Would you be offended by someone not trusting your dog?

[LaserShark]

NC as very identifiable situation that I'm seeking advice on from various sources. Firstly, I am very afraid of dogs. I can't help it, it comes from childhood experiences. I don't mind being around dogs on leads but I am terrified of them loose. I rarely have to encounter this so up til now, it hasn't been an issue.

However, my neighbours recently acquired a dog. A couple of months ago he was a tiny puppy and I didn't mind him. However, it's a pitbull and has very quickly become big and intimidating to look at (to me, someone already scared of dogs).

They don't seem to take it on walks; they let it out into the garden throughout the day. There is no division between our gardens, just a path running down the middle.

When I realised the dog was pooing on our lawn - several big piles on one morning - I was fuming but politely went over and mentioned it. They were apologetic, cleared it up and mowed our lawn. I don't think they saw why I didn't want it in the garden at all, even if they cleared up the poo but they offered to put a fence up and to keep the dog on their walled patio until the fence is up. I was happy with this. Everything was civil and friendly. I didn't see any more poo on the lawn, though a ball belonging to my son that was left out has been bitten and deflated so it's possible the dog has been back in the garden or maybe it was something else.

This morning, I took my 2 year old out to play and the dog came out onto the patio. No sign of the owners. It jumped up with its front paws on the patio wall and was watching us intently - probably friendly, but I am worried it thinks of the whole garden as its territory as it has had free reign to run over our lawn up until I asked them to stop it. Anyway, I don't have a rational reaction to dogs, my heart was pounding and I was shaking with fear. I'm pretty certain it can jump over the wall. I took my son back in the house quickly and called out to the owner. A few minutes later, she pounded on the door demanding to know what had happened. I said nothing had happened but I was worried the dog would jump the wall so had come back inside and asked if she'd shut the dog in for a few minutes so I could go back out to get my toddler's toy (ironically, a toy dog which he loves). She argued that the dog wouldn't jump the wall - she said he could but he won't. I said I was sorry but I just don't trust it. She snapped at me to call the authorities then and stormed back into her house slamming the door.

Up until now everything has been friendly and whilst I explained that dogs make me nervous, I haven't expressed any anger - though, I'm actually raging that they would let their dog have the run of our garden and to use it as a toilet even if they were happy to pick up after it. I can only think that she took great offence when I said I don't trust the dog. But I have two young children, limited experience of dogs and I have no idea how they are training this one so why would I trust it?

I was really upset this morning, both from the panic I felt on seeing the dog and thinking it was going to jump and from the unpleasant shift in her attitude. Her husband is a verbally aggressive, shouty man - I have previously witnessed eight police officers restraining him outside our house one Sunday afternoon. These are not people I want to antagonise.

But, I can't use my own garden. I don't trust them to restrain the dog adequately. They have been promising the fence every weekend; supposedly it will go up next weekend but I'm worried that it will only run either side of a hedge which I doubt is high enough to keep the dog behind. I'll probably never be able to relax with a dog so close but if I felt the fence and hedge were high enough, I could take my kids out with the rational knowledge it was safe.

Right now, with no fence I can't go into the garden at all. My 5yo has chicken pox so we are confined to the house completely. I'm keen to sell later this year so don't especially want this to escalate into a dispute. I just want them to make sure that the dog cannot access our garden and I think that's fair.

So, as people experienced with dogs, would you be offended by my attitude towards the dog? Does anyone have any advice about how I can resolve this?

(Yes, I know I could get help with my fear of dogs but I'm not in a position to pay for any sort of therapy and it doesn't have an impact on my life usually - until now, when a pitbull is sharing my garden!)

My DS is very dog phobic and I really understand your fear OP - it is the same as any phobia, totally irrational but very, very real.
If you cannot afford a fence how about visiting a garden centre and getting some trellis (plastic or wood) and fastening that to the top of the fence. It would be enough to deter a dog as long as not too flimsy. How high is the fence? From your description I assume 3-4 feet.

As an alternative, if you did not want to attach anything to your neighbour's fence (understandable!!) you could stick some canes or similar into the ground a hand width or so apart on your side so that they stuck up a few inches above the fence - not permanent but enough to deter a dog.

Eh, not that OTT. Given there is no boundary between your gardens, and the dog still sounds kind of young, it's reasonable to have concerns about how it may react to you and your child when you're in the garden. It would be totally reasonable not to trust your own dog (if you had one) with your child alone, let alone someone else's. Even golden retrievers can get nasty if they're pushed too far (not that it's necessarily the dog's fault ofc). Plus, given how you feel about dogs, it may be part of your reaction this morning is knowing how you may respond unpredictably if the dog did jump the wall. A fear-based reaction in that circumstance could exacerbate the situation for example.

