Locking dogs out of the bedroom for the first time

[PaperDoves]

Looking for some advice and opinions. My son's seasonal allergies have turned into full-blown rhinitis and while he hasn't been tested the usual culprits are pollen, dust mites, pet dander and mould. We have two big dogs and a cat.

The GP sent some checklists of things we can do and in the pet section the leaflet suggested getting rid of the pets entirely, but failing that, keep them out of the bedrooms and bathe them regularly.

Both of our dogs sleep in our bedroom (not my son's, but frankly he's in our bedroom too half the time anyway). Both have done so forever. One is approaching 14 and very set in his ways.

The only way to keep them out of the bedrooms would be to baby gate the entire upstairs off. This would effectively halve their living space.

I know loads of dog owners don't let their dogs in the bedrooms but I imagine most of them have had that rule since the dogs were puppies. My question: how traumatic should I expect this to be, if at all, and does anyone have advice on making it easier? Will the old man likely cope (to be fair, it will probably be easier on his arthritis to not be traipsing up the stairs all the time)?

And why does it make me feel so mean??

Because it is mean. Your old boy won't understand why he's being denied the comfort of his people and will wonder what he's done wrong. What a horrible situation for you.

Have you tried buying an air purifier for your son's room?

Yes, we have a couple air purifiers throughout the house. The dogs don't really go into his room at all, but he also rarely goes into his room so I'm not sure how much it helps! Our bedroom is the dog room.

Could you sleep in his room to keep him out of your room?

And what about the cat?

I think I would get allergy testing to pinpoint what's causing your poor son the issues to see if you have to resort to drastic dog banning action. I can't see any way of shutting them out without them being upset.

This would be my worst nightmare

@Clymene I was just thinking the same -- it would be helpful to pinpoint the exact allergens before we do anything drastic. GP said the NHS won't test for sniffles so would need to go private but assuming it's not excessive I think that's what we'll do.

Oh and no, sleeping in his room would just make the dogs follow me in there 😂 they sleep where I sleep.

How old is your son? Can he not just stay out of your room?

He's 10. He doesn't sleep in our room but does spend a lot of time in there hanging out.

I'm laughing imagining the responses if I posted on a different board -- I don't think they'd include keeping the children out of our room instead of the pets 😂 I love it.

The checklist also says horse allergies are very common, and to changing riding clothes and shower before coming home. 😱 It's a yard, not a gym!

I think we need to have him tested as we've got far too many possible triggers.

I'm sorry your DS health and comfort take precedence over the dogs want to sleep in 'the top spot'.
They need to baby-gated downstairs. They'll get over it.

I have a dog who sleeps with me every night, and a toddler who also sleeps in my room (in her cot) if she developed allergies or breathing difficulties the dog would sleep downstairs (it would be a nightmare at first because the dog would be upset and would do anything to get to me/her) but my dogs upset does not trump my child's health. As my dog gets older and more securely attached to me (she's a rescue) she's a lot better at being away from me in the house.

We have to be the grownups in our households and make the grown up decisions.

Plus if one of your dogs is elderly they are likely to develop incontinence issues - so having off your beds isn't a bad idea.

Crossed posted - was also thinking post this on another board and people who think you were insane you didn't know the right thing to do!

The right thing to do is to get her son tested. He may not even have an allergic reaction to the dogs.

How was your son's allergies over winter as imagine that would be worse if pets as spending much longer indoors with them but low for pollen/plant allergies, higher for mould maybe being damper but thought you'd usually aware if have some in home.

If your dogs elderly and not a liftable size it may be good idea to relocate downstairs anyway before they are unable to manage stairs. Can imagine keeping the cats out will be trickier. You may need to sleep down with them for short while to help settle or if very stressy try doing it in stages, my dogs were happier in hallway at bottom of stairs than kitchen and eventually settled in living room. It will soon start to get cold overnight though so need to consider bed with cold rising up from floor, drafts and maybe PJ's if not a fluffball or they'll not sleep well and arthritis get stiffer as bit warmer upstairs or have human hot water bottle.

Get your son allergy tested before doing anything drastic with the animals.

There's nothing wrong with them sleeping downstairs but you may have to treat them as puppies and train them to get used to it. My beagle is five and has always slept upstairs - if we tried to just change it overnight he would howl the house the down lol.

