Dogs and Dames

Grabbed from link

It’s an extremely frustrating problem I see every single day of my life. Whether we’re talking about my exam room patients, puppy park players, a neighbor’s pooch or my family members’ dogs, the problem is the same: Their pets are fat and they know it…but they’re scared of offering them too little to eat. 

OK so that’s my personal interpretation of the psychology that underlies the problem. And I may be wrong. But I believe it’s what most people objectively viewing the situation might conclude as well. Read on to see if you agree:

The owner of a fat beagle cross who admits she’s gained plenty of pounds and is more than “a touch” fat. Last year she adopted the “carrots instead of cookies” approach I recommended and it worked well for a time. Unfortunately, now Miss Chunkster won’t eat her carrots unless she’s encouraged with some other tidbit (like a dollop of peanut butter!).

What’s wrong with this picture? 

“But she’s always hungry!” her owner complains, adding, “If she won’t even eat her treats maybe it’s because she’s sick. I just need to be sure she has an appetite.”

That’s irrational, right? If the dog is “always hungry” yet doesn’t eat every time she offers something then something must be wrong so she’ll give her something she really likes to make sure she’s OK. Meanwhile, the dog’s looking like Goodyear should be printed along the entirety of her burgeoning midsection. 

It’s an almost daily finding: An “always hungry” overweight pet whose owners will freely admit they don’t like to feed him X food because “he won’t eat it.” 

OK, so how hungry can he be? Does it not stand to reason that your pet WANTS food…  but doesn’t NEED it? Can you appreciate that distinction? 

When it’s clear that the humans I’m speaking to cannot comprehend this basic point, I have to move onto bigger guns: Telling them exactly how much they should feed. Which should be an empirical, iterative process but which more often than not comes down to a prescription I’ll reluctantly offer.

Then there’s the corollary to this condition. It’s the one where the perfectly proportioned pet arrives with an owner who’s wrung her hands until they’re raw on the subject of her pet’s too-skinny, won’t-eat-a-thing, I-have-to-hand-feed-her condition. Meanwhile, the pet looks like the picture of perfect health. 

“I’m not a therapist,” I’ve been known to complain to my receptionist between clients like these. Because what these pets really need is someone to sort out their owner’s angst…not a veterinarian who knows she isn’t getting anywhere as long as her exhortations and explanations continue to fall on deaf ears. 

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