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Many, many times I envied my furbabies who got to stay home all day and snooze on the couch while I had to go out in the cold, cruel world to make money...........
drive on icy roads, deal with unpleasant bosses or co-workers, go to work even when I didn't feel well.....but in the end.....we all had a roof over our heads, food in our bellies and someone who loved us.
LOL! Good point.
This is a picture on my facebook.
It's entitled, "Oh. You have to go to work? I'll wait for you here."
I think a lot of this comes down to different answers depending on whether you already have a dog and your situation changes or if you're already in this situation and THEN choose to get a dog. If the house is consistently empty 5 days a week for 10-12 hours a day (without people coming in at staggered different times, or children coming home sooner, or the dog can't go outside because there's no yard or whatever), and you don't already have a dog, you probably shouldn't get one unless you can afford a walker or daycare. If you already have dogs, and your schedule worsens as far as attention to the dog goes, no, you shouldn't leap to getting rid of the dog(s). There are too many dogs in shelters as is, and every dog added to "the system" is ending the life of another. Some dogs can handle being rehomed, some dogs are mentally destroyed by it, and some dogs, well, they end up dying. There are worse things in life than a dog being being bored for a few extra hours a day, and there are ways to make it work as well as possible.
That's a beautiful couch potato you have there, Stan4!
I too envy my dogs' lives. They truly have it made. Talk about knowing how to work the system with their cuteness!
She's usually more alert and sweet looking. I picked that picture because she looked so damn smug that night and I was headed out for a 10 hour night shift that was guaranteed to be a nightmare. Thank you.
I'm a working person - although self-employed, so my hours are varied - and although my dogs are very well house-trained, I wouldn't consider it fair to expect them to hold it that long every day.
I have a neighbor with a key to my house who lets them out on potty/snack breaks when I work a long day.
I get up extra early to ensure they have enough time to eliminate before I go to work.
I have a 1/3 acre fenced yard, so they can get their yayas out before I leave for work.
Weather, daylight and schedule permitting, I try to take one, two or three of them for a run before work.
Or, after work.
Last puppy I had to raise, came to work with me every day. I'm a painting contractor and informed clients I would have my puppy and his crate on the job; this was not negotiable. And all I needed was a safe, cool place for him to hang out. Most welcomed him into their homes, and for those that didn't, well he hung out in the crate in a garage or yard and got very frequent play and potty breaks, plus daily socialization.
I do notice that all the days I am home, the dogs are so used to snoozing in the daytime, I practically have to light a fire under their butts to go for daytime hikes. They're like, you want us to do WUT? NAOW? LOL.
She's usually more alert and sweet looking. I picked that picture because she looked so damn smug that night and I was headed out for a 10 hour night shift that was guaranteed to be a nightmare. Thank you.
That is a great photo....and from the sounds of it you must have been going to work with me except I do12hrs.
Working at night isn't necessarily better or worse for dogs than daytime work. It's still an extended time for dogs. Owners might be home during the day, but they are sleeping roughly the same hours a daytime worker sleeps at night. It's basically the exact same life schedule except flipped around.
Working at night isn't necessarily better or worse for dogs than daytime work. It's still an extended time for dogs. Owners might be home during the day, but they are sleeping roughly the same hours a daytime worker sleeps at night. It's basically the exact same life schedule except flipped around.
Having worked nights for many many years I know I and most of my coworkers do not get as much sleep when we sleep days as we do when we sleep nights. You are fighting your bio rhythems the whole time so I sleep maybe 5hrs if I am lucky and if I sleep nights I get a good 9hrs. And when I am home sleeping days the dogs do not have to sleep too but that is what they choose to do. When I do get up it is daylight so they do get to go places and have fun if I were working 12 hr days half the year it would be getting dark out or already dark by the time I got home so no they would not be going to the dog park, the beach or walks in the wilderness on work days so it is an advatange for my dogs that I work nights. Also where I live there is less going on outside at night to get the dogs stirred up where they might start barking so they are quieter too.
My husband has worked nights for the last 13 years. He sleeps the same 5 to 6 hours day or night. I'm not a big sleeper. Even without working or needing to set an alarm, I always wake up 6 hours later tops. When I was younger, I felt tired with only 6 hours sleep, but now I'm refreshed. It really depends on the person I guess. When I was in my 20s, I had a night job. When I got home at 7am, I went to bed and I didn't wake up until 10pm to go to work. All I did was work and sleep. LOL
I like this response. Everyone seems to be more concerned with the dog's ability to "hold it" than with the dog being confined and lonely. When we got Hallie at 18 months in 2001, she had been crated all day, and then again all night as her single-guy owner slept. By the time we got her, she was a basketcase, very high energy, very low confidence, and a lifelong attention-seeking girl. If there were cuddles being handed out, she always butted in, and that was one thing we decided to never try to correct. She came to us with a lot of baggage, and she did get over most of it, but until the day she died last October, sometimes she would do something that made me think of that confused little girl we got 12 years earlier, and I wanted to cry.
What a nice story and sorry for your loss TinaMcG, but I am sure you made your dog very happy!!
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