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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To let my dog bark for an extra half hour even though the neighbour was already annoyed

484 replies

Candlestand · 17/04/2021 06:16

I have 2 dogs, DH usually takes them to work so Mon-Fri they're never here during the day. Due to a bit of excess faffing yesterday morning he forgot them. Normally he puts them in the dog box in the car and sorts out DD and they all head off to nursery then work but somehow yesterday he just forgot he hadn't already put them in the car and I got a text from DH to tell me the dogs were still in the garden. Fine. I'm up in my office, WFH, the back door is open as it was such a nice day, they can mooch in and out as they please and we'll just walk them tonight instead.
I work for the local authority and we've had a nasty incident occur with a safeguarding issue for a child and I was part of back to back meetings so I never even went down for a cup of tea. I'm then in a meeting that I have been volunteered as minute taker for and there are over 20 people in this meeting and that's when my neighbour starts banging on my door. Initially I ignore him thinking it's a delivery and I can't leave this meeting but he is now practically pounding my door down so I race to the other room to open the window to ask them to go away whatever it is and he starts swearing that the dogs are barking and its really annoying. I shout down that I'm sorry but I'm in a meeting and I will sort them out as soon as I'm out of it. I can see he's furious and he storms off still swearing but the meeting is still going on without me and I have to be in it. I'm now vaguely aware that my younger dog is barking because it's been brought to my attention but honestly I just hadn't noticed before because it had been such a busy morning so I don't know how long they had been barking for. I didn't want to disrupt the meeting by asking for a break because there was a lot going on in it and we were, I hoped, almost finished but it turned out we were still going half an hour later before the meeting actually finished and because I'm now aware of it I can hear the dog still barking on and off for that time.
The thing is, we have a big garden and they don't come in when called straight away because it becomes a game to them so although me being out in the garden with them stopped the barking it takes me over 5 minutes to get them to come into the house (which I knew it would and why I didn't want to stop in the middle of a very large meeting to chase around my garden for ages). I appreciate it must have been annoying and I could see my neighbours over our fence so when I could go get them I apologised properly and tried to explain that I couldn't leave the meeting to come and get them and they were furious with me and said I was ruining their day. They are retired and are always in their garden. My dog was actually barking at their dog who was sat with them and my little dog could smell him, the older one wasn't actually barking. I tried to explain that he was just excited by their dog and if they had taken their dog in, he would have stopped barking but this just made them angrier (I meant it to try and break the tension as a discussion rather than a criticism of them, though clearly I misjudged how to say that) as they said why shouldn't their dog be allowed outside when he's being well behaved. I apologised again and just got back to chasing the dogs into the house and went back to work.

I appreciate it was annoying but I'm not sure they needed to be quite so angry. It was the middle of the day, this never normally happens at all because the dogs are not here during the week and at the weekend we're both able to be much more atuned to them if one of them starts barking at another dog or a squirrel or something and it has never been an issue before. We live rurally so other than the house on the other side of our neighbours theres no one else to be upset by the barking.
WIBU to put work before my neighbours enjoyment of their garden for half an hour?

OP posts:

BadMotherLover · 17/04/2021 09:03

If you can't look after dogs responsibly you should have them.
Neighbour probably thinks you playing the Local Authority card as well.."Can't tell me what to do, I work for the Council." We have loads of those entitled council bullies round where we are.
Also no one has a meeting that is so important that you cannot take 3 mins to take responsibility for your dogs. What if your dogs had been attacking a child? Would you have finished the meeting first?
I think you sound very entitled, I would go round to neighbours with a gift and apologize. I am glad I don't have you as my neighbour.

MintMatchmaker · 17/04/2021 09:04

It wasn’t handled well but it was a one off. You’ve apologised and I think that’s enough. Your dog does sound as though it needs training though, he should be coming in when called.

ladsholiday · 17/04/2021 09:05

@romdowa

Dogs barking in the middle of the day is hardly a cardinal offence. Some people just have no tolerance.

It's really fucking annoying and totally unfair on everyone else.

