Side note: I’ve had a variety of pets growing up (including a small/medium dog we got as a puppy who died at 14 yrs old) and they all lived to a good age and now I have an adopted adult cat.
So my friend got her dog (male maltipoo) from a family friend who was breeder a few years ago and her family has been babying him ever since. I’d told her to desensitize him early on and crate train him and socialize him and all that stuff so he doesn’t have separation anxiety or become aggressive to other dogs when he grows up; long story short they didn’t do any of that so now he has separation anxiety, behaviour problems, aggression with other dogs and humans, is very reactive, barks nonstop at every sound, etc. He also has an insane humping problem even though he’s fixed!
in fact when he was a puppy and he’d cry at night in his crate, her entire family took turns sleeping right beside his crate every night…
I’m all for bonding with your pets and I’m glad her whole family loves their dog, but I think they may be a little overboard? Her parents work day and night shifts, so their dog has basically never once been left alone his whole life; someone is always in the house with him. Over the years, sometimes when we hung out, her sister or another family member would call her if that said family member was about to go out—so that my friend can go home to stay with the dog. Or if my friend is getting ready to go out she will not leave until someone else comes home to stay with the dog. When they go out as a family, they bring the dog in the car with them and if the place they go to doesn’t allow dogs (like grocery shopping or eating at a restaurant), someone usually the dad will stay in the car with the dog…
I do judge her silently because even though I’ve tried recommending she take her dog to a dog daycare or a leash walking program or some kind of training thing every time she said she wants/needs to work on his issues, she’s never actually done anything. And it’s like as long as the dog’s happy right? but sometimes she would invite our friends and me over but cancel last minute because her dog doesn't feel up for it (as in, her dog is acting too energetic or too tired at the moment for people to come over)? which confuses me because none of my pets had ever like told me that they don’t want guests in the house? like. is it because my pets were been well behaved or?
Here‘s the thing: they recently bought a kitten. I was kind of concerned they wouldn’t introduce the dog to the kitten properly at first. But she’s invited and cancelled last minute my friends and me to come to her house to see the kitten a few times now because the kitten “got spooked” by a noise or whatnot… So now I’m thinking, although cats are more independent and don’t exactly need training, is her family is going to somehow manage to spoil a cat this time?