AIBU - DS left out due to fear of dogs

[UnicornDust20]

Hi Mums, I’m just after some outside perspective regarding a situation surrounding DS (7).

He’s had a fear of dogs for a long time now and we’ve never got to the bottom of it. We’ve tried CBT and various other methods with no luck, so we are now hoping that he will eventually “grow out of it”. Unfortunately this now seems to mean that he’s not being invited to various get-togethers with a couple of school friends that he’s known for years.

One of these friends (who lives down the road) had a small family gathering at their house (with 3 dogs) for their birthday party. We happened to bump into the other friend on their way round to theirs to celebrate their birthday. Nothing was mentioned to us about it, however both friends were talking about it at school. The reason for the non invite was because of the dogs. I then found out that they were getting together to do fireworks in their garden tonight. Again nothing was mentioned and their reason was the dogs (surely the dogs would be inside anyway?). I know that there have been a few other get togethers where we’ve had no invite.

I don’t expect an invite to everything as we aren’t glued at the hip and the fear of dogs is limiting, but AIBU to perhaps expect to be asked if we would like to arrange something together (separately from the plans surrounding dogs) so that my son can be involved? He considers these 2 his closest friends but they talk about these things in school and he gets upset not feeling involved. Perhaps I’m expecting too much, and expecting too many adjustments for us 🤷‍♀️

I can see why they think it would be a logistic nightmare to have a party with 3 dogs and someone with severe dog phobia. I think you’d have to host; or at least suggest an outing like soft play or something where no dogs are allowed.

I’d never invite a child who is scared of dogs to our house. I’d offer to meet them outside the home only.
You and your son need to accept that a fear of dogs means you won’t be invited into their home. Why would they give themselves stress they don’t need!
I remember a lady pinning herself up against a wall in the sorting office when I walked in with my two very docile dogs. Her phobia must have been really debilitating for her.

Why should they invite him? They're entitled to not want a hysterical visiting child to ruin their party.

If the plan are already been made you can’t host because the host has already invited people to theirs. You need to look ahead at events coming up and invite people to yours eg Christmas drinks or NYE party.

The friends haven't made a bad call.

This sounds like you are saying that if you had been aware that the family were doing the fireworks night and your son couldn't go because of the dogs, you would have suggested moving it to your house. Maybe they just want to have a firework night at their house. I might have misinterpreted that but it doesn't seem like a reasonable option. I think you just have to accept that there are some things he can't do

Prior to this how did the playdates and invites to their house work? Did you go round and your son freak out, did they have to put the dogs in other rooms? Im trying to work out if the logistics have meant that it was untenable for the hosting family? Putting one dog in another room that will whine, bark, paw at the door and possibly release their anal glands (been there, done that, sadly!), is stressful for the dog and owner. Can imagine it is much worse with 3 dogs!

I have someone Im friendly with and no longer invite them to my house because they are scared of animals and it then made the whole socialisation about pandering to this, rather than having fun

You should be grateful your DS is not invited to events where dogs are present. No way would I want my DS to be in a house on his own with a dog I don’t know.

We invite any dog owning friends to play dates at our house. He never visits theirs. I hate dogs around children.

I can see why if the answer has always been "ds can't/won't come because of the dogs" that if the dogs are still around they wouldn't bother with an invite. Unless you'd told them your ds has been working on his fear etc.

But here - for bonfire night, you didn't make any plans such as hosting a get together yourself, however you'd have been prepared to take over/hold it at your house had you known someone else was organising something? No. Organise something yourself and send your own invitations out, but don't hijack someone else's.

How does your DS react to dogs? Maybe its too much for other people to deal with and its just better if he is not there?

Why did you take 2 dogs into the sorting office though? Presumably it didn't say 'dogs welcome' if that lady worked there.

I think YABU, i’m sorry. It must be hard.

Ramp up the hosting at yours if you want to but they are just as entitled to plan things that work for them as you are.

Perhaps this could be a springboard to galvanise you and your son to work on his phobia some more? This won’t be the only time in his life he is affected/ held back by it.

This.