Some dog owners are so blinkered

Shrivelled · 17/04/2021 09:05

It’s not a one off incident that your dogs aren’t under control. You said your dogs don’t come in the house when you call them and you end up chasing them around the garden. That shows there’s something that needs addressing here. Maybe that’s the back story to your neighbour being so pissed off.

Original poster

Candlestand · 17/04/2021 09:05

I'm not missing the point. I am too selfish to have dogs. They're all right. I put my work above the care of my dogs and was completely inconsiderate to my neighbours. I just wanted to get my work done and not think about anyone else! Who does that? I'm supposed to care about people but apparently I don't. I didn't think of it as a big deal but I can see now just how much distress it will have caused. Even not recognising that is wrong of me in the first place. Everyone's right. I'm not fit to look after them so why do I have them? If DH left tomorrow how would I care for them?

OP posts:

2021namechanges · 17/04/2021 09:07

My dog is a barker. For that reason I don’t leave him out unattended.
Honestly - the time it took you to speak to the neighbour is time you could have quickly run and got the dogs in.

KihoBebiluPute · 17/04/2021 09:07

You are being very melodramatic and passive-aggressive in your response to this criticism. Why "I've told DH he needs to get rid of the dogs", "I ruined my neighbours lives", and "I tried to train them but what can I do when working full time?" when this was DH's mistake and would never have happened if he had taken the dogs to work as he was supposed to. Your main mistake was not insisting that DH came and got the dogs immediately. The vast majority of the guilt for this belongs with DH. Getting rid of the dogs rather than actually sticking to the dog-care routine that works without problems is a drama-queen response.

TedMullins · 17/04/2021 09:09

@Candlestand

I'm a terrible person and I ruined my neighbours lives. Everything has been going wrong. I didn't think it was that big of a deal and I thought I could make it right by apologising but obviously not. I'm sorry

Okay now you’re just being ridiculous. I think the neighbours totally overreacted and you absolutely shouldn’t go round with wine and grovel because they were dicks about this, and a lot of people on here are overreacting too. But talking about getting rid of the dogs and ruining their lives? Get a grip. I work FT and have two dogs. They’re also lead reactive and go mental if they see another dog on a walk. It’s hard and stressful. But I don’t just go “I tried to train them, what can I do?” I also live alone so don’t have a DP to help. But I chose to have the dogs so they’re my responsibility to train, and keep training every single time I walk them.

You have to KEEP training them. Having a dog (or two) is a lifelong investment. If you’re not willing to put the time in to train the dogs outside of your work schedule then don’t have dogs. Yes, this scenario was a one off, but if your attitude is that you won’t try and train the dogs and keep training them consistently, then this kind of thing could keep happening. You’ll end up with unruly disobedient dogs and it’ll be nobody’s fault but yours. So stop being so dramatic and start googling training advice.

MaMaD1990 · 17/04/2021 09:09

This has taken a turn...

Original poster

Candlestand · 17/04/2021 09:10

But how can I fix it? There's no way to fix it is there. The damage has been done.

OP posts:

CandyLeBonBon · 17/04/2021 09:10

Op if it was a one off, then chalk it up to experience and make a peace offering. Occasional barking is tolerable- my neighbours are lovely but they have a dog who barks CONSTANTLY all day every day. I can't dined time in my own garden without their dog thinking I'm invading their space, and my dog gets barked at the whole time. If I'm in work calls, the barking is distracting and annoying. So yes, daytime barking can be problematic (tjat was to a pp).

On this occasion, whilst it wasn't ideal, was a one-off.

Some recall training is prob a good idea as pp have said. Hope you smooth things over

Tirathisyou · 17/04/2021 09:10

@Candlestand

OP don't be ridiculous. You have an arrangement with usually works, for some reason DH forgot (!) to take the dogs with him, he must know its impossible to balance working in a pressured job from home and making sure they're content and not barking away. That said, just take the lesson from it, perhaps it is worth both of you, not just you, doing some training with them. The neighbour wasn't unreasonable, but then you weren't being purposefully neglectful as you couldn't be arsed, but deffo things that would help in the future could be done.

