When Louie was young he jumped up on and off of any furniture he needed access to, be it the sofa, our bed, or the club chairs in the living room. He was incredibly athletic and could take running leaps and just go flying through the air.

We never thought a thing about that perhaps causing hip problems in later life, etc. Fortunately his hips and spine were never injured. But he eventually lost the ability to jump up onto the furniture.

As he got older we noticed that when he jumped down off of the sofa or the bed he had lost the spring in his legs that would allow him to land softly. He began to land really hard, sometimes even hitting his chin on the floor.

So we entered a new era of life with the puggies. The era of PET STAIRS. We researched them and found the appropriate size for our situation. The first day we had the stairs was hilarious. I spent hours coaxing both boys onto the stairs by putting treats either at the bottom or top to get them to go both directions.

Treats will cause a pug to hyperventilate in the calmest of moments, but these guys were so excited about learning to use the stairs that they were just beside themselves. Adding the treats into the mix caused all out bug eyed pug hysteria. Needless to say we were all exhausted when the lesson was done.

Fast forward several weeks to the time when we had to face the fact that Louie would NEVER go up the stairs, only down. He just refused to go up! Henry was fine with going both ways. Louie would stand on the first step and wait for us to help him go all the way up. Day in and day out we tried to coax him up the stairs to no avail. Fast forward to months later, heck years later! Louie would NEVER EVER go up the stairs, only down.

One day I was chopping vegetables with a newly sharpened knife and I cut one of my fingers really bad. I am usually not that squeamish about such things but this time was particularly painful and scary. (I will spare you the gorey details). Suffice it to say that I was FREAKED OUT.

I called my best friend who told me what to do until she could get over to help me. So I wrapped it up and went to the bedroom to lie down before I fainted. I wasn’t on the bed 5 seconds, when Louie came running up the stairs to check on me with a very worried look on his face.

 I could not BELIEVE that pug came UP the stairs!! He never did it again. Just that one time. When I needed him the most.