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A puppy's story


asal
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Deb Willett· 

Story of a puppy.

When this puppy was with his dog mom, his mom would do anything to protect him. His mom was assertive, firm, and fair. She ran a tight ship and provided very clear structure to the puppies.

The mom would not allow other people or dogs to come bother her puppies when they were not ready. She made the puppies feel very safe knowing that they would be fully advocated for at all time.

She would monitor the interaction and correct inappropriate behaviour between the puppies during play consistently. There was a clear structure in place so no one was confused.

Then the puppy left the mom and went home with a human. The human family was so excited because this puppy was so cute.

They spent all their time hugging and coddling this puppy. They could not leave the puppy alone. They invited all their friends and family members over to see the "new puppy". They would allow many strangers and dogs to "say hi" to the puppy constantly.

All the sudden, the puppy's dog mom was no longer there to advocate for this puppy yet her role was not replaced by anyone. Not only that, the puppy is now surrounded by people and animals who would not leave him alone to give him the space he desperately needed to feel secure in a new environment.

The puppy was in shock and was confused. He had no one to lean on, no structure to go by. He had no idea how to cope with the stress and there was no guidance.

Instead of taking up the position of being the pup's advocate and filled the void left by his dog mom as the leader, the human chose to act even softer and more unstable, weak, and vulnerable by trying to "comfort" this puppy with lots of affection, treats, and soft voices. They hugged him, baby talked to him, bought him lots of cloths, brushed him 290 times a day, and they kept allowing strangers and dogs to approach and greet this puppy because they were told this was "socialization" and would help the puppy to become more confident.

They took the puppy to pet shops to further the "socialization" where the puppy was overwhelmed with lots of people with excited and unstable energy with their high pitch voice who could not get their hands off this puppy despite his constant body language pleading to just be left alone. Again, the human did not stop anyone from getting too close too soon as the puppy's dog mom would certainly have.

The puppy was very shocked by how clueless and insensitive his owners were. He was used to having his dog mom keeping everything under control but his humans were not doing that at all!

Where is mom? Who is here to advocate for me?

Then the puppy was taken to dog parks and he was bullied. The human did not seem to notice. Everyone and their dogs were really aroused and excited. It was very overwhelming with no structure and no one was there to advocate for this puppy.

The puppy finally had enough so one day when he was on leash, he growled and lunged at these "rude" dogs yet he was corrected immediately.

His human freaked out over his growling. They yelled at him and then they hugged him and coddled him. This made the puppy more confused and insecure.

He expected his human--who was supposed to be his leader--to understand why he growled and step up calmly to protect him assertively--as he was sure his mom would; instead, he was punished for asking his leader for help, and his human was not calm at all. They looked scared and stressed. How could he trust someone that unstable and weak to protect him?

The human was heartbroken. They said, "we love him so much, why isn't he friendly?"

"We have taken so much time to socialize him, we have done all the right things, why is he aggressive?"

"We have been so nice to him, it makes no sense."

They felt guilty, and sorry, and frustrated, and betrayed.

The whole household was filled with what was interpreted by the puppy as, once again, a very soft, unstable, and weak energy. That did nothing to fill the void left by the puppy' mom. The puppy's craving for leadership and structure was never even acknowledged.

Now the human stayed away from the puppy because they were scared. The puppy was not taken out so he was even more scared of anything outside of his immediate familiar surrounding.

How can this puppy trust someone so unstable, weak, and insensitive? How could he have confidence when he had no one to trust and count on? How could he be balanced and stable if he was living under constant anxiety and insecurity?

The family felt guilty about locking up the puppy so they decided to take him for a walk.

Once outside, the puppy growled, lunged, and tried to charge at a human walking toward him. The puppy felt that he had no other option. He had to take up the role of his mom and protect himself. He had to get the person away before he came too close into his space like others had done hundreds of times in the past.

The human was petrified. They could not believe it! What happened to our cute little puppy? We loved him so much, why?

He was locked up in his yard for a few months and when he became too big and destructive he was given up to the shelter.

Everyone cried.

They tried to be honest so they told the shelter the dog was “dog and human aggressive”.

He was very stressed and anxious in the shelter. He just wanted to have his space but he was surrounded by barking unstable dogs and lots of humans coming and going all day long all displaying unstable, chaotic, and emotional energy.

He kept barking and charging at the fence to tell them to back off.

All he ever wanted was just to have someone acting like his mom, someone who would lead and advocate so he could simply follow and finally relax.

He did not care for all the nice scarves, all the cute leashes and colorful harnesses, all the home cooked treats, all the squeaky toys, all the expensive beds.

He just wanted a leader that he could trust. He had no idea why such a simple need was never met.

He was very frustrated, lost, confused, and stressed.

But it was too late...

He was not a cute puppy anymore.

No one wanted an aggressive dog.

After a few weeks in the shelter, he was put down.

The end.

 
 
 
 
  • Karen Barb Lesley Clark
    K B L Cl breeders fault
     
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  • Cheryle McMillan-Buraba
    C M-B So very accurate sometimes and so sad and preventable :(
     
    Hide or report this
     
  • Dorothy Line
    D L My heart breaks...
     
