(I was answering as a comment at first, but then decided to make a post of this. The pictures are taken from Wikipedia for obvious reasons.)
Vivid memories incoming... 😅
Yes getting bitten can really make you scared of dogs.
When I was 4 or 5 years old, I got bitten by a Dachshund. Made me scared of dogs for a long time.
But then I met a runaway Schäferhund (German Shepherd) in a forest when I was maybe between 10 to 12 years of age. It was right in front of me, just staring at me. I had no idea where it had came from, it just appeared out of nowhere.
I was scared, too scared to call my friends, and I also thought they might startle it and make it attack.
But I was also quite certain that dogs would follow sticks if I threw them. (I don't know where that idea came to me though.) So I picked up a stick and threw it into the forest, thinking I could flee while the dog was going after it.
I thought wrong. As I was about to leave, the Schäffer was in front of me again, stick in his mouth. And then it dropped the stick, right in front of my feet.
I picked up the stick again, throw it away, and sure as day the dog was back with the stick in his mouth, this time wagging his tail, and again dropping the stick in front of me.
After throwing the stick for the third or fourth time I was beginning to think this wasn't an angry dog after all. So I gave a shout to my friend, and when he came, we took the dog to his home, and his parents called the animal shelter to take the dog away.
It didn't have a tag collar, but it had a tattoo in his ear so we thought it might be a work dog, maybe it was in training to become a police work, or a guard dog.
Anyway, that's my short story of the fear of dogs that kind of went away when I was forced face-to-face with at first quite scary looking dog, that turned out to be very happy and kind dog.
I sometimes wonder what happened to it though.
That concludes my short memoir of getting rid of fear for dogs.
One of worlds kindest dogs, Ninnu says goodnight to everyone.
