Sidebar: I’ve been on DailyKos for 10+ years but my old email was hacked and I am unable to access that email to retrieve my credentials, hence this “new” account. With that out of the way… this whole Noem tragedy has prompted me to post after all these years.
There are some things in life that are unforgivable and to me, one of those things is animal abuse. I don’t need to go on and on about what an absolutely abhorrent person it takes to murder a puppy. I feel safe in saying no matter where one stands politically, we all know it’s a 1000% evil act.
For 16+ years I was the proud parent of a “mean” dog. He was a rescue and a mere 9 months old (the rescue organization guessed) when we picked him up. We didn’t know he had behavioral problems… for the first few hours. He was very sweet on the car ride to meet my then girlfriend’s Dad, then he immediately peed on the Dad’s couch and tried to bite him. Within a week we realized he was super aggressive towards other dogs, and men.
His first act once home was to knock down an elderly woman walking down the street, minding her own business. Although small, he was incredibly strong. Without warning he yanked his leash from my hand and before I knew it, he had basically hunted the woman to the ground. I couldn’t believe it. I had raised small dogs all my life and not one of them was ever aggressive towards humans or dogs or even cats. The woman yelled at me in Italian while I contained my pup and profusely apologized. Did I decide to kill my dog? No. Like any responsible and caring human being, I took him to a trainer.
We spent months working with the trainer who eventually said, “Sorry! I just can’t get past his aggressive behavior.” So she let us go. We then took him to animal behaviorists at a well-respected college who did all sorts of tests on him, and while they did diagnose him with fear aggression, they also said he would probably have to be put down. My heart sank. I knew he was a risk but I didn’t want to give up on him. He went on to nip at other dogs, my landlord, and a cyclist (who in all fairness to the pup, was riding in the dog part of the park where he shouldn’t have been riding). Still, he was my responsibility. What people didn’t see were the hugs he loved to give, the non aggressive way he shared his toys and food with his “brother,” and the way he would just melt when you gave him TTouch.
We tried everything from intensive training to making him wear one of those over the nose cage contraptions so he wouldn’t bite anyone (certainly a bad idea for him looking back on it now). My girlfriend and I split up within the year and because she thought him too much to deal with, I was able to keep the him. Years later I ended up marrying someone I had known for over 10 years. That’s when things began to change.
Instead of military-style training, we began to use positive reinforcement. It took a few years but he changed… a lot. So much so that we were able to take him to doggy day care on the regular! We could hire strangers to dog & house sit while we were away, and walk him without having to worry about seeing other dogs for fear he would attack. Sure, he would still bark incessantly if someone came to the front door, but he never snapped at anyone ever again. Positive. Reinforcement.
When he was 14, he was diagnosed with dementia. In some ways it made him regress, so we tried to tailor to his needs when we understood his brain was changing. He then went mostly blind and deaf. He would circle our downstairs for hours nonstop in the middle of the night, every night (sundowning) and we stayed up with him to make sure he was safe. He was crate trained but when he felt he could no longer stay in his crate, he would howl as if he felt trapped. At that point, I set up shop downstairs on the couch and stayed with him through the night. (I can still hear his little tapping toes on the hardwoods as he circled, circled, circled until he wore himself out).
He and his brother were one year apart in age. He died in June of 2022. On his last night, we all slept downstairs with him and hugged him for as long as we could. His death was (and still is) devastating. Now his brother is mostly deaf and blind… and also has dementia and IVDD (a degenerative back disease). He’s a sweet pup who requires around the clock care. We will happily care for him any and every way we can until he’s no longer with us.
My “mean” dog taught me so many things including patience, unconditional love and the benefits of never giving up when things are difficult. I’m not going to lie — he was really, really hard to care for at times but I wouldn’t take back one minute.
Thank you for reading. With everything within us, we must never allow someone like Noem to be normalized. Take care.
