There are two kinds of people in the world, dog lovers and those other types of people who don’t really matter much.  When you are a dog lover you find yourself smiling at dogs when they pass by like you do with babies.  It is only other dog owners that understand how much you truly love your dog and the pain you experience when you lose a dog.  Others may sympathize but they can’t truly empathize.  Nice placement of two “thize” words in one sentence, huh?  I’ve always been a dog lover but it wasn’t until the other day while leaving the dog park that I actually heard how I was talking to my dog.  It was a little shocking, truth be told.  I hadn’t realized that I had gone from a normal dog owner to one of those people that would be carrying my dog around in a pouch if I didn’t have back problems and he didn’t weigh 35 pounds.  When did I transition into this person?

We were walking to the car and I was saying, to my dog mind you, “did you make a new friend”, “you played nice with Lucy”, “mommy is proud of you”, “we need to clean you off when we get home and get you a treat”.  Ummm.  Yeah.  Then when I got home I realized I had taken more pictures of him playing with other dogs than I did of my children on their first day of preschool.  Between you and me, if I had run out of memory on my phone I would have deleted those preschool pictures.  I’m not proud of that, I’m just being honest.  I was taking videos, smiling from ear to ear, praising him, and acting like a proud parent.  “Yes, I know, thank you, he is cute”, like I had something to do with it.  I always knew that I talked to my dogs like they were able to understand me but never realized the gravity of it until that day.  Why do we talk to our dogs like this when we know perfectly well all they hear is “blah, blah, blah….treat”.  I guess the fact that I still know that they can’t understand me is a good thing, right?

Since then I started paying attention to how I act with my dogs and think  I may care more about what my dogs are doing than what my children are doing.  Don’t tell them I said that, ok?  My children bring home grades and I’m like “yeah that’s nice honey” but my dog sits for a treat and I’m like “what a good boy, who’s a good boy, mommy’s so proud of you, wait until daddy gets home and we tell him what a big boy you are” and continue to pat him for 4 minutes while my children are shaking out the toaster trying to find something to eat.  My dog had an upset stomach yesterday and I was like “do you have a tummy ache?” and “let mommy make you some special food” while I made sure he was comfy on the couch with pillows. Today one of my children woke up not feeling well and I said “you’re fine” and sent them to school.  I think it might be time to take a step back and make sure my priorities are straight with who is most important in my life.  This is going to be a difficult conversation with my children but it needs to be done.