Relax
Well-known member
@mimico_polak I've only read the first and last page of this thread, where all I've seen are positive posts. Hopefully others have already mentioned some of this things I'm about to, because you really need to go into this with your eyes open. Dogs are like children that never grow up. They will never become any more self-sufficient than the day you get them, and if you're a germaholic/clean freak like I was, get ready for a meltdown. If this will be your and your wife's first dog, you'll want to try dog-sitting for a friend on vacation for at least a week or more to really understand how it might uproot your lifestyle.
While I love our Pekingese Maltese, thank god I was originally dead set against her and made my wife agree that if she insisted on bringing her home, I would have zero responsibility for anything to do with her. That includes:
- waking up 2 hours earlier than normal to feed, walk, wash, and dry her every morning, which can also be in the freezing cold dead of winter trudging through a foot of snow before the streets have been plowed, or while hoping your umbrella doesn't collape or get blown away but the torrential rain and wind
- always having to come home straight after work to prevent or deal with separation anxiety and to walk, wash, and dry her again, as well as possibly to clean up after an occasional accident (usually just pee, but sometimes worse)
- never being able to stay out late at parties because you need to get home to walk, wash, and dry her again
- waking up in the middle of the night to walk, wash, and dry her when her stomach acts up from something she probably ate on he last walk when you weren't paying attention and she wants to go outside and eat grass
- having to beg and plead for someone to watch her whenever we need to go anywhere overnight
- budgeting for shots and regular checkups at the vet or worse when there's a problem (luckily we only had one scare that thankfully cost just $2000 for an x-ray and overnight stay at the pet hospital)
- budgeting for regular grooming
- budgeting for dog food
- budgeting for dog (and owner) training
And that's all assuming the dog is well-mannered. As our first, we didn't know what we were doing and ours developed separation anxiety as well as aggressiveness. She barks at pretty much everyone and lunges at people and cars passing by on her walks and actually bit one person while my daughter was walking her - luckily they didn't sue us. We tried training her, but I was the only person taking it seriously. If every single person in the household doesn't understand how to act in front of the dog, no amount of training will be successful. A friend of mine insists I should make her wear a shock collar, but I think that's cruel.
As I said, I do love our dog, but my wife agrees that she'll probably be our last. Mostly because at 15 years old she's at the max of her life expectancy for either breed. Hopefullt the cross breeding helps, but we've already started to see signs of her aging like diminished hearing and sight. Sometimes we get sad just looking at her and wondering if she's still breathing, and dread the day she leaves us. And out of everything she's put us though so far, that's the one thing we don't think we'd be able to handle a second time.
While I love our Pekingese Maltese, thank god I was originally dead set against her and made my wife agree that if she insisted on bringing her home, I would have zero responsibility for anything to do with her. That includes:
- waking up 2 hours earlier than normal to feed, walk, wash, and dry her every morning, which can also be in the freezing cold dead of winter trudging through a foot of snow before the streets have been plowed, or while hoping your umbrella doesn't collape or get blown away but the torrential rain and wind
- always having to come home straight after work to prevent or deal with separation anxiety and to walk, wash, and dry her again, as well as possibly to clean up after an occasional accident (usually just pee, but sometimes worse)
- never being able to stay out late at parties because you need to get home to walk, wash, and dry her again
- waking up in the middle of the night to walk, wash, and dry her when her stomach acts up from something she probably ate on he last walk when you weren't paying attention and she wants to go outside and eat grass
- having to beg and plead for someone to watch her whenever we need to go anywhere overnight
- budgeting for shots and regular checkups at the vet or worse when there's a problem (luckily we only had one scare that thankfully cost just $2000 for an x-ray and overnight stay at the pet hospital)
- budgeting for regular grooming
- budgeting for dog food
- budgeting for dog (and owner) training
And that's all assuming the dog is well-mannered. As our first, we didn't know what we were doing and ours developed separation anxiety as well as aggressiveness. She barks at pretty much everyone and lunges at people and cars passing by on her walks and actually bit one person while my daughter was walking her - luckily they didn't sue us. We tried training her, but I was the only person taking it seriously. If every single person in the household doesn't understand how to act in front of the dog, no amount of training will be successful. A friend of mine insists I should make her wear a shock collar, but I think that's cruel.
As I said, I do love our dog, but my wife agrees that she'll probably be our last. Mostly because at 15 years old she's at the max of her life expectancy for either breed. Hopefullt the cross breeding helps, but we've already started to see signs of her aging like diminished hearing and sight. Sometimes we get sad just looking at her and wondering if she's still breathing, and dread the day she leaves us. And out of everything she's put us though so far, that's the one thing we don't think we'd be able to handle a second time.
