First major (minor?) dog crisis

Elsa was due today for her heartworm pill. Like most pills, you give them once a month and it kills pretty much all internal parasites. Luckily for me, I'm on a schedule trying to get her "stuff you have to sit still for ten minutes to get done" (advantix, pill, nail trim - I do it all in one go) day to the first of the month, so I've been doing it a few days earlier every time.

This is what it's like. 

I'd noticed that she'd been acting oddly for a few days. She'd either scarf her meals down like she was starving or peck like a bird, she'd wake up early and cry for an hour, she was sleeping a lot more and attacking a lot less, and a ton of little things that you notice when you have a totally-healthy-and-not-at-all-unreasonable-obsession-is-kind-of-a-strong-word interest in your dog.

I gave her the pill on Monday, a few days before she was due, and since the moment I gave her the pill that morning, she started having accidents in the house. HP got incredibly frustrated, since she'd been doing so well on the housebreaking front, and I told him that it was because she'd been doing well that this was a bad sign.

She spent the rest of the day being restless and overly affectionate and refusing to eat. I got increasingly worried. Sure enough, that night, she passed a small, but unmistakably adult roundworm.

A picture of a baby wallaby instead. Because roundworms are gross.

Despite having seen infested dogs in my time working with them, that night I engaged frantically in many rounds of Ask Dr. Internets on all sorts of questions. Everything pretty much said the same thing: dog roundworms are common, easy to kill, and even if they do pass to people (rare) they can't survive.

The next morning, I was at the vet as soon as it opened, asking them what I should do. I gave the techs and doctors a good laugh, even the ones who didn't speak any English - apparently "oh god what do I doooo" panic translates just as well as it does in the States.

"Let me guess - first time she's had worms?"
"Yes!"
"Did she eat this morning? Poop? Want to play?"
"Yes..."
"She's fine; the pills kill everything. Even the eggs. She'll be clean in two days. Stop letting her eat dirt and grass and bugs."
"...Bugs, too?"
"Yep, good luck with that."

Apparently, there's no monthly med on the market that prevents worms, just kills them on a regular cycle. Worms here are very common, and the girls told me that as long as I kept up with the pills, I may see the occasional one every few months or so. It's the people that don't give their dogs the pills and don't clean up after them that cause the big problems, they added, and that meant that the lot behind my house where Elsa goes to the bathroom is probably a haven for all the stray cats (huge problem here) and lazy dog owners (huge problem everywhere).

I thanked them profusely for putting up with me (they told me it was funny and that crazy dog owners are the same in every country) and even though they said it wasn't necessary, I washed all of Elsa's bedding and toys. For my own peace of mind.

BECAUSE IT MAKES ME FEEL BETTER OKAY

I felt guilty at first, because I strongly believe that it's my responsibility as her owner to make sure that she's healthy, but both HP and the vet reassured me that I was doing everything right and that common parasites are totally normal in humid subtropical climates. Also, Elsa probably didn't have any damn idea what was going on.

Vet recommended that if I really wanted to help her out after the de-worming, I should make sure all of her nutritional needs were okay. Sweet potato, thoroughly-cooked salmon, and a bit more food than usual would give her a good start. And changing her pee spot. So now we're back to a litterbox, except it's outside on our porch. She's doing well so far - and now she doesn't whine about having to go out in the rain. Less wet dog smell, too.

And I'll bet anything that all Elsa remembers from this whole ordeal is that one day she slept a lot, but the next she got big chunks of two of her favorite foods and doesn't have to get wet to pee any more.

Ignorance is bliss, I guess.

And the penultimate stop is leapt over.

Elsa has her clearance and her stamps from APHIS. Everything went through.

this confetti gun could only be more epic if it shot out more confetti guns.

Last step: Inspection in Japan.

T minus 13 hours.

How to restore my faith in humanity in three easy steps

Rhode Islanders were like "Eh, close the windows and bring the cat in."

Step 1: Have a hurricane knock out power to your vet the day of your export exam.


I have to admit, I had a meltdown when it occurred to me that my vet, who had all of Elsa's medical records, wouldn't have access to them two days before I left the country.

I hated that Japan requires the exam to be within two days of departure.

I hated that most of the area around my vet got power back within twelve hours, but not my vet's office.

And I especially hated that Elsa would likely not be able to come across, after all the work, time, money, and emotional investment that the process had cost me.

As anyone watching my twitter or facebook feed will tell you, I broke. I was in tears for at least an hour, completely unreasonable. Until I wore myself out and passed out for a few hours. Elsa didn't give a crap, as she was tucked away nicely in her bed.

This morning at 8am, I began my barrage of calls.

The cape is very important.

