<p>We had our second t-storm of the season last night. No one was home during the first storm and my poor 10 yr old cocker was so scared she went into the basement and peed on a bed.<br>
Last night she climbed up on my lap and just shook until she finally fell asleep.
In other years should would be scared but I think it’s getting worse as she gets older. Should I talk to the Vet about some medication?</p>
<p>B vitamins can help the nervous system.
or you might try this
[Natural</a> stress relief for pets - Rescue® Remedy Pet](<a href=“http://www.rescueremedy.com/pets/]Natural”>http://www.rescueremedy.com/pets/)</p>
<p>I haven’t tried it- but then my lab was bred to be a hunting dog, so even when the Blue Angels flew over our house, she barely blinked.</p>
<p>If you get a lot of thunder storms, you could try counter-conditioning. At the first sign of a storm, the treats come out. You keep doling out the treats until the storm passes. People who’ve done it swear their dog comes to love thunder. </p>
<p>There are calming medications you can use but they can have the side effect of causing anxiety so you’d want to try them in advance to see if they help your dog relax. </p>
<p>My dogs have issues with thunder and with fireworks. We get thunderstorms about once every other year and fireworks only on the Fourth. I just take them down to the basement and watch TV with the volume up ;-)</p>
<p>Our dog freaks when the barometric pressure changes. Doesn’t even need thunder to be neurotic! The vet gave us Neutra-Calm for her, but the pills are huge and I couldn’t tell much difference. The dog also has an Rx for a mild anti-anxiety med. </p>
<p>We tried the treats, but she won’t eat if she’s freaked. She goes down to the basement, where I have a HEPA filter going for white noise, and cowers until she falls asleep.</p>
<p>This is a big issue at our house, since it was a thunderstorm last year that prompted her to slip out of the house, break through the fence and get hit by a car.</p>
<p>It’s always brontophobic dogs and cats afraid of vacuum cleaners. Some of them seem to be hard-wired that way.</p>
<p>We give our dogs children’s Benadryl…liquid…(I mix it with p-nut butter). I get the Wal-mart generic - quite cheap.</p>
<p>Quote from websites:</p>
<p>*My vet and others I’ve asked about this specifically say you should administer up to 1 mg/lb every 8 hours (or 3 times a day – tid). So if you have a 20 lb. dog, it’s 20 mg of diphenhydramine. This is higher than the equivalent dose for humans, but nevertheless seems to be the accepted dose for dogs. *</p>
<p>*Diphenhydramine (Benadryl®) – Dogs and cats can be given 1-2 mg/lb every eight hours. **This can be used to treat allergic reactions, and it also has some anti-anxiety and anti-vertigo effects. As a general rule, it is pretty safe stuff. *The primary side effect is drowsiness, so please do not allow your pet to drink alcohol or operate heavy machinery while taking it. from vetpets.net</p>
<p>I have never used this product so I can’t say if it works but it might be worth trying.
[The</a> Anxiety Wrap - End Thunderstorm Fear - A Product that helps Dogs & Cats overcome their fears and anxieties using the gentle technique of Maintained Pressure](<a href=“http://www.anxietywrap.com%5DThe”>http://www.anxietywrap.com)</p>
<p>We have a 13 year cocker that shakes like a leaf during the thunder storm. We have to realize now that she is going deaf that it is not the thunder but the lighting that scare her. She is so terrified of the falshing light that cant even take our camera out now bvecause she associates the flash to whatever it is that scared her. There are 2 ways I can calm her down during a storm 1) turn all the lights on in the room, have her sit on my lap and literally cover head with a blanket while I cuddle her. 2) bring her down the basement to a room we have that has no windows and cuddle with her on the couch until it passes. It breaks our heart to watch her shake and know she is scared. We have found that when we are not home in a storm she goes to the Brightest place in the house trying to get away from the flashing light. When we have to leave and there is storm coming we have a small bathroom with blackout curtains that we leave the light on and the door open so that she can go in there.</p>
<p>Fortunately, I have not had to use this product but I have read good things about it. You may want to check it out.</p>
<p>[Stress</a> Control: Comfort Zone® Plug-In for Dogs](<a href=“http://www.drsfostersmith.com/product/prod_display.cfm?c=3307+11260+13043&pcatid=13043]Stress”>http://www.drsfostersmith.com/product/prod_display.cfm?c=3307+11260+13043&pcatid=13043)</p>
<p>Thank you everyone!
m2ck - I was tempted to give her benadryl last night!
percussiondad - it has occured ot me that she might be going deaf or at least losing some of her hearing. the flashing lightening did scare her. However, I have also noticed when there are times when the kids are home and it gets “noisy” in the house; i.e. several kids being loud and rowdy she goes down to the basement and gets nervous.</p>
<p>I definitely have some good ideas to try! Thanks!</p>
<p>The Comfort Zone might work. There are wipes and spray as well as the plug in … which would be more cost effective. A closed, padded crate might help. Benedryl sounds good to me … used as a mild tranquilizer in psych hospitals.</p>
<p>omg…thought it was only our dog that this happened to; it gets so bad over the summer that the girls don’t like to leave her alone if they are supposed to go out…thanks for starting this thread…</p>
<p>Go to your vet and get a prescription for Clomicalm. It helped my Dad’s pit/catahoula who had been previously sent to the shelter for separation anxiety. It also helped their other shelter catahoula who is terrified of thunderstorms. I note that my Aussie wasn’t afraid at all until he got old and deaf. The omni-directional nature of the subsonic vibration from thunder is bad for dogs in that there is no obvious direction to run!</p>
<p>Justamomof4-- we still think ours has selective hearing because we cant go anywhere near the fridge without her being there but we do know she is totally deaf now because on the weekend she was sound asleep and snoring (louder than most humans) when I burnt some toast and the smoke detecor went off and she slept right thorugh it as we are rushing around trying to turn it off when we finished turning it off there she was sitting beside the counter smelling toast. Kind of funny really but she is such a perfect pet that we bend over backwards to help her when she gets scared. I have been up all night many a time just holding her and rubbing her head to calm her down. She doesnt bark or anything, she jusy quivers to the point we were afraid she was convulsing but the vet said no she just a chicken in storms.</p>
<p>Our golden retriever has always been terrified of thunder, and of course, she can hear it long before we do. She used to go behind the bed, but she refused to back out. As an adult dog, she would bend herself in two to turn around in that narrow space, and she actually hurt her back. We had to block off the bed, and she was upset for a while, until she discovered an upstairs closet. At the first sound of thunder, she heads upstairs. </p>
<p>Now we have to be sure the door is open so she can get in, because she will claw at it. This is a tall closet with a high bar for hanging floor length items. The only bad thing about this was that she had been doing this for about 6 months (we get frequent thunder storms) when I realized that I had hung a floor length gray wool cape with black satin lining there. It took me a week of brushing, using tape, lint rollers, and tossing in the dryer with a damp towel to get the dog hair off it. Now it’s in a dry cleaner bag–top and bottom!</p>
<p>justamom you must not live that far from me…had the first t-storms last night. They were bad - with hail. Tons of lightning. Poor corgi was a mess. We tried not to play into it, but the whimpering really tugs at the heart strings.</p>
<p>nice suggestions everyone.</p>