Managing a dog post-breakup

April 6, 2023 7:33 PM

We broke up, I took the dog, but ex has been taking her on weekends sometimes. Is this fair to the dog? How did you manage this situation after your breakup?

Pertinent details:
- I instigated the breakup and I moved out.
- We are still friendly and intend on staying friends — we have enough shared social circle that no-contact isn’t a super viable option anyway.
- We got the dog together as a puppy, but she bonded more to me because I work from home and he doesn’t.
- He really loves and misses the dog.
- His work schedule would make it hard for him to have primary custody of the dog — he works 12h shifts, often nights, not always predictable. I work mostly from home or in an office with flexible enough hours that I don’t even need a dog walker.
- I can’t drive while he does. We do have Pet Uber in this city though.
- I make more money and have paid for the bulk of the dog expenses.
- Dog seems OK with the situation so-far and is very excited to see both of us, but I worry the back and forth will be stressful for her.
- Dog is only 3 so hopefully has many years left.

Is this dog co-parenting situation viable or does one of us need to give up the dog? I feel terribly guilty about this all around, but you can’t stay together for a dog. I feel I am better suited to have the dog — which he has not argued with — but I would feel bad taking her away from him.

posted by vanitas to Human Relations (16 answers total)

I think it's okay. My partner lives a few blocks away and my dog regularly spends the day at his house or even sleeps overnight there without me, just depending on what I have going on, and he's fine. I think as long as your ex loves the dog and is giving him a calm, predictable environment when he's there, it will be fine.
posted by HotToddy at 7:41 PM on April 6, 2023 [10 favorites]

Seems fine? I think it could be a win-win for each of you to have opportunities for dog time and dog-free time and the dog will be fine!
posted by latkes at 7:50 PM on April 6, 2023 [5 favorites]

Different situation than you but I am divorced with 50/50 custody of my son. Last summer I got him a dog that is "his" dog -- meaning she goes back and forth with him between my house and his dad's house. Granted, the two houses are on the same street two blocks apart, but still -- two different houses. I researched this beforehand and the sense I got was that dogs can do okay with this sort of situation unlike, for example, cats (the explanation I read was that cats attach more to a place, and dogs -- to a person/people). It does not seem to stress our dog out. She has the same kind of crate and the same food at both houses and it seems like both feel like "home" to her.
posted by virve at 7:57 PM on April 6, 2023 [4 favorites]

I think that if the arrangement is working, keep doing it. You'd know if your dog was stressed or unhappy. Plenty of people use services like doggy daycare. I feel like this arrangement would be even less stressful than that, as dog is spending time with their two closest humans.

I wonder whether you might reach a point in the future where this arrangement doesn't work well for one of the humans anymore. But surely you can just cross that bridge if you actually get to it.
posted by kinddieserzeit at 8:14 PM on April 6, 2023 [9 favorites]

We had village dogs where I grew up - they had a home and an owner, but were allowed to wander the village and tended to visit houses on a route for snuggles and attention. (Imagine doing that nowadays...) I think they considered everyone to be pack, and home is where the pack is, wherever that happens to be.
posted by How much is that froggie in the window at 8:26 PM on April 6, 2023 [5 favorites]

I'll share an anecdote where this worked very well for the dog. In a similar breakup-but-still-friends situation, my friend was able to re-home her dog with her ex when said dog started to get territorial with her kids years after they broke up. The two of them got the dog as a puppy together, broke up, dog still got to see them both regularly until my friend moved across the country. Fast forward six years later and dog was delighted to move back to live with her other one true person and stop stressing about toddlers.
posted by deludingmyself at 9:08 PM on April 6, 2023 [4 favorites]

Seconding that you'd probably have seen signs of anxiety if this wasn't working for her. Unless she has signs of separation anxiety or stress. I would to talk about with the ex about needing to stop at a future date when her senses start going, as that can definitely make switching between locations more stressful.
posted by Candleman at 10:37 PM on April 6, 2023 [1 favorite]

If your dog were acting reserved or anxious, that would be something to worry about. But you say that the dog is excited to see both of you.