  • Denise Ward
    D WWhere is the share button, millions of people need to read this
     
    • Shari Conley-Edwards
      Sh C-E Please put this with a "share" button, so the story can go out over all the lands.
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  • Julie Matthews
    J M Oh Deb. Did you write this? I was in tears by the end of this. It is so true and I see it so often but have never thought of it like it is written. Karen why would you say it is the breeders fault. Am I allowed to share this?
    Hide or report this
     
  • Rebecca Ipsen Hill
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  • Georgina Ramsay
    G R I did not read it all but I have a method of training my pups from the first minute I get them and they grow into happy obedient well rounded dogs. They are allowed to have their quirks (as I can hear Queen barking at birds outside) after all they are doggies.
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  • Michelle Thiele
    M T Nailed it. Thanks Deb Willett. Sadly the propensity to humanise animal behaviour is leading to this level of misunderstanding and cruelty to animals everywhere.
     
     
    Never thought of it like that, was given an "aggressive" six months old puppy to re-home.  She would attack and bit, the second her food was put in the bowl.  A VERY stern NO and great assistance from tdierikx, there hasn't been  a hint of aggressive behaviour since.  Happy, well behaved ex delinquent. With questioning, that is what they had been doing with her.....as well as taking her food away soon as it was put in the bowl, then handing back, then taking it away, repeatedly, because they had been told that is how you train them not to be food aggressive.
     
     
Edited by asal
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Thanks @asal... so many "experts" out there advocating some pretty stupid methods of "training" and "socialising"... and plenty more gullible and clueless folks following blindly so they will be perceived to be the "perfect" owners.

 

There is nothing wrong with corrective training methods... they can be achieved without physical or mental harm... but one needs to be taught to read what our dogs are telling us - they can't speak in words, but their body language can tell us so much... if we are prepared to "listen"...

 

That pup of yours was such a great little tacker... so smart and wanting to please... all she needed was direction. Once she had that, she showed us how awesome she was, didn't she?

 

T.

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31 minutes ago, tdierikx said:

Thanks @asal... so many "experts" out there advocating some pretty stupid methods of "training" and "socialising"... and plenty more gullible and clueless folks following blindly so they will be perceived to be the "perfect" owners.

 

There is nothing wrong with corrective training methods... they can be achieved without physical or mental harm... but one needs to be taught to read what our dogs are telling us - they can't speak in words, but their body language can tell us so much... if we are prepared to "listen"...

 

That pup of yours was such a great little tacker... so smart and wanting to please... all she needed was direction. Once she had that, she showed us how awesome she was, didn't she?

 

T.

Sure did, in spades....

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Not a scenario I've seen, though it may be common with some breeds.  I feel the author was anthropromorphising. 

In my days as a Labrador breeder, I found the bitches pretty much ignored pups by 8 weeks.  At six weeks, when pups use their needle teeth on one another's ears, legs, and penises, and there's a lot of screaming, the mums kept their distance abd let the bullies do their thing.  Little or no protective action toward people or other dogs.

The pups, in their new homes, tend to follow people and sneak into the kids' beds, and of course steal stuff and chew things up.  The worst problems seemed to come when kids tried to play chase with Puppy, Puppy nips, kids run screaming, puppy thinks it's a game, things deteriorate.  Lab pups generally want to play with other pups or dogs but will come to people if they feel unsafe...I placed quite a few pups in homes near a dog beach, and all reports I got were of dogs who loved to meet their friends at the beach. 

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9 hours ago, sandgrubber said:

Not a scenario I've seen, though it may be common with some breeds.  I feel the author was anthropromorphising. 

In my days as a Labrador breeder, I found the bitches pretty much ignored pups by 8 weeks.  At six weeks, when pups use their needle teeth on one another's ears, legs, and penises, and there's a lot of screaming, the mums kept their distance abd let the bullies do their thing.  Little or no protective action toward people or other dogs.

The pups, in their new homes, tend to follow people and sneak into the kids' beds, and of course steal stuff and chew things up.  The worst problems seemed to come when kids tried to play chase with Puppy, Puppy nips, kids run screaming, puppy thinks it's a game, things deteriorate.  Lab pups generally want to play with other pups or dogs but will come to people if they feel unsafe...I placed quite a few pups in homes near a dog beach, and all reports I got were of dogs who loved to meet their friends at the beach. 

think the biggest problem is animals are all just as individual as people so there is no one size fits all.

 

and yep my mums dont tend to care, others do, never forget a friend who got one of my chihuahua babies I had to raise from two weeks, she was sooooooo autocratic. when she wanted attention the whole house knew it, even if it was 4 in the morning.  so wanted to keep her but hubby had enough so at 8 weeks daughters best friend nicked her for her mum,they took her to bed with them, solved that one but opened another, when she wanted to do zoomies she did, except as she ran past their faces those little sharp puppy teeth opened up noses like a zipper. lots of blood later, Marilyn came up with a beauty, began yelping like a murdered puppy. snuff stopped in her tracks, raced back to apologise and cleaned up all the blood.  went back to zooming, got too rough more yelps of pain from Marilyn and in no time she was ever so careful not to bite too hard.

 

we were rolling in laughter as she told us....BUT it worked........

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