Is Your Child Your Dog’s Owner or Are You?
At seven o’clock in the morning, in the midst of a torrential downpour, you are walking around the neighborhood with your dog so he can do his daily duties. You have a leash in your right hand and a bag in your left while your dog seems to be having the time of his life. In the meantime you are being beaten in the head by the sideways rain blowing into your ear.
I’m sure you have experienced this!
Dogs don’t always pay a lot of attention to what people say; they focus on how they say it and more importantly what they do. It doesn’t matter who says they’re the dog’s owner, that doesn’t make it so.
Often, the dog will bond with whoever takes the most care of him. He will see who cleans up his messes and who gets up in the early morning hours to let him outside. He will also notice who feeds him.
They also see who makes time for them, and who brushes them off.
So if you plan on getting a dog for your children you need to take this into account because if you are the one taking care of this dog then the dog is going to be your pet – not your child’s.
Remember the story of Lassie and his boy? They were inseparable. Just like owner and dog should be. If your child is not going to take the time to bond with his pet, his pet is not going to take the time to bond with him!
This is why everybody in the household must make sure they will take time to care for the dog before getting one! If he is just tolerated by a child, that is all the dog will do to him – tolerate!
Filed under: Training