Dear Prudence: I'd Rather Have The Dog At My PArty

[minoanmiss]

What’s the etiquette for hosting when a guest doesn’t like dogs? I recently hosted a small party (15 people) with my boyfriend at my apartment. My boyfriend’s dog, whom I love, was also in attendance. The dog is a medium-sized dog, well-trained, and sweet. The majority of guests loved having the dog there, except my friend who hates dogs. She is not allergic and to my knowledge has no traumatizing experience with them. She just isn’t a dog person. I get it; I used to be the same way until I started dating my boyfriend.

Upon inviting her to the party, I mentioned the dog would be there and that we would not be putting the dog in another room or in a crate. The dog was well-behaved for the whole party, but my friend would freak out when his tail wag would hit her leg, got upset when the dog barked when the doorbell rang, and would call me over to do something about it (what is there to even do?). She even went as far at one point in the evening to appoint one of my other guests (whom she had never met) as being on dog duty so the dog would not come near her and would call him out when he wasn’t adhering to his duties.

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I was displeased with my friend’s behavior and was upset that she gave another guest a “job” at my party. Prior to my liking dogs, I would always just give the dog a small pet upon arrival and do my best to avoid him for the rest of the night. My gut says my friend’s behavior was wrong, but Prudence, I am wondering if my behavior was also wrong in not finding alternative arrangements for the dog. I thought giving my friend the heads up about the dog’s presence was fair enough, and it would be up to my friend to decide whether to attend or not. Now I am second guessing myself. I am having another party soon, and I am not sure what to do. In the past, there have been power struggles in this friendship of she being very demanding and I being a doormat. I am working on sticking up for myself, but maybe this was the wrong area to start with? Please help.

— Am I in the Doghouse?

Dear Doghouse,

You absolutely did nothing wrong. Normally I would say, invite her to the next party with another warning that the dog will be present. But you mentioned that there’s an ongoing power struggle in this relationship, so maybe this is an opportunity to stand up for yourself. “Hi friend, I’m having another party but the dog will be there again and I learned last time that it’s hard for me to host while responding to your anxiety about him—and it didn’t seem like you were able to relax and enjoy yourself. So I think it will be best if you don’t come, but can we get together in a pet-free place another time?”

Comments

[ioplokon]

Idk if it is a friendship LW values, it might be worth talking 1:1 to see what's up (maybe the friend thought it would be fine & then was like, oh it's not fine; there's a difference between not being a dog person and being afraid of dogs, fwiw).

But it kinda sounds like they're on their last legs anyway so...

[adrian_turtle]

I like the suggested script, and I'm not sure how much it would help to "see what's up." I have some experience thinking it would be fine to do something with pets (or, god help us, therapy animals) and then discover oh, it's not fine. It's hard to say "my OCD is acting up this week and I cannot cope with how disgusting dogs are," with somebody who chooses to have dog saliva on their hands. It feels more judgmental than saying you're afraid of dogs because one bit you once, even if both specify they are reacting irrationally to dogs in general and recognize the admirable qualities of this particular dog.

[ioplokon]

Idk I just think if you start the conversation at "let me tell you about this party with all of our friends that I am specifically uninviting you to", your friendship is probably over.

[cimorene]

I think I see why you could argue the script needs to include the party this woman isn't invited to- to get across that the last gathering didn't work for the host, and she therefore intends to hold only dog-inclusive dinner parties and not to invite this person because of the discomfort everybody experienced this time. If she is willing to do other things with this friend instead, then I think she should invite her first, and explain this non-invite situation afterwards (assuming the idea is to be honest to avoid dog-hater hearing of the party through mutual friends. If that isn't true, telling her about it comes off awkward and weird, but if she is explaining to avoid awkwardness that is otherwise likely, it's understandable). I definitely do not think she should start the conversation with "I'm having a party but you can't come".

[topaz_eyes]

I don't know if it's just me, but I'm sensing a little bit of unreliable narration here. Assuming the dog was as well-behaved as LW describes, the friend's reaction could certainly have been part of that power struggle LW says is happening between them. But I do wonder if LW's relationship with their boyfriend (and the dog) is subconsciously affecting their friendship with the friend, and they should discuss that.

(If I were the friend, I would have left the party, explaining that I thought I could handle the dog being present but I was wrong, that it was no one's fault, and that we'd catch up later.)

(That said, I don't like dogs very much. That's because I find, way more often than not, that the dog is nowhere near as well-behaved as the owner thinks. It's not the dog's fault it's not well-behaved, it's the owner's, but the result is still the same.)

[redbird]

LW is really burying the lede here, with the mention of unspecified power struggles at the end of the legger.

Calling someone to say "I'm having a party and you're not invited" is unlikely to end well. If LW still wants to see this person, yes invite the friend to get together separately, but don't mention the party unless the friend asks about it.

