Thursday, July 16, 2015

Pool Time

If we put ourselves into the wayback machine, we remember the days where Henry loved the pool. He loved swimming. He enjoyed relaxing in the pug tug. Most of all, he loved fetching toys from the pool (he was "rescuing" them). Those days ceased even before he lost his vision. I think some of that was due to things not pool related, though. His siblings would get all worked up when he was in the pool and that had a tendency to make things less fun. As he was losing his vision and falling into the pool, the pool then became a scary hole he fell into and struggled to get out of. And obviously we have now blocked off the pool since it is a significant danger to him.

Now that Henry is starting to make a come back, though, and we really do need to do something to help keep him cool in the summer and get a little more exercise than he's been getting, we are working him back into the pool. It started about a week ago. And there was a video we saw on Facebook of a lab jumping into a baby pool in a larger swimming pool. We thought that Henry may like that. It would give him some security of being in the pool with his people without actually being in the pool. And for swimming, it would be a good break spot for him when we didn't want to let him actually get out of the pool. So, we are trying to work this back into his routine, too. It is a very good thing that he trusts us or he would not have even made it that far. Benny and Luna were not pool lovers even thought they were both WAY better swimmers than Henry. I guess when you think you have to swim for your life you put your best paw forward. That is what B&L did. They thought for sure they were going to die, so they swam their little puggie butts off! and they were really good at it.

Henry, on the other hand just swims for fun. So, he is all relaxed and floppy footed. Ben & Luna trusted us but you would never know it by the way they tried to dodge the pool. Henry, on the other hand, would jump right in the pool if we were in there. He knew we'd catch him and help him be safe. Henry trusts us without any conditions.

Anyway, we got Henry this little pool. He neither hates it nor is he in love with it. We did not realize until we started to blow it up that it is a girly pool, though. Little mermaids decorate the small pool. Fortunately, Henry is secure enough in his own manhood to not let something like that bother him. We just hope that this will be another thing we can slowly work back into Henry's life. #HenryStrong