Make your own plans and stop blaming others. It can't be helped that your son dislikes dogs, others should not be penalised for it. Pets are loved as much as humans in some households.

Too much hassle for a busy family to organise something separately. Dog owners will always prioritise their pets over almost everything else and will not want to make 'special arrangements' for a child who is scared. I also wonder if there is something else behind the lack of invitations and not just DS fear of dogs.

We have big dogs, I’m afraid I wouldn't want your son around them as although they’re not snappy I would still be nervous of an accident happening. A door being left open etc, which kids are prone to. A crying distressed child would get their attention and then if your boy hurt himself trying to get away from them…I’m fonder of my dogs than a friends child, so I wouldn’t want to put my dogs at risk of getting in trouble.

YABU our dog is part of our family. He would be shut in our laundry room if we had a party but we would need to bring him out for a wee at some point. Same with fireworks, most of the time people would be indoors. If someone accidently opened thr door and let the dog out how would your son behave?

I have a dog who often finds herself on a lead tied to a chair if unable to contain her enthusiasm to meet guests. And nothing annoys me more than dog owners who won't call their dog away.
I'm off on a bit of a tangent here though, I can see you've tried, but I'd keep trying to help your kid get over his fear of dogs. Dogs are everywhere and they aren't going away, they're not like snakes or something that's just easily avoided. Going through life with a fear of dogs will be very limiting for him.

I don’t get this thread. Surely they’re doing your son a favour? He’s scared of dogs (and I don’t blame him - it’s not the irrational fear everyone thinks it is, there were 16 deaths last year due to dog injuries and over 30,000 A&E admissions due to dog attacks) but they have dogs and the two are not compatible.

What would you want the solution to be?

If you want dog free events for your child, the onus is on you to put in the effort to do the planning, organising, inviting etc. But understand these events will be in addition to, not instead of, other events organised by the group which your son may not be able to attend because they are dog friendly.

Its breathtakingly enitled to think that you can dictate the terms of multiple other families social lives to accommodate your son. The only events you get to set terms for are the ones you put the effort into organising.

I’m not sure what your point is? Everyone is aware that dogs are animals.

My dog is part of the family and is treated as such. There is absolutely no way we would shut him away outside or in another room for any period of time. For a few minutes - for example of something is being delivered - fine, but not for the entirety of a play date or party. He would be distressed and this is his home.

I sympathise with any child, or adult for that matter, with a dog phobia. I can imagine that it must be limiting and distressing. But unfortunately my home is not suitable for anyone who is dog phobic.

But maybe they don't want to downs their kids birthday party managing the situation? If everyone else is happy with the dogs being with the family/party why should they have to shut the figs away for one hysterical friend of their child's? They're entitled to just prefer not to invite them.

though I highly suspect the child's fear/phobia is only part of the reason.

Presumably at 7yrs it's just the children going to these things & not adults?

In which case I can see why he isn't invited.

I would be upset at this too OP. But friends do have meets without all being invited at this age. My son is a friendship of 4 and they do meet up as twos without the others.

Gradual exposure therapy has very good results with overcoming phobias so I would look into that. If he has a phobia that means he cannot attend social events with dogs there, I would not rely on him growing out of it. I am not sure how CBT would help being as his fear is not something he has reasoned himself into, so not sure he can reason himself out of it. So I would look into gradual exposure therapy.

Another thing have found helpful with my own children is talking them through any scary experience they have had. So if they were scared of a dog coming and jumping up at them, I would talk them through what happened, the dog ran up to you, the dog jumped at you, you felt scared. The dog wagged its tail. Mum came and picked you up and comforted you. The dog went away. Mum cuddled and talked to you and you felt better. The dog did not hurt you. Nothing else happened. You were frightened, you were comforted, the dog went away and did not hurt you, you calmed down and went back to playing. It stops the child getting trapped mentally in the moment of fear, by showing them how they moved through it. Its really worked to stop my children developing lasting anxieties around events. The one time I forgot to use it my son did develop a phobia around the 'thing'. So I use it everytime now. Its so helpful.

I don’t think this is about the dogs either.