"what a bloody wimp he was tabulahrasa!"

It was more just the ridiculousness of it, he came out, told me I'd need to move so he could get to his van and I was just looking at my dog sat perfectly still who would still have been about 7 feet away from him and the van even if he suddenly dove to the end of his lead.

I'd have understood if he was close, but that far away?

I'm usually fairly obliging about people who are either a bit nervous because of his breed or just nervous of dogs in general, I move out of people's way on pavements, I'll quite happily put a dog in a different room for visitors, but that just seemed a bit extreme, lol.

Anyway, I don't think the breed is relevant or even TBH whether the OP doesn't like dogs, it's her garden, she doesn't own a dog, there shouldn't be one in there.

In some ways, it doesn't matter what breed the dog is. OTOH as pp said, the pitbull comment just proves the neighbour is a knob. Either it's really a staffie cross and he told Laser it's a pitbull to scare her = knob. Or else it really is a pitbull and he is keeping an illegal breed = knob.

My friends and I spent our childhood terrified of dogs because other white children would make their dogs chase us almost every weekend. A few friends were injured too (some badly). So I completely understand dog-phobia, and I think people would have a lot more sympathy if they understood why many of us are scared.

With reference to your neighbours OP, it is utterly irresponsible of them to get a dog whilst one of their fences is too low (knowing the dog could jump over). They should pay for a huge fence/wall, not you. They bought a dog, and they should have thought of the implications of that before they bought the dog. You also have very young children. I would never leave any young children alone with any pet, and they can't expect your children not to be independently roam around in their own garden.

Violet, my worry if it jumped the wall to attack was whether I would fling myself between it and my toddler - I was so scared that for a second I didn't know if I would. Hopefully my maternal instincts are actually stronger than my fear. I think I didn't realise how serious this fear of dogs is until now.

getlost, I had the same experience as a child, hence my fear. I was never attacked though, but I remember being too afraid to play in my garden because of the neighbourhood kids with their dogs. So this just brings it back.

At the moment, there is no fence at all - just a hedge and a path. Previous owners of both houses were a couple and treated it as a shared garden. We now need to separate them properly. The dog is currently confined to the walled patio so they have responded to my concerns - I freaked out this morning because I thought it would jump the wall.

This experience has made me think that perhaps I should look into help for the fear. I especially don't want to pass it to my children.

I used to have a dog phobia and I don't think that dog-owners realise just how bad it is. There were so many places I couldn't go and activities I couldn't do, but the woeat were the times I walked into traffic because there was a dog off the lead or on a longish lead on the street.

Whilst there is no doubt that the dog owner was unreasonable in letting the dog be in your garden and to mess in it I do think you need to think about sorting out your fear of dogs. It makes me really really mad when parents area scared of an animal which then results in the child being scared of an animal totally unnecessarily. Instead of hiding away from the dog why don't you use this as an opportunity to get to know it and reduce your fears? It's totally reasonable to be cautious around dogs you don't know but a dog living next door is a bit different.

As I've said, I sympathise with phobias, but the question is really, should the world have to inconvenience itself because of them?

" should the world have to inconvenience itself because of them?"

It's not about the world inconveniencing itself though...making sure your garden is secure is a pretty basic part of dog ownership.

What they're actually doing is relying on their neighbour to keep their dog safe, what if her gate was open? She has no reason to keep it shut and the dog could then just be loose.

It's totally irresponsible, it doesn't really have anything to do with the OP's feelings about dogs.

Regardless of the pit ill issue they should have put up a fence before they got it out of courtesy. Whose boundary is it yours or theirs?

You can can certainly report it if you think it is a pitbull.

I agree tabula, I was talking to others describing dog phobias. Plus, the dog owners in the OP are keeping their dog out of the garden.

Your neighbor is being highly unreasonable, and appears to be lazy regarding the safety of her dog.

I suspect it is a Staff.

A phobia is not rational, and restraining her dog so you could go into YOUR OWN GARDEN for a few minutes is not unreasonable. However, since this is something you are likely to have to face, do you think you could begin dealing with it in very small steps?

If you're near me (York) I'd say come and see my Staff from a distance, and stroke if you like! She does regular obedience classes, has done the Kennel Club Good Citizen Scheme, and has always been bombproof with everyone. I have heard her growl ... ONCE ... at me for sitting on her head by mistake (quite normal!). Photo attached.

"I was talking to others describing dog phobias"

I missed that, I thought it was still about the garden

"Plus, the dog owners in the OP are keeping their dog out of the garden."

