King Edgar

We are maybe the third owners as the family who we got King from are Air Force, it sound like they got King when he was 4-5 months old from another Air Force family who were moving and couldn’t keep him. King was attacked by another dog as a puppy. He did have to go to an emergency vet for care right away. He was with his air force family which comprised of mom, dad, and two little girls. The mom said King was very good with the girls. When looking for a new home for him, the mom did say he would do better in a home with older kids because of his size. The family was not able to place him in a new home before they had to move overseas, so he was left to live with the elderly grandfather. King was too much dog for the elderly grandfather, so the mom updated her FaceBook post begging for help on finding him a new home. I saw her post and mulled it over. I didn’t know anything about the breed, but thought King looked adorable. I showed my husband and we decided to meet King. My kids fell in love with King and we brought him home. We first introduced him to our little chug (Pug/chihuahua mix) at a nearby park. We then brought them home and they did great together. All was well until a week later my kids and I wanted to bring King with us to run errands. We brought him out of our yard to get in our van. A neighbor just happened to be walking his dog at that time. King ran over to them and a circled and bit at the other dog. The owner of the other dog and I were able to quickly separate the dogs. The owner of the other dog said King was probably just getting used to his new home. The owner did have a scrape on his hand his dog did have mild punctures. I was very shaken by the whole event and after that never let King off leash outside the yard,. A week later it was Halloween and King got out the front door when my husband was handing out candy. He again circled a dog being walked by it’s owner. My husband was able to drag King back inside before any damage happened. Naively, we chalked it up to King being new to our house, etc.. A little over 2 years later on a nice weather day in May, I let King out into our backyard to go potty. We are a corner house on a busy side street. We have gate on the busy side street side of our house. We have a 6 ft tall fence that goes all around our yard. It had two gates,: the one on the busy side street and one to the driveway on the other side. Somehow, the side gate was not latched. We never use that gate. It is hard to unlatch which is great for keeping kids in the yard. Our lawnmower guys use that gate and are great about making sure it is latched when they leave. Now, it could have been the lawnmower guys, or the meter reader, or a trespasser., that left the gate open that fateful day, King left our yard via that unlatched gate on our side street and went a bit a small dig being walked by it’s owner. We paid for the emergency care for the poor little dog through our home owners insurance. I signed up King for in home training sessions with a professional dog trainer. King did okay as he can be hardheaded. King was always difficult to walk. He would pull on the leash and lunge when he saw another dog. He got to be too much for my kids and I to handle on walks. I quit trying by the time he was almost 5 years old. He slipped his harness and I had to lay on him to keep him from attacking other dogs being walked by us. I am overweight and thankfully I was able to keep him on the ground. King is a total sweetheart with people. All he wants to do is cuddle. He is allowed on the furniture and used to sleep with my kids. My kids were 10, 12, and 15 when we got him. I did buy a crate for King and a nice orthopedic bed to put inside it. He sleeps in his crate at night. We keep him and our other little dog inside and let them out to pee and sometimes lay in the sun. Right after King turned 3 he started to have terrible allergies. In the beginning his allergies responded to cytopoint injections. When those quit working, we tried Apoquel. When that quit working , we tried prednisone. It is now starting to quit working. He does eat vet prescribed allergen free Royal Canin protein only dog food. I wish I had researched his breed before taking King in. I would have bought the dog insurance. His vet bills, medicines, and dog food are costing me too much money. I am having to take away from my kids to provide for my dog. I am a stay at home mom. My oldest is a 19 year old young woman who suffers with an anxiety disorder and major depressive disorder, my second oldest is a young man of 16 with an anxiety disorder, ADHD, and high functioning autism. My youngest is a 14 year old young man with an anxiety disorder and ADHD. My kids require a lot of my time and energy. King needing so much of my time and energy, too, is leaving me burned out. I have rheumatoid arthritis and handing King is very hard on my inflamed joints. I am tapped out on energy, time, and money when it comes to caring for King. His medicated baths take a lot out of me. Even when my kids bathe him, I do the clean up afterwards, because my kids can only handle so much because of their diagnosis. I want to add that King has always gotten along with our. 21 lb. chug dog. King is neutered and our little chug is spayed.