I decided it's time to get back to Nutrition Thursday...except today is all about Doggie nutrition...kinda. See, I have mentioned before that my little doggies may be slightly over weight. If I outright say that one dog in particular, Bentley Sue, is overweight, then her lawyer also known as Miss Football gets mad at me. It's really not their fault, nor mine. Maybe mine a little bit. I buy them the "Healthy" dog food. I don't give them treats that often, unless you count little bites of what ever I am eating. I know I am a bad mother. The real culprits of this doggie overweight debacle are my neighbors. Sammy and Ruthie. They are the sweetest most kindest elderly couple that live next door. Anytime I am gone the dogs are outside in the backyard, I don't have a privacy fence, just a little fence that you can pet them through and they will sit their with their lawn chairs and pet the dogs. It really is quite adorable.
Well, one day I came home for lunch and I called for them to come into the house-they didn't come. First thought, was "Someone has stolen my dogs!" If you know me, you know that this is ONE of my biggest worries about my dogs. Call me crazy and paranoid, but for some reason my first thought always goes to someone stealing my dogs. Dog thieving happens people, it really does.
Now then, back to Sammy and Ruthie...see, the dogs weren't coming to me because they were being fed, not just your normal dog food...wait for it...roast, potatoes, gravy and biscuits. Yep...while I was eating freakin Tuna for lunch my dogs were getting the royal treatment over here. I have thought several times about just sitting outside by the fence to wait for Ruthie to feed me. Now, I thought..."Aww, this is so cute, she loves my dogs." Until one day, I looked out the window and they were getting breakfast fed to them. Biscuits and gravy...not just regular gravy, sausage gravy.
Are you starting to sense a pattern here?
I sure as heck don't even make myself biscuits and gravy, let alone for my doggies. I love them, but no.
The dogs started putting on a few lbs...I started cutting back their dog food, taking them for walks, nothing was changing. So, I had to have a little come to Jesus meeting with my neighbor. Sweet lil old Ruthie. I said, "Ruthie, I think we need to stop feeding the dogs so much food, they are starting to put on a few pounds and it's not healthy." As I am saying this, she is literally feeding them bread. She responds, "Well, this is low-fat bread." I couldn't help but laugh. Then she said the kicker, the melt-your-heart kicker.
"I used to have a dog, but I can't have one anymore, and when I come out here to sit with yours, they call my name.They say Ruffie, Ruffie."
After that I knew it was a lost cause. I could not tell her not to feed them anymore, it would break her heart. So, I thought of something else. I will ask her if she wants to walk the dogs with me. That worked for oh about once around the block. When we finished walking the dogs and I was hanging around talking to her husband, she came out of the house and fed the dogs a whole sleeve of crackers.
We haven't asked Ruthie to walk with us anymore. I realized I was fighting a losing battle.
I said of all of this because yesterday I was just surfing the net, and I came a cross an article on Yahoo. "Is your pooch too pudgy?" It's like the heavens opened and it was calling my name...why, yes, Yahoo...my pooch is too pudgy. Both pooches in fact. Whatever will I do?
Dogs who are overweight, just like humans, will have a higher risk of arthritis, diabetes, kidney disease, etc. This chicka can't afford an overly priced vet bill just because the doggies are eating to many biscuits and gravy. I just might have to bill Ruthie and Sammy on that one.
The article then goes on to list the "Do's and Don'ts" of getting your dog to lose weight. Basically normal stuff you would do to lose weight yourself. Eat less/Exercise more. I just wish it told me what to do about sweet little neighbors who feed your animals. Build a bigger fence? Leave them inside? No and No. Plus, I just can't take them away from my neighbor's, they love them.
So...if you need me I will be trying to figure out a way to get my dogs skinny and to keep Ruthie from giving them food.
Wish me luck.
