If cussing or foul lanquage offends you, then please stop here and go read the blog of someone else. I am a person who speaks their own mind and I just tell it like it is!
Let me introduce myself to those who haven't been following me around the world wide web since 1996. My name is Diane Gerrish and my friends call me Dee. I am so use to my friends calling me Dee that I do not even use the name, Diane. I am the mother to two sons. I am a grandmother to three lovely children who are growing like weeds as I write this. I am prior military and since getting out of the military in 1996, I've been a private, professional, hobby breeder for Golden Retriever and Goldendoodle dogs.
When I first began creating the Goldendoodle hybrid...and yes...I did say Create, not breed....I was the only breeder in the entire southern region of the United States who offered the Golden Retriever Poodle mix. This was in 1999. Prior to that, I bred Golden Retrievers and prior to that, I was a soldier with the United States Army stationed in Mannheim Germany.
In the beginning, there were many naysayers having a fit over the Goldendoodle dog's growing popularity. I received hate email and hateful messages on my answering machine from fanatic dog fanciers. Here we are in 2009 and many of those very same fanatics are now breeding Goldendoodles! Imagine that! Many people in the United States, back in 1999, had no idea what a Goldendoodle dog was or what the advantages were of owning one. Now that many people here in the USA do own them, the advantages are well known.
There was very little known about the Goldendoodle back in 1999. So I began to write what I knew. I photographed them; researched them; documented them and wrote about them. I then turned my website into a site exclusively for the Goldendoodle dog. My business was founded in 1996. It was essential that I learn how to run it. Prior to joining the military, I was a regional manager for a very large optical firm. So I brought to the table, as a breeder, many qualities. My love for writing also helped further my business by way of writing blogs and articles about the Goldendoodle dog.
As a budding breeder, I had to modify my routine and learn to let the negative comments roll away although I do admit in the beginning I had very thin skin. The comments bothered me. But I am now no longer bothered with what someone thinks I should or should not do as a breeder.......or what type of dog I should or should not create. A breeder needs to just focus on furthering their business and let the naysayers to go on and say NAY. As someone who is accustomed at leading, I have no reason to follow other breeders or care what it is they do with their dogs or breeding program. But once my Goldendoodle articles became popular, it seemed quite a few people cared about what it was I said, did and still do.
While many people only know me as a breeder, none know me as an individual. I've had many opportunities as a person in my fifties. I've shared many great moments with multiple people thus far. I grew up in a severely dysfunctional family unit as a child. I left home when I was 14 years old. Since leaving home, I seldomed returned. Only on occasion would I visit my mother. My father passed away in 1994. I was always much closer to my father than I was my mother. She was diagnosed with dementia in 2006. Only at that time I was not aware of it. I actually didn't find out about her diagnosis until the middle of 2008. Coincidentally, in 2006 an estranged sister had emailed me asking about my giving her a Goldendoodle. The story and saga is old and to me, quite worn out.
The Upstage Problem
Apparently my popularity as a Goldendoodle breeder is something my estranged older sister still can not quite comprehend or understand. For some reason, she became unraveled over my telling her she had to fill out my canine application that is on my website at http://www.goldendoodleworld.com/ ..... something to this day, I can not quite understand or comprehend. Many quality, reputable breeders have a canine application and many require a non refundable deposit. My estranged sister didn't even have to pay me for the dog. She was given the opportunity to come to my home to pick the dog up. She was given the opportunity to pay for my gas to bring the dog down to her in Florida. All I got in return was excuses. So she never got a dog from me. No application. No dog. This estranged sister has spent since 2006 posting very over the top, quite outrageous fabricated nonsense about me as a person and about my business, on as many websites as she possible still can. All out of spite. I've spent since 2006 blogging about her outrageous Internet antics. Her inability to show self restraint or self control became very obvious to me after reading the absurd things she would write about me over the Internet. Undeniably, I've watched this person self destruct and unravel over the world wide web!
Perhaps my impact in the world of Goldendoodles unnerves her. Our Goldendoodles' wattage has increased with every single passing year. Perhaps because she felt slighted and stung by my uncaring attitude about her personal problems is the reason she can not control her fixation and obsession of posting ridiculous lies and fabricated accusations over the internet. The one thing she can't accuse me of is show-boating over the internet. Because I discovered this individual has literally spent every waking moment finding website and forum after website and forum simply to bash me as a person and trash my business, she has forced me to continue to blog about personal issues that shouldn't even have to be discussed over the internet.
The interesting thing is that this very same woman that I am speaking about has gone so far as to have copied every single blog I've ever written since 2006, not to mention personal photos I had originally placed in my photobucket account. She has claimed "harassment" to the site owners where my blogs were located and even went so far as to get some of my accounts deleted simply because they got tired of the back and forth bickering and squabbling. The rift between us will never heal because she is, without a doubt, the most scheming vendictive and quite negative person I've ever had the displeasure of knowing.
The last few months both my cousin and I discovered that this estranged sister has been posting "family" photos of us when we were children and teenagers. Why, I have no idea. I highly doubt that anyone is interested in seeing old family photos of people that are not their family members. But during this discovery, it was also found that my estranged sister copied personal photos that belonged to me. Photos that were taken with my own camera many years ago. But the disturbing part is that she went so far as splash her personal name across my images including placing a fabricated copyright watermark on them. Photographs not taken with your own camera can not be legally copy right protected. The only individual who can copyright protect images is the person who took the images themselves, with their own camera. My estranged sister for some reason believes that because my mother has dementia and she obtained a box full of family photographs and took control of those photographs after obtaining an illegal durable power of attorney, that she somehow owns the "copyrights" to those images. She further copied a photograph that my husband took with our camera back in 1996...photoshopped it...then turned around and splashed her personal name across the photo along with a fake copyright watermark. I am not sure where she is obtaining her legal advice from, but she should stop paying the people with monopoly money!
