Pets bring a lot of joy and laughter into our lives, but they also force owners into the most undignified of behaviours.
This goes well beyond your standard stooping down to pick up their mess, and extends into the truly bizarre. Dog owner nutaya wanted to hear about the most embarrassing things people have found themselves doing for their pet, and even got the ball rolling with their own story:
‘My very serious, straight-laced looking dad (who is a kind, gentle softie really) took our anxious elderly dog to the vet. Let’s call her Molly.
Molly hates the vet (who is lovely) and usually needs to be heavily medicated to go without whining the house down but she’s too unwell to have any of those meds at the moment. So he sat there in the waiting room telling her a story about a big brave wolf who pretended to be a dog called Molly and lived with a family being spoiled until they got attacked by a fierce evil rabbit (he’s a monty python fan) and the wolf/dog saved the day and was given lots of treats.
This is made so much better because Molly does not look like a wolf. She is a fluffy floppy thing with about as much sense as a slipper and who was so scared of an 8 week old puppy she had to be carried past it.
He often makes up songs for her at home but this is probably the first time he’s been ridiculous in public and he won’t have minded a bit if it helped her feel a bit less scared. I couldn’t love either of them more.
So obviously I’m sobbing my socks off at the two of them being adorable and also the fact she’s ill enough to be kept in overnight now. She’s done the at-death’s door a few times and bounced straight back so hoping this is just another one of her expensive bank-holiday-emergency-call-out adventures and she’ll be back home upside down and snoring away in no time.’
Here are the top replies from owners who have gone feral…
1.
‘We all crawled in and out of the new dog flap to show our idiot dog how to use it. It worked though! Only 6 months later he figured it out.’
-luala
2.
‘Our 2 year old ferret (Rocket) got really ill. He had so many tests, and they just showed he had some viral infection, and he was on so many meds for about 6 months and was having to be hand fed convalescent food by hand multiple times every day for that whole period, and he was gaining weight but to be honest, I wasn’t sure he would make it.
We had 3 others and had a mix of about 5 bags of ferret food that the vet had recommended in order to give them a good diet, all mixed together into an air tight container.Six months in Rocket finally showed an interest in solid food again. But not all of it. Very specifically the food that was moon shaped (which was from one of the bags that had 3 different shapes in it).
I spent at least an hour separating litres of food to find him as many moons as I could to last him a few meals. That was the turning point for him. He lived another 6 years after that.’
-KrissieBee
3.
‘My cat (aged 11) went for exploratory surgery because he’d stopped eating, and he had intestinal lymphoma. I decided against chemo, it wasn’t curative and he wouldn’t have understood why he felt so bad, so I decided to euthanize. There was a song that I always used to sing to him-it was to the tune of “You are my sunshine, my only sunshine, you make me happy when skies are grey” except instead of my sunshine, I sang ‘my fat boy’, because he was. He’d been in a few days at this point, and the vet nurse was very fond of him, because he was the squishiest, squigiest cuddliest fat cat, so she joined in.
Neither of us could sing very well, but he was probably that high on painkillers that it didn’t really matter, and he went to sleep purring. I think that’s the only time I’ve ever sung in front of someone who didn’t have 4 legs and a tail (because I am a really bad singer)’
-Stunning_Bluejay7212
4.
‘I once went round to see my parents and they were sitting one behind the other on the stairs with a cat on each lap going “brm brm brm” and bobbing about…. I asked what they were doing and apparently the cats like “playing buses”’
-Wibblywobblywalk
5.
‘Offering my umbrella cockatoo a digestive biscuit dipped in tea for a treat when he’s a bit low – he’s a rescue, between 40-50 years old and has arthritis so he has some iffy days. He does burble appreciatively and says his name (“Richard!”) in approval and “what ho!” so I know it does him some good.’
-nicrrrrrp
6.
‘I used to weave cooked spaghetti into the top of my old hamster’s cage so he had something to climb for.’
-Deep_Banana_6521
7.
‘Our puppy is “not allowed on the couch” at my parents. So my dad lets him sit on his knee, gives him hugs and kisses, lets the puppy lick him and sleep on him. The puppy is 27kg at the moment so not exactly a wee guy!’
-Background-End2272
8.
‘Just this morning I peeled a cooked pea to feed to my kid’s pet fish! ’
-EtoshaLeopard
9.
‘Rescued daft cat from the fireworks on bonfire night, when she hid under a van.
Rescued daft cat from conservatory roof by holding cushion up for her to jump onto.
Rescued sensible cat from a tree 3 streets away where she was “hiding” from a bad rash. Herded her home (then took her to vets).
Got walked home by sensible cat when we were planning to go to a nearby friend’s house after the pub, but she appeared out of nowhere and shouted at us.’
-ResplendentBear
