Get the Meds!

One of Isaac's tasks is to bring my medication when I am having an anxiety attack.  I have meds I take on an as needed basis, and they usually stop an anxiety attack in its tracks, or at least calm me down enough that I can take other steps to help myself, preventing subsequent self-injury or even suicidal impulses.

In addition, those anxiety attacks tend to spiral out of control and go on and on and on.  Something very small can trigger them.  For instance, say I am making dinner and accidentally burn the garlic bread.  The rest of the meal may be fine, but I probably won't be able to eat it, because I will be so upset and angry at myself for burning the bread.  I know that's not exactly anxiety, but I don't know what else to call it, so I refer to it as an anxiety attack.  Instead of being disappointed that I burned the bread and then moving on, I will have urges to hurt myself.  I will cry, for a long time.  I will be unable to do anything else all evening because I will be so upset that I burned the bread.  There is a good chance I'll wake up the next morning very depressed, feeling guilty about everything, still angry at myself, not even thinking about the bread anymore but feeling incapable of doing anything right.

Getting my medication at the beginning of one of these episodes can prevent all that.

The problem is, when I'm having one of these episodes, I usually cannot think clearly enough to remember to take the medication myself.  If  Mike reminds me to take it, I will, and it almost always helps.  But he's not always here, and even if he is, he doesn't always think of reminding me to take it soon enough.

In comes Isaac.

Initially, his trainer taught him to respond to the command, "Get the meds!"  My medication for anxiety is kept in a little vinyl pouch that is easy for him to spot and carry to me.  Having the medication in the pouch also assures that the bottle won't accidentally come open and spill, and he cannot accidentally eat any of the pills.

The trainer tried to mimic my behavior when I start to have an anxiety attack, which often includes rocking back and forth and crying, and she did teach Isaac to bring her the medication pouch when she did those things, but I guess her fake anxiety attacks didn't resemble my real anxiety attacks, because while Isaac would respond to my command of "Get the meds," he didn't respond to my anxiety attacks, real or fake.

So I would rock back and forth, make sure I had his attention, and after a minute or so of rocking, tell him to "Get the meds!"  I didn't bother with fake crying because I figured my fake crying wouldn't sound like my real crying, anyway.  Isaac now responds to the verbal command or to my simply rocking back and forth by getting the medication pouch and bringing it to me.

I usually keep it in the same spot all the time, but occasionally I put it somewhere else for some reason.  So lately we've been working on putting it in different places on purpose so that he has to look for it.  He will go to its usual spot first, and if it's not there, look around the room.  If he can't find it after a minute or two, I will give him a hint by pointing in the right direction.  So far, I haven't asked him to get it in a different room, only in the living room.  We'll work on other rooms later.

I have a certain spot on the couch where I sit most often, but I do move occasionally, so I've also been working on sitting or standing in different places in the living room and giving him the cue to bring the meds.  Later, I'll work on asking when I'm in another room and he'll have to go to the living room to get them.

Isaac likes to bring me my meds.  He likes doing all his tasks, really, but this is one of his favorites.  In fact, sometimes he brings them to me when I don't need them and haven't asked.  I think maybe he is just hoping for a treat when he does that, since he usually gets a treat when he brings them on command.  If I didn't ask him to bring them and I don't need them, though, I just take them from him and say, "Not now."  No treat.

One night, he'd brought them to me unnecessarily several times and it was starting to get on my nerves, so I put them up where he could not reach them.  Later, I started to have an anxiety attack.  Isaac knew where the meds were but couldn't reach them, and he got very upset about that.  He really, really wanted to help me.

Updated to add: I was finally able to get a few videos of Isaac doing some of his tasks, including bringing my medication to me.  For some reason I was not able to put the video itself on this blog, but you can watch it on Youtube.