Againstmachine · 17/04/2021 09:10

If the OP is involved with safeguarding I'm hoping her being over dramatic when someone doesn't agree with her is confined to the internet

picknmix1984 · 17/04/2021 09:10

Just get organised. A continual barking dog just affects everyone around them ( except you). Your meeting didn't start at 7 you could have sorted the dog earlier. Like others say better training.

Oilseed · 17/04/2021 09:12

YABU.

Your neighbours were fed up of listening to your dog barking, they asked you to bring it in, you didn’t and left it out there barking for another half an hour.

Quite frankly, the fact you can’t even control your dogs and get them to come in, in your own garden is laughable. Train them for God’s sake, my dog would never ignore me and not come in when I call her and we too have a big garden.

Also, leaving barking dogs unattended in a garden atm with all the dog thefts going on is awful. Please think about their safety before you leave them unattended in the garden.

MissSM9102 · 17/04/2021 09:12

I think OP is being more sarcastic than dramatic and I like it
OP, some of these replies are ridiculous.
You messed up, explain, apologise and discuss what you’ll do in the future to prevent it happening again (I’d throw DH under the bus here and blame him) and let the neighbours decide to move on or not. I mean explain you were under some work stress and don’t stick your foot in it again by explaining it was their dog who started it
Don’t let them speak down to you, leave it in their hands.
My dogs also choose the most inconvenient times to have their arsehole moments too!

shouldistop · 17/04/2021 09:12

Ffs

Oilseed · 17/04/2021 09:14

Oh and the damage is done now with the neighbours. You could leave a bottle of wine and card on their doorstep, I’m sure they’ll get over it though, especially if it was a one off!

Dentistlakes · 17/04/2021 09:14

YABVU. It’s your choice to have dogs, not your neighbour’s. Your choices should have no impact on them and leaving your dogs outside to bark after they have complained in beyond selfish. Perhaps they were working and your dogs were disrupting their important meeting! I was woken at 5am by our neighbour’s dog this morning. Bloody annoying, but he was brought back in as soon as he had gone for a pee. That barking was unavoidable, but if they had let it continue and allowed the dog to go in and out of the house to continually bark I would have been annoyed.

OhKnackers · 17/04/2021 09:15

Dramatic much op?

Crocidura · 17/04/2021 09:17

Cheer up OP and ignore the ridiculous posts on here. "Get rid of the dogs then" ffs.
You are not a bad person or dog owner
You are not "a selfish brat"
Your dogs aren't "feral"
You were not unreasonable not to realise that your DH had left the dogs at home until you were already in meetings
You were not unreasonable to stay on your work call and sort out the dogs as quickly as you could

Plumbear2 · 17/04/2021 09:18

You let your dog continue disturbing your neighbours for a further amount of time even tho you knew it was a problem. Of course you where being unreasonable. Your long winded story about meetings is irrelevant.

Original poster

Candlestand · 17/04/2021 09:18

But I've done it all wrong haven't I. We liked having the space with the new bigger garden and it was fun chasing them around. I didn't think it was a problem but clearly it is. They don't bark when told not to so when I was in the garden with them they didn't bark but I can't be in the garden with them so instead I left them there thinking it wasn't a big deal but here we are. Literally over 100 people can see clearly how selfish and wrong I was and I didn't see it. I was angry at first because I know I handled things badly with the neighbours but actually what people are saying is that I can't actually look after these dogs and I've been inexcusably terrible to me neighbours and they're right. Our set up clearly doesn't work well if when it goes wrong I can cause such distress to people

OP posts:

Homehaircuts · 17/04/2021 09:19

My parents have a dog that's outside by herself in their big secure garden they have access to the inside but she loves being outdoors. If a dog is well behaved and very friendly, I don't see the problem with them being out unsupervised. Only if it causes a nusiance/danger to others. It sounds like a one off in your case. I just would learn from the mistakes next time. The neighbour started off as aggressive but you made it worse he by not doing anything for awhile, it's probably ruined any good relations but it's partly on them being very intolerant to. Yes this would of annoyed me and you were wrong for not dealing with it sooner (regardless of meetings) and I would of been firm with you about it, but there is no way I would shout and swear at a neighbour for this incident that was wrong to.

hamstersarse · 17/04/2021 09:20

This thread is a great insight into the sheer batshit craziness that lives amongst us

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