How could we?
Sunday, September 21, 2008

I'm more than a little upset about the ongoing disagreement DH and I have over our dog. I want to keep her. He wants to get rid of her.

Our dog is seriously one of the best dogs in the world. She practically potty trained herself. The only time she ever has accidents in the house is when she is really sick and can't help it. She is FANTASTIC with Scout. Scout adores her. She is a friendly and affectionate dog, but she also has a ferocious bark and is very protective of her family. Sure, she has taken a backseat since Scout was born, and we really don't spend time with her and play with her like we should, but I still enjoy her companionship and couldn't imagine our home without her.

DH says she is nothing but a liability. She serves no purpose. All she does is cost us money and we don't get anything in return. We spend money on dog food, keeping her up to date on shots, and occasionally getting her groomed. We recently realized that we've both been getting some little bug bites and are suspecting fleas. The groomer saw a few when she was bathed a couple weeks ago, but I think DH has only actually seen one in the house and when I search her white fur, I don't see any at all. Still, we need to take care of it. Anyway, we were discussing what we need to do about said fleas and came across some negative info on flea meds like Frontline and Advantage. We started Googling more natural options and before we got very far in our search, DH threw up his arms and started talking about getting rid of the dog again.....that it's stupid to have to spend money on flea treatments when he doesn't even know why we have a dog.

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You know, every single thing he says is factual. No, our dog does not give us any kind of monetary or material compensation. I suppose she is technically "worthless". Yes, sometimes we do have to spend money on her to keep her healthy (although it's not a very frequent occurrence - she's actually pretty low maintenance as far as pets are concerned, in my opinion). Yes, we do struggle financially and so I can see why it can be frustrating to DH on those rare occasions when we do have to shell out a little bit of money on the dog.

But the dog IS worth something to me. I spend a lot of time at home and therefore I spend a lot of time with the dog. She traveled with us out of state when DH was working long periods of time in Denver and Chicago. She has been with us for most of our marriage. I can't just toss her by the wayside. I can't just give her away. I know that she is not a human being, but in my mind she is a part of our family and I DO NOT WANT TO GET RID OF HER. I am frankly sick of hearing about how stupid it is for us to have her and how it only makes sense to get rid of her. I am tired of it. I will freakin' find a way to make some extra money in order to pay for her expenses if that's what it takes to end this debate. Some way, somehow. Heck, I will ask my parents for money and tell them that it's the only way I will be able to keep my dog.

DH and I don't have disagreements about things very often. I am telling the truth when I say that we fight and bicker a billion times less than most couples I know. But this topic seems to be a sore subject for the both of us and it just keeps popping up. I hate to say it, but there have been times when I've actually thought that he might take her somewhere or do something with her without my knowledge while I'm not looking. Oh gosh, I hope I'm way off-base with that idea.

Labels: being sappy, dh, sadness, the dog

posted by Unkempt Mommy @ 7:46 AM,

6 Comments:

At Sun Sep 21, 10:16:00 AM CDT, Giggly said...: That's ok to be totally off topic ;)
I adore the song too! (duh)

I love the pic in this post, very sweet.
At Sun Sep 21, 01:10:00 PM CDT, Giggly said...: Thanks for the tip! (off topic;)
At Mon Sep 22, 05:31:00 AM CDT, Danielle said...: We did it. SOOOOOO HARD! Joe wanted her gone, I wanted to keep her. It was when Max was about 12 months old or so. We had the best dog. THE BEST DOG! I prayed and prayed and I thought surely God would find a way for me to keep my dog...but He didn't. He did something even better. He found a christian homeschooling family that had been waiting for a dog 'til their children were old enough to really help with it and appreciate it. My dog's life now is soooo much better than her life with me. Her new owner takes her to agility training and runs with her several times a week and they take really good care of her. The children are there a lot so she isn't alone. It really was the best solution. Cause Joe was resolved that she had to go.
My advice is to just start praying and just see what God does and ultimately defer to what hubby thinks is best.
Animals are a drain financially, they do give back in comfort and love and your dogs "job" is to bark and let strangers know they can't do any funny business at your house...
Having said all that, I've always used some kind of flea control on the back of the animal's necks. I worried about the transfer to Max but now that we only have outdoor animals it isn't that big of a deal. When we do get another indoor dog (couple years away), I'll use flea control like advantage because fleas in the house are not fun. Another monthly expense though that is costly.
At Mon Sep 22, 05:34:00 AM CDT, Danielle said...: If you have a low cost spay/neuter place near your home, they may have a "house" frontline flea control, that will only cost you like $5 a month. You have to take your dog in and have them apply it out of a huge bottle but because they buy it in bulk, it can be cheaper to you. Just a thought if that wouldn't be too much of a hassle.
At Mon Sep 22, 12:53:00 PM CDT, Two Lines On a Stick said...: Tell DH that Scout doesn't give you any monetary rewards either but you don't think it's fair to get rid of her because of that... so why the dog... lol

I am not a big dog lover but I feel sorry for you going through this! Also I have heard fleas are really hard to get rid of once they are in your house :(
At Sat Sep 27, 12:05:00 AM CDT, MIP said...: I have definitely been in this position and totally understand just how difficult it can be. We had two dogs when the mister was born, and how quickly they went from our babies to just pets again. We ultimately ended up finding them new homes when we moved, since bringing them was just logisitically unsound, but we had had many discussions prior as to how neither we nor the dogs was really benefitting from the situation anymore. Tough stuff. Hopefully DH can come to better understand your point of view and you will be able to reach an agreement you both feel good about.