I've spoken about our beagle, Sweetie, a few times already, so I wanted to share her story, as she was instrumental in awakening my skills in speaking with dogs. I'll cover what we knew when we got her, and what I learned over time.
When we decided that we wanted to get a dog, we looked online for people trying to find a home for pets they couldn't keep. I've had beagles before, so when we saw this pretty lemon beagle needing a home, we made an appointment to visit.
We met the lady that rescued her, and heard her story. She had seen that the beagle, who she called Honey, chained up in a back yard in freezing conditions. She knocked on the door and told the guy that he needs to bring the dog in, and he got belligerent and said, "If you don't like it, you can take her!" So, she did. Unfortunately she already had four other dogs, and Honey didn't get along with a couple of them, so she decided to find her a new home. We left with Honey, my wife in the backseat with her, and they immediately bonded.
"Honey" didn't quite fit her, so we tried many names, and she responded best to "Sweetie", and it stuck. Her health was good, and needed some dental work from chewing on her chain.
The moment that my wife saw my skill in talking with her was when I was telling her that Sweetie was used for breeding, and had at least three litters of pups. She asked, "How do you know that?" and I replied without thinking, "She told me." It was only then that I learned this was unusual - I never made the connection before until my wife pointed it out to me.
Over the next couple of years, here are some of the things I learned from Sweetie about her life before us:
* Her owner was an abusive man that beat her when she barked. As a result, she was a quiet beagle, which is VERY unusual. And it also explained why she bonded with my wife instead of me. She figured out I could translate, so she often told me things to tell my wife. This was probably the only reason she tolerated me. :)
* We were walking in the neighborhood, and she suddenly stopped dead, looked at a house we were by, and gave me an overwhelming sense of danger. That's when I smelled the marijuana smoke coming from the house. After some prodding, I learned that the abusive owner grew his own plants in the cornfield behind their house, and so he always smelled like it.
Her passing a few years later was traumatic, and it deserves its own post. But she absolutely loved my wife and would have killed for her. We gave her the best years of her life, and she gave us so much in return. I think about her every time I do a reading.