She is adorable! Dobies are great... they're one of the breeds I'm considering when I go to get a dog (which will likely be at the end of summer). And that's such a huge step too- congrats! I went through a period that lasted SEVERAL months, where I was downright terrified of dogs- just seeing a PICTURE of a dog would freak me out. That got me quite upset, as there was no good reason for it (I hadn't been bit), it seemed to come out of no where (well, the therapist I had at the time had a few theories about what triggered it) and animals had always been part of my daily life. Thankfully I wasn't working at a hospital as a tech at the time or things would have become even more complicated. But I was taking a class in animal assisted psychotherapies. And we worked a lot with dogs. So I had to talk to the professor and work out alternative assignments with him. It sucked though- I used to meet up with the professor every weekend and help him walk some of his therapy dogs. He had one dog I was particularly attached to, and we had a deal, where he'd drop her off at my house for her to spend the night, and then the next day I'd meet up with him to go take the dogs for a hike and bring her back, but we'd have to stop half way along our hike for me to eat a small snack- he always brought the snack, and I just had to trust him and eat it regarless of if it were a stick of celery or a candy bar. After this bizzare dog phobia came up for me though, I was crushed because I cared SO much about this one dog, yet even if she were 3 football field lengths away from me, I'd still freak out. Even if he showed me a video clip of her, that caused me anxiety. It was really stressful. I finally got over it when I showed up to help out at an equine assisted psychotherapy retreat. All I can say is thank god the therapists I was helping out that week were really good and knew a lot of awesome breathing exercises they taught me! I had thought everything through, gotten everything taken care of, but forgot one detail: I forgot to ask about any dogs. And of course there were about 5 dogs that lived on the ranch. Who all ran up at once to great me when I got out of my car. Who wanted to follow me around all day. Who absolutely terrified the hell out of me. I almost jumped back in my car, but I stuck it out. Talk about exposure therapy and flooding, huh? I suppose it was good for me though, after that week I could at least enjoy being around animals again.