If it's behind a wall that's not high enough to stop it coming over if it wanted to, it's not secure though. Well not enough that I'd be ok leaving a young dog unsupervised.

Violet, my worry if it jumped the wall to attack was whether I would fling myself between it and my toddler - I was so scared that for a second I didn't know if I would.

I know you are irrationally scared but it probably won't attack you. It will probably just want to play.

I know EXACTLY what you mean tabula and am worried here about sounding argumentative but if we put it another way:

'We have a young dog and a garden which backs on to a neighbours with a young child. The neighbour came round and told me my dog had been running in her garden and soiling, I of course apologised, cleared it up and mowed the lawn for her. I also assured her I'd put up a fence. In the meantime I've been keeping our dog on the patio. Although in theory he could get into the garden this way he is trained not to. Today she came around complaining she was scared of him and couldn't go out with her child and wanted me to put the dog in so she could get a toy from the garden!'

I mean, we'd all be a bit more then!

Now I get there are other factors at play primarily the breed of the dog, but this situation is motivated by OPs phobia and that's impacting on her neighbours.

MrsA, yes it probably did want to play. I just worry that it could be territorial over the garden because it's been free to run in there (I've seen it out of the window, digging up my plants - my garden is scruffy and the plants were no good anyway, the whole thing needs a thorough overhaul, probably why they thought it makes a good dog toilet in the first place!) and the dog has rarely seen us out there - so it might think the garden belongs to it? Are dogs likely to think that way? So I thought it might want to chase us out.

Anyway, being under house arrest with chicken pox means I was more than usually observant today and it looks like they took the dog on a bloody long walk. Maybe to accommodate my demands and leave the garden free . On their return, toddler was at the front door with my husband and he shied away as he saw the dog approaching. Neighbour gave me a filthy look. So I think our previously friendly relations with her are spoiled and she no doubt thinks I'm training my children up to be as soft as I am.

"Are dogs likely to think that way?"

I'm not saying that dogs are never funny about strangers (or near strangers) in gardens, because yes they can be .but firstly it'll know you live in your house, it'll all smell like you.

But mostly, the most common reaction of dogs to people in a garden is, yay, people!!!

Ok, well although there is the cliche of dog owners saying 'he's only being friendly', it really does help me to think this dog is being friendly and does want to play. I'm obviously not going to rush out and embrace it but I am going to work on relaxing a bit. I've certainly never seen it display any aggression and I think it may have been wagging its tail this morning (I was mostly looking at its jaws).

I have in the past known some dogs that I have been quite friendly with. My Gran had a border collie who I adored. I think the fear has resurfaced since having my own children and getting anxious. I'll admit to some Staffy prejudice - if next door had a lab or a border collie I probably would feel better though I'm well aware those dogs can be aggressive and Staffy type dogs are unfairly maligned. Fear isn't rational and I can't talk myself out of my reaction. That said, this thread has made me think about addressing this and I really appreciate all the posts. I think if I had posted either my OP or kate's reverse in AIBU, for example, I would have been torn to shreds. So since you are all such considerate and sensible people and you all like dogs, I am thinking that I do need to get a grip on this.

To the poster who offered, I'm not all that far from York physically, but still some distance mentally from going to pat a Staffy but thank you for the offer .

Love the look of pride on your dog's face Godstopper. In fact her whole body has a 'see this cup, it's mine' look about it.

Aww, don't worry, It's not necessarily about you having to get a grip or moderate your behaviour in any way. If you don't like dogs then you don't like dogs. Fair enough. What struck me was your assumption that if it came into your garden it would attack you. I appreciate that that's part of your irrational reaction but it's just not likely, really it isn't. You're not afraid that random cats will scratch you or strange birds will swoop down and peck you. It's really not likely that you'll be attacked by your neighbours dog.

Well, there has been more dog poo on the lawn so it clearly is still getting in our garden and no fence up yet. It has not calmed my nerves to read of the Staffy that has attacked children in a playground in Blyth this week. I hate having an unfriendly relationship with the neighbours but I think I will phone the council this week to find out what my options are with regard to the poo issue at least.

Sorry to hear that OP. Some dog owners really don't help themselves, and give the rest of us a bad name.

Sounds terrible op. I have a staffs x ridgeback so a bit bigger and less barrel shaped than the dog you mention, and she can jump 6ft. No-one believed me until she got over my dog sitters fence to get to me. Make sure any fence you build is tall enough. And no, I don't trust mine either. I don't know what she's thinking all the time and I can't always predict her actions despite keeping a very good eye on her body language. She's a good dog but she's always leashed in public and crated in our house if nervous visitors or kids are round.