Altering Attitudes

This morning something quite special happened. Absolutely irrelevant to anyone else, but still, sod it, I’m going to write a little bit about it.

I’ve been with Herself now for heading towards 2 years, (about 21 months currently, if anyone cares about accuracy) and living with her now for just over a year (about 14 months, ditto). In all that time, Hound has been getting used to me, and allowing me to do more stuff with her – it started with walks, following commands, feeding her, playing with her (well, being the primary ball-thrower etc.) and that kind of thing.

Again I should point out, feeding her is actually quite a big issue – she suffers from a throat condition called Megaoesophagus, which means we have to feed her dry food by hand. The Megaoesophagus means she can’t swallow properly, all the nerves in her throat are knackered, so she chokes on normal food, has to have a water bottle (like the one on a hamster cage, only bigger), and so on.

All this time, though, she’s always gone back to Herself for affection. I don’t mind – because of the throat condition and a bundle of other things, trust is a big issue for Hound, and she’s also so routine-driven she might as well be autistic. So of course a “new” person was always going to be a bit of a shock to the system/routine, and these things take time to figure out. Particularly for dogs.

Anyway, and to get back to the point of this post, this morning – for the first time ever – Hound actually came over to me for a stroke, and a scratch behind the ears. She even rolled over and let me scratch her belly. And all this got witnessed by herself too.

So yes, I’m actually pretty chuffed. No good reason really, but all the same, I’m happy about it.