Meet Olly the Cavalier King Charles puppy – isn’t he cute? He dropped in with his owner to pick up some supplies for his new home.

Amazingly, his new owner (that’s the lady cuddling him in her arms adoringly) was terrified of dogs before he arrived. A friend convinced her to try starting out with a puppy and while she still feels a little nervous of strange dogs, Olly has pretty much cured her fear. As the lady herself said “how could anyone be afraid of him?”

In my experience meeting people who have a fear of dogs, it seems to usually stem from an incident during childhood – maybe a nip from a dog or even just from having to walk past the big dog at the top of the road that seemed so scary to a little person. Either that or simply due to a lack of contact with dogs, people develop a fear of them. Like anything, the longer you leave it simmer the more the fear escalates.

Take my completely irrational fear of going to the dentist – I can’t explain it but can’t get over it either. The only way I will get over it is to go, and have a good experience and realise its actually not that bad. A very nice lady from the local dental clinic shops in our Dun Laoghaire store, her clinic really does sound lovely and I’m slowly building myself up to picking up the phone for an appointment

If you have a fear of dogs and would like some help overcoming it, therapy can be very helpful.
Katie Jane from the Paul Goldin Clinic shops in our store and tells us her (beautiful!) dogs help people overcome their fear of dogs in the clinic all the time.

Alternatively, if you have a dog who is fearful – our all natural Sleepy Time Tonic works wonders for stressful situations.