Cody was an abused dog who lost his home to Hurricane Katrina. He was a stray on the streets of New Orleans for 3 months before he was captured. He became Lauren’s foster dog. Cody was the most emotionally damaged dog Lauren had worked with, and she knew that he would always need a therapeutic home; she adopted him. Two years later, Lauren was also abandoned and alone when her husband of 29 years ended their marriage.
Cody and Lauren healed together over the next several years. He helped her recover from the loss of her marriage, a hysterectomy, a suicide attempt, and unemployment. When she couldn’t find a job in the U.S., Lauren moved to China as an English teacher; Cody went as her service dog. In China, Cody became an independent dog, while Lauren worked on becoming an independent woman.
They moved to Alaska after three years in China, first living on a remote and isolated island in the Aleutians, and then moving to a less-remote, but still-isolated island in Southeast Alaska. Cody’s evolution, from a “quivering mass of dog flesh” to a confident and capable dog, was an inspiration to the people he met along the way.
Cody was an abused dog who lost his home to Hurricane Katrina. He was a stray on the streets of New Orleans for 3 months before he was captured. He became Lauren’s foster dog. Cody was the most emotionally damaged dog Lauren had worked with, and she knew that he would always need a therapeutic home; she adopted him. Two years later, Lauren was also abandoned and alone when her husband of 29 years ended their marriage.
Cody and Lauren healed together over the next several years. He helped her recover from the loss of her marriage, a hysterectomy, a suicide attempt, and unemployment. When she couldn’t find a job in the U.S., Lauren moved to China as an English teacher; Cody went as her service dog. In China, Cody became an independent dog, while Lauren worked on becoming an independent woman.
They moved to Alaska after three years in China, first living on a remote and isolated island in the Aleutians, and then moving to a less-remote, but still-isolated island in Southeast Alaska. Cody’s evolution, from a “quivering mass of dog flesh” to a confident and capable dog, was an inspiration to the people he met along the way.
We were watching television when Fran turned off the lights.
It was September 5, 1996. We were in Garner, NC—a town outside of Raleigh, the state capital. My husband Keith, our 11-year-old daughter Robyn, and I were concerned about family and friends in the expected path of Hurricane Fran, which was predicted to make landfall near Cape Fear and Wilmington and turn northeast, following the North Carolina coast. When the lights went out, we assumed the outer bands of the large storm had affected the power grid. We lit some candles, and I continued hemming the shirt I was making. We talked and laughed. One thing we didn’t do was worry about ourselves. Raleigh had not sustained a direct hit from a hurricane since Hazel in 1954, so we had no reason to believe Fran would pose any danger to us.
The lights had gone out around 8 p.m. Three hours later, the power was still off. We could hear the wind howling in its unearthly voice, rattling windows and doors like an avenging spirit seeking entry. Evidently, we were closer to the path of the hurricane than originally anticipated. We decided to sleep downstairs in the living room so we would be protected from falling trees or other debris. Even the cats and the dog sheltered with us. It felt like an indoor camping adventure, with sheets on the sofa, sleeping bags on the floor, and flashlights positioned nearby.
I woke up at about 2:00 in the morning to find Keith and Robyn also awake, listening intently. The world outside was eerily silent. The silence was more frightening than the storm had been.
“Why is it so quiet?” asked Robyn, nervously. “Is the hurricane over?”
We admitted we didn’t know. “Maybe we’re dead, and this is the afterlife,” I joked.
“Or maybe everyone else is dead,” suggested Keith, “and we’re the only ones left.” Robyn rolled her eyes at us, an expression familiar to parents of preteen girls. Soon, the wind and rain started up again, roaring their frustration at their inability to enter our home or lure us outside. Keith and I, having been through other hurricanes, realized the silence was the eye of the storm passing overhead. We figured Fran must have turned northwest from Wilmington instead of following the coast. With the sounds of the storm raging around us like a lullaby, we all went back to sleep.
The next morning dawned sunny and clear. We were lucky; the only damage our property had sustained was a broken fence rail where a tree limb had fallen, though the large branch had smashed a play gym on the other side of the fence. We assumed Garner had escaped the worst of it; however, when we went to the shopping center up the street and spoke with other dazed neighbors, we learned the Raleigh area had actually taken a direct hit from Hurricane Fran, the first in over 40 years. The trees that had grown up since Hurricane Hazel had never been tested by gale-force winds, with the result that Fran had leveled over 4,000 trees in Raleigh alone. The storm’s flooding had contaminated the local water system, and customers were being warned to boil water before drinking it. The school system was closed, too—even if the power had been on, the streets were impassable due to the downed trees and power lines. We would later learn from news reports that Fran had killed 37 people, 24 of whom were from North Carolina. Damage was estimated to be $5 billion, with almost half of that number coming from North Carolina.