Step 2: Find a very popular vet clinic who will squeeze you in


I had made at least a dozen calls looking for USDA-accredited vets in the area, and most practices that had them said "We won't know until the vet comes in at X:XXpm, sorry."

But finally, I found Povar Animal Hospital, one that my mother used to frequent as a child, who not only squeezed me in at 5:45pm, but as part of the export exam prep, called APHIS and verified my appointment and paperwork for me. They asked if I could come in early to drop off the papers for them to check as well as fill out the New Client papers, and I came by with the export forms, titer results, and a Box o' Joe and carton of munchkins for the staff. There were audible cheers as I put the boxes on the counter.

"When someone saves your ass," I said, "it's nice to at least buy them coffee."

So I went around doing errands for a while, accomplishing only a few but very important things, then swung back around to pick up the furball. The clinic was very pretty and very clean, the staff was great, and as I paid for the visit, I checked the receipt.

They only charged me the cost of her vaccine and the export exam. No new client fee, no office visit, no nothing.

"We waived it for you," the tech said. "Special circumstances and all that."

Yeah.

Step 3: Government Officials who really understand


I had previously spoken to the APHIS office, who told me that in order to endorse the papers, they'd need to see her rabies certificates for each vaccination.

Which were on my vet's computer. Which was without power.

Well, fuck.

I called this morning and explained my circumstances, and the woman (who I now know as L*) said that while the certificates were procedure, the circumstances merited a little... leeway. My vet had signed off on the vaccinations provided for the titer, which was good, and the paperwork had the manufacturer and expiration dates for each one.

 If I could bring in whatever documentation I had, she said, they'd make it work somehow. If my vet got power back before my appointment and they could get the certificates, great.

I could have cried.

Seriously my life.

In Summary:


After a hurricane comes rainbows and kittens.

But seriously, not only did I get a last-minute lifesaving replacement vet, but also a very compassionate APHIS employee who saved me from a panic attack.

Project Elsa-Beast is fully back on track, less than 12 hours after total system failure. What a mindfuck.

T minus five days

I'm in a surprisingly peaceful state of mind right now. My YAY:OHNOES ratio at any given time is about 50:1, which is remarkable for a bouncing ball of neurotic tension like me.

I went on a shopping spree for new clothes for Japan. Lightweight, breathable fabrics, less low-cut jeans, layering tanks, that kind of thing.

And bras. Because Japan a) will not have my size and b) puts frills on everything.

Why would I want frills there? Why?

So the essentials are there. I also shipped across 90% of Elsa's supplies to arrive by Monday or Tuesday, and the dog food will arrive at Adam's door any day. I switched her to the new stuff here as well, and she goes bonkers over it. The cats try to steal it, too - so taste is clearly not an issue.

The Animal Quarantine Service has been awesome. A few days ago, I received this e-mail:
---
Dear Sxxxxx Xxxxx,

Have you prepared the certificates for your pet ?
If there are any omissions in the certification when you arrive in Japan,
the animal must be returned to the exporting country on your own responsibility
or undergo a detention inspection at our facility for the necessary quarantine period up to 180 days.

We can check your certificates before your arrival.
Could you send the following documents to us before getting endorsement by fax or e-mail (within 1MB)? (It is too difficult to correct them after getting endorsement.)

1.Form A, Form C 1/3, Form 2/3 and Form C 3/3.
2.Certificate for Rabies serological test issued by the designated laboratory.
3."APPROVAL OF IMPORT INSPECTION OF ANIMALS"

Note: These original documents are required when you arrive in Japan.

I would appreciate your response.
田中　咲子/Sakiko Xxxxxx
---
I was like "Proof them for errors before I get there? OKAY."

So all of her paperwork checks out, and I just need to have my vet and APHIS fill out their respective sections.

AND my visa is in my passport and ready, AND I got my approved Yakkan Shomei in the mail, AND I made copies of my birth certificate, passport, marriage license, and tax exemption letter.

My schedule for the home stretch:


Today: Omiyage shopping, farewell party, packing
Tomorrow: Packing, banking (travelers checks ftw), do any and all last-minute clothes alterations
Sunday: Packing, movie with Dad
Monday: Elsa's vet evaluation
Tuesday: Elsa's APHIS appointment, work
Wednesday: Fly out of Boston at 9:30am. Arrive in Dulles at 12:30, arrive in Tokyo 3:00pm local time,
arrive in Okinawa 8:45pm, where HP, his aunts (!) and his boss (!!) will pick me and Elsa up from the airport.

I've tried to keep my schedule relatively free to leave wiggle room for last-minute things, like shopping or paperwork or mental breakdowns.

All in all, though, despite the incoming hurricane? Everything's pretty okay so far.

And there he goes.

It's 8:30 am.

