Puppy bitten- trauma recovery tips

[Leslie C.]

Well, today my friend's large dog bit / grabbed hold of my 13 week old's leg and shook her in the air as she screamed and I stopped breathing. Her leg now appears fine and there was no blood. To try to minimize the experience, I maintained my composure and let another friend check out her leg. In about 5 minutes she was walking on her back leg and seemed less scared. We were able to continue a walk at a safe distance and my puppy continued to appear more comfortable, as we progressed. Other than not letting this dog around my puppy, what suggestions do people have to help keep these experience from creating problems for my puppy.
Thanks, Leslie

[Lynne B]

put her in some supervised situations with other dogs as soon as you can. If you can have her play with a friends dog, or if you have a good doggie day care, or even a puppy socialization class. The idea is to demonstrate to the puppy that not all dog are mean before they form that idea on their own

[Leslie C.]

Thank you Lynn. I already had her play this evening with the Westie a few doors down. I will continue to do so. Thanks, Leslie

[Tammy & Gracie]

Not sure how to tell you to handle this. When my Gracie was a pup we would go to the dogpark and play fetch with tennis balls with my friend's "people agressive" German Shepherd. Things were fine for a month or so of these meetings. Then for no (obvious to human) reason he picked her up by the neck and carried her off to the opposite end of the field. We yelled and he dropped her when he was ready. Then for a terribly long few seconds she played dead! (instinct I guess) she too, luckily was not injured. I stopped breathing, I did think she was dead. Needless to say, we don't play together with that dog anymore. My friend understands why. After the incident Gracie was a little leary of Shepherds at the park but she recovered from that fear too after a few months. Apparently she was not permanantly emotionally scarred....I did not coddle her over it and I think that helped her fear subside. Now she has several other Shepherd friends at the park. It's unlikely that another dog would repeat that act with your pup. I would say to just keep socializing her with all types of humans and dogs, except maybe that one...l

[Leslie C.]

Thanks Tammy and Gracie for sharing your story and letting me know that things will be o.k. and that I'm on the right track. Interesting that something so similar happened. I'm glad that things are good for you and Gracie. ~Leslie

[Tammy & Gracie]

Yeah, I know exactly how your heart stopped. Our event was so scary for me that my friend (of 30 years) never even had to discuss it, it was just a given that our doggie playdates were over. But Gracie grew up to be a normal well-socialized doodle!!! Glad yours is ok too.