Recently I was speaking with an acquaintance who was telling me how much of a handful her toddler was. Mom is unable to do anything without her baby girl interrupting or causing chaos. She vented saying:
“I can’t even get my nails done. She won’t stop, ever! My son was so much easier, I could take him everywhere, such a calm baby.”
Which made me think about all the clients I meet who say that because their first dog is (was) such a perfect one, they decided to get one more. A new companion who can be a new addition to the family; to their pack. However this new dog has caused so much disruption in the household: going after the elder dog, destroying things, being unruly on the leash, etc,. that now these new pup parents are confused about what they did wrong. My answer to that question is usually a variation of the following:
“you didn’t do anything wrong. No one is at fault here. You were a different person when you had your other dog, your other dog has a different personality. The new dog is much more sensitive, etc”.
My intention when having these conversations is to remind people that in the same way no two people are the same, no two dogs are interchangeable. Conversely, we also change (a lot) through our life spam. Sometimes what worked with one dog, will not work on another. Sometimes the same education given to two siblings of the same household will create two completely different results. Understanding and surrendering to that will, I hope, make it clearer to the reader if they are ready to add another dog to their pack.
My go to answer when someone brings up adding another dog to their pack is: are you ready and available to spend time and resources teaching your new dog the rules of the game? Or are you relying on your other dog to do so? If the answer to the first question is yes, then I tend to say that the person is ready for the commitment of having another pack member. Understanding that this being will arrive at your house not knowing anything about how you expect them to behave is the first step in welcoming a new pack member. Surrendering to the fact that, very much like that mother had to adapt into ways of teaching her toddler (since the ways she taught her older son didn’t seem to work with her daughter). One will have to accept the challenges of being a new pet owner, whatever the differences between the two dogs are. The comparing of the two beings is, in my opinion, not only useless, but unfair. It is absolutely normal to have the best intentions and hopefulness that adding a new member to the pack will turn out perfectly The excitement that the two pups will get along fabulously and will be each other’s best buds is usually the main reason one gets another dog. The issue arises when that intention becomes an expectation, and anything short of that expectation becomes a disappointment. Everyone in this case will come out on the loosing end.
When thinking about welcoming a dog to your family (be it your first. second or third) the most important aspect to understand is that life will never be the same; for good and bad. Dogs are creatures that depend exclusively on their pack to learn rules and boundaries. Dogs need a pack that provides protection and direction. Very much like us humans, the pack is their initial source of information and education. If we fail in that role, then trust is broken and respect lost. Treating a new dog as a carbon copy of another dog, or expecting another dog to be solely responsible for the teaching of a new one usually ends up with the pack becoming unbalanced. Since the responsibility of educating this new being is, at the end of the day, ours alone. We absolutely can rely on other pack members to help (we send our kids to school, have coaches teaching them sports, instructors teaching them a skill, etc). Nevertheless the overriding responsibility of proving protection and direction to our dogs is ours alone. No matter how many dogs we have.
If you are thinking of adding a new member to your pack, do it with gusto. Yet, recognize that two dogs are two different souls. Two different beings that operate in two different time frames and states of mind. In addition to that, recognize that you are not the same person today that you were when you experienced your first dog. Life evolves, changes happen, we transform into different people. Accepting that will be the healthiest way you can we can welcome this new being into your life. They deserve our commitment into guiding them the best way we can. If it starts to become overwhelming make sure you seek advice from a professional. Someone that can help navigate the new reality of a multiple dog household, since having two dogs or more is completely different than having a single one. I suspect that any mother would tell you the same thing about having kids.
Happy training!