For this estranged sister, there is no better aphrodisiac than to conduct herself in this manner over the internet. She had sent me an email awhile back stating matter of factly that she does these things because she knows it "pisses" me off. Perhaps this individual feels that the more material assets she acquires, the better it will make her feel. What I do know is that she can post whatever she wants over the internet, but her words will remain untruthful and her continued fabricated, absurd claims is not going to cause me to "close up shop". (Something in an email she had addressed to me.) Her grandious delusions will just remain to be that. Delusions.
Behind her facade of being a loving individual, she is deeply selfish and deeply disturbed. Since founding my business, Lake Ridge Kennel/Goldendoodle World, I've had great success in our dogs finding "forever" loving homes. We've so few ligitimate customer complaints that we can proudly proclaim that we have entirely more successful canine adoptions than many breeders with this same breed. Perhaps my estranged sister is completely discomfited by the excessive attention our dogs obtain by complete strangers? I wish I could sit here and say to you that the negative publicity being put out over the internet regarding me as a person and my Goldendoodle business by my estranged sister...her family members and her gaggle fuck of followers would end soon. I wish I could tell you otherwise. But if I did, it would be a lie. My estranged sister continues to post under multiple fake user names, pretending to be various "wronged" customers when that just isn't the truth whatsoever. She continues to proclaim she is a "victim of harassment" at my finger tips when that is so far from the truth it is laughable at best. Perhaps her behaviour would ruffle the feathers of someone who isn't confident. She chose the wrong person to target.
I am not afraid of exposing people for who they are and of speaking the truth. After all, I am entitled to write about myself...my experiences...my life...my dogs....anything that comes to mind. My father always told me, regarding bullies, "You don't run from them. You don't hide from them. You stand up for yourself and you stand your ground to face them." He further told me, "You were born a fighter. You will die a fighter." Any time my Goldendoodles make a public appearance, all eyes swivel in their direction. My retinue of pages of blogs and articles will continue to sit on one side while the naysayers sit on the other. They can train their eyes with opera glasses to follow my glossy head. I vowed as a teenager to not make the same mistake my parents made and that was to live a life of dysfunction. If my estranged family members can not rise above the dysfunction they grew up in, then it is their own personal problem. My Goldendoodles are irresistible, so the more mass hysteria the naysayers can promote, the more they feel they can downplay these adorable dogs that we create!
My Goldendoodles and my Goldendoodle dogs are my legacy. This can not be denied. It doesn't matter the comical shortage of cash my business is lacking caused by my estranged sister's outlandish internet nonsense or how long her seriel snubbings continue. I have a gift of giving to the media continued popular Goldendoodle articles and blogs. My values are humanitarian. My values are of giving and not of taking. My estranged family members values are material. My Goldendoodles will continue to gain the admiration of complete strangers. Against the background of a life riddled with dysfunction, I am a survivor. I have made it a point to distance myself from estranged family members and for good reason. I continue to remain focused on my dogs and the life that I have chosen to build for myself.
I was reminded by my brother that I began my dog business many years ago and that I've spent years dedicating myself to something I love. There is no way I would ever allow a delusional, dysfunctional, out of touch with reality type of person to over shadow the greatness of my dogs and a business I built from the ground up, by myself. It would not surprise me if my estranged sister scored an alarming high number on a test to see if she is suffering from a mental illness. She had once claimed in a posting that I was diagnosed with schizophrenia as a young child. I have asked her to produce the name of the supposed doctor who made this diagnosis and to explain how I've been able to function as a very normal human being all of these years, if this were true? I'd love to have it explained to me how I was trusted as an active duty enlisted soldier who carried an M16 with live amunition, if it were true I was schizophrenic??? My life has included marriage, children, career changes, stress, change in living conditions, change in countries, change in work responsibilities, achievements, accomplishments, school, change in residence, change in family, change in activities and yet....I've come out unscathed. It's a freakin' miracle!
Sure I've had tantrums. Sure I've yelled. Sure I've been hostile. But I've also been happy. I've been funny. I've cried. I've loved. I've done all the things that many normal human beings do. I actually have a very bubbly personality and a fondness for laughing. I am enthusiastic about things and I do not sit around feeling sorry for myself. If I don't like something, I change it. If I don't like what I see in the mirror.....I'm not going to become depressed over it! I'm going to do what has to be done to change what it is I don't like about the person staring me back in the mirror! I am not terrified of the general public. I thrive around people and I love meeting new people and I could talk for hours to people I do not even know, about shared interests. It seems to me that my estranged sister who continues to this day to attack me as a person and my business over the internet, needs constant reassurance and validation as a person. She's so paranoid about ownership of material things that she feels the need to "copyright" protect family photos that she never even took! Family photos taken when she was a mere child and given to not just her, but to all of the family members, by our parents...the true owners of the very photos she is placing fake copyright protection notices on. It's absurd at best!
Although it appears this blog is about explaining and complaining, I assure it isn't. My purpose is to introduce myself as a person. Then as a dog breeder. If you follow my blogs and articles long enough, you will walk away feeling as if you know me and of course, then, my blogs have served their purpose.
Introduction: Dee Gerrish by Dee Gerrish is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
Based on a work at goldendoodleworld@hotmail.com.
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