Don’t let all this cuteness deceive you. If any of you are familiar with the bulldog breed you know that they tend to go to the beat of their own desire and are stubborn as hell. Ours is no exception. He is like the eternal two year old – all about him. Biggie is an old English bulldog so he has more of the boxer and pitbull mix in him, which basically makes him 60 pounds of strength, mischief, and love. While he definitely loves a good nap, he’s also always up for a long walk and some wrestle and play time with my husband.

He is as tenacious as they come. So when it’s walk time, while he does tend to have good moments of listening, when he sniffs something he wants, it inevitably turns into tug of war – with us winning of course, but it takes a great deal of effort and pull. When we first rescued him at age 1, I thought he would be the death of me. The bulldog was walking me! And at age 6 now, while the pulling has decreased significantly and he’s fully aware who the alpha is (yes my husband and I) there are still those bulldog moments.

So a few days ago my husband comes home with food from petco and a new leash. We had tried other harnesses with no real good results so when my husband attached the leash to his regular collar and then wrapped the other part just behind his front legs to go around his upper chest, I was a bit skeptical. How was this any different? But okay let’s see what happens.

I couldn’t believe it, the walk with Biggie that evening was so calm. No pulling or tugging! He just walked alongside my husband. The real test though would be when it came time for me to walk him alone on the days my husband is at work.

When that day arrived I was stunned and smiling from ear to ear. Sometimes when I come home from work biggie is so excited, the minute I would get him out the door he would make a mad dash and take me on a fast sprint for the first part of our walk. First time using the new leash he walked at my side most of the time and the rest just going ahead the length of the leash. This is especially nice now that I’m almost 9 months pregnant.

We were always big fans of the retractable leash but I must say this thunder leash has made me a believer.