The Little Guy

One of the most telling changes that led Nan to live with us was her inability to provide continuous quality care for her pets. Now, Nana has always had a menagerie of pets to help fill her home with noise and activity. I've heard tales of her raising German Shepherds. At one point, I think she may have had seven animals living with her. For as long as I've known her, she has always had a small dog or two around. She most recently had two cats, some birds as well a string of replacement fish. Her pets and their care were of paramount importance to her.
When Nan moved in with us, we also got her chihuahua mix male dog. He may be three years old or so, but he is not very much older than that. When Nana lived on her own, visiting her was always made uncomfortable by this dog. He was not properly house trained or mannered. He would bark incessantly and jump every which way, biting and pulling at sleeves, pant-legs or even hair. When company came by, his behaviors were exacerbated, so he was often kenneled in a dog crate. Which led to more barking and biting, so he would be let out. Which led to more misbehaviors, which caused Nana to crate him up again. By the end of the time she was on her own, he was destroying furniture, leaving messes everywhere and as hyper as he had been as a puppy. Although we were buying groceries for Nana, including pet food for the dog and two cats, she wasn't regularly feeding her animals. They had a horrific flea infestation as well. To add to that, the dog didn't really have a name, nor did she recall even what sex dog it was. He originally had come with the name Roscoe, but that could never be remembered. It was also too similar to our male Cairn Terrier's name Rocco.
So now the little guy lives with us with Nana. Having her give up animals would be such a cruel blow to her. We have a five year old Cairn, Nessie, the four year old Rocco and a six month old golden retriever puppy named Sahara. What a bunch! However, NoName has made tremendous gains. He loves to play with the puppy, often to Nana's distress. She either thinks he is going to be seriously hurt, or she seems a bit resentful that his attention is not solely upon her.
Now, my patience in training a puppy is not very good. The two cairns are not always great at remembering their training either. We use crates for bedtime, which helps. Before Nana came, we were able to enclose our three in the kitchen area while we were at school/work, which was starting to work really well. With Nan in the house, the dogs now have open access. So now, one of my first jobs after coming home from work is cleaning up after the dogs. Ugh. It just puts me in such a negative mindset. Especially when, after a weekend of being there with the dogs, I know with the proper routine and attention, they can have two whole days with no "mistakes".  Nana will sometimes pick up a spot she sees, but if she goes for the paper towels and cleaner, she often forgets what she is getting or where she is going with it. Or, she even excuses it buy saying it will just dry up. This is totally not the Nana I recall from years past.
And what do we call the dog? Right now, it is Little Guy or Little Mex or Little Buddy. Nana sometimes calls him Lilly or Precious, which were the names of her cats we had to bring to the shelter. Sometimes Nana wants to bring him to the shelter, but most of the time she wants to wrap him up and keep him stifled in her arms.
The best part is in the mornings, Nan's best hours. She doesn't want him to go outside with our dogs, even though we have a fenced in area for them. So she reports that he is potty trained and goes on the toilet with her. Now, we don't go in the bathroom with her, so I don't really know how this actually occurs, but she swears she has him all trained!