My Sweet Boys -

Today I thought I’d introduce you to my family. My husband, Bob, I’ve spoken about in past posts, but my furry four-legged sons I haven’t. At least, not in detail.

Bob and I used to have eight Rottweilers. Yes, eight! In a nine-hundred square foot house. It was a crazy time. A time I cherish but a time I would never repeat. Well, I have mixed emotions on that subject because each one of them enriched my life. Each one had their own personality and characteristics. So I am glad we did it, but now I’m too old to have that many dogs again. Yes, that is more accurate.

We started with Odin. By the way, some of these names I’ve used in my novels. Then Bob said he always dreamed of having two Rottweilers. Plus, if we both left the house they’d have each other and not be lonely. That thinking was what up’d the number to eight! So along came Sydney, for Odin.

We bought a house and figured why not get another one. I love puppy breath and having a baby in the house so that was what pushed us into that decision. And along came Lexi. Well, Lexi needed a playmate because now Odin and Sydney were two years old. So, Levaughn came home. When Lexi and Levaughn got old enough to breed we figured, “Hey, let’s have puppies!”

It sounded like a great idea at the time. HOWEVER, you must be the type who can let the puppies go to strangers’ homes. We soon discovered neither one of us were this type. I created long, detailed applications and contracts. Gathered as much information as I could on potential puppy buyers. I really put a potential family through the ringer. Needless to say, we kept two puppies: Austyn (girl) and Cylus (boy). But then I kept receiving calls from this jerk who lied on the application and said his girlfriend was the one getting the puppy. In actuality, it was him. I would have never sold to him had I known. He complained about one thing after the other: the puppy chews everything, the puppy did potty in the house, etc. Barkley, the puppy with him, was only six weeks old. What did he expect? I ordered him to return the puppy after he told me, “He’d give him a beating he’d never forget.” That was all I had to hear. I took Barkley back and told him he was lucky I didn’t report him for abuse. I should have but didn’t. Barkley was safe and that’s all that mattered. But he’d done something to him because now he was hand-shy and would flinch if you raised your voice even one octave.

When Lexi and Levaughn had another litter, all the puppies except one were still born. How could I possibly give that one away? I couldn’t. Plus, since Mommy didn’t produce milk well I had to bottle feed all the puppies from both litters. It’s exhausting but awesome! That was how Gideon entered our lives.

Rottweilers have a ninety-percent chance of getting cancer. 90%! I didn’t know that until we lost Odin, Sydney, Austyn and Barkley from cancer. We lost Lexi from a spider bite. That’s a story for a different day. And were left with Levaughn, Cascius and Gideon. We bought a new home and moved up north to Alexandria, NH, where we are now. But two weeks before the move Levaughn had massive internal bleeding from a benign tumor and passed. It broke our hearts. He was eleven years old.

Cascius and Gideon made the move and are now seven-ish. Cascius has hip dysplasia but it doesn’t slow him down. Last summer Gideon came down with an auto-immune disease, a protein deficiency disease. He takes lots of meds but is doing great. He’s my baby. He was born small with a blocky head and huge paws, and is still that way. Below are pics of my babies.