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Likes: Love from my dog mom and dog dad
Pet-Peeves: Squirrels, rain
Favorite Toy: You're gonna give me a toy? A toy? I don't care what kind, give me that toy!
Favorite Food: Wellness
Favorite Walk: Any walk with Sandy, my dog sister
Best Tricks: Being friendly and making everyone fall in love with me
Arrival Story: Chester was adopted from the Furry Friends Foundation in Chicago
Bio: Go to http://www.thetruthaboutpitbulls.c om to find out more about how wonderful pit bulls are, courtesy of renowned pit bull expert and rescuer Catherine Hedges.
Forums Motto: Barkenstein
The Groups I'm In: Bully Ed 101, Dont Bully My Breed
Special Talents: I have magical self-cleaning properties. My mom and dad can't figure it out, but no matter how much I get dirty, play in mud, and roll in things, I always manage to make me fur smell extra-sweet. And the white parts of my fur always stay perfectly snow-white, no matter what! It's amazing!
Life Saver: Catherine Hedges saved my life by having me pulled from a pound in Indiana the day before I was due to be gassed! She brought me to a shelter in Chicago where my mom and dad found me. I love Catherine for saving my life!
It seems there are animal lovers everywhere, and when the subject of dogs comes up, as it often does, I have a sense of anticipation, as I love to tell people about my dogs, but I also always have to fear their reaction. You see, my two wonderful dogs are pit bulls. Yes, the mean dogs you see on TV attacking people. The dogs that Cincinnati has banned because they are considered so dangerous. When I tell people I have two dogs, the first question they always ask is “what kind?” Sometimes I proudly tell that they are pit bulls. Though for the neighbors and dog warden, they are “boxer mixes.” The reactions are so varied that there is humor in them. It’s always a delight when the person turns out to be educated about dogs, and proceeds to tell me about the rescue pit bull in their life. And then there are the people who just look at me like I’ve gone completely insane and end the conversation quickly, eager to get away from the crazy woman.
Some years ago I never would have expected to have a dog, much less a pit bull. I never liked dogs when I was younger. As I child, we had neighbors with a difficult dog. He once bit me as I rode by on my bike, and I was always a little bit afraid of big dogs after that. I even remember in college, I had a boyfriend with a friendly-as-can-be yellow lab, but I was even uncomfortable with him. A big, unpredictable animal jumping on you to say hello? No thanks.
I still can’t say for sure when or why I changed. I think it was when I first started dating my now-husband. He is a huge animal lover, and even had a framed photo of his sister’s dog! Though he didn’t have a dog himself, perhaps it was just being around someone who had that kind of relationship with animals that turned me. In my own family, nobody was much of an animal-lover. But somewhere inside me there was a latent dog-lover that emerged, and by the time my husband and I got engaged, I was stopping to pet other people’s dogs on the street. I found out years later that my great-grandmother was a dog lover. She had a beagle named Daisy into her 80’s, when she could barely get around herself. My grandmother gave me a picture of her in the 1950’s, with her two dogs at the time. She was sitting, looking down at them. One was partially in her lap, and she was petting him. She was smiling, and I recognized that contented look of having the pure love of dogs in your life. So it turns out I was destined to be a dog lover all along.
With my new love of dogs, and time on my hands due to temporary unemployment, I started to volunteer at an animal shelter. It was a bit of a fluke. I went to a dog adoption event one weekend, just to get to look at and pet and play with the dogs, as I could not get one of my own yet. Many different shelters and rescues had different areas to show their animals. I just happened to start chatting with a volunteer from one shelter, and when I found out that it was only two blocks from my apartment, on a lark I asked if I could volunteer. I went in the next week for an orientation. The shelter was volunteer-run, and the shelter director was insanely busy. She gave me a quick overview of the shelter, and explained to me that this shelter took in a lot of pit bulls and other difficult-to-place dogs. Then she rushed out of the office to take care of other things, leaving me to fill out the paperwork and sign the waiver. I remember thinking, “What on EARTH have I gotten myself into? I’m going to be walking PIT BULLS?” I even thought about just sneaking out before the shelter director returned. But I stayed. In fact, I stayed for three more years, until I moved out of state. And I learned to love pit bulls. They are never given a chance, yet their incredible personalities could win over the hardest heart. That is, if that heart actually met them! I realized that I had actually never had contact with a pit bull before volunteering there, and that my only knowledge of pit bulls came from the media. I just wish I could introduce everyone to a pit bull so they would know better.
