Honesty please - getting a puppy

[Wiggleyfingers]

We've been desperate for a dog for a long time but never done it due to two reasons and would love some thoughts on these from people who have been through it.

Issue 1:
Family set up is 2 adults working full time and 2 children.
The dog would be left home alone for 2 days per week between hours of 7:30-4:30 (Mondays and Fridays if that makes a difference?!) On these days, I can pop back on my lunch break for around 45 minutes. Is this going to be an issue with a puppy? If so, for how long? We may be able to get a dog walker in the morning on those days to break the day up further.

Issue 2:
How much time off did you have when getting a puppy? I'm a teacher, so limited to school holidays. Would a week off in October be too short of time? Do we need to wait until Christmas? Is getting a puppy with toilet training during winter a bad idea?! Am I overthinking everything now?

Any advice welcome!

@Wiggleyfingers Do not be disheartened at all, I admire you asking for honesty and you were most certainly given it. You need to give yourself a huge pat on the back for deciding your situation does not fit having a dog at this time, if only many people were as sensible.

It may be sad you cannot share your life with a dog currently, but when the time does come, the dog will have a far better life, as will you, that it is not left at home for long periods of time.

Don’t feel disheartened!

plenty of working people with children and jobs get puppies. I did, I am the lone adult in my house and I work full time. My kids were 9 and 12 when our pup arrived.

you just need to plan and crucially have the financial resources available to pay for care if you need it. Quite a lot of financial resources actually!

There can be a slightly odd undercurrent on mumsnet when it comes to dog ownership, the debate tends to polarize into two camps: “you can only have a dog if you’re a non-working millionaire hermit who also likes long walks” versus “we left ours at home every day from 10 weeks”.

And puppies are not babies, they really aren’t. Generally they are clean within a couple of months, and many (but not all) can be left for up to four hours as a one off from a fairly young age. Some can’t, ever, but that’s why it’s really important to choose a calm dog from a reputable breeder whose lines are not plagued by anxiety , OCD, hyperactivity, etc. No guarantees but friends I know in this situation have dog sitters who come into their home. It costs.

I work in education and I have a lot of teaching colleagues who have dogs but they all have something in place for the longer days. A few are part time. If it's two days a week and your life revolves around the dog (within reason) outside that then I'd be inclined to sort out care for those days short term and work on leaving with a walker.

It depends how much you want one. We make sacrifices for ours (I couldn't attend a funeral today because ours is post spay so needs supervising so my husband had to go alone) but along with our cat she's a huge part of our life. She has to be considered first but we're fine with that. I work 32 weeks a year so it's shorter than your average 4 - 5 weeks a year off.

You absolutely can make working full time and a dog work, especially in your set up but you do need to sacrifice money at least for the first couple of years and lots and lots of time.

We had two adults wfh with our puppy - they struggled. Puppy was a Duracell bunny and needed watching 24/7z. Eventually he settled into a routine, sleeping ands waking. It was hard work, relentless, day and night.

Then there’s the puppy biting stage. Not nice. I had a few items of clothing sacrificed due to bite holes.

Then there’s the cabin fever as they can only go on short walks.

And the puppy blues when it all gets on top of you.

Pup is now two years old and usually. We can leave him for up to three hours in his crate. Then he is usually up for a couple of hours, often needing some sort of stimulus, before his two hour afternoon nap. Our life revolves around him.

To be honest, I like our dog, but don’t love him.

My dog is 11 and we don't like leaving him for more than 4 hours. He would almost certainly be fine but we don't think it is fair. He likes being with us. If we are both indoors he is too, if we are both in the garden he is too, if one of us is inside and one in the garden he will go in and out to see us both.

Dogs like company.

It is really disappointing when you're circumstances aren't right. I wanted a dog for so long but as a single parent working full time, it was never feasible.
COVID was great for me as we moved from 5 days in an office to hybrid working. I'm only in 2 days now, so got a dog 2.5 years ago and he's amazing.
Looking on the bright side, when the time comes, you'll love that dog and enjoy it far more knowing how much you wanted it.

Maybe you could sign up to Borrow my Dog or something, and see if you could dog sit or walk a dog at weekends and during school holidays?

We have a dog (from a puppy) and work full time. Could you get a puppy at the start of the summer holidays? That would give you 6 weeks. We use doggy daycare (picked up and dropped off) for the time we are all out of the house - for us with various home working ratios that ended up being 1 day a week (occasionally 2) which was very doable. I do think the whole day at home is a bit long otherwise.