Meet Toast, a Valentine's Day addition to our family (timing coincidental)!
Toast is 8-ish months old and so, so scared and sad looking. She spends most of her time looking like this.
And she won't come with us unless we pick her up. It's a good thing she's only 27 pounds or this might have been a bit more challenging!
When we met her at the shelter, she walked around a little bit, but I had to scoop her up and hold her in my lap to get her anywhere near me and it took a good 10 minutes to get her to stop shaking. The volunteer was delighted that she stopped and relaxed at all.
I fell in love with her and knew we had to take her home and save her and show her that the world's not scary and not all people are bad, but at the same time it's a little heart-breaking to think about the situation that turned her into this in the first place.
So far we've carried her up and down stairs and outside for bathroom breaks, and she mostly just lets us and doesn't do much of her own free will. Except eat! But even then I had to go stand about 15 feet away and not watch her.
Luke is supposed to be her mentor to show her that people are good and how to relax, but unfortunately he's been a little stand-offish. I thought he was jealous, but Ryan thinks he's getting a little anxious because this new dog is so, so afraid and he doesn't know why. So basically we have two little scaredy-dogs who are going to needs tons of love and attention until everyone figures out that it's all ok.
But I'm sure we'll get there eventually.
Toast is 8-ish months old and so, so scared and sad looking. She spends most of her time looking like this.
And she won't come with us unless we pick her up. It's a good thing she's only 27 pounds or this might have been a bit more challenging!
When we met her at the shelter, she walked around a little bit, but I had to scoop her up and hold her in my lap to get her anywhere near me and it took a good 10 minutes to get her to stop shaking. The volunteer was delighted that she stopped and relaxed at all.
I fell in love with her and knew we had to take her home and save her and show her that the world's not scary and not all people are bad, but at the same time it's a little heart-breaking to think about the situation that turned her into this in the first place.
So far we've carried her up and down stairs and outside for bathroom breaks, and she mostly just lets us and doesn't do much of her own free will. Except eat! But even then I had to go stand about 15 feet away and not watch her.
Luke is supposed to be her mentor to show her that people are good and how to relax, but unfortunately he's been a little stand-offish. I thought he was jealous, but Ryan thinks he's getting a little anxious because this new dog is so, so afraid and he doesn't know why. So basically we have two little scaredy-dogs who are going to needs tons of love and attention until everyone figures out that it's all ok.
But I'm sure we'll get there eventually.
