At My Whits End

How many times can you come up with tactful answers to comments like;

"He got dirty so fast after you groomed him the last time."

"Take his nails shorter than you did the last time, they grow so fast."

"Cut his hair so that it won't grow out so fast, but don't shave him."

"Take his hair shorter around the eye, because it grew back too fast last time."

These comments always seem to come from  pet owners who go 2 months or more between their grooming appointments.

Sometimes these comments are made in such a tone that makes it sound as if I am to blame for the fact that their dogs nails are so long and overdue for clipping, or it is somehow my fault that their dog did not stay clean until its next grooming.

I had a customer today that wanted to know if I would clip her dogs nails short, or did she have to take her dog to her Vet to clip them short and not leave them sharp.

I must say, sometimes it takes all of my patience not to take these comments personally, and not respond in a sarcastic manor.

What was my response?

It is always tactful and nice.

The same thing that I tell everyone who asks me the same question, or something close to it.

"We take the nails as short as we can get them without bleeding the dog. Sometimes the quick of the nails grow with the nail and we are not able to take the nails as short as we would like to. We also file the nails smooth if your dog will allow it. We will not force your dog to accept the file."

This particular customers dog barely tolerates the nail clipping, much less allow us to use the file on them.

Not to mention the fact that this particular owner also moved her dogs appointment back twice, and the dog had not been groomed in  2 months.

Not surprising, the nails were long.

I so, so, so, so, so, want to say;

"How often do you trim or manicure your nails?"

"Will your hair and body stay clean for 2 months?"

"How often do you get your hair cut?" 

For customers that like to blame me for the nails being so long, I want to say; "I am here five days a week, nothing is stopping you from coming in and having the nails clipped between groomings."

I tell quite a few of my customers that I am available for them to bring their dogs in between groomings for while-you-wait nail clipping and eye trimming.

Very few take me up on it. 

Where in the world did this mentality come from, that a dogs hair cut and bath should last for months and months, and months?

Oh well, I guess that I am making to big a deal about this.

It just gets frustrating sometimes.

I am rambling.

I am done.

Rant finished.

I am going to go climb under warm covers and read a senseless romance novel. :) 

 ✂ Happy Grooming, MFF ✂

So Mad at Myself

I groom a lot of difficult dogs....A LOT!

My daughter keeps telling me to stop taking so many.

I feel bad for these dogs.

I like teaching them that grooming can be nice.

I like the challenge of getting them to trust me.

Most of the time a lot of the biters turn out to just be scared.....fear biters.

If you take your time and talk to them a lot, they usually turn out to be pretty good dogs to groom.

I had one of those today....a very nervous, scared Schnauzer.

A fear biter.

I have groomed this dog at least half a dozen times.

By the second grooming it became very apparent that I was never going to be able to clip this dogs nails.

I can not quite describe just how badly this dog freaks out if he even thinks you are going to do anything to his nails.

Lets just say that I didn't think it was possible for a dog to flip its body around like that dog did the first time that I attempted to clip the nails.

No amount of talking, holding, or petting would get that dog to come out of the zone he would go into when someone tried to clip his nails.

Because of this, the owner was informed, after the second grooming and another unsuccessful attempt at clipping the nails that made me fear for the dogs safety, that I would know longer try to clip his dogs nails.

The dog was very good for the rest of the grooming, although he still is a little scared of the HV drier.

He is very nervous all of the time.

A lot of petting and talking does relax him a little.

Did I mention that he is not neutered?

This is him.

Isn't that a sweet face.

He is sweet!

But, he is a fear biter!

And, I forgot that today!

I let the sweet side of him lull me into a false sense of security.

We were doing so good.

He was bathed and dried with no problems.

I had clipped his body and head.

All that was left to do was scissor up his face and feet.

Now, I will defend myself here a little.

I started with one of his back feet.

I slowly lifted it just enough to see the bottom of his foot.

I lifted it very slowly while talking to him and watching to see if he would get upset.