Losing a single fence rail seemed irrelevant in the face of such widespread loss.
At the time, I was recovering from what had politely been referred to as a nervous breakdown. I had been released from a seven-day stay in a psychiatric hospital just five weeks earlier. Upon my release, I wasn’t able to do anything on my own. Coping with the stresses that had led to my hospitalization had left me without any judgement or decision-making ability. Medication adjustments left me temporarily unable to drive. I couldn’t even go to the grocery store on my own. My recovery was proceeding well, but slowly.
Trying to survive the heat of late summer in North Carolina without refrigeration, water, or air-conditioning was more than I was able to currently handle. We packed a few belongings and headed west, taking the dog, but leaving the cats with an ample supply of food and fresh water. We didn’t know how long we would be away, but we knew it wouldn’t be longer than the food supply would last. We spent a night and a day as tourists in the Blue Ridge Mountains—normally a pleasant outing, but not under those circumstances. The scenery was as awe-inspiring as ever, but we were too preoccupied with worry and anxiety to enjoy it. On the second evening, our neighbor called and left a message on our home voicemail to let us know that the power was back on. It had only been off 48 hours. We bought enough bottled water to last until the boil order was lifted, went home immediately, and cleaned out several hundred dollars’ worth of spoiled food from the refrigerator. Of all the hurricanes I have lived through, Fran was the most personally devastating.
I was able to empathize on a deeply personal level with the destruction I saw on television when Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast in August, 2005, devastating New Orleans. Katrina caused $81 million in damage and killed over 1,800 people. I was especially worried about the 100,000 pets who had been left behind when their owners evacuated to shelters; 70,000 of those pets perished in the storm. The 30,000 survivors were reunited with their owners or adopted by other families in the weeks following the storm. A few ended up in shelters, waiting for their families to find them or to be adopted into a new home.
In February, 2006, I saw a news report on a cable network saying a temporary shelter that had cared for displaced pets after Katrina was closing. The 70 or so pets that remained homeless were going to be dispersed to shelters throughout the nation when the temporary shelter closed. Unfortunately, the permanent shelter in New Orleans was already filled to capacity and wasn’t able to accept any more animals. The newscaster asked professionals in rescue agencies to contact Best Friends, Inc—the agency running the temporary shelter—if they were interested in taking any of the remaining dogs. Although I had worked as a volunteer, not as a professional, I contacted Best Friends. They put me in touch with Patty, the director of a small animal rescue organization in Sadorus, Illinois, since hers was the rescue nearest to my home in Urbana.
Patty told me about the three dogs she had received from the New Orleans shelter. Two were Chow mixes, while the third was a yellow Labrador retriever. The Chows were adjusting well to being in a new place, but the Lab wasn’t. He seemed to get along with the Chows, whom he had known in the temporary shelter, but not the other dogs in the household, and he didn’t interact at all with the humans. Patty had tried everything, but nothing seemed to help.
Although I was at that time an English as a Second Language teacher, working part-time at a two-year college, I’d had a lot of experience teaching children with emotional and learning difficulties. The skills that made me effective with children who were withdrawn were the same skills I needed in helping skittish dogs—patience and kindness. My nurturing personality tended to elicit trust from the children. I had seen much the same thing in working with shelter animals; the shy ones usually warmed up to me. I was sure I could help. At the same time, I knew my three dogs, Pepper, Beowolf, and Rascal, were experienced hands at rehabilitating foster dogs. Keith was a supportive partner in caring for needy animals, so I wouldn’t be taking on the challenge alone; I had lost count of the number of dogs we had fostered in our home to rehabilitate and train when we lived in Tallahassee. My decision was an easy one, and I agreed to foster Cody, the withdrawn Lab.
Cody entered the house at a crouch, his belly dragging against the floor. Patty held one end of his leash, but Cody was glued to her side even when she let it go. He didn’t react to me when I tried to greet him, so I ignored him for the moment. When Patty stepped outside to get something from her car, Cody scuttled into a corner near my desk and stayed there, his nose buried in the space between the desk and the wall. He seemed to believe if he couldn’t see me, I couldn’t see him.
