Relationships | Raining Cats and Dogs

Friendly Furry Companions and Better Health

Furry companions live in the moment. Pets serve as ice breakers and facilitate social situations among us. Mentally, emotionally, and physically this is a good relationship to have especially when a person is alone.

The articles on this site, dpfa.org highlight the health benefits. Pets give us unconditional love, comfort us in our woes, listen when no one else will, and teach us how to let things go. There are four elements to the human and furry companion relationship–intimacy, safety, kinship, and constancy. If you want a pet of your own, you can go to http://www.ebayclassifieds.com/ and check out their Pet page, where you can find the information you need and even interact with fellow pet lovers.

Intimacy with a furry companion is immediate and at the owner’s discretion. Studies show pet relationships lower blood pressure, and anxiety especially in the elderly. Often Alzheimer patients are more manageable when a pet is around for soothing.
Safety can be the fabulous story of a furry friend warning a person about a stranger, or other dangers. Safety also involves the fact furry friends make humans feel more secure. Walking a dark street at night is a joy if a dog is tagging along, but can be a frightening experience when alone and every shadow seems a threat.
Kinship is simply the fact furry friends form such deep bonds with humans that they become family. They provide a love pattern in our lives that humans take for granted until one day the furry friend is not there. Humans discover they often grieve as deeply for the loss of a pet as they do for a loved one.
Constancy is the concept that furry friends do not change over the years as much as humans do. The bond is stable and easy.

Loving furry friends is cheaper and healthier than taking medication.

Filed Under: Pets, Relationships Tagged With: Furry fandom, People, Pet

How to Socialize Your Puppy

Socializing is a critically important step in the dog-raising process. While the process itself is pretty easy, it tends to be one of the most difficult things for people to do for their dogs. Making the effort now will ensure that you won’t have an aggressive dog in the future. Your dog may be aggressive towards people, visitors, children, or other dogs if you do not socialize your dog.

Part One: People

Take your puppy everywhere you can. Take him to a local park and invite children and adults to play with him (chances are, you won’t have to ask—people LOVE puppies and will probably be asking you if they can play with him). This is also helpful in your jumping-up training, if you ask people to not touch your puppy until he is sitting or lying down. Have him meet everyone you can: young children, babies (gently and supervised, of course), older children, teens, adults, the elderly, etc. Keep these interactions as positive as possible and have everyone give your puppy treats and affection. If someone is treating your puppy aggressively or negatively, gently remove your puppy from the situation immediately. The key here is gently. You don’t need to grab your puppy roughly or harshly, just scoop him up and walk away.

Part Two: Dogs

Dog interactions are tricky because dog introductions require structure, and not all dog owners are prepared for that. Try to gauge the dogs you know. Which ones are friendly and non-aggressive? Which ones are well-behaved? Which dogs will give your puppy positive experiences? Find these dogs and invite them over, so your dog gets used to having other dogs in his space. Go over to non-aggressive dogs’ houses.

Part Three: Visitors

You need to invite people over so your dog gets used to having visitors on his home turf. The more people come over, the more your dog will be okay with outsiders in his normal space. Some dogs aren’t aggressive at all unless someone is in “their” space.

Filed Under: Pets, Relationships Tagged With: Dog, Recreation, Socialization, Your Puppy (Complete Pet Owner's Manual)

Reasons to Socialize Your Dog

When many people first get a dog, they focus on the basics. House training. Sit. Stay. Don’t eat shoes. Don’t go through the garbage. These are all incredibly important lessons to teach a new puppy, but don’t forget another very important lesson: socializing.

What is Socializing?

Socializing is the process by which you introduce your dog to the concept of other people and other dogs. We often don’t think about socializing because we as humans do it naturally: our babies and toddlers often go out into the world in shopping malls, grocery stores, or daycare centers. No one is afraid of a baby and adults often come up to our children and talk to them, smile at them, make silly faces in the checkout line, etc. However, dogs generally stay in one area. They may have a fenced yard where they exercise or go to the bathroom. They stay in your house. Even if you take your dog on frequent walks (and you should), you probably don’t stop to greet people or introduce your dog to them. Having a puppy generally makes this easier since almost no one is afraid of new puppies, and children (or adults) often ask to pet the new puppy. Your dog also needs socializing with other dogs to curb aggression problems later in life. This can be tougher than socializing with humans, because many other dogs suffer from the same problems you’re trying to curb now. Other dogs don’t “play nice,” and you may be afraid they’ll cause an injury to your tiny puppy.

What Happens if I Don’t Socialize my Puppy?

You’ll experience greater problems when your dog reaches adulthood. They may not like children (or not know what to do with children). This is incredibly difficult on young couples who may want to start a family one day. If your dog isn’t socialized to other dogs, your dog may experience severe aggression later in life, which may prevent you from taking your dog outside the house (and furthering the problem). You may also be unable to get an additional dog.

Filed Under: Pets, Relationships Tagged With: Dog, Dog breed, Housebreaking

Reasons to Take Your Dog to Obedience Classes

You think you know all there is to know about training dogs, right? Maybe you had dogs growing up. Maybe you figure if you’ve raised three kids, you can definitely train a dog. Maybe you just think that it can’t be that hard to get an animal to sit when you tell it to. Maybe you’re right. Here are some things to think about before you make that call.

Obedience class will help socialize your dog.
If you were thinking that training your dog to sit can’t be that hard, you’re onto something: it really isn’t that hard. Even if your dog is an exceptionally slow learner, the internet and dog training books can help you figure out the best way to train your dog. However, your dog will never become socialized if it’s just you and your dog (literally) sitting at home every day. Obedience classes are a socially acceptable way to get your dogs socialized to other people and dogs. What is socialization? Socialization is the process by which your dog learns to be around people and other dogs. Think about it: if your baby had never, ever seen other humans besides your immediate family, wouldn’t your baby be afraid of other people? At the very least, wouldn’t it make childcare a nightmare? Obedience classes often stress the importance of meeting other dogs (and the correct way to meet other dogs). The controlled environment is a safe and structured way of socializing, especially compared to taking your new puppy up to strange dogs in the park.
Obedience classes will show you different ways to train your dog.
Treats, clickers, hand signals, and other forms of motivation and training will all be presented to you in hopes of finding the best training method for your dog. Just like people, no two dogs are alike. Think of people: each student has a different learning style, right? Just like how a person may be a visual learner or a hands on learner, a dog can be food-motivated, play-motivated, praise-motivated, etc.

Filed Under: Pets, Relationships Tagged With: Activities, Dog training, Obedience training, Training