This is Holly!
She came to live with us when she was almost 8 weeks old from a wonderful family in Sheffield who had five gorgeous pugs of their own.
We went to meet her on a Thursday evening and we fell in love as soon as we saw her! She was with mama pug and one of her sisters and she came over to play straight away! She was very obviously the boss in there and she still is now!
Hugo came with us to meet her and it really was love at first sight for him too! His little tail was wagging (as much as a pug’s tail can wag anyway!)
We stayed a long while and asked questions and met their other pugs and then started making arrangements to go back the next week to bring her home with us. She’d already been weened and was a very confident little pup, and her sister was going to her new home the next day, so her family were happy for us to take her home with us that night! We arrived with one pug and left with two! A tiny bundle of fluff wrapped up in a big blanket slept on my lap all the way home and all night on my chest in my bed!
Hugo was still sleeping in his crate (doggy prison!) in our bedroom but Holly was too tiny to go in there with him so she slept on my chest for the first week or two (or three!)
Pug dad took two weeks off work to look after her, and Hugo of course, and then pug gran came over every single day for the next 3 months! She’s like Wonder Woman!
Eventually Holly wanted to sleep in her own bed, not the bed that Hugo had in the bedroom, oh no, Holly wanted to sleep in a different room! For a while they slept separately but eventually Hugo realised Holly would look after him when we were sleeping!
When she was 16 weeks old we took her to obedience classes! She was the cutest pup there but for some reason she really didn’t enjoy it. We went for a while but after her first season, which was followed by a phantom pregnancy, it got to the point that she just barked at the other dogs for the entire hour and I just cried at the thought of her being so stressed.
We made numerous visits to the vets and came away with various pills and potions but eventually with the recommendation for doggy valium. Right then and there I decided there must be another way to deal with this, there absolutely must. That very same evening pug dad brought home a business card for a dog behaviourist and we haven’t looked back! We learnt how to walk on a lead without lunging at people, bicycles and traffic, how to play in the park without barking at other dogs and most of all we learned how to be happy!
Holly’s still an anxious pug, she thinks she’s in charge and it’s hard work looking after everyone but we’re trying to let her know she’s not top dog and doesn’t have to look after us and hopefully once she realises that it’ll ease the strain.
When she was just four months old she got a bout of diarrhoea and we were given a course of antibiotics from the vet which cleared it up. About a month later the same happened and again more antibiotics. After four visits to the vets office for the same thing we saw a wonderful new vet, Michael, and he said do you realise Holly’s been here more than 3 times in the last 4 months for the same thing. One runny poo sample later and it turned out she had a form of parasites that the ordinary antibiotics wouldn’t treat. We picked up the new antibiotics and she’s been fine ever since. I still worry that it stunted her growth and I question EVERYTHING the vet tells me now!!
She loves going for walks but pulls like a sled dog on her lead! When she eats she either breathes in and it’s gone or she looks at you with contempt because the fresh chicken you’ve just given her wasn’t cut quite right and takes aaaaaaages to finish it!
She smells like flowers on a summers day and gives kisses freely, whether you want them or not! She loves chicken and she loves treats but she especially loves chicken treats! She doesn’t like other dogs (unless they’re pugs?!), or the music that plays at the beginning of Coronation Street but she loves sniffing in the garden and stealing socks. She sits at the top of the stairs every morning waiting for me and greets everyone with jumps and kisses!