After volunteering for 6 or 7 months, my husband and I began to look at condos. Once we bought out own place, we could have a dog. I would take the train to the shelter after work, and sometimes my husband would pick me up on his way home. One day, as I returned from my last walk, he was already waiting outside. I introduced him to the dog I was walking, and she jumped all over him. She was a difficult case. I got her inside, and when I got into the car to drive home, my husband asked “What was her name again?” I told him it was Sandy, and he said he liked her. I laughed, because she was far from the most likable dog in the shelter. I told him how she would bite the leash when you tried to get her out of her cage, so that sometimes it would take 10 or 15 minutes of struggling to even put a leash and collar on her. I told him how she would lunge and bark at other dogs, and how many volunteers wouldn’t even walk her because they were afraid of her. Even I wasn’t particularly fond of her. But, just a week or two later, as I discussed condos with the shelter director, who had by now become a friend, I told her we wanted to adopt a dog as soon as we moved. And I just offhandedly mentioned that Greg (my husband), actually liked Sandy. From that moment the deal was done. She was so excited to have a potential adopter for Sandy, there was no way I could have backed out, even if I had wanted to. Sandy had already been there over six months, and was going to be very difficult to find a home for. So, within a few months, we bought a condo and moved in, and crazy Sandy came home with us.
And what an experience she has been. It’s been a journey, and we’ve had our challenges, but now, almost five years later, when I think back to the Sandy I knew at the shelter, I can’t believe it is the same dog who is my baby now. She is so obedient, and listens so well. She is a true communicator. One of the most beautiful things in my life is seeing and feeling how our intuitive communication has grown with each passing month and year. She has learned the power of quiet expression. When she wants to come into bed, she doesn’t whine or poke at my foot with her big, black, wet nose. She just sits quietly, knowing full well I won’t be able to resist her when she “asks” so perfectly politely.
Her physical beauty also seems to grow and become more dignified with age. She is a beautiful, reddish shade of brown, like the old crayon color burnt orange. Her fur is very short, but so soft and silky that we call her “buttery.” She has several different positions for her ears, depending on her mood – perked up when excited, halfway back and floppy when relaxed, pulled back tight against her head when anxious. She is a compact bundle of muscle. By her size, you would guess she weighed 10 pounds less than she does, because she is so dense. The shine of her fur in the light highlights the beautiful ripple of the muscles in her thighs when she walks.
Sandy had us all to herself for the first few years, and we thought having a dog couldn’t get any better, but then Chester came into our lives. In the time we had Sandy, we had done a lot of training, she had mellowed with age, and we had moved from a tiny condo in Chicago to a big house with a big fenced yard in Cincinnati. She never liked other dogs. But with time, when she saw another dog, she had gone from being intent on killing it to simply hating it. So, in our infinite wisdom, my husband and I decided it might be time for Sandy to get a brother.
