A few months into Marissa Taffer’s search for a dog, her mother sent her a photo of two puppies. “They were really cute, and I was ready to adopt,” she said.
Just under a year ago, Marissa, a project manager, had accepted a position at a dog-friendly company. She’d always wanted a dog, but her previous work hadn’t provided the ability to be a responsible pet owner.
The puppies caught her eye. She learned more about them, and then her mother called her–she needed to go meet the little male puppy immediately at his foster home because he was due to be moved back to the shelter.
Marissa decided to see if they’d be a good a fit. “He sat down and looked at me, and did that little head cock thing that they do,” she said. “I said, ‘Your name is Charlie. Do you want to come live with me?’ And that was that.”
Marissa decided to start training with Charlie soon after bringing him home. “I knew that I wanted him to have the opportunity to learn and potentially become a therapy dog if that was something he showed any aptitude for,” she said. “You bring a puppy home at three months and you don’t know what they’re capable of.”
She learned quickly that Charlie, simply identified on his paperwork as a large mixed breed, was smart, and she started looking for a training company that had good reviews, a good reputation, and techniques similar to the ones her mother had used with her therapy dog. “Philly Unleashed had exactly what I was looking for,” She said. “I knew I wanted him to be comfortable being out and about. I wanted to take him places. In order for that to happen, I knew he needed training.”
In their three months of training so far, Marissa and Charlie took Puppy Kindergarten with Collin and Jess, completed Star Puppy with Jess, and they’re now working on completing Level 1. She hopes to complete Level 2 and start therapy dog training with Charlie, who just turned six months old. “He’s just very friendly and sweet and loving,” Taffer said. “He wakes me up every morning with hugs and kisses and he loves to be around people.”
Marissa advises other dog owners to work on their own relationship with their dog. “I think the biggest thing for me that I was surprised about in general was that everybody and their mother wants to tell you how to raise your puppy,” Taffer shared. “Training is really important, but also, it’s your dog. You and your dog have to figure out your relationship and everything together. Everybody is going to give you advice and tell you how to raise your dog, but at the end of the day, it’s about the life and the relationship you want to have with your puppy.”
