The Dog Whisperer

I love the Dog Whisperer.  The insights are just amazing.  One of my favorite cases involved a little dog named Sugar who had trained the husband and wife owners in a most ill manner.  She was attached to the husband and was so possessive of him and hostile to the wife, the couple had quit sleeping together!  Sugar would bite the woman when she got in the bed and act in all manner of hostility toward her. 

I didn't think one had to be the Dog Whisperer to comprehend that the husband and wife were the culprits.  The wife was a well defined victim, and the husband was a jerk.  The husband made no effort to get this dog under control - why?- because he enjoyed having the dog's attention and being someone's favorite.  Eventually the man revealed that he had always had to share a pet, and he was enjoying having a pet that was his alone.  He and the dog would walk together an hour every day and had bonded in healthy ways, but they had likewise bonded in totally neurotic ways that excluded the wife as part of the pack.  The wife was a victim because she did not demand that the dog be removed from the room, from her bed, for Pete's sake.  Simple solutions were not even on the radar screen for people so caught up in such neurotic needs that they defy logic.       

Humans aren't always bright, or their brightness is dimmed by emotional need.

One of the actions taken by The Dog Whisperer in dealing with Sugar involved his getting on the bed on his knees, towering over the dog and advancing.  Not a word or sound was uttered.  Eventually Sugar started backing up, jumped off the bed and ran to hide under the bed.  He smelled no fear; he was not given hands on a platter to bite as someone tried to pet and calm him down; he felt an advance he could not stop by having a biting, barking fit; he gave up. 

There's something there to be learned about dealing not only with dogs, but humans as well.