Those were exciting times in my household, with another baby on the way to join my first producer of grey hairs. Well, I should say my wife and I were excited. Our little guy? He would get there eventually, once he understood a new baby meant a new plaything. There was one individual in the house, however, who I was positive wouldn’t do any backflips. And that would be our jealous old dog.

Now he did have good reasons for jealousy. The four-legged grouch was technically the first child for my wife and me. And in all fairness, he wasn’t always bad-tempered. He was a spry, happy puppy when my wife started caring for him years ago. Once I met her and we began dating, I too adopted him as my own. That was nearly a decade ago.

Through the years, he went from a pooch of boundless energ...

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