Do you have horses or was the horse thing just something on the list? I'm horribly allergic to horses and had to stop riding when I was little. I have a massive reaction even from people's clothing if they've been around horses. I'm fine with dogs though 🤷
Definitely get him tested because then you know exactly what you're working with.

I would get him tested . I was diagnosed with COPD / asthma / small vessel lung disease aged 50 , having owned horses since I was 10 . I’m now 57 and can’t go to the yard at all unless I want to be really ill, which I don’t as I have other illnesses that are affected if I’m ill . Fortunately we only now own 1 pony ( the rest have died ) and she is on full livery and my sister goes and deals with anything that needs dealing with . I’m fine with our short haired dog and my sons Siamese cats and that includes sleeping with them .

I have agree you should get your son allergy tested first, so that you know what you are actually dealing with. If it IS caused by the dogs or the cat, keeping them off the bed may not be enough to cure his allergic reactions. Once you know the actual cause you can plan your course of actions.
Of course your son’s health has to come first.
I moved in with my son and family after the death of my husband. We had a dog, which I adore. My young grandson couldn’t cope with the dog barking - as he is autistic and non verbal, so I had to re home the dog with my stepson. It’s very tough … but the dog is loved and settled and I’m able to visit him.

Thanks everyone, we're going to get him tested so we know what we're dealing with. In the meantime we'll put a baby gate on his own bedroom door to keep the dogs from wandering in (probably won't work with the cat).

He wasn't previously allergic to the dogs or cats (we only got the cat in December but my mom and sister have oodles of cats between them and he never had a reaction to them), but I'm aware allergies can develop at any time.

And yes, I have two horses! I'm wildly allergic to hay and grass so often have the sniffles myself after a visit to the yard. It's really, really difficult not to bring bits of hay and horse hair into the house. A hot shower at the yard before heading home would be ideal if he did have an allergy but I haven't seen a yard yet that offers one of those.

I'm willing to make a lot of changes if they will help, even to the point of moving if it turns out it's UK pollen (we're not originally from here and have often considered moving back home so this isn't as radical as it sounds). I could live without the horses or could find a way to mitigate. I can't give up my old man dog, though -- he's on his last legs anyway and loves no one but me! Hopefully it's not the pets though, or it's the kind of thing where more frequent bathing would help.

So -- allergy test, pronto.

How was your son's allergies over winter as imagine that would be worse if pets as spending much longer indoors with them but low for pollen/plant allergies, higher for mould maybe being damper but thought you'd usually aware if have some in home.

So this is why we didn't realise it was rhinitis at first -- in the summer we thought, oh, it's just hay fever, then in the winter we just assumed he had colds (like we all did, they seemed to be back to back this last winter). I gave him antihistamines and they did nothing so I thought that confirmed it was a cold, but the GP said actually if it's rhinitis then a couple doses won't make a difference, you have to give them consistently for a few weeks before you're likely to notice an improvement. Which is what we're trying now, along with deep cleaning the house.

Allergy testing is not diagnostic and often throws up both false negatives and false positives so don't rely on that. Symptom history is way more important.

If it's pollen there's advice widely available to help with reducing pollen indoors.

If it's the pets you can try allergy wipes like petal cleanse which help break down the proteins which trigger allergies.

Probably also worth following advice for reducing house dust mites too.

Also, to add, the hayfever season for some of us is almost entirely all year.

So much this. Last year or the year before, I can't remember, my hayfever dragged on until November. It was miserable. Until now I had the "worst" allergies in the family and often dreamed of moving back home to my arid, low pollen count area (except it's now on fire half the year so that wouldn't help much either!).

My son has multiple food and airborne allergies - cat and now dog included. You need a nasal spray (avamys) cetirizne 2.5ml twice daily, showers/baths daily, constant hoovering and air purifiers….it has improved my sons health so much. When we stop we notice it goes straight back to being bad again. We did have a cat but he was long haired and very aggressive so we didn’t remind rehoming - can’t imagine how hard it much be with such an old loyal dog, there will be ways to help your son though.

I've heard eating local honey helps with pollen allergies. No idea if that's true, but worth thinking into if that's part of the issue?