As the owner of a Bad Dog, I love and agree with all of this. Guinness’s background is with a former member of the UVF in east Belfast who and he (Guinness) needed a police escort to free him from his former home. He is a 14 year old blind, deaf, diabetic and toothless chihuahua and I have moved back to my mother’s house (40 miles away) because it takes 2 of us to give him his twice daily insulin - toothless as he is, he is still so fierce. As I read this, he is lying on my Patagonia down coat because it’s his favourite blanket. He won’t let me pet him, he is angry at everyone (because chihuahua) and last year, he passed out and was rushed to a £££ cardiac vet, hooked up to a Holter monitor for a day to reveal that he has a great heart and had possibly just fainted.
I feel this with every ounce of my being. My cocker spaniel, Ned (nearly 8) has just been diagnosed with heart failure. I am utterly destroyed. I don’t have kids either so he is essential to my existence. I am already mourning him, despite the heart pills having perked him up no end and his having no idea he is at all ill. He is as chirpy and waggy as he ever was. I’m the one wailing and clutching him to me, which he finds intensely irritating! Dogs are so wonderful. No human has EVER been as thrilled to see me as my dog is, whether it’s been 2 minutes or an hour. Barney is gorgeous by the way, it’s lovely how much you care for him and his little ways 😂.
My cat won't let us go to the loo in peace either. She also shouts at us when she feels she's being failed in some way (not being stroked, being ignored, not being fed, needs someone to watch out for danger when she goes to the loo in the litter tray). I didn't think I'd be able to have another pet after our last family dog died (2016) but grew up always with a dog from the age of 9. Last year a local cat adopted us and although I'd never been a cat person but I'm completely in love with her
Love this. I know there are lot of differences but I do think having a dog sounds similar to having kids in some ways. I’ve never had a dog although my mum has one now and my kids ask for one a lot. I hope to get one one day when the kids are a bit older but know that they are such a big commitment and I’ve got a lot of commitment already as a single mum of 2! Before kids I would have been like “why is she carrying a dog up the stairs in a sling?” and would have been blaming you for his behaviour, but like you say that’s his soul and that’s how he is. My children are both very different and one is a lot more clingy than the other and demands a lot from me and I get criticised by my parents at times, but it’s just how she is.
So I’m always worried about doing any comparison because some mothers might get annoyed. But I’m not sure we should try and “rank” how much people love or who is worth it. I don’t want to feel less because I have a dog and not a kid. And you’re right - kids and dogs come out as themselves. Trying to force change is often pointless (and leads to unhappiness). You get what you get.
Dogs are ridiculous but brilliant friends and family members. My dog Sylvie is the queen of our house. She barks, she sneaks things she's not supposed to, she is a nightmare often, but always a treasured one. Just don't tell her that!
I love this, it chimes on so many levels. I often feel I love dogs more than people and I’m not ashamed to admit it, we don’t deserve them truly.
Having said that I always seem to have such BAD dogs. But that’s ok, could it be the really well behaved ones have had some of the personality knocked out of them with all that training? I don’t know.
Our old dog (an enormous black lab called Elvis) was so very very bad. My partner grew up in a house where pets were frowned upon so Elvis was an introduction into this world of animals in the house. And on the furniture, including the bed. He ate everything he encountered - hairbrushes, sunglasses, mobile phones when they used to have chewy yummy bits. Unbeknown to us he had a spot on the wall he licked constantly when we weren’t looking which resulted in a large hole right down to the mesh. He died at the end of the year of Covid, we will never forget him. And now we have another very naughty black Labrador who is also called Barney.
So dogs….never stop. Life would just not be as much fun without you.
My last black lab had a thing for plaster too. He chewed through most of the plaster in the hallway and some in the lounge - down to the brick. I was so worried that he would poison himself but the vet just laughed and said he’d heard worse!