He didn't flinch.

He didn't even pay any attention to what I was doing.

He was too busy looking out the window next to my table.

I clipped out the pads of that foot and put it back down.

Now, what happened to him and to me between that back foot, and me moving on to the front foot, I can't say.

I guess because he had been so good about letting me clip that one foot, I just figured he would be okay with all of his feet.

I know better.

I have to say that that is not like me.

All I can say is that I had a brain fart at that moment in time, because I just causally reached for the next leg. 

A front leg.

I took one swipe of the clipper over the pads and that was all she wrote.

That little sweet face in the picture above was no longer looking out the window.

That little sweet dog had gone into the zone.....the twilight zone.

He freaked big time.

First he snapped at the hand with the clipper in it and missed.

I was in the process of letting go of his leg when he continued his freak out by very forcefully throwing his entire body backwards, in turn causing me to have to grab onto his leg again, to keep him from doing a back flip off of my table.

Then came the next bite...on the hand that had grabbed the offended leg.

The leg that I could not let go of while he was freaking out so badly.

A catch twenty-two.

He nailed me good.

I am going to stop here for a minute and please ask that I not get comments about not using a grooming loop with this dog.

I can assure you that even if I had had this dog on a grooming loop, that I would still have had to grab him to keep him from flipping off the table and hanging himself.

When this dog freaks out, he flips his body around and backwards so violently that your only option is to grab him to keep him from doing bodily harm to himself.

Believe me, this dog is not having a single rational thought in his head during these twilight zone moments.

All I can do is get a hold of him and talk him down.

It is like night and day.

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

I do not know what ever happened to this dog to cause such unbelievable  fear of having his feet worked with.

This was the first time, since back when I first tried to clip the nails, that he had gone so far off the deep end.

I had always been able to talk him through everything.

That was my mess up.

I should have gotten his attention before picking up that front leg.

I should not have let him continue looking out of the window.

He needed to be aware of what I was doing.

I messed up.

I was so mad at myself.

I paid the price.

This was the worst of the bite.

The bite on top of my hand barely broke the skin, but boy is it bruised.

Thankfully the bites were not deep.

I still had to finish him.

He did not want his feet touch at all now.

I had to muzzle him to finish scissoring his feet.

My daughter held his head and talked to him while I scissored his feet as quickly as I could. 

His owner likes all of his feathering to stay nice and long, no trimming....that's okay with me. :)

Done.

Still nervous, but happy.

 Once he was done, he stretched out on my table to clean his teeth.

Yes, he had to clean my blood off of his teeth.

I saw it after he bit me.

He was still mad at me and showing me his teeth, because I was still holding on to his leg.

I saw my blood on his front teeth. :/

He really is a sweet dog.

He just has a temper.

I need to remember that!

At all times!!

Even when he is being good and nice.

As I said at the beginning of this post, maybe I do need to back off on the difficult dogs.

I was shook up a little after I finished this guy.

My nerves were on edge.

To top it all off...I had two more difficult dogs to groom.

My next dog was a Shih-tzu that I have been working with for 6 years.

The very first time I groomed this dog it went for my face, and missed biting me by about half an inch.

I could only groom the dog with a muzzle on for the entire grooming.

After 6 years of grooming, I now only have to muzzle him for his feet and nails.

I had to collect my nerves.

I could not let the Shih-tzu feel my anxiety.

Not easy.

Especially since I knew that the Shih-tzu goes for blood if you piss him off.

He is not nervous or scared, like the Schnauzer, he is just down right nasty when he does not like something that you are doing.

We have a mutual respect for each other.

He respects that I will not hurt him, and I respect his teeth.

I got through the next two difficult dogs just fine, but I was completely drained.

So drained that I felt weak.

I average at least one difficult dog a day.

I just scheduled another new difficult dog the other day.

My daughter yelled at me.

It is another Shih-tzu that was thrown out of a local box store grooming shop.

