I have to get this out of my head.

[hannah]

I had a doctor's appointment today - not with a medical doctor, which is why there was a dog in the office. Look, I don't care. I don't care. Doesn't matter to me what it wants or that it gets weird if left alone. I freaking do not care, I didn't want it in the office with me. Its presence put me on edge and I wouldn't have been able to focus or concentrate with it in the same room as me. Once it was outside, I couldn't even get myself to look at it, and I had to work to keep my attention on the point of the visit.

I think at this point, I can move it from aversion and wariness to outright phobia. Jesus, but they make me uncomfortable and wary and even thinking about it hours later gets my bile up and my body shaking.

I did my best to explain to her why I prefer most other domestic animals like cats and horses and birds - that their communication is more in body language than in their faces, how cats and horses don't use their faces very much compared to dogs and how birds effectively don't have faces.

A few weeks ago, I told someone I have more experience with horses than with dogs, which she found somewhat astonishing. I told her that I'd much rather have another rabbit, or rats, as a pet. "Quiet animals," she said.

"No!" I told her. "Prey animals! Acutely aware of the tiniest change in posture and tremendously responsive to it!"

Not an experience I get with domesticated canines. Some of the most unresponsive animals I've ever encountered.

Today the doctor tried to tell me all the dog wanted to do was love, which is fabulous for the dog, but didn't strike me as a tremendously effective thing to say to someone who was really trying to focus on a specific reason for being there.

I asked, though, and next time I'm in, she's not bringing it with her. Which: thank fuck.

Comments

[lilacsigil]

Oh no! I would also be very distressed by that. And it's especially bad with the dog people who think that everyone loves their dog.

[olivermoss]

"all the dog wanted to do was love"

I hate it when dog owners use that as an excuse. I'm sorry you had to deal with that. A girl in my high school had a phobia of dogs. When we got a new headmistresses it pretty much took our whole class in solidarity to get her to accept that her dog at work was not okay.

[rosefox]

I once worked with a therapist who occasionally brought her little dog in. The dog ignored me, but it was tremendously distracting and stressful. I'm sure it works great for dog people! I am not dog people. I'm so sorry the doctor not only put you through that but tried to justify it—I hope this isn't someone you're seeing about mental health concerns, because addressing a phobia with "But the dog just wants to love you!" is very bad practice.

[lizzie_omalley]

Hannah, thank you for sharing this.

Your description of your reasons really resonated in a way that I could almost feel what you were saying about faces, and prey animals, and the different ways they attune to nuance.

As a therapist in training I will take this in to my being. In my thoughts about the possibility of someday opening a private practice I was considering having therapy animals involved in my practice. Animals I am considering are a standard poodle, a cat, and/or a rabbit. Your post reminds me that I need to have a way to A) assess a client's potential reaction to having any animal in a session before they ever encounter said animal and B) a place for the animal to go so that a client never has to see the animal at anytime during their appointment times and C) be clear and open that there are therapy animals around so that the client can make a choice about whether or not to see me at all even knowing that they won't likely be forced to confront an animal.

Thank you for sharing. You have helped me see and grow.