Heart Like a Dog

The Good, the Bad, and the Oh My God of living with dogs!

Michael Vick

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Yes, Michael Vick has confirmed he has a dog.

Many of you expected this topic to be included in my WTF Wednesday post, but it turned out to be rather longer than I expected, so I gave it a post all its own.

Grab a cup of coffee, put some Bailey’s or Sambuca in it and pull up a chair.

To do this properly I have to go back to last year, when I heard that Michael Vick had teamed up with the Humane Society.  At that time I was still on the free WordPress and fully expected The Legacy of Michael Vick to be pressed.  (I don’t know, maybe it was the picture of the hanging black man that prevented it.)

If you read that first post you’ll notice that at first I was outraged that the Humane Society was working with a convicted (insert your derogatory word of choice here,) but then I started thinking about the influence athletes have on our children and I thought maybe, just maybe if someone like Michael Vick warned our children about the evils of dog fighting he could actually make a difference.

Flash forward to Michael Vick tweeting a photo that included a box of Milkbones.  As you can imagine dog and animal lovers reacted quickly and angrily.

More than one of you sent me a link to the article. I started prepping my post for WTF Wednesday, it was scheduled to look like this.

Michael Vick confirms he is again a dog owner, Philadelphia, PA

The very first thing that comes to mind is, what idiot gave this person a dog? I’m pretty damn sure it’s no rescue that I’ve heard of. I mean you know, you’ve seen those applications.  “Have you ever been convicted for abuse of an animal?”

Then I thought, maybe someone bought it for him.

My next thought was, can’t this million dollar quarterback afford a treat a little more expensive than Milkbones? Not that I’m knocking Milkbones per say, for those of you who may use them, I’m just saying my income vs his income I’d think he could afford say a box of something along the lines of Mother Hubbard or Blue Buffalo.

I set these thoughts in my WTF post and continued with my week.

In the meantime, Monday was Be The Change 4 Animals, after I’d posted my contribution I started hopping around to see what you all had written about.

You all had some wonderful, wonderful posts.  There was one however that really touched me and made me think.

Maps of Reality from Julie at The Daily Dog Blog.

I won’t post the whole thing here, but the paragraph that really resonated with me was this:

“Several years ago I listened to a speaker talk about “maps of reality”. Every single person has their own map of reality based on what they have learned from teachers, parents, friends, acquaintances and experiences. These maps of reality make up our “beliefs” about what is right and wrong and how we should act. Sometimes we fail to realize that our map of reality might be skewed and it’s quite possible that what we believe really isn’t true.”

I thought of how much MY map of reality has changed since Sampson entered my life.

This may surprise you to know, but I haven’t always been the dog mom that I am today.

Many of you come from the same era that I did and know thirty years ago, the majority of people had a different view of dogs.  Don’t get me wrong, our dogs lived in the house, but they were considered animals.

Thirty years ago I wouldn’t have left a party early because the dog needed to go out, or it was an hour past their dinner time.

Truthfully, even twenty years ago I didn’t even know dog’s toenails needed to be clipped!

Until Sampson owned me, (and this really saddens me to say this) dogs were just dogs.

When I sat down to write my WTF post for last week, I thought it might be good to include a picture of Michael’s dog so I googled.

No, I did not find a picture but what I did find was this article, “Vick has a dog? Might be just what’s needed to break the cycle of cruelty.”

Imagine my surprise as I found myself agreeing with the article.

I know, it floored me too.  This one paragraph stuck out.

“It’s going to be emotional torture for Vick, but it will be more than that. It will be healing. That dog’s going to make him a better person, and when someone as influential as Michael Vick is a better person, the effects ripple outward.”

Since my map of reality has changed I have a lot of guilt and a lot of regrets, regarding the previous dogs in my life. There’s very few things in my life that I regret, except for when it comes to the animals in my past.  If I had one and only one do over, it would be for them.

I suspect Michael Vick’s map of reality is about to change.  And the guilt and regret will eat at his heart and do far more to changing him than prison, bankruptcy and public outrage ever could.

What’s a map of reality and how have I changed yours?

 

Have you ever heard of a ‘map of reality?’  Has your map of reality changed over the years?

I Believe The Children Are Our Future – Blog The Change

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I believe the children are our future, teach them well and let them lead the way.  So sang Whitney Houston in The Greatest Love of all.

Whitney was on to something.

If there is any hope at all to change the condition of animal welfare in this country, we have to educate the children.

When I was a kid we got smacked when we needed it, I rarely if ever heard of family services being called.  That began changing toward the end of my high school years.

It was definitely enforced with my own children through the school system and I know it worked, because many times in the heat of an argument if they felt threatened in any way, my children would remind me, “If you hit me, I’m calling the police.”

Trust me, my children were never beaten and the police were never called.  My point is, they were educated about child abuse and understood they had the right to be protected.

I believe it’s possible to teach children the proper way to treat animals.  I see it with my own grandchildren.  They are taught how to behave around and be respectful to my dogs.

My daughter was telling me a story about Tara Costa who was on Biggest Loser a few seasons ago.

Tara was in Atlanta for a speaking engagement.  Somewhere near the airport she saw two dogs running on the highway.  She stopped and managed to grab one, a pit bull mix.  She started driving around looking for an owner, when she came across a group of kids.  The kids said, Hey that’s Bishop and then one kid looked at her and said, Don’t give him back, they fight him.