Also, LW admits to not knowing why their friend doesn't like dogs, but thinks someone who doesn't like dogs should just "try to avoid" a dog who is standing close enough that when it wags its tail, it hits the friend's leg.

[conuly]

So, putting aside the weird comment at the end about power struggles, what I don't understand is why this well-behaved dog is close enough to LW's friend that its tail is hitting her repeatedly. How small is the space?

[laurajv]

I mean, if it's my dog, she is under a table and/or between chairs where the humans are sitting, doing her own thing peaceably but definitely existing close enough to a human to hit them with her tail or touch them with her nose.

Like, unless I crate my dog, every guest in my house is going to get brushed by her tail fur in the course of an evening.

I'm projecting super hard, yes

[r_tt_n]

Friend was being kinda annoying with the whole "giving another guest a job" thing, but tbh I can imagine that being social awkwardness coming from being stressed out about the dog being around. I def have said/done awkward things (or straight up rude) in social situations because I was anxious/uncomfortable/overwhelmed and I didn't know what to do with myself, and this particular example really reminds me of that. To me the friend's behavior seems completely understandable, honestly

"My friend would freak out when his tail wag would hit her leg" this could be an OCD thing, as someone else has brought up already. Dogs are dirty (I'm sorry, but even clean dogs smell, if you don't notice it's because you're used to it, but they do. They might not smell BAD like dirty dogs do, but it's still a noticeable smell for someone who's not around dogs regularly, and it's not pleasant)

"got upset when the dog barked when the doorbell rang" due to ND reasons some people are very sensitive to noise in general, loud noises and many noises happening at once in particular. The combo of the doorbell + barking + bunch of people at a party can in fact be pretty overwhelming and distressing

LW thinks only people who are allergic or traumatized are allowed to feel this level of discomfort around dogs, but other possibilities exist. If you don't want to lock the dog in a room or whatever (which I can understand) and find her attitude off-putting, just don't invite her to these parties and make different plans with her, if you still wanna keep this friendship 🤷‍♀️

Re: I'm projecting super hard, yes

[bookblather]

Oh, dogs absolutely smell, and they also leave a kind of residue on your hands when you're petting them, even if they don't lick you. And I say this as someone who adores dogs and will pet any dog anytime. These are real and valid things to be uncomfortable with!

Re: I'm projecting super hard, yes

[r_tt_n]

Oof yeah, that stickiness is the worst... at some point I stopped petting my aunt's dog because it left my fingers all sticky and smelly and I couldn't always go wash my hands easily. I actually like dogs and it makes me a bit sad to be this way around them, but that feeling in my hands really makes my brain act up 💀

[lilysea]

I like dogs, and am not allergic or traumatized

but I have had issues where dogs jumped up on me or flopped over onto my legs in ways which caused me serious pain

dogs can jump on you or flop on you hard, and that can seriously aggravate chronic pain.

I once met up with a friend who had their very sweet/affectionate dog in tow for a walk, and we sat down on the grass for a rest

and the dog (Labrador sized) affectionately flopped all it's weight on the front of one of my legs so hard that for half a second I genuinely thought it had broken my leg bone, it hurt so much.

I was like "ow!!!!!!!" can you not let sweet dog flop on me?

and my friend got really grumpy and defensive and was like "dogs are gonna dog! you can't stop a dog just deciding to fling all it's body weight on your friend's sore leg!!!!!"

So then we stopped going for walks together.

[r_tt_n]

That does sound very painful 💀 I'm glad you didn't break anything, tho I wonder how your friend would have reacted in that case (ngl I have come to resent the overzealous Dog Lover™ types a lot in the past years)

But yeah, I also considered that kind of thing. Dogs can hurt people even when they're not being aggressive, especially big dogs. The letter mentions that this is a medium-sized dog, so I'm not sure how much of an issue that could be in this case, but I'm sure there still could be accidents, even if it's "just" tripping or something like that

[lilysea]

Yes, a paleoartist I follow on social media got very badly injured after he accidentally tripped over his very sweet scottish-terrier sized dog

[firecat]

The friend came to the party and after some difficulty came up with a way to keep the dog away from her that made it not LW’s responsibility. I get why LW didn’t like it when the friend “freaked out” over the dog wagging his tail, but I don’t understand why LW is upset about her recruiting another party guest to help. I think objecting to that is unreasonable, and I wish Prudence had said something about that. (If the party guest complained, that would be another story, but nothing was said about that.)

LW has a few choices.
1. “you’re not invited to parties at my apartment any more because I can’t handle your reaction to the dog”

2. “I don’t like how you handled the dog issue at my last party, and I’m not willing to crate the dog during parties, can we think up another solution?”

3. If it’s important to keep this whole set of people together, throw some parties outside the house so the friend can attend.

LW can probably imagine the results of each of these solutions and choose depending on how important the friend is.