Deb: Puppies Can Be . . .

Debb writes:  

Many years ago, I gave my sister and her family a puppy from our first litter. They had fallen in love with our "Teako", though they lived in another state and hadn't seen her many puppy antics. They just knew the loving, protective, well behaved Teako. I warned them..forcefully...about how bad Airedale puppies can be. They assured me they definitely wanted an Airedale. 

I spent the next year fielding hysterical calls from sister about her bad puppy. She escaped multiple times and had to be bailed out of "doggie jail". She ate a pepsi can and they thought for sure she'd die. nope. not even bloody stool when she pooped out pieces of aluminum. One day my sister called saying "oh my GOD!! she dug up an entire six foot cherry tree with the WHOLE root ball still attached and dragged it up six steps onto the deck and then had the AUDACITY to scratch on the door and was happily wagging her tail, showing me her proud accomplishment!!" 

With each of these calls, I reminded her that I'd warned her and if it was too much, I'd take her back. Each time, she'd sigh and say "no. If a dog does bad things, it's the fault of the humans, not the puppy." 

Then one day she called and said "you aren't going to believe this. every night, at 10pm, if we don't go to bed, Abby stands up, looks at us like 'are you coming?' and then if we don't, she goes upstairs." They lived in a three-story townhouse with their family room at the bottom, doors on the second floor, and bedrooms on the top floor. One night, my brother in law, Fred said "you know, i don't think she goes straight to our room to her bed." So he quietly followed her. when he came back, he had tears in his eyes, saying "I can't believe what I just saw. She went first to the front door, stood a minute, sniffed, then went to the back door and did the same thing. Then she went very quietly into each of the kids' rooms, went up and sniffed their faces, then wagged and went to the next. She finally went to our room and got in her bed." 

My sister was crying when she said : "she checked the doors and checked the kids before she went to bed!!! Six months ago, I was ready to give her back. Now, if she got hurt or sick, we'd sell the house if we had to to save her."