Retired Hero Military Dog and U.S. Army Sgt. Reconnect After Two Years

Dassie's personality is, for one, he's always energetic, never stops. It's how it's always been. Even when we're trying to sleep, he just won't leave me alone. He'll always be putting the ball. From what I remember, I assume, what you guys said, that he's still the same way. He was probably the most energetic dog I've ever had to deal with, and he was probably the most high-strung. The reason why I say high-strung is that he is just, like I said, go, go, go, go, go. He will not stop. So you have to basically cater to that. I was used to slow dogs. I was used to kind of lazy dogs that I had to hype up the most just to get them to work. But with Dassie, it was totally different, so I had to change my whole mentality when it came to handling. He was... They say it's a dog team, but in reality, it's the dog that makes the team. And I could literally just sit back and hold a leash, which is kind of bad for me to say as a handler, but he would do my job for me, and it would make it a lot easier. It was kind of surreal, after just knowing everything we'd been through and then seeing him again. It took him a little bit to warm up to me and realize who I was, but once we started playing, he listened to me, and it was great seeing him just being able to play with my son and everything like that, because that never happened in the military. So it was actually very, very great. After Afghanistan and after my times with him, I can see that he's... They become part of you, and they have their own personality. They uplift your spirits when it's the worst possible times in your life. They uplift everybody's spirits around you. And just to give a military working dog a retirement that they rightfully deserve, just as anybody else, is a rewarding thing. I've done it before. It was very rewarding, and it is probably one of the best things you can do from a veteran to basically another veteran. I am honestly looking to just have him sit on port couch and just relax. He's done enough. He's been to enough countries with me. He's been to enough states, done enough missions, been enough firefights. He's good to just relax, get fat, play with my son. Maybe every once in a while, if I ever go on a walk or he makes me go on a walk, we'll go on a walk. But other than that, I just look and just bond with him and just relax and enjoy just being around him and him being part of my family. Like I said before, my son, he is so excited. We've adopted a military working dog before. He sadly passed away, but they were inseparable. At first, the dog's name was Aaron. He didn't know what he was because he never saw a little kid before, basically. But once my son started dropping him food, they became best friends, and my son still asks about him. So hopefully the same thing happens with Dastie. I have a better bond with Dastie than I did my last dog just because of my deployments, and I hope that my son, that Dastie will be around long enough that my son can remember him and also remember that that's the dog his dad deployed with, and that's the dog that kept him safe. If I didn't have Dastie in Afghanistan, there's no possible way to know what would happen, but what I do know is that I did take him, and I made it back home safe. And my family and I are very gracious to Dastie for that, and he probably doesn't even know what he did.