Reintegrating With Humanity

For the first couple of week Frank got me out of the house a limited number of times. He had not yet had all his jabs, so we couldn’t go for walks. I’d stared reading up on dog training tips so I would take him for short walks with him in my arms, to get him used to being on streets, around traffic, around people (something I wasn’t good with either at this point in my life), and we ended up in coffee shops a lot.

Now as I’ve mentioned I wasn’t a very sociable human at this point in my life. Frank however was – he loved people and he loved the attention he got everywhere he went. Every walk, with him in my arms, we wouldn’t get more than 20 feet without someone stopping and giving him affection. This forced me into having brief human interactions. I just about remembered enough human sentences to get through all of these.

In coffee shops I’d always sit us in the corner to try and avoid humans, largely impossible when you’re holding a tiny Cavalier puppy though.

Then the day came for Frank’s first walk. I’d been diligent with my book learning, so he was already lead and harness desensitised before his first walk. And I knew that this walk was only to be short, 5mins for every month he is old – so at 10 weeks 12.5mins was our maximum walk.

[Training note – this is a very important rule that all puppy owners should stick to. You want to make sure your puppy’s bone growth and muscle growth remain in parallel, and over exercising your puppy can fuck this up, resulting in an adult with joint issues. Keep to this rule, let your puppy manage their own exercise in the house (they are good at this) and your puppy will be absolutely fine.]

We walked to the top of our road, and due to his initial trepidation, followed by excitement at sniffing EVERYTHING, this took 12.5mins. So, at the top of the road, I picked him up and we walked to the coffee shop. First walk completed!

We did this a few more times over the next few days, and then one day I decided to carry him to the park and do our 12.5mins there.

This resulted in something I had not really thought about – talking to people. Every single person in the park wanted to say hello to Frank, and in doing so spoke to me as well. I was asked his age, breed, and name 20-30 times a walk. Every dog owner with a sweet dog would come over and let Frank say hi to them (socialising is so important for your puppy. We will talk about this properly later as it is often done badly, but please make sure your puppy says hello to every dog it can).

Something happened during these interactions – I started talking to humans again. It’s a skill we can easily lose if we retract into our devices, or into our own heads during a breakdown. But Frank needed walking if I wanted to go out or not, and Frank wanted to talk to everyone even if I didn’t. To this day I swear he knew that I needed to do this.

At first, I found it difficult, and kept my responses short. But overtime I started to get better at it – totally by accident. I thought I couldn’t face people anymore, but they spoke to Frank, and therefore spoke to me, and slowly my confidence started to come back. Suddenly, one day without warning, I started to enjoy it and look forward to it.

Frank did something no human could do. As I’ve mentioned, for years I had a team of very nice, experienced professionals around me. They were all trying to keep me alive, and change my mind set about my situation. And they all failed. I was too stubborn to engage, and they couldn’t find a way around that wall.

This little guy did in a day what no human was able to do in years – from day one he made me care and love something that was more than just myself and my own problems. Fast forward 3 weeks and he had me back out in the world of the living – again, something no human had been able to do.

3 weeks of having a dog vs 6yrs of therapy – the dog wins hands down. Sigmund Freud invented the therapy dog by accident – he noticed patients who were treated with his Chow Chow Jofi in the room did better than those who were treated without Jofi – and thus the idea of the therapy dog was born (it may have been thought of earlier but this is the earliest and most famous reference I’m aware of).

Frank was officially my therapy dog (well my emotional support dog) by 11 weeks of age. You might think this is a lot of responsibility for such a young and small pup – but not once from that day onwards did that ever show. He seemed to know what his job was (all dogs need a job on some level), and to this day I am convinced the universe brought Frank to me for this very reason.

Frank had reignited by desire to be alive and to do stuff, so it was time to re-evaluate my life.