I told the owner that I would give the grooming a try.

I think that it is a sickness in me.

I always feel as if I don't groom them, who will?

I think I need help.

Help for my head.

Dr. Phil where are you when I need you?!

✂ Happy Grooming, MFF ✂

Tuesdays Tip # 48 Something Silly....

......or something clever depending on how you look at it.

Personally, I would have loved to have thought of this years ago, when I was working at other grooming shops.

When I was working at other shop, with other groomers, I would have a problem with other people using some of my grooming tools.

I should not say just other groomers.

Everyone in the shop seemed to gravitate towards my grooming station.

The thing is, they would not touch my tools while I was at my table, they would wait till I was away from it, or had gone home, or use my tools on my days off.

No matter how many times I asked for people to leave my tools alone, I would inevitably come in to see my tools moved around, or sitting out someplace because the person who used them didn't even bother to put them away.

I guess that I could have gotten a tool box that I could have locked up, but I don't remember seeing anything like that when I first started grooming.

Plus some of the places that I worked did not have anyplace to set up a tool box.

My tools were in drawers, or laying out on a table, or cart.

Needless to say, the thing that bothered me the most was when someone would use my scissors!

I came in one day, at the pet shop that I was working at at the time, to find my best scissors, on my cart where they belonged, but cover in some kind of sticky substance.

No one ever fessed up to using them, and I never figured out what was all over them, but they were so dull I couldn't use them till the sharpening guy came.

Come to think of it, I could have used this trick for all of my scissors.

Then maybe my daughter, who was three years old at the time, could not have used my scissors to go in the bathroom and give herself a haircut.

Soooo, what is my Tip?

LOCKS!!

But, not for what you think.

Not to lock up a tool box.

Or drawers.

Or cabinets.

They are small padlocks to lock up your scissors.

Each individual scissor.

Or, just your special, expensive, important scissors, thinning shears, or chunkers.

So when someone picks them up to use them....

....THEY CAN'T!!!!

Again, I wish that I knew about this trick years ago.

I hope that this helps someone. :)

Happy Grooming, MFF

A New Sign....Maybe...

  ❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧

I Just Took A Pain Pill

Why Are You Still Here?

❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧

A new sign to sit on the counter in my lobby?

No?????

Really????

Not professional, right? 

I know, I know. (whiny voice)

I have to be professional.

I can't have any fun.

Well, I think it is funny anyway.

It doesn't even apply to 95% of my customers.

Those 95% would probubly find it funny too.

It is the other 5% that would get offended.

Oh well, I'll just have to be satisfied with sharing this sign with my fellow groomers, and anyone else out there that have to deal with people that can drive you crazy. :)

✂ Happy Grooming, MFF ✂

Puppy Surprise

Just about every groomer cringes when an owner waits until their puppy is 6 months to a year old before they get it's very first grooming.

I like to start getting puppies used to grooming as early as possible.

The sooner that they get used to being handled, brushed, combed, and bathed the better.

Yesterday I had a customer come in with a dog that I have groomed several times before and their new puppy.

An 8 month old Miniature Poodle. (Well, mostly Poodle. Long back, short legs...I didn't say anything)

Let me say that I was very pleasantly surprised when I saw this puppy. 

 I was pleasantly surprised, because I could tell right away that his owners had been brushing him.

From what I could tell, while the owner was still holding him, he looked to be in very good shape.

I was right.

For as long as his hair was, and his hair was long, they had been doing a really great job of keeping him brushed out.

They had even been trimming around his eyes.

And, they didn't put a hole in his head that I would have to repair!

He was so good for the bath.

He was a little scared of the big dryer at first, but quickly got used to it.

Look at all that fluffy, mat free hair!

Okay, he wasn't totally mat free.

He had one small mat behind each ear, and a couple small mats around his private parts.

As far as I am concerned....that is mat free. :)

 Because it is mid February, and pretty cold right now, his owner only wanted a little less than half taken off.

