DIY Projects | Lifestyle | Living

I never ever thought of myself as a particularly pet person or ever imagined I would be a pet parent and yet, here I am, living my every day with a dog now.

As a family, we were slowly coming around the idea of getting a pet. We talked endlessly about the pros and cons of having a dog or a pet but it always came down to our lifestyle and travels. We just didn’t think it was fair to even temporarily abandon a pet after we have it so we could travel and live the lifestyle we want. When we travel, we are usually gone 2-3 weeks which is a long time to leave a pet in the care of someone else, not to mention, expensive.

This, and all the additional expenses we might potentially have to bear like getting it a vet, perhaps insurance, supplies, food, boarding, and others were just deterrents until one day we just decided that we may want to do it anyway.

We visited our local county shelter and looked at a dog that was very friendly but too big for us especially for the kids. We also looked at several cats but they were all older cats and our preference would have been for a kitten. Then, the kind and very knowledgeable volunteer who was at the Shelter the day we went recommended Hogan strongly and suggested we contact his current host dad and set up a meeting which we did.

When we met Hogan, he seemed very friendly, very treat motivated, and just the sweetest thing. Of course, I wouldn’t know much. I never grew up with or around pets. After fostering him for about 5 days, we went in to get his neutering surgery done and officially adopted him. Life has been quite interesting with this pitbull-terrier mix.

We’ve had sleepless nights twice, once a couple nights after his surgery when he was still constipated, reeling in pain, whimpering and crying all night and we had no idea why until the next morning when he finally did his business, and a massive one at that!! The second one was last night when he finally decided he was no longer going to use his crate and instead, wanted to sleep with us. We moved his mattress to our bedroom but it took some training to make sure he actually slept in it and not by us on our bed…this is a process and will take a few more days I guess.

I do like having him around. I love how he is so happy to greet us and welcome us back home. I like that he feels sad when we leave. He sits right by the gate for a long time after one or two of us leave waiting for us to return before he gets distracted but even then he just mopes around. It’s a different lived experience to have and care for an animal. I’m getting used to it for now. I particularly like that he came in already house trained and has had almost all his vaccines take care of. I do like taking him for walks when I’m in the mood for it and of course, increasing my steps’ count.

Here’s to more life with a doggo…