Phantom: "See? It was worth it, wasn't it? Look how well behaved I am now!"

The following is a guest post from my energetic and very compassionate friend Alex.

A lifetime ago, I lived in Alaska and spent my days rescuing dogs from the Anchorage pound. I loved dogs, and dogs were being killed at the pound (as they still are, in every city in the nation, because people are still breeding dogs), so I got involved―my first foray into activism.

I rescued, fostered, sterilized, and found homes for a heck of a lot of dogs. They destroyed the husband's nice house, upset the neighbors, and took over every minute of my life. But I loved it!

I ended up with most of the "bad" dogs. The ones nobody else wanted—sometimes because of health or age but usually because of extreme hyperactivity. These dogs were wired like they had found the mother lode of crystal meth (which I do not partake of, by the way). Ninety percent of them had a similar story: Purchased on impulse when they were cute, tiny puppies. Then they grew up (what a shock!) into 8-month-old, big, strong, totally untrained bundles of hyperness. They jumped, ran away, chewed, pissed, pooped, dug, and barked and then ran some more, and they very rarely slowed down or slept. Bad dog? No. Lazy, ignorant humans!

A lot of my foster dog training was learned the hard way. Many of the tips and tricks that are common knowledge these days were unknown back then, and I didn't even have Internet access. Positive reinforcement, training with treats, lots of exercise and affection … if only I had had KP's Dog Blog 10 years ago!

The most valuable thing I learned was patience. And this is the advice I hear myself giving most often to people with new dogs in their family. Be kind, be consistent, train them, give them lots of exercise, and BE PATIENT.

I sucked as a teenager, but my parents were patient and now they have a brilliant adult daughter who is a joy to be around. Or at least is an adult.

My boyfriend could not figure out how to cook for me. But I was patient and trained him gently with lots of positive reinforcement, and he's making tofu scramble as I write this.

Dogs deserve the same chance. If they're young and crazy, just wait. Don't be mean. Don't stop loving them. Do not even think about "getting rid" of them—only scumbags "get rid of" dogs. Puppyproof your house, laugh at their antics, and anticipate the many years that you will have with a calm and totally devoted friend once you both work through the "terrible 2's" (8 months, in dog years).

Phantom was one of those crazy dogs, perhaps the craziest of the bunch. He's a husky mix, like so many of the dogs dumped in Alaska. Sled-dog people are just as bad to dogs as greyhound racers are. They breed and breed dogs like crazy, keeping only a few who are "good enough." The rest are either dumped at the pound or by the side of the road, kept on chains to be abused or neglected, or put into sacks to drown (yes, they still do that).

Phantom was in the pound and had a tight rope around his neck, obviously put there when he was younger and smaller. He was totally unsocialized. Nuts. Crazy. Out of control. Eighty pounds of craziness. The group that I volunteered for had let me pick the dog to rescue from the pound that week, and I thought, "Well, I'll pick the one least likely to be adopted!" Everyone told me not to do it. They said that I would spend all my time and money on this one dog and that he would never, ever be adopted out. "Phooey," I said! "That's the one we're rescuing today!"

Thus began about eight months of hell. Nobody wanted Phantom. Nobody even wanted to meet
Phantom. He was the only dog to have his picture in the Anchorage Daily News and not get adopted (you could see his craziness in the photo, eyes bugging out of his head).

Some days, he came inside the house, and I couldn't get him back out for a few days. He would pee, poop, chew, eat, and bark all over the place. Other days, he would dash out back, and I couldn't get him to come back inside. He was aggressive, food-obsessed, and constantly barking. He would dash out the door into traffic, so I had to barricade the door. And he LOVED to jump. He would jump way up on people―and hard. Eighty pounds, remember.

He did gradually improve, but in my frustration and my fear of keeping him, I barely noticed. Then came a rare moment when Phantom was not moving. He was lying on the floor, sleeping in the sun. I was sitting next to him. I looked down and realized how shiny and soft his fur had become and how cute and velvety his face was. He was a gorgeous dog, one of the most striking dogs I've ever seen before or since. And even though he didn't possess social graces, he did try—he wanted to play, to be petted, to love and be loved. He just usually attempted all those activities with too much verve.

Looking down at him, I realized that I had to make a decision. Either I had to adopt him permanently, or I would have to euthanize him. Nobody was going to take him, at least nobody decent (I did have one guy approach me who was looking for a "mean" guard dog for his vacuum cleaner store). Taking him back to the pound would mean a week of fear, confusion, loneliness, cold cement floors, and then euthanasia. So I would have to do it myself, be with him, hold him, and stroke him—he deserved that much. And of course, I couldn't do it. So that was that—in that very instant, I adopted him.

And that's when things began to improve! I think Phantom had been picking up on my stress and unhappiness with him. I couldn't handle him, and I didn't want him. Dogs are much more sensitive than humans (it took the husband seven years to figure out that I didn't want him!), and I had inadvertently been confusing Phantom all this time. Once I made the mental commitment to him, we both changed. I didn't get as stressed out—and neither did he.

He didn't become a perfect dog overnight. He and I still had many months of training to get through. But it became fun and silly instead of negative and hopeless. By the time he was 5, he was a great dog. And I mean a GREAT dog. Always super-energetic and ready to get crazy, but hey―I'm the same way. He is still alive, Mr. Phantom, and he's now a soft, loving, smooshy, totally well-behaved cuddle monster. He loves dogs, cats, humans, rocks, rivers, food, hikes, runs, sleeping on the bed, car rides, and life. That dog loves life like no one I've seen, and all he needed was a little patience for him to learn how to fit in and actually have a life.

If you've got a naughty dog in your life, I simply can't believe that he or she is worse than Phantom was. Take a deep breath, make sure that Fluffy knows that you love her, and just be patient. Hidden beneath all that bad behavior, there's a jewel of a dog who will come out eventually with a little coaxing.