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 🤷‍♀️

He is only 7, I can remember being very afraid until I was about 14. Then you learn to "act" as if you are not afraid. You don´t cede ground or step back or change your direction etc etc. Because they pick up on that. Now as an adult I am more wary of the owners. The amount of useless owners there are is astounding, zero recall, the dogs ignore them. My husband had two canine marks on his legs when a medium size dog just lurched at him when he passed him. The owner was shocked and couldn´t understand why the dog had done this. Now I can be in houses with dogs, but I like my space. I actually take my daughter to a friend of hers house, they have 2 friendly dogs and she is getting much more confident. She likes dogs and cats, but was afraid around dogs. I think the fact that my husband and I are naturally wary of them was picked up by her, even though we put on an act and pretend. Your son will get better at handling this with age.

I have a dog & I've always been selfish.

Maybe you're on to something there.😂

an attack is different to an a stand alone phobia
very different!

Yes, I think it has. I feel sorry for people scared of dogs as they are taken everywhere now. I've been in pubs for evening meals often where there are dogs in there barking. I never took my dog to an indoor restaurant/pub in an evening. Sadly part of the trend where everyone thinks about themselves before other people.

So you have given up with therapy and are now doing nothing to combat the problem. This is something that needs working on intensively, with a mixture of therapy, exposure, follow up work at home and even medication if needed. Your approach is slab dash.

Of course the world has changed but we were always surrounded by dogs as children. I lived on a big council estate and people would kick their dogs out in the morning and they would just wander until dinner time. The neighbours collie used to come everywhere with us. As we got older dog wardens started working the estate and that put an end to it.

I was a child of the 80s. Dogs were allowed in pubs while kids were in the car/garden. The world is far more child centric these days!

You think a small child who’s scared of dogs should be medicated???? Jesus wept!

There has been a huge increase in dog ownership, particularly post covid.

As a child I went to friend's houses who had dogs. I don't recall ever being jumped on licked, being told 'they're just being friendly'. They'd either be right by their owner's side in the immediate 'visitor here' excitement, or asleep or in another part of the house/garden.

They definitely weren't in all the shops and cafes, running amok in parks, or headteachers having to ask parents not to bring their dogs onto school premises, or parish counsellors remind people not to take them in the enclosed toddler play area at the park.

I don't know what sort of fear your DS has. Is it a legitimate diagnosed phobia? Have you got to the root of it? My son was scared of dogs, and it turned, when he was out with my nan, she used to make a bit of a fuss about keeping him away and protecting him from passing dogs.
He's never been hurt by a dog, and at that point had never interacted with a dog. So I felt comfortable with not feeding into it.

MIL has a dog that jumps up at people. So we've let him jump up at us (not my DS at first) so he could see he isn't trying to eat or harm us. We encouraged DS to stroke the dog when he was resting, offering his hand for the dog to sniff first.

We also go to a lot of pubs which are dog friendly, some also with resident dogs. One particular pubs had a lovely pair of English bulldogs, and my son became comfortable around them.

DS likes going to parks to play football or ride his bike, but of course people take their dogs here to run off their leads. Me and DP like to make a bit of fuss of some of the dogs and we've demonstrated how we must always ask the owner first if it's ok to pet the dog.

There are still a few occasions where we're out and a big dog runs up to us, and my DS forgets what we've told him and decides to run away, which means the dog chases after him. But mostly he's calmer about it now.

DS knows that he would miss out on a lot of things if he couldn't get to grips with his fear. The onus is on us rather than others.

Also, my group of friends and I have a WhatsApp group chat, and we discuss and plan events on there. If you know fireworks night is coming up, you get in there early and say you'd like to host something at your place. Again, the onus is on you.

DS knows that he would miss out on a lot of things if he couldn't get to grips with his fear. The onus is on us rather than others.

Exactly this.
If DS wanted to be included this much, he would be throwing all his efforts into overcoming a phobia. It's hard, it's uncomfortable, but it has to be done.
I know a lady who was terrified of flying but her son went to live abroad. It was sort herself out or miss out on seeing him and not seeing her granddaughter very often.
Guess what? She now does out there 3 times a year! It was tough. She had to do 'homework' almost every day and go on courses, spend a lot of money and it wasn't easy. But 'hoping it will just go away' is a very naive attitude.

