little dog crazy and why it is sometimes hard to adopt one.
Carol · Jun. 1, 2014
we moved all of the younger little dogs into the computer room with buddy...buddy thinks he is a young dog too so he tolerates their high energy pretty well. and we put that bat shit crazy roxy in with them too because they are all young enough to have to deal with her. she's pretty good with them, just verbally psycho-bossy when the little ones start playing but they pretty much just ignore her.
poor roxy..she gets yelled at a lot. roxy shut up, roxy knock it off, roxy cut it out, geezus roxy, you are driving me nutz!!! 5 pounds of dynamite with a quarter inch fuse. but... roxy is pretty freaking adorable occasionally too. sucks to be a one eyed biting raging monster...and it sometimes it sucks to live with one too.
i really want to find the perfect homes for babes and spot, and hank. it is not just about finding a good home...for these guys it has to be the right homes.
i have a thing about finding homes for our guys..i am not really interested in homes who think they will be the perfect match once they get their hands on them and can change them. i am not saying that i don't want homes who will invest the time and energy in helping them be all that they can be. but what i am saying is...if this is as good as it gets, i want homes who will cherish and love them anyway.
some of these guys already lost homes because they could not (for whatever reason) be who their families wanted them to be...why on earth would i send them out again to a home who wasn't 100% happy with who they currently happen to be? and sometimes people don't get it. when all i want to hear is.... how will you cheerfully deal with lifelong house peeing?..what they tell me is how they will work so hard to successfully house train the little leg lifting monkey.
well great, but what if you can't? because i do not want one of our dogs living in a home surrounded by frustration for some problem the new adopters knew that the dog already had.
we have talked a lot here about hank and that last good home that did not pan out because the 3 yr old was afraid of him. should i have..or shouldn't i have? not that it matters because i went for shouldn't.
hank is a pretty exuberant dog...not too careful of where his feet land when he is jumping around. the family felt the child would get used to him..ok..well probably... but how many times would hank be knocking the poor kid down and how many times would he have to feel bad for making her wail? yes there was training..but training what? hank not to bounce? hank is five years old, he is a high energy, somewhat klutzy dog...training is not going to give him soft grace. honestly...he is more of a hip hop street dancer than someone who can waltz. that family needed a dog who could foxtrot or waltz.
people get mad at me when i say no. well..the bottom line is this...i want every single dog of ours to get the right home. i am not perfect and i am not infallible but i know these dogs better than anyone else in world. i live with them, i sleep with them, i eat with them and i sit and just watch them a lot because i am fascinated by them (plus i adore them.) and when i say no..i am not saying this or that is a bad home...i am saying a different dog would be happier with them, one more suited to that particular home and this dog would be happier in a different kind of home.
but here is the thing... folks THINK they already love that dog and want him/her so badly and sometimes folks get angry or offended when i won't give them what they want. PLEASE... give me a break..A. they don't know that dog and no one falls in love with the real dog in an instant. what they fell in love with, was the dream. real love takes time to grow..and it IS a shared thing. i have real life dogs here, not dogs made of flimsy fantasy. B. don't tell me i am being mean keeping A poor dog in a shelter when he/she could have a good home because my plan is NOT to keep them in the shelter forever, my plan is to find him/her the right home. and C...what these folks are really missing from not really listening to me is.... they really do not want a dog that i tell them will not fit well with their needs....it makes life that much harder for everybody.
dogs are not trading cards, interchangable to any and every decent home...that is so grossly disrespectful and really unfair. loving them is NOT enough...wanting them is NOT enough..lots of them already had both of those...and look where they are now.
roxy is a crazy dog...and i do happen to love her. not a picture on the internet, not some dream of teaching her to be normal...i just love roxy as she is (a ROYAL pain in the ass.) and if i ever find a home for her..it will be someone who will love her like that.
It takes an amazing amount of strength and love to say no. And "no" is a full sentence. I applaud you and salute you.
Our own old girl passed away two years ago. At the end she was kinda senile, peed on a pee pad, had to be hand fed, cried sometimes just cause she wasn't sure what the hell was going on....and we loved her so much it was crazy. Her death broke our hearts. I didn't want to think about a new dog for a long time. Now I'm sort of dabbling in the idea. Ewok has tugged at my heartstrings from afar for quite some time. I found her (and Smokey) by perusing PetFinder. She reminds me so much of our Chibi. Sweet and kinda stampy (not quite as graceful as she maybe once was). I can just feel how wonderful it would be to bury my face in her soft fur....but we say, right now, "no". And I'm pretty sure you'd say it too. The truth is, I don't think I want another dog ~ even darling Ewok. I think I want Chibi. So much it hurts. And that wouldn't be fair to anyone. And I don't think I'm the only one to experience this.
So I'm really glad you say no to people. I admire and respect you so very, very much. You, and everyone who keeps SAINTS going. Thank you.