Lucky as a puppy, before his right ear had turned brown
Sat day morning I woke up at 6:30, like usual, to get ready for soccer and violin. However when I woke up I looked to the floor in my room for my boxer, Lucky, and he wasn’t there. A little nervous (hes usually the one that gets me up in the first place) I walked around the house looking for him. I found my other three dogs but not Lucky. Feeling very frightened, I noticed our frond door was ajar. Lucky is very adept when it comes to opening doors, and it wouldn’t be the first time he’s walked out of our front door when someone doesnt latch it all the way. So I walked outside calling him. He didn’t come. That’s when I realized that something was very wrong. I went into my mom’s room to see if she would drive me around to look for him, but she wasn’t there either. This made me relax a little; obviously mom had taken Lucky somewhere (she always forgets about their vet appts). I decided to call her and make sure everything was okay and that Lucky wasn’t hurt (our dogs get into bad fights sometimes). I called and she didn’t answer. I still wasn’t too worried though (she could be talking to the vet). So I jumped in the shower, scrambling so I wouldn’t be late. When I got out I heard my mom come in the front door and waited for Lucky to run and find me, jumping and wiggling and wagging his tail. After a moment I walked out to my mom and asked where Lucky was. She started crying. She said that she put him to sleep. All I could think is why???? He was young and healthy and a GREAT dog. WHY???!!!
Well Lucky came to us from two previous owners that we know of. We took him from a neighbor of my brother’s who lives in a not-so-good area. Dog fights are very common in the neighborhood and there have been many raids. My brother had suspected that his neighbor was participating in these activities and inquired about the white boxer they kept in a cage for more than 12 hours at a time. The neighbor said the dog wasn’t good enough to fight and they didn’t know what to do with him… So he sat in his cage. My brother himself couldn’t take the dog and finally convinced my parents to take him for awhile, ‘just until the rescue could take him’. However when David brought him over I adored him from the start. I named him lucky the second day we had him even though my parent’s told me not to get too attatched. It was funny that they even said that because Lucky was a very positive dog. He had SOOOOO much energy, a trait of the boxer breed, and required long runs and constant attention to be manageable. I soon fell into the routine of caring for him and we became very attached to each other. I was overjoyed when my parents decided that we could keep him. However the longer we had Lucky, the more we realized that his energy was not expendable. He was constantly bouncing off the walls and had a very hard time calming down. He listened as best he could, but if you told him to sit you could expect him to lower himself enough to touch the floor and then jump straight into the air to bump your face with his head. After a few months we noticed that it seemed even harder for Lucky to behave and that we really couldn’t control him anymore. We tried classes but eventually asked our vet for advice. The vet put Lucky on some medication that would calm him down. I didn’t like the idea of a medicated dog at all, but I soon realized that Lucky seemed more content with the medication to help him settle himself. He still had enourmous amounts of energy, but now he could calm himself down enough to listen to us and obey. However, dogs are not like people and when on medication for longer periods of time than a few months, they build up a resistance. As such, we were instructed to attempt to ween Lucky off the meds and try teach him how to contain himself. This was a huge effort and very difficult. It was hard to play with Lucky because he would play tug and just not stop. When you were ready to stop he just wouldn’t. On bad days he would jump on you, knock you down, and proceed to nibble and lightly bite you. This was a bad habit that we tried to break him of. However, more recently he had been progressing to larger biting, and hold your arm firmly in his mouth. Never enough to break skin, but enough to cause a little pain. He wasn’t being malicious–he really couldn’t help it and his tail would wag the whole time. He thought that you were playing with him. The only way that he would stop was if my other dog, Nico, would step in and redirect his attentions. They would play together for hours on end in this situation. Finally Lucky would be too worn out and fall asleep in my room on his dog bed.
This Sat morning, my mom had let all of the dogs out in the morning because Lucky had woken everyone up after opening my door and getting the other dogs excited. She called the other dogs in and went to play ball with Lucky in the usual attempt to wear him out a little. However, Lucky got even more excited than usual and knocked my mom down. Unfortunately, Nico was inside and not available to step in. Although Lucky is a handful, no one in our family had ever been afraid of him. This Sat morning, however, my mom was afraid. She couldn’t get him to calm down and he firmly had her arm. After a long time of wrestling with him and having him get agitated she was really scared. Luckily, Nico seemed to sense something and managed to open our front door to help my mom. When Lucky’s attentions were diverted, She called the vet who told her that he needed to be put down. My mom took him, not wanting to tell me because she knew I wouldn’t let her.
After Lucky’s death, the vet examined the chemical levels in his brain as part of a study on puppy mills and inbreeding. Sure enough, Lucky had the characteristic chemical inbalances of severly inbred fighting dogs. Lucky couldn’t help it, but he had the potential to be completely out of control. When Lucky was Lucky, he was the perfect dog. But when that switch went off to the point where you couldn’t call him back he was unpredictable. Its really hard for me to accept the fact that he had to be put down, but I guess I don’t have a choice. However, I can’t even express my hatred for the kind of people that do this to animals. Massly inbred dogs have very sever bipolor disorder, behavioral disorder, and chemical inbalances that can cause unpredictable behavior. Most of these traits cannot be maneaged; classes cannot help. The only way to deal with them is to keep them on medication which you simply cannot do. Thus these dogs, however wonderful they may be when in their right minds, can be very dangerous. And people made them that way.
