When Ryland Bell moved to Bendigo after high school he struggled to find his feet.
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Then one day he saw a Facebook post by an animal rescue agency looking for someone to foster a difficult dog.
After eight years, and more than 40 fostered animals, the 31-year-old has now developed into something of a dog whisperer, who has now defied his shyness to start advertising as a private dog trainer.
That first dog, Plum was "a staffy who'd been so severely abused in Melbourne that no-one would touch her," Ryland says.
She had been used as a 'bait dog' for dog fights - "to rev the other dogs up ready to go each other".
"I remember when she first arrived how withdrawn she was," he says. "She had a lot of severe trust issues because of the circumstances she'd been placed in.
"I threw the rule book out the window. I said to her, 'Plum, this is your home'.
"It took a lot of time and patience, love and affection but she came out the other side and was able to be re-homed, and she's still with that family today, who have got three kids now."
Many of the dogs would have otherwise faced euthanasia
Plum was the first of dozens of dogs the Kennington resident took in over the next few years, many of them "hard cases" from NSW who would have otherwise faced euthanasia.
"The agencies asked me to take them on because they knew I won't quit," he says.
"I've had that many things in my house destroyed. The door was one casualty. I've lost curtains and TVs."
"But every dog deserves a second chance. It's not their fault that their humans have treated them like dirt."
Ryland, who has at times had problems of his own with people's treatment, had discovered a gift for rehabilitation.
"In most cases it's just that the dog needs love," he says.
"It also needs to know it's safe, it needs a home and it needs to know it's got a bed.
"And the most important thing is trust. Because they don't know who you are."
Sometimes the dogs broke his heart.
Like a labrador who was surrendered simply because his owner was moving to a smaller home.
"The dog was gutted. It took me a long time to bring him round," Ryland says.
Another who was very special to him had been subjected to "unbelievable" cruelty and neglect by her owner, who was a serious drug user, Ryland says.
He kept the staffy for five months - longer than any of the other dogs - renaming her Hope and forming "a really deep bond" with her.
On his wall he has a picture of Hope, tucked under his doona, asleep in his bed like a person.
'People don't understand ... unless they walk in your shoes'
"It's mainly patience," he says. "You've got to have a lot of patience to do what I do."
Before getting involved with foster dogs Ryland often experienced people's negative judgements, he says.
"I had a lot of people say, 'What's he good for? He can't do anything'," he recalls.
Having suffered a stroke before he was born, Ryland has an acquired brain injury, and paralysis - known as hemiplegia - on one side of his body, and also suffers from epilepsy.
'Every day you wake up feeling good because you know you've done something good.'
"People don't understand unless they walk in your shoes what it's like," he says.
"I still get it today. People still say things."
But with the animal work, "every day you wake up feeling good because you know you've done something good".
And recently the dog whisperer has turned his attention in a new direction.
"Some friends saw what I was doing and asked if I could help train their two kelpie crosses," he says.
"It just started as a hobby, and it's turned into something.
"I was really shy and flying under the radar but I got encouraged to pursue that path and I enjoy it so I made the leap and put myself out there.
He has now had a range of clients and has received a slew of positive reviews on social media.
"I can vouch for Ryland...he is a gentle gem with animals," one woman noted on a Facebook post about his training services.
"I'd always grown up with dogs and I guess you get attached to them and everything," Ryland says.
"But it's self taught, from years of reading dogs' body language and working out what works and what doesn't.
"And I've surrounded myself with positive people who think I've got it in me to do it.
"It's amazing what you can do when you actually surround yourself with people who believe in you rather than kick you when you're down."