It’s such a key point to drive home - you have to look at the dog you’ve got, not the dog you wanted. It took a good few years for me to realise that and I was basically at constant war with my hyper active, stubborn, scared and manic Cockerpoo. When he was a puppy, he was a floor shark, with these tiny needles for teeth that he used in everything. It was not what I thought I was going to get. I trained him, and he still chased planes, literally for miles and across A-roads. He rolls in anything, all the time and eats whatever he finds, which because he’s the breed he is, his stomach cannot handle. But after about 2 years he’d worn me down and I finally began to accept him for who he is, which was the greatest gift I could give myself. I think it’s fair to say that I now give his welfare and happiness as much thought as my two kids and that’s ok. I felt like a fool because he wasn’t even a rescue and he was a nightmare, and he has to be on a lead in 99% of places because he chases everything which means he can’t actually come on holiday with us because he’d die and cause accidents and that makes me very sad. He loves me so hard. I often don’t deserve it. I’m going to go and say good morning to him now actually because I ignored him for some of the day yesterday after he ran off and refused to come back for ages. We’re like bickering spouses
After seven years of asking, we got our daughter a Golden Retriever for Christmas. I did not want to raise another baby and so we adopted a two year old from a family that felt they could no longer care for him. We soon realized why. My husband, reluctantly resigned to the idea of a dog, now loves him so much that all the expense he was so worried about doesn’t factor. Not when the dog has to be sedated at the vet to be able to receive ear drops, not when we have to buy our second round of 1:1 dog training sessions, not when he eats his dog bed and lays on the clean laundry instead and not when we can’t bring him anywhere near other dogs. As I write this he is drooling on my tablet and stepping on my feet. I have raised a baby through the terrible twos and the threenager stage and I now have a preteen girl. I can say with confidence that raising a bad dog is harder. And, like a kid, you get what you get and you don’t get upset. He is ours and us his.
We lost our Toby dog last February. He was a 40kg Rottweiler Alsatian cross (lovingly referred to as a Rottsatian). Toby also had a lot of training but still was an absolute pain in the arse and a Bad Dog 😂 He was a boisterous oaf who acted as if he was the size of a chihuahua! But he was our oaf. I remember the vets telling us when he was 1 that he would calm down once he was about 2, then said the same when he was 2, by the time he was 3 they admitted that this was just his personality and who Toby dog was 😅
Toby had almost identical operations to what Barney had Bella. Back in 2016 both his cruciate ligaments in his knees went within 6 weeks of one another. The bills were eye watering 😳 The recovery was absolute torture for him (and me). No treats, lower food so he didn’t put weight on and no walks 😭 We lost him to cancer last year. In his last few days all he ate was steak (made a change from him stealing it off the counter when we walked away for 5 seconds 😂) and had endless cuddles from everyone who loved him (a lot, he was known as the village dog ♥️)
I haven’t got another dog yet, mainly due to circumstances, but our kids ask us every day for one! Maybe I’ll cave soon haha
Thank you for telling us about Toby. He sounds like an absolute blast. The bit about him being the village dog nearly made me cry. If you do decide to get a dog again, the best thing is that they’re never like your old dog so there’s no comparison to be made. They’ll be their own weird mix x
I'm definitely in Camp 2. We lost our beloved Henry (also a Choc Lab of the less intelligent variety) one Friday last May; by Saturday I was on the search already. I think everyone was horrified that I wanted to replace Henry with such indecent haste. The truth is I couldn't bear a dogless house or to be alone within it. Murphy arrived two weeks later, this time a Fox Red Lab, life with him is totally crazy, endlessly entertaining and my step count is far higher! The mental health benefits of all that fresh air are working wonders against the dreaded menopause but please tell me Bella, what sling do you use to carry Barney upstairs? Murphy also sleeps with us and waits to be carried up but is getting heavier... !
I love this. I always chuckle to myself when people say ‘Dogs are like their owners!’ My Sunny is in so many ways the opposite of me and that’s what makes us such a good match. He’s not what I thought I would want but everything I need and I wouldn’t have it any other way. Barney is very lucky to have you both, but who am I kidding, we all know we are the lucky ones to have them!
