Thanksgiving is a wonderful holiday to spend with family. But not all families happen to get along, making it a tense day for some.
A woman who chose to celebrate a little early with her sister-in-law had an experience much like the latter. While it's great to have dogs, it seems like her sister-in-law is the type to put the comfort of her pets well before the comfort of people.
More from LittleThings: Science Has Confirmed That Yelling At Dogs Has A Long-Term, Devastating Impact On Their Minds
"My SIL is very much a 'this is my dogs house and you are lucky to be here' type of person who takes it to the extreme," she explained on Reddit. "As in her dogs are far from trained in the very least and are constantly ripping food out of people's hands."
That type of behavior can get a bit annoying during big meals like Thanksgiving.
"We went there for Thanksgiving dinner last night (only time everyone had available) and within 15 minutes the three dogs were up in my 4-year-old's face taking food out of his hands and off of his plate while my SIL just laughed and talked about how much her dogs love her cooking," she vented. "Made a complete [expletive] joke about it while my son is crying because he cant even get a single bite in."
Her son wasn't old enough to know what to do in the situation, especially since the dogs invaded his personal space. "He was at the table sitting in a booster seat even and her dogs are small," she explained. "Meaning they were physically jumping in his lap and just about pulling the booster right off the chair."
She already knew this would be an issue before even going — but she had no choice.
"I will admit that this is not even a place I wanted to spend Thanksgiving," she wrote. "I hate going there. I only go to please my husband because we dont see the family often (most live over 3 hours away). Anyways, I stood beside my sons chair and every time a dog would try sneaking past, I would just block them from being able to."
According to the poster, her sister-in-law wasn't too happy over her dogs being shielded. "She didnt say anything. Just shot daggers my way, as if I was destroying her dogs lives," she wrote. "Fast forward to my son having finished a good portion of his plate… he asked for the last roll."
Once again, a dog happened to interfere.
"SIL goes to hand it to him and her dog jumps up and intervenes, snatching the roll from his hands as quickly as he grabs it," she said. "She reaches down and grabs it back AND THEN tries giving it to my son with dog slobber all over it. I quickly said he was all set and he wasnt about to eat food with dog saliva all over it." Most parents — and humans — would feel the same way.
"She tried pulling the 'dogs have the cleanest mouths' BS and I just ignored it," she said. "She tried giving that roll to my son easily three times after I said no." By the third attempt, the original poster (OP) realized that it was a good time to leave. Yet that didn't end well for her.
The sister-in-law believed that she was causing a scene.
"SIL asked why and I said 'Because you clearly cant respect any sort of boundary.'" She also said that it was nasty to give her son something that's been in a dog's mouth, and that it was rude to insist he eat the roll after she clearly said no. Her sister-in-law claimed that she eats food her dog touches all the time and insisted it wasn't a big deal.
Luckily, Reddit cleared it up — leaving abruptly might have been a little rude, but it seems like the sister-in-law had no regard for the young child in this scenario. "Your SIL is a bad aunt and a worse dog owner," said Libba_Loo. "Having her dogs jump all over him while he's just sitting there trying to eat could literally be traumatizing for your son. Not to mention they could injure him! I hope he doesn't have a fear of dogs after this."
A lot of people also felt outraged by the 'dogs have clean mouths' myth.
It may not be the worst thing, but it's still a mouth — and mouths aren't the cleanest. "That is disgusting!" said zlm542. "Behaviour and hygiene. I have two dogs, I love them, but they would never even get handed food from the dinner table. Allowing your dogs to climb over your guests and steal the food that the are eating is disgraceful. And trying to feed your son food that's been in the dogs mouth, what the heck?! You were 100% right."
MD7001 made it clear that it'd be the last time they'd visit their house with food involved. "As a huge animal lover who has 2 dogs this behavior is outrageous," they wrote. "I would never eat there unless I supervised the cooking. God knows what the dogs are touching and how clean she is."
While she might love her dogs, she needs to realize they can be an issue.
Dogs are wonderful, especially if they're trained. But it's always important to put hygiene first, even if you consider your dogs to be your children. Redditor mikuzgrl understands it well. "I am childfree and have two big dogs who are essentially my kids," they wrote. "They are very spoiled and pretty much run my house. But they have manners and I would never allow them to take food out of someone's hand, much less the hand of kid who was actively trying to eat. I don't even let them take food from each other."
It seems like this Thanksgiving may have changed the way that the OP interacts with her sister-in-law. But as a mom, she needs to put her child first. If the sister-in-law really treated her dogs like children, she'd make sure they had the proper training to avoid incidents like this in the past. Just like we discipline human children, sometimes dogs need to learn that their behavior is not OK.
These stories are based on posts found on Reddit. Reddit is a user-generated social news aggregation, web content rating, and discussion website where registered members submit content to the site and can up- or down-vote the content. The accuracy and authenticity of each story cannot be confirmed by our staff.
