My American Staffordshire Terrier, Ted, came to me as a senior dog, rescued two days before he was scheduled to be euthanized. He was 6 years old, suffering from advanced heartworm, with teeth filed down, scarred from fights, fly bitten ears, underweight.
His head held down, afraid to meet my eyes, he slowly walked toward me on a leash held by one of the thousands of amazing people who work for rescue groups around the country. As he came closer, he looked up and saw my smiling face and I swear, that dog smiled back. His tail started to wag and it has not stopped in 2 years.
Ted now is 80 pounds of pure, muscular joy. He chases his tail, plays with my other dogs (a mixed batch of a lab, a pit mix, a pit foster, a chow/shepherd and a Heinz 57 even the vet can’t figure out), gators in the driveway to scratch his back, gives big sloppy kisses to everyone who visits whether they want one or not, and passed his canine good citizen test with flying colors. He’s fun, smart, playful, gentle, loyal, loving, grateful and happy – just like thousands upon thousands of other pitbulls around the country.
Their nature is to please people and research into animal intelligence ranks them very high. Pitbulls are not inherently human aggressive dogs and a pit that is human aggressive with no provocation or specific training to be aggressive is a genetically faulty dog. Show me a pitbull that has bitten a person and I’ll show you a dog that is either the result of irresponsible breeding or of irresponsible, neglectful, or abusive ownership.