So, while I was bathing and blow drying him, I was trying to decide whether to totally hand scissor him, or use a clip comb to set the length.

 

Even after so many years of grooming, it can still be a little intimidating when cutting into such a long coat for the first time.

I decided that I would run my longest clip comb over his top line.

I started with a very light touch to see how much the clip comb would take off.

I ended up using almost full pressure.

 This is how much the comb attachment took off.

This is the length that it left.

Just right.

I mainly used the comb attachment on the body and just skimmed the legs with it.

I scissored up the rest.

Half way there.

He was being so good.

I am only showing this picture because I thought that it was so cute, and showed the kind of personality that this little guy has.

 Every groomer out there can understand what a pleasure it is to give a puppy its first grooming without having any heart attacks, or feeling like that puppy drained every bit of energy out of you after you struggled to get a nice cut on a wiggly, moving object (puppy).

What you see in this picture is how this puppy stood for his whole grooming.

Oh well, he did turn his head once in awhile to watch what I was doing. (like in the picture above) :)

Don't you just want to hug this little guy?

✂ Happy Grooming, MFF ✂

Knowing When to Quit

There are times when a groomer needs to know when to stop grooming a dog.

One is knowing when you are finished scissoring on a dog.

When to stop knit picking and put the dog away.

I still struggle with that one sometimes.

Some dogs you just feel like you could scissor all day and not get them smooth, or all of the sticky-outies. :)

Yesterday was different.

It was not a matter of  knit picking on a cut.

It was a matter of 'was I going to be able to groom this elderly dog?'

This elderly, biting dog.

This elderly,can be vicious at times, biting dog.

I have been grooming this little lady for a very long time.

We respect each other.

I respect the fact that she will not hesitate to go after me if I do anything that she does not like.

She respects the fact that I am nice and gentle with her grooming, so she rarely goes after me.

Until recently.

She is about 84 years old in people years, and she no longer tolerates being handled much.

As you can see in the picture, she suffers from 'dry eye'.

Her eyes crust up very badly.

Her owners were able to control the crusting better until recently.

She no longer tolerates anyone fooling with her face.

When her owner dropped her off yesterday, they said that she was biting more than ever.

As soon as I saw her I was not sure at all whether I was going to be able to clean up her eyes.

This mixture of eye crust and medicine sticks like glue to the hair and skin around the eyes....and she can not stand to have her hair tugged on in anyway.

Note: I am going to stop here before I show anymore pictures.
This note is mainly for any non-groomers that read my blog. In the next series of pictures you will notice that I am holding this dog by putting my hand around her neck. As groomers know, this is a way to hold a dogs head still and keep them from biting you without hurting them. When I pick my pictures to put on the blog, I try to pick pictures that give the best visual of what I am describing, or trying to show. Unfortunately, the pictures are frozen in time, and people can not really see the action.
My hold around her neck is just below the jaw line. The pressure of this hold is light.  I am not in any way, shape, or form choking her. (Believe me when I say,  if I was hurting this little lady in any way, she would be going after me big time.)

The very first thing that I do with her is put her in the tub.

With nice warm water, I put the sprayer on a gentle shower setting and place it right up against the top of her head so that the warm water can gently run down over her eyes.

I am holding her head up to keep any water from going into her nose.

She actually enjoys this.

I think that she likes the feel of the warm water running over all of that dry crust.

My goal is to have that warm water soften up all of that dry crust.

The crust on this side of her is face is so thick and large, that at this point, I have know idea how I am going to get this off of her.

I know she is not going to tolerate me fooling with this mess.

I can already see the some blood and puss under this big piece of crust.

So far so good....she hasn't gotten upset with me yet.

Next, I very, very slowly and gently rub some medicated shampoo on the crust.

I can't tell you how slow I have to move around this little lady.

If she even thinks for a second that I am going to pull on that crust, she will not hesitate to use the four teeth she has left and eat me.

I don't care what anyone thinks...when a dog with little to no teeth bites you....it still hurts like heck.

