What Loving a Frightened Puppy Taught Me
Let the party start. Let the fun never end. Let the affirmations roll. Let the changes be seen before another year goes.
The voices that swarm around us at a time when the road curves and one year flows into another, are all too well-known. They are hedonistic, like there's a conspiracy and our pleasures face the threat of being halted soon. They are self-righteous, like there's a want to set things straight, all for good reason I'm sure.
Writing this, on the third day of another new year, I am marvelling at how the curved road just a few days ago, taught me something completely new. After a beach start to Christmas and dilly-dallying through most of the days around, I went over to a friend's place in Goa. Set in the middle of nature, surrounded by man-made structures created with heart, I was introduced to a tiny, shivering being that ran off at the slightest touch.
A frightened puppy that had appeared in my friend's garden a week before I had arrived. Let me try and put in some effort to conjure up his image - brick brown fur closely on a slight body frame, luminous eyes too large for a tiny head, floppy ears determined to outgrow the rest of him. In short, an adorable visual except for a larger aura of fear that threw me off at the very first instance. I happened to notice how even my friend clearly showed his preference for the kitten who had similarly turned up a month back. Tigur was confidence incarnate.
Cocoa was not.
Cocoa's tail would always be a-wag every single time my friend and I returned from an outing. Cocoa's tail would do the dirty dance every morning the door overlooking the garden was opened. My friend had placed a warm quilt on the front porch, that helped Cocoa face the chill during the nights.
Through my three and a half days spent in that house, I got into the habit of observing Cocoa every time I would sit on the bench in the front porch. His slinky eyes took all of me in, his jittery body tentative. One morning as I sat doing this exercise, a strange overwhelm came over my heart. And I cried. In that one mindful instant, I believe I had been taught several things.
- Each little weakness deserves compassion - To have only seen Cocoa as a troubled, fearful being was easy. But as I sat watching him, I realised there's a Cocoa in me. And in the people I know. That lump of fear I sometimes feel in my throat, without being able to explain where it's coming from, that's no different from Cocoa. That curling up of my insides when I experience "unsafe" with no plausible reason on the outside, that's no different from Cocoa. All the anxiety I have seen in relatives and friends, that's no different from Cocoa. Under such dark hours, if I could learn to extend a hand to myself or a person I cared for, perhaps Cocoa too was no different. And if I had it in me to see through Cocoa's fear, perhaps I could feel compassion towards all those anxious (and stressed) people in my life (which includes me), a little more.
- Overcoming fear is a process - Nothing happens overnight. Especially growing into or growing out of a process. A process of fear. Seeing Cocoa's extreme flight response, I remembered times from my own life where survival seemed guaranteed only if I fled. Times where I physically needed to garner that repose or emotionally needed to shut down. And each time my limbic brain sputtered in that process, I added to my overall working a peculiar nervous pattern. I have been told such stories by people I have come to know as well. But lessons are tough and time and again, I have forgotten not to be harsh towards myself. Watching Cocoa cringe put me back in touch with that part of myself, which needs time to grow into and grow out of processes.
- Trust is slow and painful - I don't think I will ever know what makes Cocoa the way he is. In the short stint of my stay, my hypotheses included death of his mother and the entire litter he was born with, someone picking him up randomly and then realising he's a handful, him losing his way etc. Having said that, does it matter what brought about the trauma in the first place? If we safely assume he is traumatised and hope that there are probably better days ahead of him, won't rehabilitation involving care that he finds safe suffice? I know for myself that when there is trauma, small or big, depending on when it happened (that is, whether you were small or big), bringing back trust is slow and perhaps even painful. Watching Cocoa that morning, I was reminded that trust isn't an overnight affair.
On the second day, I took Cocoa slightly by surprise (and not much to his l
iking I guess) and put him on my lap. From scared stiff, his body softened but then in a minute he wanted to be released. And I let him be. That night he kept whining through the night, and a couple of times my friend asked him to stop. The next morning I discovered he had been right outside the door, begging to be let in.
I smiled. I smiled because such things always have a way of working themselves out in the end.
Be it love, be it fear, it is absolutely essential to remember everything is a process.
The voices that swarm around us at a time when the road curves and one year flows into another, are all too well-known. They are hedonistic, like there's a conspiracy and our pleasures face the threat of being halted soon. They are self-righteous, like there's a want to set things straight, all for good reason I'm sure.
Writing this, on the third day of another new year, I am marvelling at how the curved road just a few days ago, taught me something completely new. After a beach start to Christmas and dilly-dallying through most of the days around, I went over to a friend's place in Goa. Set in the middle of nature, surrounded by man-made structures created with heart, I was introduced to a tiny, shivering being that ran off at the slightest touch.
A frightened puppy that had appeared in my friend's garden a week before I had arrived. Let me try and put in some effort to conjure up his image - brick brown fur closely on a slight body frame, luminous eyes too large for a tiny head, floppy ears determined to outgrow the rest of him. In short, an adorable visual except for a larger aura of fear that threw me off at the very first instance. I happened to notice how even my friend clearly showed his preference for the kitten who had similarly turned up a month back. Tigur was confidence incarnate.
Cocoa was not.
Cocoa's tail would always be a-wag every single time my friend and I returned from an outing. Cocoa's tail would do the dirty dance every morning the door overlooking the garden was opened. My friend had placed a warm quilt on the front porch, that helped Cocoa face the chill during the nights.
Through my three and a half days spent in that house, I got into the habit of observing Cocoa every time I would sit on the bench in the front porch. His slinky eyes took all of me in, his jittery body tentative. One morning as I sat doing this exercise, a strange overwhelm came over my heart. And I cried. In that one mindful instant, I believe I had been taught several things.
- Overcoming fear is a process - Nothing happens overnight. Especially growing into or growing out of a process. A process of fear. Seeing Cocoa's extreme flight response, I remembered times from my own life where survival seemed guaranteed only if I fled. Times where I physically needed to garner that repose or emotionally needed to shut down. And each time my limbic brain sputtered in that process, I added to my overall working a peculiar nervous pattern. I have been told such stories by people I have come to know as well. But lessons are tough and time and again, I have forgotten not to be harsh towards myself. Watching Cocoa cringe put me back in touch with that part of myself, which needs time to grow into and grow out of processes.
- Trust is slow and painful - I don't think I will ever know what makes Cocoa the way he is. In the short stint of my stay, my hypotheses included death of his mother and the entire litter he was born with, someone picking him up randomly and then realising he's a handful, him losing his way etc. Having said that, does it matter what brought about the trauma in the first place? If we safely assume he is traumatised and hope that there are probably better days ahead of him, won't rehabilitation involving care that he finds safe suffice? I know for myself that when there is trauma, small or big, depending on when it happened (that is, whether you were small or big), bringing back trust is slow and perhaps even painful. Watching Cocoa that morning, I was reminded that trust isn't an overnight affair.
On the second day, I took Cocoa slightly by surprise (and not much to his l
iking I guess) and put him on my lap. From scared stiff, his body softened but then in a minute he wanted to be released. And I let him be. That night he kept whining through the night, and a couple of times my friend asked him to stop. The next morning I discovered he had been right outside the door, begging to be let in.
I smiled. I smiled because such things always have a way of working themselves out in the end.
Be it love, be it fear, it is absolutely essential to remember everything is a process.
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