Former Bachelor Sean Lowe has been moving forward since his family’s rescue dog attacked him twice in the span of 12 hours.
“It was quite the ordeal,” Lowe, 42, said during a recent appearance on Jordan Syatt’s eponymous podcast. “I was just telling someone I don’t really have PTSD. It’s funny because I’m such a dog lover and I’d never thought twice about putting my face in a dog’s face, but now I do think twice about doing stuff like that.”
He continued, “A dog attack is a very traumatic thing, and then reliving it 12 hours later, I just can’t express to you the emotions that I was feeling.”
Lowe revealed in March that his family’s pet, Moose, bit him twice, drawing blood and requiring a visit to the hospital emergency room.
Sean Lowe and Catherine Giudici Joke About ‘Aging Out’ of Bachelor Nation
“The only PTSD I have is the thought of, ‘What if it had been my children,’” Lowe told Syatt, referring to his three kids with wife Catherine Giudici. “He absolutely would have killed my children or my wife for that matter. I think about that quite a bit, but for the most part, I’m doing pretty good.”
Keep scrolling for more of Lowe’s updates about surviving the dog attack, his home life and more:
Sean Lowe Was in ‘Survival’ Mode After the Dog Attack
Lowe had been grilling for a barbecue when the usually “well-behaved” boxer, whom he had for two months, began freaking out over smoke wafting from the grill.
“Smoke starts to waft into my house, smoke alarm goes off … and Moose is, kind of, freaking out,” Lowe recalled. “He starts biting my feet aggressively, like really aggressively, like, put holes in my shoes. I’m, like, ‘Moose, no,’ trying to be stern but also got this blaring alarm.”
According to Lowe, Moose didn’t retreat after biting his owner’s leg.
“He is on me and will not get off,” he said. “It lasted about one minute and 20 seconds, something like that, where he’s just attacking me, blood everywhere. It’s survival.”
Lowe, who stressed that he loved Moose prior to the incident, eventually was able to keep the canine outside when he went back into the house.
The reality TV alum subsequently noticed “blood squirting” out of his wrist.
“I’m thinking he might have clipped my artery because it’s literally squirting [and] there’s pools of blood all over the floor,” Lowe said. “Go to the hospital, get me all stitched up and my mind is just blown. I can’t really make sense of what just happened.”
After he was discharged, Lowe planned to rehome Moose. Even before he could make arrangements, the dog bit him again on the opposite arm.
He Doesn’t Know ‘What Happened’ With Moose
Lowe and Giudici still don’t have answers about what led to Moose’s violent behavior.
“A lot of people speculated, maybe, it was a brain tumor, something kind of snaps,” Lowe said. “I’m friends with a very good dog trainer. I think she had the best explanation. She told me, … ‘When we teach dogs bite work, we use what’s called a bit rag, and it gets the dog going.’ It looked just like a dish towel, [and] she said, ‘Well, we also use whistles, which corresponds with the siren that was going off in my house.’”
According to the trainer, many pet owners shouldn’t teach their dogs how to do bite work.
“She said, ‘A lot of people will take a breed that has no business doing bite work, like a boxer, because it’s a cool, athletic dog,’” Lowe recalled. “They try to teach them and, basically, what it does is screws the dogs up — and then they get rid of the dog. She said, ‘If you’re the one being bit … and that dog is screwed up, basically you have a bullseye on your chest for the rest of your life.’”
Sean Lowe and Catherine Giudici Are Done Having Kids
Lowe and Giudici are parents to sons Samuel and Isaiah, as well as daughter Mia.
“I went to the doctor, so unless a miracle happens, we’re done,” Lowe revealed, confirming he underwent a vasectomy. “We had three, and my wife said, ‘I think three is our number.’ I’m not going to argue with that.”
The Ups and Downs of Marriage
Lowe and Giudici got married in 2014, which came with a “steep learning curve” for the former football player.
“We got married when I was 30. I [learned] I had a lot of selfish tendencies from the time I graduated college to 30,” he said. “I’ve got my routine. I do think this way, and this is just how I live my life. … Marriage taught me, like, ‘Hey, I need to be more selfless and less selfish.’”
Lowe now hopes to “instill” the lessons he’s learned into his kids.
“[Today’s dating culture] teaches you when you don’t like something about someone, you break up with them and move to the next person,” he said. “That pattern continues … and then you get to whatever age you want to get married, you say, ‘Well, it’s time for me to get married. Now, I’m going to commit to this person,’ but you’ve developed this habit of breaking up and leaving when things get hard.’”
As a result, Lowe is hopeful that his children will “get married young.”
“I believe that marriage should be the foundation and then you build your life on top of that,” he stated. “Too often people are trying to build their lives, [thinking], ‘I’ve got to get my career going, I’ve got to save up some money. I got to do this and then I’ll be ready to get married.’ I think they have it backwards.”
Why Sean Lowe Hopes His 3 Kids Will ‘Get Married Young’
Where Sean Lowe Stands With His Former ‘Bachelor’ Contestants
Lowe revealed that he’s not in contact with any of his Bachelor castoffs — though Giudici has maintained her own friendships.
“Catherine is friends with a few of them, and so I will see them occasionally through my wife’s friendship,” Lowe said. “I want to make that very clear: I am not in contact with any other women.”
Overcoming an Eating Disorder
Before Lowe became the Bachelor in 2013, he worked as a fitness model, where he ultimately developed an eating disorder.
“When I wasn’t getting ready for a photoshoot, I would be eating fast food and completely binging. I would gain 25 or 30 pounds within weeks, and it was so unhealthy,” he recalled. “I, unfortunately, wasn’t able to break that mental hurdle because I had healthy foods [to prepare for shoots].”
After gaining weight between shoots, Lowe would rapidly try to shed his excess pounds ahead of the next job.
“You’d rapidly drop those 25 pounds and it was just so unhealthy,” he said. “I would wake up at 4:30 in the morning, just like my dad used to, and I would go to the gym. I would get my workout in, and then I would go to work all day.”
At the end of the day, Lowe would return to the gym for a 45-minute regimen of cardio before going home and meal prepping for the next day.
“It’s incredibly unhealthy, and I do not suggest that way of life to anybody,” he said, revealing how he’s since transformed his mindset around dieting. “I’m much more balanced with food, but I’m either following my macros and working out really hard or I’m not.”
If you or someone you know struggles with an eating disorder, visit the National Eating Disorders (NEDA) website or call their hotline at (800) 931-2237 to get help.
