Dog - Socialize Your New Puppy

Bringing a new puppy into the house is forever exciting and fun time. Everyone at home would like to play wit, cuddle and hold the little ball of fur. The last thing on minds of the most new puppy owners is to train the new addition, but is very vital that puppy training and socialization begin as early as possible. Mingling a new puppy is an important part of any training program, and it is also significant for socialization to begin early. The gap for socialization is very small, and a puppy that is not properly socialized to people, dogs and other animals by the time he or she is four months old never develops the socialization he or she requires to become a good canine citizen. Learning how to interact with other dogs is something that usually would occur among litter mates. However, since most dogs are removed from their mothers so soon, this litter mate socialization regularly does not finish properly. The most vital lesson puppies often learn from their litter mates and from the mother dog is how to bite, and how not to bite. Puppies usually roughhouse with each other, and their thick skin protects them from most bites. However, when one puppy bites too hard, the other puppies, or the mother dog, swiftly reprimand him, often by holding him by the scruff of his neck until he submits. In fact the best way to socialize your loved puppy is to have it play with lots of other puppies. It is also okay for the puppy to play with a few adult dogs, as long as they are friendly and well socialized. Many communities these days have puppy playschool and puppy kindergarten classes. These classes could be a good way to socialize any puppy, and for handler and puppy alike to learn some essential obedience skills. When socializing puppies, it is best to let them play on their own and work out their own issues when it comes to suitable roughness of play. The only time the owners must step in is if one puppy is hurting another, or if a grave fight breaks out. Other than that the owners must simply stand back and watch their puppies interact. While this socialization is taking place, the pack hierarchy must quickly become apparent. There would be some puppies that are especially submissive, rolling on their backs and baring their throats at the least provocation. Other puppies in the class would be dominant, ordering the other puppies around and telling them what to do. Watching the puppies play, and formative what type of personality traits your puppy has, would be extremely valuable in determining the best way to proceed with more advanced training. It is also significant to introduce the puppy to a variety of other animals, particularly in a multiple pet household. Introducing the puppy to friendly cats is imperative, as are introductions to other animals the puppy might encounter, such as rabbits, guinea pigs and the like. If your household contains a more exotic creature, it is essential to introduce the puppy to it as early as possible, but to do it in a way that is secure for both animals. It is often good to start by introducing the puppy to the smell of the other animal. This could be easily accomplished by placing a piece of the animals bedding, like a towel or bed liner, close to where the puppy sleeps. Once the puppy is familiar to the smell of the other creature, he or she is much more likely to believe the animal as just another member of the family. Anbhuselvan is an experienced dog care specialist and is also a good writer on the topic. He also gives suggestion on how to make your dog look catchy and colorful without irritating the dog's mood. Various products are designed and are available keeping in mind the dog's comfort and mood. For further information on dog care, dog clothes and accessories, and other dog requirements please visit www.dressypuppy.com and to contact anbhuselvan mail to: anbhuselvan@gmail.com Article Source:http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Anbhu_Selvan

Custody - Grandparents' Rights for Custody in Pennsylvania

In Pennsylvania, Grandparents have the opportunity to seek custody of a Grandchild under limited circumstances. The Pennsylvania Statute enunciated at 23 Pa.C.S.A. ' 5313, sets forth the circumstances under which a Grandparent may petition for Custody of a Grandchild. A Grandparent may petition for Partial Custody and Visitation where an unmarried child has resided with his grandparents or great-grandparents for a period of 12 months or more and is subsequently removed from the home by his parents. The court will grant the petition if it finds that visitation rights would be in the "best interests of the child" and would not interfere with the parent-child relationship. The best interests of the child is the standard used in all custody cases in Pennsylvania. In it core form, the best interests of the child means what is best for the child's physical, moral, intellectual and spiritual well being. A Grandparent may petition for Full Physical and Legal Custody of a grandchild if it is in the best interest of the child to not be in the custody of either parent. In order to qualify for such type of custody, the Grandparent must (1) have genuine care and concern for the child; (2) have a relationship with the child which began with the consent of a parent of the child or pursuant to an order of court; and (3) who for 12 months or more has assumed the role and responsibilities of the child's parent, providing for the physical, emotional and social needs of the child, or who assumes the responsibility for a child who has been determined to be a dependent child or who assumes or deems it necessary to assume responsibility for a child who is substantially at risk due to parental abuse, neglect, drug or alcohol abuse or mental illness. In attempting to establish a Grandparent's rights to either Partial or Full Custody, the Pennsylvania Courts will consider the following factors: (1) the amount of disruption extensive visitation would cause in the child's life; (2) the suitability of the grandparents' home (3) the emotional ties between the child and the grandparents; (4) the moral fitness of the grandparents; (5) the distance between the child's home and the grandparents' home; (6) the potential for the grandparents to undermine the parent's general disciplining of the child as a result of visitation; (7) whether the grandparents are employed and the responsibilities associated with such employment; (8) the amount of hostility that exists between the parent and the grandparents; and (9) the willingness of the grandparents to accept the fundamental concept that the rearing of the child is the parent's responsibility and is not to be interfered with by the grandparents. Greg Artim is an Attorney with offices located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. For more answers to your Grandparents' Rights legal questions, please visit his website at http://www.gregartim.com/grandparents.htm Article Source:http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Greg_Artim