I slept maybe an hour and a half last night.

I woke up at 3:00, dragged HP out of bed, and he picked Elsa up out of her kennel to say goodbye. She knew something was up, as it was 3am and he never picks her right up out of the kennel. And she's no fool - she's known something was up for weeks now. She clung to him, scrambling up onto his shoulder with a panic that read "something is going on I don't like it what's happening OH GOD" and refused to relax like she always does when he holds her.

This, of course, did not ease any of the anxieties he had about leaving.

I kid you not, this is exactly what her expression looked like.

We stopped at Walgreens for wedding prints (which was an adventure in itself) to show to the kids and his family, then spent the drive to the airport chatting about this ridiculous thing we were doing and watching the sun rise.

I had made it through this whole experience without crying. But when all of his bags were unloaded and he kissed me goodbye, I will totally own that I broke a little. I was exhausted, this whole ordeal was intense, and I still had a long day ahead of me.

When I got back to what was left of the apartment, Elsa was awake and pacing. I grabbed a box of clothes and the necessary dog supplies, tossed them in the truck over my moving boxes, and took her out to pee before the trek to RI.

Seriously, I'm surprising the hell out of myself with this newfound stamina. Two days of information overload, packing and no sleep, and I still managed to complete three one-hour car trips. And am still fairly awake, if unhappily so. Badass level of stamina, people.

Maybe I should grow a beard.

I couldn't find her car harness, but Elsa knows how to ride in a car. She sat obligingly in the passenger seat, but was visibly nervous. So when she inched over to ask for affection, she got it, and alternated between staring out the windows and sleeping with her head in my lap. It was the first time she'd really asked for reassurance, and while it did freak me out a little bit, I was super impressed that she understands car manners enough to know to ask rather than bulldoze into the driver's lap.

She was super ecstatic to arrive at my parents' place, as it's the land of Grandma and Grandpa Have All the Best Parties. She ran around in their huge gardens, scaring moles and bees and being a general terror until I brought her inside and kicked the cats out of my bedroom. In went her kennel, litterbox and toy bucket, and somehow she just knows that this time was different. Instead of tearing through the house like she normally does, she only went a few feet beyond the bedroom door before ducking back in and crawling into her kennel. Even now, the only time she's spent out in the living room (previously her favorite place to rampage) has been velcroed to my feet and being extraordinarily clingy.

Maybe she's just tired.

Or maybe she understands a lot more than I give her credit for.

I hate booking flights

After a grueling battle with various airlines, I now have my ticket to Okinawa all set and ready, and all three legs of the journey notified that I'll have a dog with me.  It's a huge weight off of my mind. AND 24 HOURS IN TRANSIT. 3hrs, 2 hr layover, 14 hours, 2 hr layover, 3hrs.

I also sent off my Notification for Importing Dogs after (yay, more fighting!) another battle, this time with the fax machine. Luckily, this morning I awoke to a message in my inbox from Narita customs saying that they'd received my notification and had a few questions. And now I just sit back and wait for my confirmation number!

Here's hoping the rest of the 363287654834 sheets of paperwork go as smoothly.

Looking at airfare

Looks like United is the only carrier to allow carry-on dogs on international flights. That works fine for me - it's $125 to keep her in the cabin, $225 to check her in the cargo hold. And it's so worth it for her to not be in the big, noisy, terrifying cargo hold alone.

Now to talk to the vet about possible sedatives. Yes? No? The second leg of the journey is 11 hours, so I'm not sure how restless she's going to get. Maybe just stuffing a kong with something really difficult will be good enough.

Bringing Elsa to Japan: T minus 107 Days

The first thing you need to know is that I started this process back in November. And that's the advice I give to anyone thinking of applying and bringing their dog: start prepping now. 

If you know nothing else about my process, it's that I function well on timelines, and that's the one thing that the importation literature defines quite clearly. You miss so much as a day or a single sheet of paper, and the 12-hour wait period turns into a 6-month quarantine. Needless to say, I was totally on top of this since the day HP decided to apply for the program.

The other thing to note is that my vet's practice is awesome. I'm on a pet insurance plan, and though they only get pets who need to travel internationally every so often, they had procedures in place. And they bent the rules for me: because of my schedule, I could drop Elsa off in the morning, they'd do what needed to be done, and I could pick her up on my lunch break, only paying the supplies' cost. They never charged me an office visit fee, which saved me a lot of money.

Point the third: This can be damn expensive. As I mentioned in my "Here's the dog!" post, my dog is part of my livelihood, and not just a personal pet. I also was very cautious to budget a large chunk of money for unforeseen medical expenses her first year of life even before I signed a contract with her breeder. I'll be putting down how much everything cost me, but unless you have a similar arrangement with your vet, don't bank on getting a lot of breaks.