I loved this, me and my husband have just been howling because this reminded us so much of our stupid little dog. She has to be one of the world’s smallest Jack Russells, with the face of an angel and all passers by think she is the cutest puppy in the world (this must be some kind of evolutionary tactic). She rolls on every worm she finds, she licks walls, she stares at a space in the hallway every night and barks at it (ghost??), she must sleep in between two human legs at night like the hotdog in a bun, if she’s on the sofa, she digs at a blanket until you cover her with it, she jumps in the empty bath tub and yells until she is rescued, she knows the sound of a packet of cheese and sings until she is paid, her preferred sitting place is on the face of a human, covering all breathing holes with her tiny face, she licks my husbands bald head every morning, and when I let her choose her own walking route, she walks me directly to the nearest pet shop for a treat. But I wouldn’t have her any other way, she’s so funny, and affectionate, and daft.
Oh god I have a bad dog too. Whippets are supposed to be Velcro dogs but mine hates both of us unless she’s hungry. She walked in shit in the garden then walked it up the stairs on our brand new carpet, popped into our bedroom and walked across the bed just for good measure… dug up the rats burrow in the garden then made a muddy nest on the sofa…barks and snarls at every other dog, bike, kid on a scooter… absolute arse but I love her to bits 😂
I rescued my dog under the impression he was an older street dog who just wanted to live out his days on a couch with a full belly. A perfect slow companion to my arthritic 10 year old soul mate dog. Turns out he was just an elderly looking puppy. He’s a menace. He’s afraid of most flooring, ceiling fans and any and all lawn equipment. I’ve spent thousands on training only to be told by his trainer he’s never seen a dog who hates to work more. The real trick of very bad dogs is that they are such creatures of extreme they also love their people harder than any others.
This post resonated hard! Also an owner of a Bad Dog™️ (also a Battersea boy!) It’s an uphill struggle at times, but you’re right they weirdly do turn you into a better person.
As the owner of a Bad Dog, I love and agree with all of this. Guinness’s background is with a former member of the UVF in east Belfast who and he (Guinness) needed a police escort to free him from his former home. He is a 14 year old blind, deaf, diabetic and toothless chihuahua and I have moved back to my mother’s house (40 miles away) because it takes 2 of us to give him his twice daily insulin - toothless as he is, he is still so fierce. As I read this, he is lying on my Patagonia down coat because it’s his favourite blanket. He won’t let me pet him, he is angry at everyone (because chihuahua) and last year, he passed out and was rushed to a £££ cardiac vet, hooked up to a Holter monitor for a day to reveal that he has a great heart and had possibly just fainted.
He is (along with your Barney), the best Bad Dog.
This is incredible.
I feel this with every ounce of my being. My cocker spaniel, Ned (nearly 8) has just been diagnosed with heart failure. I am utterly destroyed. I don’t have kids either so he is essential to my existence. I am already mourning him, despite the heart pills having perked him up no end and his having no idea he is at all ill. He is as chirpy and waggy as he ever was. I’m the one wailing and clutching him to me, which he finds intensely irritating! Dogs are so wonderful. No human has EVER been as thrilled to see me as my dog is, whether it’s been 2 minutes or an hour. Barney is gorgeous by the way, it’s lovely how much you care for him and his little ways 😂.
My cat won't let us go to the loo in peace either. She also shouts at us when she feels she's being failed in some way (not being stroked, being ignored, not being fed, needs someone to watch out for danger when she goes to the loo in the litter tray). I didn't think I'd be able to have another pet after our last family dog died (2016) but grew up always with a dog from the age of 9. Last year a local cat adopted us and although I'd never been a cat person but I'm completely in love with her
She hates ALL shut doors in the house! 🤣
Love this. I know there are lot of differences but I do think having a dog sounds similar to having kids in some ways. I’ve never had a dog although my mum has one now and my kids ask for one a lot. I hope to get one one day when the kids are a bit older but know that they are such a big commitment and I’ve got a lot of commitment already as a single mum of 2! Before kids I would have been like “why is she carrying a dog up the stairs in a sling?” and would have been blaming you for his behaviour, but like you say that’s his soul and that’s how he is. My children are both very different and one is a lot more clingy than the other and demands a lot from me and I get criticised by my parents at times, but it’s just how she is.
