| My husband and I went through his with our male Rottie and our child! When Bear (my Rottie) was three years old. We had our son, he was a preemie weighing only two pounds and he weighed only four lbs when we brought him home from the NICU six weeks later.
Anyway, the whole time i was pregnant, my MIL and FIL proceeded to tell us several times to get rid of Bear, then they went on to tell us about every Rottie attack they heard of--especially the ones on children. Thankfully, my parents knew that Bear was a wonderful dog and they knew everything would be okay.
When we were about to bring Tyler (our son) home a few days before we started bringing home a blanket that Tyler had slept with, so he could smell Tyler's scent. When we brought Tyler home we leaned over and let Bear smell Tyler, he was so gentle and he just smelled him. Then while I held Tyler, Randy gave Bear lots of attention, then he held Tyler and I gave Bear lots of attention.
Bear loved Tyler, oh there were a few times when Tyler started crawling and he went to crawl on him and Bear would growl---but it was just a 'get this kid off of me growl', I knew the growl and I knew my Rottie--he would never hurt a flea. Bear never ever snapped at Tyler.
We taught Tyler to never pull his tail (Bear's tail was never docked) or ears or to hit --in other words we taught our son not to be mean or cruel to animals. When Tyler was three years old he and Bear played together, when Tyler had friends over (Bear died when Tyler was 6 1/2 years old) Bear had to be outside with them---simply because Bear loved kids and he loved playing with them. When Tyler was four years old, I would leave him and Bear alone together while i took a shower. Tyler was watching tv, Bear slept on the floor right beside him. People say never to leave a child and a dog alone together, but i knew Tyler knew how to behave and i had all the trust in the world in Bear.
The week before he died (he was ten years old) of autoimmune disease, he had been very sick, but for some reason that day, he decided to play ball with Tyler and they played for about 40 minutes. After Bear died, I prayed to God to show me a sign that Bear was alive somewhere. The next day when i woke Tyler up for school the first words out of his mouth was 'Mom, I had a great dream about Bear last night, he was in Heaven playing ball and he looked so happy'!
Bear was simply the best---he proved to everyone--including my in-laws that Rotties can be a kids best friend.
I do want to add a couple of things, Bear was well trained and socialized from a pup, I think that makes a world of difference. And also he was still loved and played with even after Tyler came along, Bear never felt jealous because we never gave him reason to feel that way.  |