Do You Love Your Dog Too Much?

My name is Leslie Smith and I may be addicted to my dog. I don’t think I have an addictive personality either because I don’t have the typical vices of gambling, smoking, or drinking. So, I was pretty surprised at my separation anxiety when it comes to my dog.

This is not something that I’m used to, but I might love my dog a bit too much.

Ground Rules

My husband, Mike, and I decided not to have children, but we were excited to have a dog. We saved up our money, found a place that allowed pets, and became a dog family. The next step was to make sure we didn’t overdo it like some people we knew. We weren’t going to baby-tall or dog, or parade him around in costumes, and we most certainly weren’t going to be like our ex-friends who didn’t accept dinner invitations that were not extended to their Labradoodle.

Our dog was going to be our dog, not our child. This means that we’d have no birthday parties, no Christmas cards, and a maximum of two dog pictures at the office. Furthermore, we weren’t going to call each other “Mommy” or “Daddy”.

Adoption

We had found our dog online and picked him up at the shelter. He was a small dog of ten months old with a sad expression. Our drive home felt like leaving the doctor with a new baby and my maternal instincts kicked in immediately.

He was called Uno because he was our first dog. I was smitten by the way he smelt, how his paws looked, and pretty much everything else about him.

We woke up to him barking, as a way of waking us up from sleeping in, and taking walks in the park in the afternoon. We were the perfect family.

Life With Uno

Admittedly, our rules were very flexible. Mike was calling me Mommy and we even included Uno on the answering machine. We became obsessed with his past, and what brought him to the shelter. We even got an expensive DNA test to find out more about his breed mix. To our surprise, he was half Doberman Pinscher, and not Labrador or Pointer as we thought. I immediately researched to learn more about our child. My best friend Beth even equated it to a mother playing house. She even said she was worried.

A Good Boy

I wondered if my relationship with Uno was inappropriate and if I was treating him like a human child. Did I love him too much? Perhaps I had lost my mind. We enrolled him in doggy daycare and took him on three walks a day. He was always on our minds. Well, Mike and I still go to dinner with humans only and travel without him. Though we rush to his side when we get back. It could be worse, but that’s just us.

Do you feel like you love your dog a little bit too much?