Giving a shelter dog a chance to have a forever home has to be one of the most rewarding things you could do. However, it’s not always the easiest to convince other family members to let you bring a dog home- especially if they’re just not dog people.
With that being said, we don’t see much harm in trying to change that person’s mind, even if that means bending the truth a little.
So when Sue Markham of Lincolnshire, England, fell in love with Yogi the puppy at the local shelter, her mission became to convince her husband, Robert, that they should adopt him.
Robert initially wasn’t keen on the idea of having a dog, but eventually compromised with Sue and told her that as long as the dog was relatively small, he wouldn’t be against the adoption.
Unfortunately for Sue, the dog that she had fallen in love with was in fact a Boston Great Dane. But did she give up? Absolutely not!
“When I saw Bear I fell in love with him and knew I wanted him- but I knew Robert didn’t want a big dog,” Sue said.
As a puppy, Yogi didn’t look that big, so Sue came up with a genius idea. She told her husband that Yogi was in fact a Jack Russell puppy, and decided to deal with the consequences of her husband finding out the truth later on when the dog began to grow.
Naturally, that time arrived soon, when Yogi outgrew the average size of a Jack Russel at only five months old.
It was time for Sue to confess- but luckily, by that point, Robert had fallen head over heels with Yogi.
“I thought a big dog would be a lot of work and could be trouble. We only have a small living room. I thought, ‘How much trouble can a Jack Russell be?’” Robert said.
But the more time that Robert spent with the gentle giant, the more that he grew to love him.
Yogi had soon grown to huge proportions. His tail was as big as a baseball bat, and he wore a coat that was made for horses. Nine years later, Yogi was as tall as 6ft 11 and weighed around 200 lbs — which is about 65lbs more than the average Boston Great Dane.
Yogi soon became a special part of the family, and despite the family having to spend around $213 on food for him every month, Robert never once complained.
According to Sue, Yogi thinks of himself as a real person. He has his own couch — who he won’t let anyone else sit on- and watches TV every night with his family.
The only one special enough to sit on Yogi’s blanket is the senior neighborhood cat named Toffee, who would always come round to snuggle up with Yogi.
“Last winter, an old female cat we call Toffee started coming in the house for warmth…We thought Bear wouldn’t be a fan, but instead he welcomed her onto his sofa and they often curl up and sleep together…Bear sees Toffee as his own pet,” Sue explained.
Despite being such a huge dog, Yogi is truly the gentle giant, and we’re so glad that Robert eventually came around to the idea of owning a big dog. Yogi’s comical adoption story was shared on YouTube by CreepyWorld, and you can scroll to watch it below.
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