I’d kept my three dogs outside for the moment so they wouldn’t overwhelm Cody. I brought Beowolf in first, since he was both the pack leader and the gentlest of the dogs. Beo was curious about the new dog, but he didn’t have much time to get to know him. I must not have latched the back door securely, because Pepper and Rascal came running in a minute later and interrupted the getting acquainted process. Fortunately, they all sensed Cody’s fear, and everyone behaved appropriately, with no growling or barking.
After Patty left, I read over the information Best Friends had compiled. Cody was probably under 2 years old. He had been found on the streets of New Orleans in November, 2005, about 3 months after the storm, dirty and malnourished, with a chain collar embedded in his neck.
Dogs are naturally clean animals and won’t soil their sleeping and eating areas if they have a choice, but while Cody was at the shelter, he had been too afraid to walk across a floor to go outside to eliminate, so he would do it wherever he was. One of the Best Friends volunteers had taken special care of Cody, carrying him outside for potty breaks. He had spent most of his day at her feet, hiding his head under her desk. When she walked away, Cody would follow in a crouch. Now that he had left that safe setting, he had reverted to his previous behavior.
Skittish hardly seemed like an adequate word to describe how truly terrified this dog was. He was trying to make himself invisible. His body was curled into as tight a ball as he could form. His head was turned away; I couldn’t even see his eyes. Cody shivered at every new noise, the flesh on his back rippling like a pond disturbed by a pebble. He didn’t know what to expect in this new setting, and his uncertainty expressed itself as fear.
One of the more intriguing things I found in Cody’s file was a notation that indicated the name “Rex” and the date of his last rabies vaccine, which was before the hurricane. Cody wore a rabies tag on the faded red and green striped collar he was wearing. I thought it was possible Best Friends had been able to trace the tag back to the vet clinic that had vaccinated Cody, and from there had been able to learn his original name, his owner’s name, and the date he had received his rabies vaccine. I didn’t know if that meant Rex/Cody’s original owner had perished in the storm, if he didn’t want Cody back, or if Best Friends had decided not to allow the owner to take Cody back, considering his embedded collar was a sign of serious neglect.
Cody’s owner must have placed the chain collar around Cody’s neck when he was much younger and smaller and never checked it again. As Cody grew, the collar became tighter around his neck, eventually growing into his flesh. I’d seen something similar happen to trees, when someone tied a rope or chain around a trunk and left it there as the tree grew around it. Cody’s collar had to be surgically removed. The surgery, along with his neutering, took place on New Year’s Eve, 2005.
Poor guy! What a way to ring in a New Year!
* * * * *
If Cody was two years old when I met him in March, 2006, then I calculated he was born in New Orleans in Spring, 2004. Although nothing concrete is known about his life before he was rescued in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, I can make educated guesses about what his early life was like based on how he reacted to things later on. He hated confinement. He was wary around men. He flinched when anyone raised a hand, even if it was just to gesture or to pet him. He accepted women easily, but it took him months to warm up to men enough to let them touch him. He hated loud noises, even applause. He was especially terrified by thunder and fireworks. The condition Cody was found in suggests he was the victim of a certain mindset on how dogs should be treated.
Based on the available evidence, I think Cody’s first two years of life went something like this: he was a quiet, shy puppy, possibly the runt of his litter. Though just as intelligent as his litter mates, he was more submissive than they were. As his brothers and sisters wrestled with him, Cody was always the first to roll onto his back, displaying his vulnerable belly in a show of submission. However, Cody was undisturbed by being a low-ranking member of his litter; he preferred to be alone, watching the world and learning from what he saw.
Cody watched as one by one his litter mates left with people who would give them a loving, forever home. Cody, the shy, loner pup, didn’t approach these strangers as they came to ooh! and aah! over the puppies and choose one special dog to take home. Cody didn’t jump up on the people, didn’t lick their hands, and didn’t scamper. Cody watched from a distance. Thus, Cody was never chosen.
Eventually, someone took Cody from his mother’s owner. Cody’s new owner knew a yellow Lab would be a good watch dog, and he knew just how to turn any dog into a watch dog, no matter how gentle the dog might start out being. Everyone knows that if you want to make a dog mean, you treat him mean. Chain him up outside. Don’t let him in the house, or you’ll turn him into a sissy dog. You want him to guard your property, not your bedroom. Yell at him. Beat him. Treat him like you want him to treat the strangers that come onto your property: mean.
There are several problems with what “everyone knows.” The first is that the guarding instinct in dogs is based on the instinct to protect the pack’s territory. If you want your dog to protect your property, you first have to make him part of your pack. If you live in the house, so should he. He should eat and sleep where the rest of the pack is, meaning the human family and any other pets in the household—that way he’ll do everything he can to protect the members of his pack and the territory they occupy.
