Rescuing Jojo

My dog Jojo has a whole host of issues. He is anxious but also aggressive, sensitive, and prone to passing gas frequently. He dislikes car rides, meeting new people, dogs of any kind, disruptions to his routine, having his ears cleaned, and trips to the vet. Our family jokes that he trembles if we look at him wrong. But beneath his problems, he is a sweet soul, just very slow to embrace change.

I will admit that when we adopted Jojo at eight weeks old, we had no idea what we were getting into. My husband Dan and I grew up with family dogs with temperaments suited to young children (springer spaniels and black labs). We expected Jojo to adapt to the happy chaos of our family—then with a two-year-old and seven-year-old and our other dog, Gigi—without many hiccups. We thought the worst of it would be housebreaking him.

But we learned quickly that he was a different kind of dog. He was always scared, even as a little thing, which puzzled us, since we rescued him when he was so young. We fi…