We adopted this 13 year old Chihuahua after years of abuse at the hands of his owner. We've had him for a couple of years now and he's now very happy, he loves to cuddle with me, he plays with the cat and even will let strangers pet him briefly.
That sounds like an ordeal. Stressing out older animals is stressful on the human too. Don't know if you've tried, but we used the dirty plate trick (smear something on a plate/spoon/shoulder/forehead and let them lick) to distract our doofus. It worked far better than force ever did for us.