The second problem is that when a dog lives only outside, he thinks all of the outside is his to protect. Instead of a dog who protects your property and only your property, you end up with a dog who tries to protect everything from everyone. He barks at every passerby and every sound that disturbs the silence. If you live in a busy area, especially with lots of kids around, your dog will bark all the time, annoying you and your neighbors. A dog that barks all the time can’t be relied on to give a warning when danger threatens your home.
Finally, the process of turning a dog “mean” is highly fallible. If you yell at and beat a dog to make him mean, what you teach him is fear and distrust. He believes everyone approaching him is going to hurt him. If the dog is somewhat dominant, he may become aggressive, believing he must attack in order to protect himself. You have turned him “mean,” but he will attack indiscriminately, including you, your children, and your neighbors.
If, on the other hand, the dog is naturally submissive, he will withdraw further and become more docile, hoping something he does will please you so you will stop beating and yelling at him. All he wants to do is whatever you want him to do, but he can’t figure out what that is. Dogs want and need to be told what to do, but yelling and beating only tell them what not to do.
Cody was temperamentally unsuited to be a watchdog. With a gentle trainer with an understanding of doggy psychology, he would eventually have become a member of his family/pack, and been protective of them, but he would never have been willing to attack on command. Under the conditions Cody found himself in, he became nervous and ever more skittish. He developed fears of everything. Living outside, and especially in hot, humid Louisiana, he learned that thunder accompanied lightning and rain, all things he disliked. All loud noises reminded him of both yelling and thunder. Being fearful resulted in more scoldings and beatings, resulting in even more fear.
Cody was probably terrified out of his mind when Hurricane Katrina hit, with hours upon hours of rain, wind, lightning, and thunder. Whether his owner released him during the storm to save himself or he broke free on his own, Cody became a stray. He wandered the streets of New Orleans, trying to find food. He didn’t want to challenge other dogs for the scraps he could find, but he also didn’t want to starve. He got into at least one fight that left him with a scar on his muzzle. Someone shot at him, leaving a piece of shrapnel in one ear. He stayed away from humans after that, and became so good at avoiding people, it took three months before someone was able to catch him.
There’s no denying the all-transcending power of love: it can save any living creature, no matter how low they’ve sunk in life. If you’d like to witness an instance of Sigmund Freud’s quote, “How bold one gets when one is sure of being loved,” come to life, you can view it in Cody: The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Dog by Lauren Henry Brehm! In this heart-warming book, the love shown by his new owner (the author) performs such a miracle for Cody—a severely mistreated, malnourished, and depressed stray Labrador retriever; a hurricane Katrina survivor rescued in New Orleans in 2005. At the story’s beginning, Cody is a terrified, sad recluse. By the end, he has transformed into a confident, intelligent service dog—a source of pride for any owner! Love reclaimed him!!
Central to this story is the bond between Cody and the author. It’s the outcome of some commonalities in their lives. While the author faced significant challenges, including the pain of divorce, Cody lived in a world of intense fear and rejection. Both felt broken and experienced comfort and healing in the other’s companionship and love. Suffering helps us appreciate the needs of the hurting, so the author’s suffering helped her deeply understand Cody’s rare needs. As a result, she gave Cody the right protection, patience, and loving care he needed, and he recovered, albeit slowly. In turn, his presence, protection, and excellent support as a service dog did wonders later to rebuild her life and confidence.
This book’s cover is beautiful and succeeds in clearly conveying what it’s about. A certified English teacher, the author writes very well and the narratives flow easily. In addition, the photos in the book enhance the pleasure of reading.
Is this book special? Is Cody special? If it were some other dog in his place, would he/she have made as remarkable a turnaround in life as Cody? Although I’m not an expert in cynology, I feel that just as people are special, dogs and Cody are special too. Their emotional makeup and the environment they grew up in (before becoming adults) largely shape a dog’s character. A cruel owner raised Cody, terrifying him and making him feel worthless. However, he stands out by his sheer will to survive and perseverance in the most trying times. Most other dogs in his place would have failed. The book is also a shining testament to the author’s care for Cody and her devoted, patient care to make him a success. Few people have achieved this distinction, so here’s a well-deserved ‘kudos’ to the author!
I recommend this book to all as a nice casual read. All pet owners and lovers, especially dog lovers, will enjoy it. I also recommend it to foster parents, vets, animal welfare organizations, etc.