Bad Dog Or Bad Day? The Reality Of Trigger Stacking
Haven’t you ever had a bad day?
The kind of day where everything aligns perfectly, or rather imperfectly. Not enough sleep and waking with a raging headache, followed by a flat tire on your drive to work, leading to reprimand from your boss for being late to work, a stubbed toe walking around the corner to get coffee only to find out the coffee maker is broken. You then get to return home to a heated argument with your significant other
Trigger on top of trigger on top of trigger…
On these trigger-stacked days, it’s difficult to be or feel like our best selves and for our dogs they can totally relate. Well sort of. They aren’t ever quite as upset about a broken coffee maker, but compare it to a day full starting with a stressful vet visit, toss in a thunderstorm, a toddler bumping into them and then you can for some that creates the recipe for Growl! Snap!
I hear regularly, “Their behavior was unprovoked and came out of nowhere!” But we must look deeper than that. Our dogs can 100% have bad days too, and these bad days can absolutely affect their tolerance level, irritability, impulsivity, and reactivity.
Throughout my early 20s, I struggled deeply with depression, and this made even the smallest triggers difficult to cope with. I had quite a few bad days stretched over what seemed like years, and somehow that all snowballed into one really difficult night.
After a game of darts with some friends at our local bar, I sat there and sipped on my Pabst Blue Ribbon. I use the term friends loosely to describe who they were to me. See these were “Joey’s” friends. I was just the ex that had been accepted into their elite click, even after the breakup. When I was in a relationship with “Joey”, I had pretty much isolated myself from any other family and friends that I had outside of his circle...so as pathetic as it sounds, his friends were all I had. I was told that Joey would be showing up soon and that there would be an after-party following our bar shenanigans. They made sure to tell me that Joey would be accompanied by a lady. The same lady he happened to be sleeping with while we were together. I was told all of this because they didn’t want “it to be weird for me”.
Cool, cool, cool, cool.
He smelled of cigarette smoke and Rumple Minz Peppermint Liqueur as he walked through the front door of the bar. I pretended like I didn’t see him. I pretended like it didn’t feel like a punch in the gut every time I saw him like my heart didn’t sink every time he spoke. As I finished my beer, I decided to save myself the embarrassment and heartache and leave for the night. Tears, chain-smoked cigarettes, and Pink Floyd kept me company on my drive home...Ding. Ding. A text notification and my roommate reminding me that rent is late yet again and asking when I’ll be able to get her the money I owe so we don’t get evicted. I don’t have an answer, because I don’t have the money. My bank account was over drafted when I closed out my tab at the bar. I can’t ask my parents for money...not again. Asking for money leads to a lecture about how I need to do better at managing my finances. What am I doing with my life anyway? Dropped out of college for what? I need to be doing better. But I am doing my best, it’s never enough. I need a drink...followed by regretful drunk texts confessing my ever-present love for “Joe”...met with a “Go to Sleep” reply...and then radio silence. Alone at last. The way my depression liked it. Depression is a weird monster. A sinkhole of loneliness that you can’t get out of by yourself, but you won’t allow yourself the help of anyone else nor do you feel deserving of anyone’s help. I cried in my dark room that night until my head felt like a balloon and my face swelled up so much that I couldn’t breathe. I don’t want to do this anymore. I can’t do this anymore. Make it stop. I don’t want to feel like this anymore. I don’t want to feel.
I won’t go into any detail about the steps I took to try to end my life that night, most of it is just a blur anyways. I will say that it wasn’t planned ahead of time and it’s not something I ever thought I would attempt. As I relived this day in my head to write this blog, I honestly felt embarrassed and ashamed. Not embarrassed of my attempt to commit suicide, but because the series of events that led to my suicide attempt seem so insignificant. Like my experience wasn’t traumatic enough to warrant such a rash decision. So your boyfriend cheated on you, you alienated yourself from your friends, you didn’t have enough money for your rent, you were struggling with depression, and?...but that’s the whole point. That’s trigger stacking at its finest. One stressful thing after another after another created a recipe for an overwhelming overreaction.
We don’t always see the effects of trigger stacking on the surface, especially when it comes to our dogs that can’t communicate how they’re feeling verbally. It’s so important for us to not only become aware of their body language to determine their state of stress in various situations, but to be understanding of their thresholds and how those thresholds vary from day to day. Sadie’s patience for random strangers rushing up to pet her may be excellent one day….but if she just left a stressful veterinary appointment and her tolerance level may be different when faced with similar circumstances. Tucker may normally love kids, but if he develops painful arthritis, he may overreact when bumped into by his favorite kiddo. Sampson could be super dog friendly, but anxiety from a move to a new home could lower his threshold for pushy adolescent dogs. These aren’t bad dogs, they’re just having bad days.
While our dogs don’t express themselves in the same way we do as humans, they are living, breathing, feeling beings that have reactions molded by their experiences and emotions. So the next time your dog has a reaction “out of the blue” “unexpected” or “unprovoked”, take a look at the context. How has your dog’s day been? Their week? How are they feeling? Have there been any stressful changes? The stress they experience is defined by their perception, not ours. Has their reaction been intensified by the pain they’re in? Keep in mind pain may not always be visible. Anxiety, depression, PTSD, and other mental illnesses are also forms of pain. Be your dog’s support system, and listen to their body language. Our dogs deserve forgiveness, compassion and empathy...and so do you.
Be kind to your dog and yourself. We are all doing our best, and it is enough. You are enough.