Dogs and Children

My partner's friend, who is a private foster carer, bought the boy who is she is currently fostering with her to see our new home. Now, the day before, she had told me how slow the boy was, and how he never listened and had no concentration or attention span. He is, by all accounts, a special-needs child.

He also, apparently, has an irritating habit of questioning everything to the nth degree. For example, he might ask "What day is it?", you might answer Monday, and so he would ask "So which day is it tomorrow?", and you would answer, "Tuesday", and he would go on.

Now me, I'm not a big fan of children, I must confess.However, for reasons that I have never been able to explain, they seem to gravitate towards me. The only reason that I have ever been able to come up with is that I flatly refuse to treat them like anything but capable young adults. I'm a huge believer in trust. I truly believe that if you put trust into people, they will, on the whole, respect it and not abuse it. This might be a very naive view but it works for me. Regardless, as someone who never really had a childhood, I find it very hard to try to relate to children at a child level. Anyway...

I, as I usually do, observed the boy for the first time, when he arrived. As someone who has his own mental health issues, I wanted to judge for myself, as opposed to relying on the words of someone else. Remember, I was told this boy had no concentration.

What I did notice about him was that he immediately had hundreds of questions about our GSD. How old is she? What's that brown part at the back of her? What's her name? Why does she need four legs? Will she eat frogs? the list went on. But, you know, something told me that this wasn't as random as it might at first seem.

Shortly after, I asked the dog to sit, as I was talking. The boy asked if he could try it. He tried it, the dog didn't listen. I explained to the boy that it was in his tone. It was very dull and uninspiring. He jollied up his tone and the dog sat for him. I then took him through Blondi's entire repertoire, sit, lie-down, stay, come, feet-up, quiet, leave, break, and so forth. Once he learned the voice commands, I taught him the associated hand-signals for each.

What stunned me was how quickly he (a) learned it was in the tone of voice, (b) remembered each hand-signal for each command, (c) recognised that if it went wrong, it wasn't the dog but his own delivery, (d) just how focused he was on learning, and how much he seemed to be thoroughly enjoying what he was accomplishing, and (e) how much he actually listened, as opposed to actually asking endless questions. Apparently, this was a first.

It's an incredible shame as, truly, the poor boy doesn't have a great deal going for him. He is, visually, physically, and mentally, what one could reasonably describe as one of life's natural victims. He's only fourteen and has had a God-awful experience of life thus far.

Sadly, he can't be left alone with anyone, or else I'd love to work with him a little more, even if it's just walking the dog. I'd like to think that the time he spent with the dog gave him something positive. Id' also like to think that he learned he has skills that not everyone can naturally adopt or naturally has, regardless of their mental make-up, experience, or physique.

If ever there was a case for dogs making connections that we mere humans sometimes seem unable to make, this day made that case for me. Few things touch me deeply, but this day was truly something very special, I think.

Beautiful story Maz. I do hope you get to see more of him.

Wonderful story and I'm sure the boy got a very positive experience from it! Well done!

What a wonderful blog . You know, maybe your friend would come on walks with you?
I am often moved to tears by the sight of my son with our dogs. They have a special bond and understanding. Dogs can really bring children out of themselves.

"Will she eat frogs?"
The innocence of children ...

That's a lovely story Maz, and wouldn't it be wonderful if you and Blondi could help this boy in some way? Seems like you quickly built up a rapport with this lad, despite your assertion that you don't 'do' children ...

What a cracking,moving story and well done on having seen this in the wee chap.Hope he gets to visit you more often too.

A very nice story. I think I'm right in saying that people like that young lad have been found to relate to animals much better than humans so it would be nice if he could go on the occassional walk with you.