So I’m always worried about doing any comparison because some mothers might get annoyed. But I’m not sure we should try and “rank” how much people love or who is worth it. I don’t want to feel less because I have a dog and not a kid. And you’re right - kids and dogs come out as themselves. Trying to force change is often pointless (and leads to unhappiness). You get what you get.
Dogs are ridiculous but brilliant friends and family members. My dog Sylvie is the queen of our house. She barks, she sneaks things she's not supposed to, she is a nightmare often, but always a treasured one. Just don't tell her that!
I love this, it chimes on so many levels. I often feel I love dogs more than people and I’m not ashamed to admit it, we don’t deserve them truly.
Having said that I always seem to have such BAD dogs. But that’s ok, could it be the really well behaved ones have had some of the personality knocked out of them with all that training? I don’t know.
Our old dog (an enormous black lab called Elvis) was so very very bad. My partner grew up in a house where pets were frowned upon so Elvis was an introduction into this world of animals in the house. And on the furniture, including the bed. He ate everything he encountered - hairbrushes, sunglasses, mobile phones when they used to have chewy yummy bits. Unbeknown to us he had a spot on the wall he licked constantly when we weren’t looking which resulted in a large hole right down to the mesh. He died at the end of the year of Covid, we will never forget him. And now we have another very naughty black Labrador who is also called Barney.
So dogs….never stop. Life would just not be as much fun without you.
The hole in the wall is fantastic. What dedication!
My last black lab had a thing for plaster too. He chewed through most of the plaster in the hallway and some in the lounge - down to the brick. I was so worried that he would poison himself but the vet just laughed and said he’d heard worse!
I think labs are built to eat anything; but not chocolate.🤣
It’s such a key point to drive home - you have to look at the dog you’ve got, not the dog you wanted. It took a good few years for me to realise that and I was basically at constant war with my hyper active, stubborn, scared and manic Cockerpoo. When he was a puppy, he was a floor shark, with these tiny needles for teeth that he used in everything. It was not what I thought I was going to get. I trained him, and he still chased planes, literally for miles and across A-roads. He rolls in anything, all the time and eats whatever he finds, which because he’s the breed he is, his stomach cannot handle. But after about 2 years he’d worn me down and I finally began to accept him for who he is, which was the greatest gift I could give myself. I think it’s fair to say that I now give his welfare and happiness as much thought as my two kids and that’s ok. I felt like a fool because he wasn’t even a rescue and he was a nightmare, and he has to be on a lead in 99% of places because he chases everything which means he can’t actually come on holiday with us because he’d die and cause accidents and that makes me very sad. He loves me so hard. I often don’t deserve it. I’m going to go and say good morning to him now actually because I ignored him for some of the day yesterday after he ran off and refused to come back for ages. We’re like bickering spouses
After seven years of asking, we got our daughter a Golden Retriever for Christmas. I did not want to raise another baby and so we adopted a two year old from a family that felt they could no longer care for him. We soon realized why. My husband, reluctantly resigned to the idea of a dog, now loves him so much that all the expense he was so worried about doesn’t factor. Not when the dog has to be sedated at the vet to be able to receive ear drops, not when we have to buy our second round of 1:1 dog training sessions, not when he eats his dog bed and lays on the clean laundry instead and not when we can’t bring him anywhere near other dogs. As I write this he is drooling on my tablet and stepping on my feet. I have raised a baby through the terrible twos and the threenager stage and I now have a preteen girl. I can say with confidence that raising a bad dog is harder. And, like a kid, you get what you get and you don’t get upset. He is ours and us his.