Our experience has some similarities to your situation. My daughter has a severe peanut allergy and we have ended up having her friends to ours much more than her going to other people's houses. People who use peanuts in their homes have often been, understandably, worried so my daughter has frequently missed out on invitations. It's one of those things. She learned from an early age that people want to do get togethers at their own houses and have parties - it doesn't mean that they don't like her, it's just they are entitled to be able to do things at their own house and my daughter's problem shouldn't prevent this. We just made sure we did lots at ours and she knew it wasn't personal.

You can’t expect an invite to theirs if they have dogs in my opinion. They don’t speak of it to you as they know they’d either get pushback from you about the dogs being present or you wouldn’t attend.

My friends daughter is similar, in fact 2 were but 1 has become much more able to deal with dogs with the help of all of us and no longer needs to avoid settings where a dog is present, the other - well she knows we plan things and don’t include her because her daughter wouldn’t attend due to a dog.

You could ask the host why it wasn’t mentioned but I think they’ll say they have 3 dogs and child wouldn’t attend.

ps. My dog is absolutely fine with fireworks and would wander freely (her house) amongst guests and I would only if 100% necessary shut her elsewhere for a short period of time so in above example, friends daughter doesn’t come to our home due to this.

Also on that note. I was a child with a fear of dogs. If I went to a house with a dog they’d only ever hold the dog until I was in and then I just had to suck it up if the dog was around.

Not ideal but I clearly got over it as I’ve had dogs since I was 10, was kind of forced on us by a family needing help so I just had to deal with it. don’t get me wrong I can still be hesitant round dogs I don’t know but I’m not scared and shaking like I used to!

my point is that we aren’t even aware that plans are being made, otherwise we would host

But people don't want you to host their parties. One of the examples you gave was a birthday party - it's not as if you could host that for someone else's child. People want to host their own fireworks and whatever. You can host your own events but you can't expect people to agree to move their own events to your house just because your kid's scared of a dog, or to run events past you in case you want to arrange your own version for your son.

He has a phobia that limits him. It will continue to limit him if he doesn't get proper treatment.

Gently, you need to try to get him to overcome this fear as it will limit his life experiences considerably.

How does your son react when he sees one of his friends dogs ?

We have always had dogs since before having our children and kids that were petrified were, I have to say, hard work! I would try to keep the dog in a different room, but the kids would inevitably let him out by accident! I think you should continue to work on his phobia as it is limiting his social life. Sounds crazy, but I know several families who cured this issue by getting a dog!

Maybe they just stopped bothering as found it too much aggravation or messing around to navigate around the dogs to different venues etc.

Very very tough for your son, but they’ve not done anything wrong. I have a friend with a DS the same, but he flaps, screams and runs away. My dog doesn’t react, but I’m anxious she’ll chase as a game, as she chases the dog walkers daughter round as a game.

Medication … to a 7 year old for a fear of dogs?!?! Are you ok?? 🤣🤦🏻‍♀️

I very much doubt they'd want you hosting their child's birthday party.

Having a fear of common situations/elements is limiting.

He will most likely grow out of it, I just wanted to give you some hope with this. My DD was terrified from a very small age, it started when she was probably around 18 months old toddling along and a tiny terrier waltzed over to her. It didn’t do anything to her at all, literally just walked up to her and she started screaming uncontrollably and that was just it from there on out.

Trips out were always a struggle because she was genuinely terrified, particularly of dogs off their leads. I remember the time we were eating fish and chips at the seaside and a pug came bounding over to our table and she was devastated, screaming, jumping on the chair etc. Everyone was staring and tutting, I guess because it was a tiny pug and they couldn’t understand her reaction.

Anyway, she’s 14 now and totally unfazed by them. Her best friend has dogs and she’s fine at her house. No idea how she moved past it, I think she honestly just grew out of it.

I don’t think your DS’s friends are being mean excluding him, they just know he’s scared and don’t want to put him in that position. You’re right about the fireworks but perhaps they’re thinking if he needs the loo or something.

If your son was that afraid of dogs that he's had CBT, I wouldn't be inviting him to parties at my place when I had 2 dogs.

His fear is going to limit his social life. Nobody's going to have dog free extra things just for him. People are just too busy.

If your phobia is that bad you do what it takes. You don't just 'hope to goes away'. You throw every weapon in your armoury at it.