Things Dogs Teach Us

[Tripper11]

[bigwillq]

1. Dogs are amazing creatures.

K and R

[shenmue]

2. Yes they are!

[IrishAyes]

3. I LOVE people - in fairly small doses. Wouldn't want my best friend at my elbow too much.

Dogs are another matter. I can't live w/o one (preferably 2) anymore than I could w/o air. That's one of the best things about retirement: my 4-legged best friends at my side pretty much 24/7. Maybe I was a dog in a previous life???

[drynberg]

5. Me too, but my golden of 14 yrs. loved people so much, she was my ambassador to our

Neighborhood. Really through her I was introduced to all. She's been gone now for 47 days...tonight I'm going to meet a guy with a golden due in a week...maybe in two months...we'll see. Good post.

[IrishAyes]

6. You're good to leap right back in despite your broken heart. When we lose a pet, we might not feel

like getting another ever, much less soon. But the fact remains that they need us, and we're here to serve. If you don't take the dog, you don't know what his/her life will be like. With you, at least one more animal is safe. That's why I always urge people to jump right back in - not for our sake but for the animal who needs us.

I just learned that Brigid had a brother who went to a family about a hundred miles from here. At least they were safely assumed to be littermates because they were the same age and discovered in the same place in the same condition - nearly starved. We'll never know for sure of the brother's fate. In a way I'm glad I didn't know about him until too late, because I would've been tempted and all reason shouts against my trying to keep 3 dogs unless they're super tiny.

[Packerowner740]

4. I've got two german shepherds and my young 3mo fell in our pool

She couldn't climb out but our older 3yo came running to the back door jumping on it to get our attention and then ran back to the pool to show us what happened. She was our hero.

[IrishAyes]

7. You bet she is!

[northoftheborder]

8. the toddler in our family wading in a kiddie pool upset the German Shepherd who tried to....

....pull him out by his diapers!!! Funny, but showed the dog's innate rescue instincts.

[Fortinbras Armstrong]

9. Some years ago, my wife got us a Great Pyrennes who was a rescue dog

We had Abigail trained as a therapy dog, which she clearly enjoyed doing. Once a month or so, either my wife or I would take her to the local hospital to see the patients. I noticed that if the patient was hook up to monitoring equipment, when the patient touched her, the heart rate would slow and the blood pressure would drop noticeably. Obviously, she was a calming influence.