Custody - Divorcing Parents: Honor Your Child's Feelings

Hi, I am your child. I just lost my family. My dad doesn't live with us anymore. Nobody even asked me about it. You just told me and thought that hugging me and telling me that you love me was enough. It wasn't. This is the lament of our children. We tell ourselves we are doing what is in their best interest but rarely do we respect how they feel. We try to tell them everything will be okay, yet they feel the stress and tension we are under. We tell them that our love is unchanged but they watch helplessly as they lose one thing after another. As divorcing parents, we are admonished by child advocates, mediators and the courts to put the child's interest first. But many times, our actions send a different message to our children. Post-divorce, I was challenged with two decisions. One was subtle and the other was more blatant, but both required that I put my child's BEST interest before my own. Should I change my name back to my maiden name? This was one of those decisions I had to make. To me, my husband's last name represented pain. It tied me to a life that I preferred to disconnect from in every possible way. But, to my son, this last name connected all of us. This last name signified his belonging. A child may perceive a name change as your decision to detach from him. He might wonder if his mother's love has changed somehow. Someone once said, "there is no right or wrong, but only perception." Post-divorce, our children need to feel connected; otherwise, they feel vulnerable and unsafe. Likewise, I considered that my changing to my maiden name might make my child feel a heightened sense of abandonment. Then there was the issue of custody. How much time should the child spend with each parent? This is a very sensitive and scary issue that is often decided by the courts as we parents clamor not to lose importance and visibility in our child's life. Initially, my ex and I tried a split custody arrangement where our son lived with his father for one week, then our son lived with me for one week. This was his ongoing schedule. Almost immediately, this took its toll on our son. It was too unstable. His father and I had different lifestyles. Our values, our priorities, our expectations and other inconsistencies created chaos as our child had to constantly recalibrate and switch on a weekly basis. Our son spent most of his time preparing to leave one residence and preparing to go to another. He was constantly doing laundry and constantly cleaning up his room. Sure, these are great skills for our child to have but, due to the schedule, he never got a break. Then there was homework. If he had a project due in a week or two, he'd have to split its preparation between two households. Then while getting ready for school, our son would often discover that he didn't have a textbook or some other important school item. He'd stress over trying to remember where he last had it. And many times, this would involve going back to his dad's and searching for it. Despite our efforts to have clothes, toiletries and other comforts of home at both residences and coordinating schedules, something as simple as clothing became hugh. For instance, our child had a favored outfit at one house and wanted to wear it at the other. To tell him he couldn't, because it was at his dad's house, sent the message that he couldn't wear his own clothes. But on the other hand, if he did wear the favored outfit or removed clothes from one residence, he'd have to transport his desired outfits between houses. And inadvertently, one house would end up with more clothes than the other. Hence, a simple decision became stressful and cumbersome. I encourage divorcing parents, and every parent for that matter, to value your child's feelings. Please strive to make decisions that honor his importance and nourish his spirit. Suzette R. Hinton, SAC-I, Certified Life and Mentor Coach, Counselor and Mother. Graduate of CANA, Inc. (http://www.CoachingInstituteofNorthAmerica.com) and Founder of Purposeful Connections (http://www.purposefulconnections.com). Suzette believes that purpose is not only a destination but it is the energy that pushes us toward its fulfillment. Article Source:http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Suzette_Hinton

Custody - Is Alec Baldwin Really a Jerk?

