A friend and I were IMing each other. Every time her message arrived my laptop beeps. I like that as I don’t have to stay on the page but can follow my ADD (which isn’t on the prompt, by the way) and click on whichever tab I want to peruse.

But Kali goes nuts. She starts shaking and panting and won’t eat or drink. All those little noises the phone or laptop make to tell me someone wants my attention terrify her. Have any of you dealt with this? It’s been there since she moved in with us and I think my daughter had to deal with it also. I do remember when visiting my daughter that they couldn’t put on the oven because it made small ticking sounds. The would send Kali into a huge shaking fit. You have to cook so they just tried to ignore it and get the meal finished.

Our stove here doesn’t make a noise and the microwave doesn’t seem to upset her. So at least there’s that. But I miss many texts and IMs on my phone and laptop because I try to keep the sound down.

She looks calm but she’s blurry because of the shaking. At least she isn’t panting anymore. The IM conversation was a half hour ago.

She was a rescue way back when. It was her nervousness that ended her life at my daughters as she couldn’t be left alone without destroying the place. My daughter has to go out in the world and work, ya know. We took her in because we are home all the time, so…

We wanted to try her as an assistant dog for me but my anxiety gets way worse when I take her out with me into the busy world. We are only good for each other at home or out in the yard. Even walks make me more nervous because she wants to attack other dogs. She thinks she’s the alpha when the other dogs could eat her for lunch. So I have to be careful where I take her so we don’t have those encounters.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not complaining about her. I love her dearly and in our days she sits connected to me nearly 24/7. I’m just concerned about how to deal with her ‘sound anxiety’. Any ideas?

Well, I didn’t exactly meet the prompt requirement but I did follow my stream. Thanks, Linda!