The long and short of the story is, the dog’s owners came out to the car and Tara noticed Bishop cowering.  She made a split second decision and high-tailed it out of there.  The last I knew Bishop was recovering at a facility in New York and would be up for adoption soon.*

Shortly after I heard this story I saw a blog post on Pittieful Love Lovebug Goes to School.

I knew the two would tie together perfectly for Blog The Change.

Animal education could easily be incorporated into our nations school curriculum.

Just as we have educated children about the dangers of drugs, and abuse, we need to educate them about the proper care and treatment of animals.  When we do that, and start at a young age you will begin to see changes in society.

I think this could be accomplished very easily, by engaging rescue groups in each state to provide local schools with the following:

  • Printing up inexpensive flyers with important phone numbers in the area that provide low-cost spaying and neutering programs.
  • A toll-free hotline where people can report cases of suspected abuse or neglect.
  • Animal welfare programs in our schools where children are educated in the proper treatment of animals.

It may be hard to change adult minds, but children are little sponges, they soak up information.  We just need to make sure they get the right information and they in turn will help to bring about real change.

Big beef’s got nothing on the kids of this nation.  We can ensure our farming is humane.

Dog fighting can become history.  Granted an ugly part of history, but sadly many aspects of history are ugly.

BSL? Won’t know what hit it.  Kids know, it’s not how you look that matters, it’s what in your heart.

Granted, it may take some time, but time and money well spent if we are headed in the right direction.

We’ve seen the proof with so many issues.

I’ve contacted my state representative and have a meeting set-up to discuss this issue.

I’m ready for real change, how about you?  Will you join me?

Just imagine the possibilities.

* (Note, this story took place in June.  At the time I contacted Tara Costa, but she did not respond to my e-mail.  The details of this story are based upon what my daughter told me and what I discovered on Tara’s facebook page.)
Blog the Change


 

A Plea To Rescue Groups

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I’m not affiliated with one particular rescue organization, seriously, it doesn’t take a NASA engineer to figure out I’m partial to Labrador Retrievers, but Labs aren’t for everyone.

Instead I like to advocate for rescue.

On the rare occasion someone asks me about getting a dog, I like to educate them a bit on the joys of rescuing.   That’s not to say people shouldn’t get a dog from a responsible breeder, I just make sure they know where pet store puppies come from and how much work goes into training.

Rescues have some pretty strict guidelines when it comes to adopting a dog.  The rescues I’ve been associated with do a home visit.

Where will the dog sleep, how will the dog be exercised, where will the dog be when you are out of the house?

These are all important questions.

I get why they do this.   They are over-whelmed with dogs and understaffed with…well staff.

They see the horrors of the rescue world on a daily basis.  The dogs that have been neglected or worse yet, abused.

In many instances they have the unbelievable task of choosing which dogs will live and which ones will not.

Day in and day out they see the result of people not being responsible and spaying and neutering their dogs.

I get it.  I really do.

And yet, I wonder how many more dogs could be saved, if their guidelines were a bit less stringent.

Case(s) in point:

Stay at home dog mom.

When we made the decision to enlarge our pack I went immediately to Petfinder.  Honestly I spent hours and hours on that website searching for the right dog.

I submitted a fair amount of applications for puppies.  I was turned down on each and every one.

Why?

Because I wasn’t home during the day to let the puppy out for potty breaks.

I couldn’t understand that, we both worked full-time and had managed to successfully raise Sampson from a puppy.

Yes it was true someone wouldn’t be with the puppy 24/7, but my mom lived next door and could go over at three and four times a day to give the puppy a break.  By that time we had fenced in our yard so exercise wouldn’t have been a problem, plus there was already an older dog to provide companionship.

A Tale of Two Labs.

I mentioned in my Tick Tick Boom post there were two wildly crazy labs in the drop-in agility class.  The mom told me, they’re sisters and are inseparable.

I questioned Sara afterwards.

This well-dressed, established couple in their mid-fifties, with a beautiful home, a fenced in yard with a pool, applied to rescues and were turned down.

Why?

Their yard was too narrow.

The result was they went out and bought two dogs. The woman said, what else could I do?

Spaying and Neutering:

A young couple I know rescued a 16 week-old lab mix, the female dog was altered before being adopted.

The dog has urine leakage, which I’ve heard can happen if they are spayed too early.  A perfectly healthy dog now on medication, making an additional expense for the adopter, because the rescue spayed too young.

A friend whose rescue dog, came unaltered.  The rescue sent a van out to spay the dog, 15 minutes later the young woman gets her dog back, still groggy on anesthesia. 15 minutes!!

Newsflash, my mammogram takes longer than 15 minutes and they’re just squashing boobs!!

What’s the answer?

I’m not sure I know.

I do know having someone home 24 hours a day does not necessarily make them a great dog owner.

I do know having a narrow yard is not the end of the world and does not mean the dog won’t be exercised.

I do know the numbers of animals in shelters and rescues is astronomical, but I don’t believe creating health problems in healthy animals will resolve the issue.

The key to changing any behavior (as those of us in the dog world know) is education.

Educate yourself and educate others, it’s the only way to stop the bleeding.

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