Today, I thought we’d do something a little different. Instead of a writing post, I am going to tell you the story of my mongrel crossbreed, Topher and
why I tell people he’s a horrible animal and that he makes my life a living
hell. This article started life as an email sent to the pound I got Topher from—though
my friends liked it so much, I thought I would share it here:
Topher was one of nine pups, brought to YAPS from Yarrabah
in early 2011. Their mother looked something like a brindle German Sheppard—though
it was hard to tell, as she was half bald with mange. The pups were five weeks
old when I first saw Topher, and she had already abandoned them. The nine of
them lived in a pen, outside, in some plastic kennels because YAPS, like so
many no kill shelters, is desperately underfunded and has too many dogs.
I chose Topher because he was the quietest and when I
picked him up, he sighed and rested his head on my chest, listening to my
heartbeat. I fell in love. That ended a week later, when I finally went to pick him
up and I heard him scream for the first time.
Yarrabah is a remote aboriginal community. So saying Topher’s
mother was ‘part German Sheppard’ is really a joke. There are feral dogs
everywhere, most of them descendant from herding dogs or pig dogs. However
there hasn’t been a purebred in Yarrabah.... ever. It’s probably 30 generations
since there was a ‘breed’ in his lineage. However it’s likely his father had a
decent amount of dingo in him, because the sound coming from that 6 week out
puppy was nothing like a dog could make.
It wasn’t a whine. It wasn’t even a howl (though he can howl
and dingo howls make dog howls sound like goddamn sneezes). It was an extended
shriek. A hysterical, unending scream, like a car-crash and a fire alarm had a
baby and the baby hated you.
Topher was the most disastrous, nightmarish puppy I have
ever known. But what triggered all this screaming? A lack of physical contact. Yes,
if I wasn’t physically touching him at all times, he would become an air-raid
siren. However he would enthusiastically bite anyone who picked him up. I spent
several months living on the floor to keep him quiet. We bled constantly, he
bit anything that passed by his face.
Despite having raised three other dogs to be perfectly
behaved, well adjusted animals in the past—including Pheonix, who had been
badly abused and came to me extremely aggressive and depressed—nothing I did
with Topher seemed to work. Determined not to be defeated by a creature that
occasionally ate lint, I persevered.
He hated going outside and after several months of him lying
prone, letting me physically drag him around the block like he was dead, I gave
up on walkies. The neighbours were becoming suspicious.
He ate well, but remained as skinny as an anorexic greyhound
but despite several vet visits where he metamorphasized into a hysterical
octopus on crack, I was assured he was a healthy, if utterly psychotic, puppy. He
was desexed on the earliest possible day the vet was willing to do the
procedure in the hope it would calm him down. It didn’t.
He loved banana more than life itself and while he refused
to eat bread, pasta or rice leftovers, no one could eat fruit without giving
him some. He continued to be slightly thinner than a skeleton and I began to
get paranoid someone would call the RSPCA. He also had mange from his mother—dermodectic,
not sarcoptic—and a severe allergy to mosquito bites, so his fur was patchy and
he looked badly abused. Eukanuba puppy food and every mange cure known to man
did nothing to help.
Despite refusing to leave the house, Topher found he quite
liked the treadmill and began running a few kilometres a day while I watched
TV. He loved trips in the car too, until anyone attempted to leave it, or get
him out of it, when he would become a hysterical screaming crack octopus again.
It was just as well, as he looked awful.
Every week we brought home piles of new toys to keep him
entertained and happy, until the house resembled a very messy day care centre.
Whenever Topher destroyed a toy, the little toy pieces would become ‘new toys’
and he would become distraught at any attempts to throw them out.
We moved to Brisbane in October of 2011 and after the mange
finally cleared up, Topher began limping. After another hysterical octopus vet
visit where the attending vet called him ‘deranged and psychotic’, we found out
that both his knees dislocate and the vet suggested surgery. $7000 surgery.
I was told, by many people, that a bullet only costs a
dollar.
Why would I spend $7000 on an animal? A feral mongrel, no
less. A new dog would be cheaper. Even a pedigree from a breeder would be
cheaper. There were plenty of people willing to tell me they would never spend
that much on a pet.
It never even crossed my mind. After numerous expensive vet
visits where I pointlessly assured vets he was ‘not always this mental’ we
found a medication that keeps him pain free and walking comfortably without
invasive surgery. There may still be surgery later, but it’s been a long time
since he limped at all now.
And, as I had always hoped, on his first birthday, he
mellowed out completely. He still has oodles of toys, he’s still as thin as a
greyhound and he still hates going outside, but he walks on a lead like a
normal dog now. I work from home, so he’s always with me, but these days he’s
equally happy to sleep in another room while I work—rather than glued to my
leg, shrieking hysterically when I go to the bathroom.
I can’t even imagine how he would have survived in Yarrabah.
I suspect it would be physically impossible for him to exist without a couch to
sleep on and a kong toy to occasionally drop between my legs into the toilet.
I’d give up my house and live in my car before I gave up
Topher. These days people say he’s beautiful and ask what breed he is. I say
he’s a ‘some kind of horrible mongrel’ and they look horrified. Topher knows
exactly what sort of dog he is. He’s my dog, and he’s never going to be any
other kind.
Oh, and for the record? He still rests his head on my chest,
listened to my heart, and sighs.
