Want to stay motivated? Want to help out a deserving animal? Want somebody to love you unconditionally? If the answer to any of these questions is yes, then you need to adopt a training partner!
When I first received a date for my Weight Loss Surgery (WLS), I told my wife that I needed to get a dog. She looked at me kind of funny. Our dog Emma had just been hit by a car and killed a few months earlier. We had kind of talked about waiting to adopt another family member so I think she was kind of surprised. I told her that I needed a dog to serve as my training partner after the big surgery. I explained that if the dog was dependent upon me for a daily walk, it would force me to get out and get some excersise. Not wanting any excuse for failure, she agreed.
We started out our search on the Internet. Most local shelters have pictures of dogs that need to be adopted. After viewing hundreds of dogs on-line, we went to the Watsonville shelter. My wife immediately started looking at little dogs. I reminded her that the dog was for my training partner, so he would have to be big enough to walk some real miles. I spoted a big, goofy looking dog. When we went up to the cage, he wouldn't even come see us. He looked lost and scared. He looked like he had given up. We moved on down the row of jail cells. We picked out a couple possibles. The shelter worker took us outside to a visiting area. She brought the possibles in for us to interact with.
The first two dogs they brought in, just didn't seem like a good match. Finally I asked the worker about the big, goofy dog we had seen. She said that he had been abused and wasn't taking to people very well. She said they would probably have to put him down. I asked her to bring him out. She said she would, but not to expect much. She said to stay seated and see if he will come to you.
The worker brought him in to the visiting area. My wife was in a chair on one side, me on the other. The dog came in and walked straight up to my wife and gave her a kiss. The worker was suprised, Kelly was suprised, and I was jealous. That dog didn't want anything to do with me. It turns out that most of his abuse came at the hands of men. He had some issues.
Well, as you can guess, he came home with us. He didn't have a name, so we named him Rex. That only provided a little trauma to my daughter Tammy. You see we had told her many years ago that if she had been a boy, we would have named her Rex. I don't know why she was so stressed, I mean why waste such a great name?
Part 2 will talk more about my partner
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