Comment on Loving a reactive dog means grieving the dog you thought you would have by Dawn Rago.

This really hit home for me. It even brought tears to my eyes, as I have to walk my Jake late at night to avoid other dogs, people on bikes or scooters, motorcycles, any other animals, kids playing… well everything. Jake is a pointer/lab mix and I rescued him from an L.A. shelter with my ex fiancé 5 years ago. He was only 7 months old, but definitely dumped because of his abundance of energy and reactivity. We didn’t know this about him until after we got him home. My fiancé was great with him, but when we broke up, I took Jake, as I was the one that fed, walked and played with him. But having only had cats before, I had no idea how to train a dog. So sadly I spend my life planning around my reactive dog. I can’t go on vacation, I can’t buy an affordable condo because I need a big yard for him. I would love to walk him more, I would love to take him to the dog parks. I can’t. It makes me incredibly sad and defeated. But I love him so much, so what can I do?