Buck, who is healing in a loving home after developing PTSD in Afghanistan (Photo: Estella Diaz)When I met Buck, the kennel he was in at Lackland Air Force Base was so loud that I thought his name was Puck. The other dogs — all part of the Department of Defense’s Military Working Dog program — were going nuts because they had visitors and it was hard to hear anything other than loud barks.
Several dogs were spinning in crazy, fast circles while others ran back and forth in their concrete kennels. Some just stood there, barking at my escort and me like they wanted us for lunch.
And then there we came to Puck, er, Buck. Buck is a chocolate Lab. Because Labs are normally rambunctious and happy, I expected him to be woofing with the rest. But he was curled up in a tight ball toward the back of his kennel. He appeared to be the only normal, calm one among these super energetic dogs. But there was something about his eyes, his demeanor, that seemed almost sad. He didn’t lift his head; he just looked at me unblinkingly and then stared out again, eyes not seeming to focus on anything much.
Buck, it turns out, had been in Afghanistan as a Marine IED detector dog. The man taking me through the kennels told me, “He heard one too many explosions.”
Check him out in this CNN video about some Marines of the Alpha Company in Afghanistan in 2010. You can see him starting around 54 seconds into the video. The reporter said that the poor guy would jump not only every time he heard a “bang or a boom,” but also at far-less threatening sounds, like someone walking by and kicking a rock.
Buck was diagnosed with the canine version of post-traumatic stress disorder. He did not respond well enough to treatment, and it was determined that he needed to retire from being a war dog. He was going to be adopted the day after my visit by a couple “who loves him a lot,” my escort told me.
Lynette and Larry Sargent, and Buck, whom they love like a child (Photo: Estella Diaz)That was back in July, when I was on the road doing research for my upcoming book, Soldier Dogs: The Untold Story of America’s Canine Heroes (Dutton, March 2012). I address canine PTSD in the book, and I was heartened when a couple of weeks ago the New York Times ran an article about it and dozens of media outlets picked up the story or ran their own versions. It’s good to see this disorder getting some attention. The dogs who have it suffer greatly, as do their human counterparts.
Signs of canine PTSD include hypervigilance, increased startle response, attempts to run away or escape, withdrawal, changes in rapport with a handler, and problems performing trained tasks — like a bomb dog who just can’t focus on sniffing out bombs anymore. These are variations of PTSD’s symptoms in humans.
Sporting breeds, like Labs, appear to be more prone to canine PTSD than war dogs like German shepherds and Belgian Malinoises. Walter Burghardt, chief of behavioral medicine at the Daniel E. Holland Military Working Dog Hospital at Lackland Air Force Base, is not sure of the reasons for this. But he and a small team at Lackland are starting to investigate this and dozens of other questions about the disorder, including how to prevent it, and how to best treat it. Right now, affected dogs are given time off, and get a combination of drugs and different therapies. A dog who is shaking and hiding may be given anti-anxiety medication; one who is withdrawn could get antidepressants. There are also counterconditioning therapies, in which a dog is slowly desensitized to loud noises.
About 25 percent will not be able to work again, and end up being retired from service. Depending on their condition, they could go to a police force, or be adopted by a family or individual, as Buck has been.
About three weeks ago I got in touch with Buck’s new owners, Larry and Lynette Sargent. We played phone tag for a while, and when Larry left a message on my voice mail saying, “I’m calling you back about my dog Buck,” I have to admit that I misted up a little. It probably sounds strange, but it was the “my dog Buck” part that got me. After the rigors and terrors of war, Buck was someone’s dog, at last.
Buck, now 4, is living a happily-ever-after story. Or he would be if he didn’t have PTSD. The Sargents have no human children, and think of him as their child. They dote on him, spending a great deal of time working and playing with him and trying to help him. They live in a large San Antonio home with a big yard they fenced just for Buck. But Buck isn’t a typical Lab.
“We’ve had other Labs before, and thought Buck would be similar, but we’re still trying to figure him out,” says Larry.
Larry is a pastor, so the Sargents frequently have people over for prayer groups, or just to lend them a hand. Buck quickly attached to Larry, and if the pastor is not holding him by a leash or right next to him when other people come by, Buck barks in fear, cowers, or both. He is not friendly with strangers, as most Labs are. As expected, he is scared of loud noises, too. Fortunately there haven’t been too many thunderstorms since they adopted him.
Buck has done a couple of PTSD-related things that are pretty heartbreaking. I describe them in my book, and my publisher doesn’t want me to give too much away in this blog post. But the good news is that with a lot of love and attention, Buck is coming around.
Buck in his big yard, playing with a faux skunk-skin dog toy. He loves stuffed animals. (Photo: Estella Diaz)“We are seeing more and more of his inner puppy,” says Lynette. “He loves to catch a ball and throw it in the air for himself and catch it over and over. He can be really silly.”
And Buck loves stuffed animals. Like any self-respecting Lab, he seeks them out no matter where they’re hiding and joyously rips their stuffing out.
The Sargents wish they had a little more background on Buck. Or some instructions from the Department of Defense about how to best help a dog with PTSD. But it’s such a relatively new disorder — Burghardt called a blue-ribbon panel in January and it was only officially decided then that canine PTSD is, indeed, real — that there aren’t yet many answers.
So the Sargents take it one day at a time, and that pace seems to be a good one for Buck, who appears to be starting to heal with the Sargents’ self-written prescription of big doses of love and happiness around the clock.
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Dogsters, the New York Times article says civilian dogs can get PTSD from car accidents or less traumatic incidents. I wonder how prevalent PTSD is in puppy-mill breeder dogs or bait dogs? Have you ever seen a dog who might have PTSD? Maybe some of you even have a dog with it. Have you been able to help affected dogs? Any advice for the Sargents?
Larry Sargent gives Buck his "prescription": Huge doses of love around the clock. (Photo: Estella Diaz)(All photos in this post are by the Sargents’ friend, Estella Diaz, who is passionate about photography and donated her time to take these photos for me because the Sargents are like her “parents away from home.” She wrote me that she met them in 1997 when she started going to their church. “I had been to other churches before, but he was the first pastor that remembered my name only after meeting me just once. I felt so welcomed there that I never left. The Sargents were never able to have kids but they have so many children through their congregation. I’m just one of those kids. As far as dog parents, they are the best. Their pets are like their kids … very much loved, cared for and spoiled. Which is how it should be. 
I just love them so very much … I can’t say enough about them!” Buck sure hit the lottery with the Sargents.)
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