Okay, so the entire world knows that Alec Baldwin talked horribly to his little girl. We all know that speaking that way to an 11-year-old girl is rehensible and clearly abusive. All across the country people are jumping on the bandwagon to engage in attacking him for his behavior. He has been villainized in the press, on radio talk shows and, of course by his ex-wife, with a vengeance. The media love this kind of drama. We have a bad father who verbally abuses his child and the public eats it up. We have someone we can publicly ostracize for their outlandish behavior. The courts validate our outrage and his villainy by preventing him access to his child, and we all feel better that justice has been done. What we have done, as a public audience to this drama, is to let ourselves get caught up in the blame game. Oh, how we love to have someone to blame. Alec was a perfect target for our blame. Unfortunately, the process of blame unites us against someone without regard for compassion or full understanding of the situation. (Who released that recording to the media anyway? And, hasn't Kim Bassinger been held in contempt numerous times for not respecting court orders?) It hooks us into a cycle of identifying someone as the Perpetrator and someone else as the Victim, and then of course, someone else as the Rescuer. We lock these individuals into these roles and never mind the reality of anyone else's true accountability. The roles are comfortable to us. We find comfort in the simplicity and can feel justified in our outrage at the Perpetrators behavior. The problem is that these roles help us to make sense of our world and keep us stuck in a cycle that has no room for anything but continued drama and pain. The roles are more accurately understood as: Self-Protector (instead of Perpetrator), Rescuer (or caretaker), and Victim. Why Self-Protector? A Self-Protector is someone who is desperate to protect him (or her) self from continued pain and fear. They sense themselves to be under attack in some real or imagined way and this can result in unpredictably dangerous or abusive behavior simply because the person feels completely powerless. Think of a trapped animal. Trapped, and animals instincts take over and there is no accounting for how they will respond. Humans, as much as we like to think otherwise, are animals too. We will react with the same survival mechanisms as any mammal. Does anyone ever stop to think about how the alleged "perpetrator" was provoked? I am not implying that being provoked justifies an outrageous response (i.e. calling your 11 year old daughter a "pig") but it does force us to have some understanding and not blame him (or her) for the entire situation. I would wager that any of us, at certain times, have behaved in ways that we are not proud. We may have treated our own children, our lovers, or our spouses in ways that we later regret and have to make apologies for later. The people closest to us, simply because they are so important to us, are the most likely to evoke these irrational and rehensible acts. Can you honestly say that you have never been provoked to behave in a way that you later regretted with a family member? The reality is that we, as a culture, and as a nation, must come to a different way of understanding the conflicts that occur in our lives. Conflict is a natural part of living and it is not a "bad" thing. It does however, evoke the worst in us when we are caught up in the roles of Self-Protector, Rescuer and Victim. These roles dictate that we behave in certain set ways and provoke certain set responses from others. This is exactly what occurs in gang warfare. One gang member shoots another gang's member and retaliation is required to regain a position of strength. So the gang goes into Self-Protector mode to protect the reputation of the gang and they shot a member of the other gang to get their "rep" back. But of course this requires the other gang to do the same. The cycle cannot end as long as the survival mechanisms of the cycle are in place. If we continue to engage in the blame game of pointing a finger at the bad guy and saying "Shame on you" then we perpetuate the cycle of pain and misery that the blame game engenders. Jumping on the bandwagon to blame Alec Baldwin for what is publicly a bad situation (that none of us knows all the details of), seduces us into believing there is a "bad-guy" and a "good-guy". And worse, it keeps us caught in the cycle of pain and misery from which there is no escape. Without question, Alec Baldwin needs help, so does Kim Bassinger, and most of all, their poor daughter who is caught in the middle. But we do not help her, or any of them, but identifying one of them as the "bad-guy" and the other as a Victim. These are the automatic mammalian brain responses to perceived threat. Fortunately we are not mindless animals. We are able to consider our behavior and make choices. Many of us don't even realize we have a choice. We think that the automatic reactivity our survival mechanisms dictate is the only way to survive. But we do have a choice and we can learn to respond to conflict differently. We can learn the mechanisms of compassion and choose different reactions. But first we have to understand what the choices are and how to go about the difficult process of learning do respond differently. Compassion is comprised of empathy, respect and ownership. Learning how to apply these concepts to our lives can transform how we feel about ourselves and respond to others. Melody Brooke, MA, LPC, LMFT is an author, motivational speaker, workshop presenter and counselor. Melody holds an MA in Counseling and Guidance from Texas Woman's University. She is also a Certified Radix Practitioner, Right Use of Power Teacher and InterPlay Teacher. Melody's 19 years work with individuals, couples and families provides her with a unique approach to solving clients' problems. Her life-altering book, "Cycles of the Heart: A way out of the egocentrism of everyday life", is based on her experience helping people resolve their relationship difficulties with themselves and others. http://www.melodybrooke.com Article Source:http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Melody_Brooke