We lost our Toby dog last February. He was a 40kg Rottweiler Alsatian cross (lovingly referred to as a Rottsatian). Toby also had a lot of training but still was an absolute pain in the arse and a Bad Dog 😂 He was a boisterous oaf who acted as if he was the size of a chihuahua! But he was our oaf. I remember the vets telling us when he was 1 that he would calm down once he was about 2, then said the same when he was 2, by the time he was 3 they admitted that this was just his personality and who Toby dog was 😅
Toby had almost identical operations to what Barney had Bella. Back in 2016 both his cruciate ligaments in his knees went within 6 weeks of one another. The bills were eye watering 😳 The recovery was absolute torture for him (and me). No treats, lower food so he didn’t put weight on and no walks 😭 We lost him to cancer last year. In his last few days all he ate was steak (made a change from him stealing it off the counter when we walked away for 5 seconds 😂) and had endless cuddles from everyone who loved him (a lot, he was known as the village dog ♥️)
I haven’t got another dog yet, mainly due to circumstances, but our kids ask us every day for one! Maybe I’ll cave soon haha
Thank you for telling us about Toby. He sounds like an absolute blast. The bit about him being the village dog nearly made me cry. If you do decide to get a dog again, the best thing is that they’re never like your old dog so there’s no comparison to be made. They’ll be their own weird mix x
I'm definitely in Camp 2. We lost our beloved Henry (also a Choc Lab of the less intelligent variety) one Friday last May; by Saturday I was on the search already. I think everyone was horrified that I wanted to replace Henry with such indecent haste. The truth is I couldn't bear a dogless house or to be alone within it. Murphy arrived two weeks later, this time a Fox Red Lab, life with him is totally crazy, endlessly entertaining and my step count is far higher! The mental health benefits of all that fresh air are working wonders against the dreaded menopause but please tell me Bella, what sling do you use to carry Barney upstairs? Murphy also sleeps with us and waits to be carried up but is getting heavier... !
I love this. I always chuckle to myself when people say ‘Dogs are like their owners!’ My Sunny is in so many ways the opposite of me and that’s what makes us such a good match. He’s not what I thought I would want but everything I need and I wouldn’t have it any other way. Barney is very lucky to have you both, but who am I kidding, we all know we are the lucky ones to have them!
I loved this, me and my husband have just been howling because this reminded us so much of our stupid little dog. She has to be one of the world’s smallest Jack Russells, with the face of an angel and all passers by think she is the cutest puppy in the world (this must be some kind of evolutionary tactic). She rolls on every worm she finds, she licks walls, she stares at a space in the hallway every night and barks at it (ghost??), she must sleep in between two human legs at night like the hotdog in a bun, if she’s on the sofa, she digs at a blanket until you cover her with it, she jumps in the empty bath tub and yells until she is rescued, she knows the sound of a packet of cheese and sings until she is paid, her preferred sitting place is on the face of a human, covering all breathing holes with her tiny face, she licks my husbands bald head every morning, and when I let her choose her own walking route, she walks me directly to the nearest pet shop for a treat. But I wouldn’t have her any other way, she’s so funny, and affectionate, and daft.
As I'm thinking of getting a dog, this is a really helpful perspective. I know it will be a commitment but I feel ready
Go Rosalind... Do it! Get a dog. Good or Bad, you won't regret it!
Oh god I have a bad dog too. Whippets are supposed to be Velcro dogs but mine hates both of us unless she’s hungry. She walked in shit in the garden then walked it up the stairs on our brand new carpet, popped into our bedroom and walked across the bed just for good measure… dug up the rats burrow in the garden then made a muddy nest on the sofa…barks and snarls at every other dog, bike, kid on a scooter… absolute arse but I love her to bits 😂
I rescued my dog under the impression he was an older street dog who just wanted to live out his days on a couch with a full belly. A perfect slow companion to my arthritic 10 year old soul mate dog. Turns out he was just an elderly looking puppy. He’s a menace. He’s afraid of most flooring, ceiling fans and any and all lawn equipment. I’ve spent thousands on training only to be told by his trainer he’s never seen a dog who hates to work more. The real trick of very bad dogs is that they are such creatures of extreme they also love their people harder than any others.
This post resonated hard! Also an owner of a Bad Dog™️ (also a Battersea boy!) It’s an uphill struggle at times, but you’re right they weirdly do turn you into a better person.
Also, Barney is adorable.