Our puppies becoming a real drag

Midnight is growing up. It’s hard to believe that she’s just over 9 months old now! She’s been with us for 6 months and it’s amazing how many changes she’s gone through in that time.

Last week we took her to the vet for a heartworm test and to start her on her first prescription of heartworm preventative medications. She’s had needles at the vets before but this was her first blood work. She did well and the heartworm test was negative.

While we were at the vets she got weighed and she’s up to 27.1 kg or 59.7 lb. Considering how sick she was the first two months she was with us I thought she’d probably top out at around this weight, but she’s still got some growing to do, so she might get a little bigger.

Anyway, with her weight up to close to 60 pounds I now know why she’s pretty much pulling Chris and I off our feet when we walk her. You wouldn’t think she’d be strong enough to pretty much drag an adult around, but she’s darn strong! I guess because she’s still quite low to the ground she’s able to pull us off balance.

We’ve tried taking her for walks with just a leash on - way too much pulling, used a gentle leader for a while but that took the hair off her muzzle, tried the Sporn halter for a few months and that worked well up until about a month and a half ago and then now we’re using a Comfort Wrap harness. The comfort wrap is working much better than the Sporn, but walks are still almost unbearable.

It’s gotten to the point that Chris complains that his knees are sore when he comes back from walking her. His shoulder is also sore too. I’m barely walking her these days. In an earlier post I explained that I’ve been dizzy several times over the last couple of weeks. If I’m feeling dizzy or weak or if my stomach is causing me pain the chances of her making me fall when I walk her is even greater. Just letting outside on her leash to do her business is a tug of war too.

It’s not like she hasn’t had any training. I work with her all the time to teach her new commands and tricks, plus she’s been through puppy training and intermediate dog training as well.

Earlier today I took her for a walk to the local corner store. Walking there was ok but she was acting up in the store. The store owner needed to get one of the things I was buying from a back storage area so I decided to continue our walk and then return to the store. Well, on our way back the store owner saw me being dragged around by Midnight. She thought it was funny, but I was exhausted by then! I was also frustrated and angry at Midnight. Crazy hyper Labrador Retriever puppy.

Any suggestions as to how we can get her to stop tugging, or do we just have to wait for her to calm down a bit more? She’s pretty good when she’s indoors, but she gets so excited when she’s outside that she barely listens to our commands.