rpuckett
Well-Known Member
I have always been around animals, and been the person people call on when they need help training a dog, catching a stray, or really any sort of situation. I have been helping my mother in law with her dog, who has a myriad of behavior issues as far as training and diet. My MIL is in poor health so I have also been periodically bathing and going running with the dog just to help out. Recently she asked me to cut his toenails as they are quite overgrown. It was definitely not my first rodeo as I cut rabbit nails all the time with no problems, and at least somewhat regularly help others in nail trimming for dogs/rabbits/things with nails. She bought a nice pair of nail clippers with a safety guard and everything. So it took me and two other people, the dog on a leash and restrained to even get a hold of his feet to see what was going on. Which is an improvement because he used to snap at you if you touched his feet at all. Anyways, I digress; I was able to trim a bit off of each nail on the front feet, but when I got to the back foot, things went to h***. I snipped a bit off on the nail and the dog cries out, my MIL freaks out, the dog starts bleeding from the nail (It wasn't gushing, but you know nails can bleed a good amount if you hit the quick). And I am keeping it together on the outside, but now I am freaking out too. The general consensus from the family becomes that I must not really know that much about animals, even after I explain that if the nail is overgrown sometimes the quick is out of place in the nail. The dog is fine of course, quickly forgets about it and stops bleeding.
That story is all well and good, but now I am so scared to cut my buns nails. I keep overthinking about the dog, and how I felt confident in what I was doing and hurt him (even if it was just for a minute/something minor.) And now the rabbits are a bit overgrown and it is just getting worse, because the longer they get, the more afraid I am going to hurt them. It seems so dumb even just typing it out. I have been cutting their nails for 5 years, and trimming rabbit (and dog) nails for years before that. Why did this shake me up so bad, and how can I overcome it so that my buns don't have to live with long uncomfy nails? Also, someone else tell me their stories so I don't feel completely insane about all this.
That story is all well and good, but now I am so scared to cut my buns nails. I keep overthinking about the dog, and how I felt confident in what I was doing and hurt him (even if it was just for a minute/something minor.) And now the rabbits are a bit overgrown and it is just getting worse, because the longer they get, the more afraid I am going to hurt them. It seems so dumb even just typing it out. I have been cutting their nails for 5 years, and trimming rabbit (and dog) nails for years before that. Why did this shake me up so bad, and how can I overcome it so that my buns don't have to live with long uncomfy nails? Also, someone else tell me their stories so I don't feel completely insane about all this.