We happened to be going to Chicago for a visit, so I arranged with my friend to take Sandy to the same shelter to meet some other dogs. It didn’t go exactly as I had hoped. Sandy didn’t take to it at all, and couldn’t even have contact with any of the other dogs for more than a second. We had a trainer in Chicago, who also worked with the shelter, who was just like The Dog Whisperer. He had agreed to try to help us that weekend. I had seen him get Sandy to lay right down on another dog before, so I assumed that he would magically make that happen with one of our potential adoptees, and everything would be fine. Unfortunately, he was sick that weekend and never could help. Sunday morning we had pretty much made up our minds to go home without another dog. But after a long lunch with my friend, and some more very nervous introductions and walks with other dogs, somehow we decided we would give it a try. Because they could not be together, Sandy had to go in a crate in the backseat, and all 75 pounds of Chester sat on my lap in the front the entire 5-hour drive home. We had agreed that we would not officially adopt Chester, but rather temporarily foster him, so that if it didn’t work out we could bring him back. Not that I ever could have.
Chester turned out to be a character, a wonderful, joyful addition to our family. Though he was only barely full-grown, with plenty of puppy in him, he was the picture of calm in contrast to Sandy’s hyper craziness at the slightest stimulation. We took to calling him “Mr. Good Morning Man,” because when we let him out of the basement in the mornings, he would fly out with such energy and happiness – a wonderful way to start a morning. He brightens up the whole atmosphere of a room when he comes bounding into it, as though the space itself smiles. He is the classic big, goofy, dog. He is mostly the same color of beautiful brown as Sandy, but with more white. The top part of his tail is so perfectly white that it looks as though he dipped it in paint, and he wears white “socks” on some of his legs. His fur is a little longer, just long enough to make him perfectly snuggly. And he loves to snuggle. He is a big boy, and lanky, so that when he walks it sometimes seems as if his head and his butt are attached to different bodies.
The first few months with Chester at home were some of the hardest I’ve had. It took a very long time until we could even let them interact off-leash. And during that time, my husband was traveling for work a lot, so most evenings I was on my own, having to hold Chester’s leash the whole time, and not able to so much as get up and go to the bathroom without taking him with me, as even a moment of unsupervised time could turn into an ugly dogfight. There were some of those, too - I had to break up several in those first few months. I don’t recommend trying to pull apart two fighting pit bulls who weigh a combined 125 pounds! One time in the midst of reaching into the middle of a fight, Chester accidentally bit me as he was lunging for Sandy. The bite was large and deep enough that I went to the emergency room. I remember that when I was checking in, the nurse thought I was an idiot to try to get them apart, and asked why I didn’t just go get a broomstick or something. And I remember thinking, “OK, sure, I’m going to go run several rooms away and get a broomstick, while letting them tear each other apart, then come back and start hitting them with it? I don’t think so.” People thought that I must be very upset that I had been bitten, and seemed to assume that I would somehow be more careful or do something differently if it ever happened again. And while I was upset, I would have done exactly the same thing. I remember explaining to someone that I would much rather it be me in the hospital getting stitches than me rushing one of the dogs to the emergency vet. At least I could understand what was going on and why it had happened, and know that everything was going to be OK.
After all those months of wondering if Sandy and Chester would ever really get along, finally they did get used to each other. Now, a year and a half after bringing Chester home, they are best friends. They play like crazy, chasing each other all over the house and yard, wrestling and playing tug-o-war with toys. They even curl up next to each other on the couch in the evenings. Again, when I think back to what it was like when we first brought him home, it still amazes me that these are the same dogs.
The little differences and similarities between them are fun to observe. Sandy loves to be cuddly in the mornings, but in the evenings doesn’t like to be bothered. If you sit too close to her on the couch, she will get up and move! Chester, on the other hand, won’t stay out of your lap in the evenings. Chester loves to spend hours and hours laying by the patio door and just watching the world go by outside. Sandy never was interested in windows. When Sandy lays down, she tucks her back legs under her. Chester leaves his stretched out behind him, so he looks a little like a frog. Sometimes he will also stretch his front legs above his head, and then he looks like he’s flying like Superman.
And he is Superman to me. They both are, because they have the power to wash away a bad day, to lift my heart with happiness, and the power to give the gift of unconditional love. And when you have two superheroes living with you, it’s hard not to have your life and way too much of your brain taken over by them. It’s the best obsession I’ve ever had.
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