The Boy

If you know Eli, you know he is a tad sensitive. Clever, beautiful and fun, but oh so sensitive. Unfortunately he takes after me. I was one of those kids who didn't really get the joke. Hiding hiccups so no one would scare you, as that would make you cry. You must know the sort. Growing up with two sisters toughened me up, though, as being kicked in the back from one direction and having porridge thrown at you from the other can make you very angry. No point crying, throw the remote at them instead ;)

Anyway, Eli has never been into raucousness, unless it was in a safe environment, with daddy, that is. A puppy, as you might know, is raucous. Even this one. See, we managed to find a puppy that fits this family perfectly. Antisocial and cautious should be written on our post box under the name. But Molly is a puppy. And puppies jump. And run. And nibble. And jump. And jump. And jump. Especially when they are very small. When the puppy sees another (human) puppy running around, squealing uncontrollably, that MUST mean they want to play. Now our human puppies do this, but only one of them wants to play. The other one squeals in pure panic, arms flailing in the air.

So we had communication issue there for a while. Eli would come out of his room in the morning, scream and run. Molly would get up and run after him. Mayhem ensued. Grumpy (= just tired, we're never normally grumpy...) parents would yell equally at all directions, hoping to gain peace and quiet. Obviously that only made it worse. It got to a point where Eli would hide on the sofas and chairs and only get onto the floor if Molly was kept away by someone. It did look like a crappy scenario, considering Molly was supposed to be Eli's assistant dog. It's difficult to assist when you're stuck in another room.

But somehow, it did get better. Molly calmed down, just ever so slightly. We were able to contact the dog in that small, thick skull and she listened. Eli calmed down, too. He realised he could ask Molly to sit or lie down, and she would. Imagine that. The routine changed and now there are two different children in the house for Molly. One is for cuddles and company, the other one for rolling on the floor and running around. Handy. The gender stereotypes don't apply here, though, as it is the little princess in her fairy wings and pretty shoes that is growling and crawling on the floor, when the Lego engineer sits and calmly plans his savings plan for the future, wearing his sister's skirt. Oh how I love them both.

It is a great feeling to connect with your dog, as cheesy as that may sound. The clicker training helped, Molly seemed to understand that she can communicate and get us to do things, too. The general screaming has diminished, though not disappeared completely. But with two under 5's, there will always be some screaming. Hopefully from now on it'll be done by the kids. Or we can at least pretend that is the case. As an adult, surely I am able to express myself in an adult manner. You'd think so, wouldn't you?

Basics

To update, this is what has happened so far.

We got a small boy. (He was followed by a small girl, who may occasionally appear in the blog, too. Usually as a distraction. A gorgeous distraction, may I add.)

The small boy got diabetes. This wasn't on our original to-do-list.

The small boy got in trouble with his lows.

We got a puppy. Not an easy task. After declining offers to buy mixed breed puppies straight from the airport in the middle of the night, we found a good breeder. She was willing to sell us one of her Havanese puppies a bit cheaper as the pup had a strong underbite, making her less likely to be the Crufts Supreme Champion. This was fine by us, as we're not really into shows anyway. Even if Molly would have been presentable enough, we would have been kicked out of any shows for being scruffy and untidy. We're students. Poor students. Poor students with children. Poor students with children and no sense of style. Enough said.
We chose this particular breed as I have some experience of Havaneses. They are also known to be extremely social, good with children (!!!!) and fairly intelligent (?). They are small dogs and relatively easy when it comes to grooming.

We searched for more information on D.A.Ds, or hypo-alert dogs, or hypodogs or diabetic assistance dogs, or whatever you want to call them. There is a lot of unofficial information online, news on research projects and discussion forums. DAD's are common in the States and considered as official assistant dogs. In the UK there are some hypodogs and experienced trainers. In Finland, the country we've managed to get stuck in, there is all of one official dog that is being trained as a hypodog. That dog is being trained in an institution and then handed 'ready' to a family of a small diabetic boy.

Concerning the training , the Americans are very quiet about their specific methods, which are supposedly 'groundbreaking' and 'unique'. This probably means they are fairly simple and executable by dog owners with the help of a trainer. But that would be quite unprofitable for the companies.
If you are considering training a hypodog, a good place to start is http://www.diabeticalertdog.com/forum/. There are a lot of opinions on methods and particularly on the scent acquirement.

We searched for a dog trainer. And found a brilliant professional, experienced in scent training. She came to meet Molly and was greeted by a scared, shaky mess. It didn't look good. Molly was petrified of other people. Strangely, she was comfortable with children, even when there was twenty of them piled on top of her "stroking" the poor creature. But adults were huge, smelly and unpredictable. So the next step was to socialize Molly so we could at least leave the house without nervous vomiting by the post boxes.

It took a few weeks but now we have a pretty normal dog. She is comfortable with people, though a little cautious at first. She is so comfortable on public transport (we don't own a car) that the snoring begins as soon as she's curled up on the bus. I got her a carry bag which opens. It's easy to bring along and lift it on the seat next to me or on my lap, creating a safe haven anywhere. We also use it in cars, whenever we can get a lift somewhere. I secure the bag with the seat belt and the dog is safely tucked away, not pestering the driver or chewing on the handbrake. Nor would she fly through the windscreen if there was ever an accident.

Molly had her first private lesson on Friday and it looked promising. We had already begun clicker training before the lesson so she was familiar with it. I got a new clicker from the trainer, with a softer click, a lot nicer for the ears. With the help of the spanking new clicker and Molly's favourite treats, we've got as far as getting her to smell a jar. Which will eventually contain a saliva sample. Which will be collected from Eli. Who will happily stick cotton sheets in his mouth when he's hypo. Yeah, right.

We are only in the beginning and it's a loooong way before we can trust our loyal mop to wake us up in case of hypos. But there is no harm in trying. The worst case scenario is that Molly doesn't learn a thing and we end up with a pet. A pretty cute one, who loves the kids and who love her back. So it's not that bad.

Here it goes.

This is Molly, a four-month old Havanese puppy. She is pretty daft, being a puppy and all. Hopefully she will grow up to be the next Lassie, though smaller and dirtier. At the moment she is enjoying her own turds and generally, any piece of crap she can wolf down before we get to her. Despite her disgusting taste, our intention is to train her to become a hypo alert dog. This would mean that, in the future, she could smell low blood sugar - also known as hypoglycemia - and alert us about it.

This is where we come to Eli. He is four, too, but in years. And he has type 1 diabetes. Which he dislikes occasionally, asking when it'll go away. 'Never' is not the answer you want to give to your child. But hopefully the future will bring better treatments and more options. Until then, all we can do is make it easier for him.

One problem with type 1 in children are the lows and not spotting them. When a small boy is engulfed in his pile of Lego, no amount of shakes, sweats, headaches or hunger will get him out of there. Combined with sudden crashes in blood glucose levels, this can have disastrous results. The lows often happen at night so we, the adults, have to get up to check the levels to make sure Eli will still wake up in the morning. As horrible as it sounds. This is where Molly steps in in all her stinky glory. If she can A) learn to smell the lows and B) learn to alert us when the lows occur, then C) we can fix them. Easy peasy. Hopefully.

The purpose of this blog is to record Molly's training and hopefully give information to others considering training their own DAD (=the acronym sometimes used for 'Diabetic Alert Dogs').
Whether the blog will be updated on time, or at all, is another question.
Wish me luck.