Marlene expanded her search to Courtenay, where I lived. At a local pet supply store Marlene asked if they knew of anyone who had experience with Great Danes. She was told there was a woman that had two of them, a woman who had a cafe on Fifth Street.
I was very, very busy with my new cafe, putting in 18-20-hour days. Marlene showed up there on a Wednesday evening in 1992 and asked me if I would adopt this Great Dane. Otherwise, she told me, Cleo would be put down on Saturday. I told her that although I was sorry about this, I was way, way too busy and would not have the necessary time or energy to give to a troubled dog.
When I got home that evening I told Doug the story. To my amazement he said, "I could look after her. I could take her to work with me every day." (Doug worked at construction.)
Doug and I no longer had two Great Danes. A year or so previously, my fawn-coloured Dane, Kaela, had died at the ripe age of eleven and a half. Cadillac, my massive mantle-marked, merle-coloured Dane remained, He was seven years old and showing his age - a bit overweight and slow of movement.
(I refer to Kaela and Cadillac as 'mine' because I adopted them each as puppies before I met Doug and both were bonded to me. They liked Doug, but they were certainly mine.)
I told Doug he should be the one to rescue Cleo by going to Campbell River to pick her up, but he wanted me - the dog 'expert' - to go. The following evening, after the cafe had closed, I made the trip to Campbell River in my old Suburban car (the back was all mattress - a dog ‘limo’).
When I arrived at the clinic, Marlene took me to the back where the emaciated, exceptionally small Dane (she might not even be a Dane!) was in a cage. Cleo snarled at me. Marlene said she was really okay, but frightened. She put a leash on her and brought her out of the cage. I opened the door to the yard a crack and could see Cleo was eager to get outside. I took hold of the leash and out we went. The first thing she did was have a huge, huge pee, then snuffled through the grass, apparently forgetting entirely that some stranger had hold of her on a leash. I walked her around the front of the clinic, opened the back door of the Suburban and Cleo, without a pause or question, leapt into the back! I closed the door, went and told Marlene that I would take her home for the weekend to see if she got along with Cadillac. I then headed off on the 45-minute ride back to Courtenay. Cleo settled onto the mattress, knowing as animals seem to almost instantaneously that she had been rescued.
My worry was that Cadillac, who was jealous and possessive of me, would be furious when I pulled up into the yard with another dog. Although he was fused with Kaela, once she had died he seemed blissfully happy to be the only dog. He loved playing with other dogs and having dog visitors, but he would not tolerate me paying attention to another dog.
I pulled into the yard and was met by Cadillac and Kilo, who was Doug's son's dog (Gary and Kilo were visiting). I walked Cleo, on the leash, into the back yard with both Cadillac and Kilo following with avid attention. She ignored them altogether and sniffed all over the yard. In a matter of a couple of minutes Cadillac amazed me by putting his muzzle into Cleo's ear in a gesture that was possessive and full of love! In that moment, right there, he took her completely into his heart.
On that first evening, Doug, Gary, Kilo, Cadillac, Cleo and I went for a walk around the block. Although Doug thought it was too soon, I insisted she not be leashed - I wanted her to know right away that was the way things were in this pack. She understood. Cadillac set himself up as her protector. If she fell behind, he would drop behind, beseeching me to wait up for her.
In the following days and weeks I got a fair idea of the abuse Cleo had suffered. As chance or fate would have it, Cleo had fallen into an ideal situation for her healing: me, a female to tend and nurture her, and Cadillac, as mentor, expressing happiness, calm and confidence. She looked to him in all situations to see how he felt and behaved.
Cleo's exceptionally small size indicated to me that she had lacked nurturing on all levels - insufficient food, love, attention or the companionship of other beings; she had probably been kept in isolation. Walking the very skinny Cleo about town in those first few weeks incited some people to rebuke me, believing I was starving her. I explained that Cleo had been newly rescued and praised each for speaking out about her obvious emaciation.
One evening, on our last walk of the evening around the block, Cadillac and Cleo took off after a dog, the dog running and yelping in terror (Cadillac running!), me shrieking in rage behind them. When I caught up to them, I spoke harshly and severely to both of them and led them home, Cleo on a leash. She went into an almost autistic state - for a week. She was like a robot, not responding to anything. I guessed she was waiting for some awful beating. That made me understand that she had suffered such beatings that she would separate her mind from her body - as do children who endure events too terrible to be present at. From then I made sure that I never yelled at her or otherwise expressed anger.
Doug was indeed taking Cleo to work with him. He adored her (I joked that once upon a time he used to look at me with just such an adoring gaze). Part of his job involved driving around to buy supplies, going places where it was okay to allow a dog inside or to wander around the yard. Cleo became a popular visitor to lumber yards and paint stores. He told me how while on a job site he would leave the cab door of his truck open so she could get in or out as she pleased, how the men he worked with paid attention to her, how she would explore and then go back to the cab of the truck. He also told me that although everyone offered her tid-bits from their lunches, Cleo would not accept any food. Then Doug and I noticed that she would not eat anything that he offered to her. I realized that the man who owned her had most likely trained her to not take food from anyone other than himself - a cruel business. Usually the owner first starves the dog, then gets someone to offer her food. The owner comes out of hiding when she takes the food and beats her. This would be repeated until the dog is able to refuse the food no matter how hungry she is. This went toward explaining her emaciated state. Again, it was good fortune or good tactics on Marlene's part that Cleo was adopted by a woman and that she had another dog to show her there was no harm in accepting food. She did gain 10 or 20 pounds, achieving a weight of 80 or 90 pounds, although Cleo always remained slim.