So, here's my timeline, based off of the (adorably illustrated) official guidelines in the link to the left. I gave myself some leeway, but not much.

--

11/17/10 - 287 days [DONE]
Elsa is spayed. While she's under, I have her microchipped.
NOTE: Make sure the microchip your vet uses has the International ISO (11784 and 11785)  standard or Japanese readers can't read it and it's worthless.
Spent: $50 on microchip.

12/10/10 - 264 days [DONE]
She's already had one, but Japan requires two rabies vaccinations after microchipping, no less than 31 days apart. So Elsa gets another rabies vaccination on her 3-week spay checkup.
NOTE: Most vets already do this, but the vaccine has to be killed-tissue in order to be valid. Still doesn't hurt to check.
Spent: $15 on vaccine.

1/11/11 - 233 days [DONE]
Elsa has her second mandatory rabies vaccine, 31 days on the nose.
Spent: $15 on vaccine.


2/15/11 - 198 days [DONE]
Elsa has her titer (measure of rabies antibodies, making sure the vaccines took) drawn. The vet draws and labels it for free, spins it into serum, and I put it in my cooler to bring to the UPS outpost.
NOTE: The only laboratory that Japan accepts in the USA is the Kansas State rabies lab, and they're just as much a stickler for paperwork that Japan is. Mislabel something, and your sample is worthless. For what it's worth, though, the staff are very friendly and happy to answer your bajillion questions.
Spent: $5 on ice packs, $80 for the titer, $120 for overnight mail.

2/15/11 - 198 days [CURRENT]
Wait six months. No, seriously. From the day the titer is drawn, the dog has a 180-day wait period in the country of origin. No trips to Canada, folks.
NOTE: The wait is at least 180 days, and the titer is good for 2 years, so if you wanted to get this done very early and just wait around comfortably, you definitely could.

3/3/11 - TITER RESULTS [DONE]
It could take anywhere from 3 to 10 weeks to get your serum antibody results, and they need to be at least 0.5 IU/mL to be acceptable. Imagine my surprise when Elsa's comes back 4.68, roughly 9 times as immune as necessary. Rabies lab called her "robust and resilient" with a laugh when I called to make sure I hadn't raised the Hulk. Guess that's what happens when your pup gets 3 rabies vaccines within a six-month span.

Back to waiting. Yayy.

Between 7/1 and 7/15 - T > 40 days
Notify Narita Airport that I'm importing the dog.
NOTE: The application, and instructions on how to fill it out in English, are on the linked website.

Between 8/21 and 8/30 - T 7-2 days
Have an APHIS vet fill out the Export Certificate and vet forms.

9/1/11 - 0 days
Get my ass to JFK Int'l and get ready to fly to Tokyo.

--

And that's the plan.

Elsa is small enough (six pounds, I'm not kidding) that I'm going to see if she can fly in the cabin with me. So, between her and my laptop, I should have my hands full for the long 12 hours it'll take to get to Narita.

I'll update on this process as it goes on, but for now, this is where things stand. I feel like such a boss right now.

The Tiny Tornado

Otherwise known as Elsa, Elsa-Beast or Brat.

I have an extraordinarily ferocious year-old papillon. She loves shredding things and eating clementines. And she's one of the most intelligent creatures I've ever met.

this is my brat.

I've worked with a lot of dogs in my time, but this one is by far the easiest I've ever had to train, and the most naturally eager to please. I've taught her a bunch of meaningless commands (ex: spin in circles, "where's my nose?", "go bother your papa") just to keep her occupied. She's litterbox-trained, as we live on the third floor and her bladder is the size of a walnut. She trained herself (I can't take credit for this) to sit at the door when we're out in public or visiting a friend when she needs to go outside.

We've worked hard together. She's wonderfully socialized (except she still goes barreling toward toddlers with reckless abandon and tail wagging), has excellent leash manners, won't take anything from your hands that you haven't told her to, and instantly switches into "lap dog" mode whenever she's in a lap or pair of arms. It's taken a lot of trial and error and a lot of work, but now that we've got the basics down, I'm looking forward to training her on agility courses and obedience trials.

This dog isn't just my pet; she's an integral part of my life and career. Which is why I'm going to be bringing her with us overseas.

Yes, it's difficult. Yes, it's stressful. And yes, there are virtually zero procedure resources for those of us looking to bring dogs over to Japan. Just a lot of forum posters saying "Don't bring your cat!" That is super unhelpful, internet. Thanks. But I can't picture being away from her for 2-4 years and still have the bond necessary to run trials, and I started this blog in the first place to make resources where we have none.

So I'm going to document every single thing I do to bring her across.