 I very slowly and gently work my finger with medicated shampoo on it, under the crust.

My goal now is to try to lift the now softer crust away from the skin just enough to cut the crust away.

My other problem here is that I have to rub extremely gently and slowly, because what teeth she still has are so rotten, that too much pressure against her mouth will hurt.

So far so good.

I have gotten most of the crust lifted away from the skin.

Except for that big piece on the other side.

I am still putting warm water on that piece waiting for it to soften up more.

While waiting, I will try to scissor some of this crust away from her eye.

She is still very calm.

Believe me...I am watching for any sign of stress.

And, for any sign that she is starting to get pissed with me.

"Good girl...lets get this nasty stuff off of you."

"You are doing so good."

"I know....I am almost done."

 "Doesn't that feel better?"

"Now lets try to see what we can do with that big mess under your eye."

I tried to touch that big crusty piece to see if it had softened up enough to pull away from the skin.

She let me know, in no uncertain terms, that there was no way she was going to let me fool with that big piece of crust.

This is why I hold her head and neck the way that I do.

She was not able to reach my hand.

I still had to rinse the shampoo off of her face, but she was pissed now.

She did not hesitated to give the sprayer a couple good bites before she calmed down and let me finish rinsing her face. 

Let me just say that it was killing me to give up on her face.

The thought of letting that yucky piece of crust stay on her face was driving me crazy.

At the same time, the thought of getting an elderly dog upset was killing me even more.

So, for the first time ever, I gave up on that eye crust.

  I have to use my little hand dryer to dry her, because she no longer tolerates the big dryer.

I dried her head as best she would let me.

That eye crust was hardening up again.

It was driving me crazy.

I had managed to move the crust way from her skin just enough to get a blade under it.

Five seconds.....

Five seconds...that is all that I would need to take my clipper, with a #10 blade, and clean up under those eyes, and swipe that big piece of stinky crust right off there.

Five seconds.....

Unfortunately, she will know longer allow the clippers anywhere near her face.

I was able to clean this side up fairly well with the scissors.

It has to be done very slowly.

She will let you scissor and scissor and then suddenly she will snap.

That is her sign for..."your done, I've had enough!"

 I had clipped her body, and scissored her face the best that she would let me.

That big piece of crust was still there.

I couldn't stand it.

I visualize the owners taking her to the Vet.

Them holding her down while the Vet shaved that crust out with a #50 blade.

It was driving me crazy.

I knew that I could get it off more gently if she would only let me.

I kept asking myself...should I try again?

She is old.

She has had enough.

I had had enough.

I have to work so slowly with her, that a grooming that should take no more than an hour from start to finish, had taken me two hours.

A half an hour just spent on washing her face.

Did I try one last time?

Of course I did.

What can I say...I am pathetic.

Now, to take up for myself, she was doing really well.

She was not pissed about anything.

And, she was feeling so much better with a nice hair cut and most of her face cleaned up.

So, I had my daughter pet her to distract her.

I picked up my clippers and took a quick swipe under the eye.

She jerked away but did not bite....good sign.

One more swipe and that crusty piece would be off!

I waited a few minutes to give her time to forget about what I was doing, and then, one more swipe.

Got it!!

Off.

Gone.

Yuck...

The face still had gooey puss under the eye.

At least the crust was gone.

There was no way that she was going to let me try to clean up that puss.

I had to quit.

I had to let it go.

 It certainly wasn't one of my best grooms.

It killed me to let her go home with her face still messy.

For a 17 year old elderly dog, it was more important that she stay calm and go home happy.

At least that heavy crust is no longer hanging under her eye. :)

I will say, that if she had not let me take those last two swipes with the clipper, she would have gone home with that crust still on her face.

I would have quit...no matter how much it bothered me.

I would have just had to get over it.

Who am I kidding...it is still bugging me that I let her go home with puss on her face.

✂ Happy Grooming, MFF ✂