Doug and I could see numerous manifestations of the dreadful cruelty inflicted on her by her first owner. One of them was that she did not express her needs or desires; if she was frightened or injured, she did not ask for or expect solace. Her personality had been deeply submerged so that she seemed rather devoid of emotions or spark. I went out of my way to communicate to her that if she was frightened or hurt that I was there to protect and comfort her. Each step in her confidence was a joy to behold.
The arrangement of Doug taking Cleo with him to work seemed a good one. Cadillac was elderly so he was content to stay home and sleep. My hours at my new cafe were long and arduous, often working late into the night, grabbing only a couple of hours of sleep and getting up at some ridiculously early hour to get back to the cafe. Nonetheless, no matter how early I had to get up, I still walked the dogs before I left - and again in the late afternoon or evening before I returned to the cafe.
After four or five months of Doug taking Cleo to work with him, one morning, after I had said goodbye to both dogs and set off to the cafe, I realized that Cleo was waiting for me to come home. I was simply pervaded by this knowledge - that her day consisted of waiting for my return - that she had bonded to me rather than to Doug. She loved and trusted the gentle Doug, but she perceived me as her pack leader. She got to a point where she did not want to go with Doug, preferring to stay home with Cadillac, both awaiting my return. Perhaps this was the first incidence in which Cleo was expressing her own desires. I changed my schedule, taking a couple of hours off in the middle of the afternoon to take both dogs for a walk and to have a half-hour nap, before going back to the cafe.
My cafe was closed on Sundays and Mondays. On some closed days, Doug and I took our travel trailer and the two dogs to Bates Beach, a trailer park at the sea's edge. Many children around wanted to meet the dogs. Cadillac allowed any child to do anything to him, but Cleo had probably no experience with children. One weekend Cleo lashed out - probably only a warning - to two separate children who were being gentle and non-threatening to her. In each case she nicked the child on the eyebrow. At each incident I put her in the Suburban, without yelling at her, but telling her quietly that this was unacceptable behaviour, that she must NEVER, EVER, EVER hurt a child, that humans are absolutely not tolerant of such behaviour and that she could be killed over it. My father-in-law, when he heard of this, offered me $500 toward the purchase of a new puppy, telling me I could not take a chance that she might harm a child. Doug and I talked and talked about this crisis, contemplating having Cleo destroyed. Finally I resisted, saying that it was obvious that Cleo had been through such torture at the hands of some man, that she deserved a chance to experience happiness. Many years previously I'd had a Doberman who, although a gentle sweetheart of a dog, would have killed a cat if he'd been able to - it was part of his instinctive makeup. But he had never killed or harmed a cat because I knew he had that in his nature so took precautions to ensure he did not enact upon it. I would do the same with Cleo, I argued. I was certain that she simply had no experience with children (and they do seem to be a special case, don't they, for dogs?), that she was threatened by or frightened of them. I would make sure she was never left untended with a child. Doug agreed we would give her a chance.
For the rest of Cleo's life, whenever a child happened by, I would make sure she was close to me, that I had my hands on her and spoke gently to her as the child petted her, ensuring that she understood I was there to protect her. I warned children not to touch her unless I was right beside her. This worked; Cleo never snapped at another child. I think that she even came to like some children.
Cadillac died in November of 1995, three years after we adopted Cleo (he was ten and a half - his back end went so he could not get up; I brought a vet in to euthanize him). Cleo adapted well. She had to learn to express herself further. For instance, where Cadillac had done all the mooching for left-overs, Cleo learned the time-honoured behaviour of asking for food. She was a lovely, sweet dog, although she bore the scars of her tortured puppyhood always. She had six good years with us, lots of walks, car rides, people, love.
At eight or nine years old, Cleo got cancer, somewhere inside her; we did not know exactly where - there was no obvious lump. She had bouts of severe pain. One night I got up to some noise from her and found her in terrible, terrible pain, I called a veterinarian who did house calls and he came to the house in the early morning hours of June 5th, 1998. Cleo was not cognitive; perhaps the cancer was in her brain. As I held her tightly in my arms, the vet administered a lethal injection, and within a moment Cleo was dead. Although she was not cognitive and was suffering intense pain, I console myself by believing that she was comforted by my holding her. Cleo's was the worst death of any dog I've had and I hope no other dog of mine ever has to die in that kind of pain.
Altogether, Doug and I decided, adopting a dog who has come through hell and watching that dog unfold and become happy is a deeply rewarding experience. We would do it again.
This photo shows Cleo with her paws on my shoulders. She needed to do this every time I took her in the car - pleading with me, it seemed. I think she was frightened of car riding - I'm not sure why. She would sit in the passenger seat and I would keep one hand on her most of the time to calm her.
