Shipwrecked!: Day 14: The Rule of 12

Friday, June 15, 2018

Day 14: The Rule of 12

Another post about this puppy. I know. But I mean he's completely engulfed all of our time, so what else am I going to write about?

So, the whole reason of picking this breed, this littler, and this puppy, was to have the most kid-friendly, adventurous, social dog possible. We want to take him everywhere, have him love everyone and every dog he meets, and not deal with the trouble we've had with previous dogs (disliking kids, dogs, cars, water, etc).

My friend told me about when they got their puppy, they worked on this theory called the The Rule of 12 (link provided). The idea is that by the time the puppy is 12 weeks old (the critical age of socialization for dogs is between 8 and 12 weeks), it should have experienced at least 12 things in each of the categories (sounds, places, people, dogs, moving objects, surfaces to walk on, places to eat meals, rides in the car, etc etc etc). This helps build a confident, "desensitized" dog, and to me the theory makes perfect sense. And since Rebel seems to be a little cautious, at least, does not throw himself recklessly into new situations, I felt like we really needed to use this.

So, since the day we brought him home, we have been hammering at the Rule of 12 List, and adding in our own Rules of 12 that we knew would be part of his individual life (for example, I added an entire "Water" category, because I'm hell bent on having a water dog for the first time in my life!). He's watched us vacuum and open and close the garage door, climb stairs, taken rides in the car every day, had a field trip inside our market store (and met 1389 people who were giddy to pet him), and has eaten every meal in a new place, to name a few. He's also experienced water in various ways (sitting in the pool, checking out the slip in slide, drinking from the hose, etc). It's exhausting for us and really, truly hard work, but I'm confident it's going to really help turn him into the world's best doggo.