Hello, I am Carrie Silva Wooddell, and I wanted to share my story.
I have been around dogs my entire life. My father was a K9 officer, and he brought his partner home with him every night. I never remember having any boundaries with the dogs. They were just part of the family. At one point, my dad imported a dog once, and he wouldn’t let me go inside his outdoor kennel because he didn’t know much about the dog. Within a few days, I was jumping the fence and sitting for hours petting him.
I now operate a dog training business I have owned for almost 20 years. My entire life has revolved around dogs and my passion for training them. But something changed for me right before I got pregnant, and now Dogs to Diapers is my new passion. About six years ago, I got severely bitten by a dog. I had many bites before, but this bite was different. The intent behind this bite was not anything I had experienced before. It was long overdue for me as a trainer. This bite reminded me that dogs are a different species. I felt betrayed after it happened. How could this be? The animal that I connected with my entire life on so many different levels had just attacked me. It forced me to look at dogs differently. I was enlightened to have an even deeper connection to a dog’s genetics. No book or seminar could ever teach me what this bite did. It made me evolve into the dog trainer I am today and the dog trainer I continue to strive to become in the future. I base my expression of love for dogs on my respect for who they are as a species. Unfortunately, our world is developing, and dogs get treated in a way that does not bring out their best. It is now my passion to show you how to love your dog on the deepest level and treat them with the utmost respect—giving them a life they understand and deserve.
Life with dogs is changing, and it is changing fast because of our culture. Kids are not going to have the same relationship I got to have with my dad’s K9 dogs when I was growing up. We enable dogs when we don’t treat them like the fantastic species they are. We try to make them little humans. We impose our feelings and emotions on them and even make excuses for times they try to act like the animals they are. We are changing the unique thing we love about them: they are dogs! Bite statistics are through the roof with dogs and kids, and you frequently hear in the news about a family dog killing an infant child. How could this be? I am here to explain why this is happening and what we must do to change it.
I gave birth to my first daughter two and a half years ago. I got pregnant one month after my dog bite. It ignited a desire to educate expecting parents with dogs and advocate for all the dogs out there who want so badly to coexist with humans and be the dogs they are. Our society is misguided on why our family pets behave as they do and that the cause of this behavior is our perception of fulfilling them. I strive to educate dog trainers and new parents on ensuring their dogs have a happy life.
This passion for educating dog owners and new parents led me to create the Dogs to Diapers video and this blog. Many Internet resources must be corrected, and dog trainers must educate clients about outdated content. The video is the product of someone who has not only been a professional dog trainer for almost 20 years but also a dog-loving mom of two young girls. I want to see healthy dogs again. I want our kids to have the experiences I got to have as a kid growing up with dogs.