Follow your dog's lead on this. If it helps to think about: you know how if you have a family where grandma lives out of state, and either grandma comes for a visit or the family goes to visit, the kids are super-excited because seeing grandma is a rare treat and so they're all "YAY GRANDMA"? And the kids don't even know that the parents are stressing about the hassle of driving to grandma's or remembering grandma needs the good pillow for the foldout couch or whatever?

You're stressing because you're focused on the circumstances of your visits, but your dog is more like the kids being excited about grandma. And your dog gets to be that excited all the time. How cool is that?
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 3:55 AM on April 7, 2023 [4 favorites]

Dogs remember people they're comfortable with and enjoy seeing them, even after months or years. What you describe seems ideal for the dog in this situation.
posted by mediareport at 3:57 AM on April 7, 2023 [1 favorite]

Fair to the dog, I would say. For six years I travelled 5 months a year (in a row) and my dog lived with my friend (not an ex). Worked brilliantly for all involved as far as I can tell.
posted by dobbs at 5:03 AM on April 7, 2023 [1 favorite]

I think if the dog isn't acting distressed either during the visits or after them, you're fine to do this as long as it works for you and your ex. But stay alert to the possibility that it might stop working if something about the living situation at either house, or the dog's health, changes. Maybe just be ready to reassess every so often so you don't overlook if the dog does start to seem unhappy, because you're so used to the way things are now.
posted by Stacey at 6:06 AM on April 7, 2023 [1 favorite]

It seems like a nice setup for the dog, but it’s totally ok if you need to cut him off from seeing the dog in order to move on with your life.
posted by cakelite at 7:14 AM on April 7, 2023 [3 favorites]

I went through this almost a decade ago: we got the dog as a puppy together, but getting her was my idea and I was the primary caregiver. When we broke up, I got "full custody" of the pup but she would go stay with him on occasion - mainly when his middle-school aged kids were in town, because they loved her. It worked out well: I paid for everything (vet, food, etc) and he was an on-call dogsitter. He and the kids were happy to see her and she was happy to see them.

The arrangement came to an end when I moved away and the 3-hour drive each way made it impossible to maintain any sort of casual schedule, and the driving because it was too much of a hassle. At that point his kids were older and were better able to understand why the dog went to live with me full-time. Also - I needed to finally cut that last tie with my ex to fully move on with my life. It was hard but I was glad when it was done.
posted by Gray Duck at 8:48 AM on April 7, 2023 [2 favorites]

Actually, seconding cakelite's response. I had an old boyfriend who had a similar "shared pet custody" arrangement with his previous ex, involving a cat; and they were even trying to keep that going despite my old boyfriend living in Brooklyn and the ex living in Oregon. (She did a lot of international travel, and she'd just do a layover in New York, drop the cat off with him, and then go on to whereever, and he would cat-sit.) They finally dropped that after about a year because it was getting to be a serious pain in the ass for both humans.

If it were any other cat I'd also add that the cat didn't seem happy anyway either, but Rupert was a Savannah cat who hated EVERYONE and EVERYTHING as a matter of principle, so who knows.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:49 AM on April 7, 2023

This is probably great for your dog ... he gets to go on an adventure/field trip every so often and see another person who he loves and who loves him! Unless the dog seems anxious in some way, it sounds like you have found a great way to provide him with enrichment. :)
posted by mccxxiii at 10:54 AM on April 7, 2023

If the dog seems happy that's great! My dog was stressed by joint custody, but was forced to suck it up because my kids needed him with them at both houses, and he's learned to live with it. My ex and I both really appreciate always having a go-to dogsitter for travel etc. and the dog gets different stuff he likes from each place (more hiking here, more people there).

So do it as long as it's making everyone happy, though don't feel bad stopping if it stops making you happy (want less contact with ex, logistical challenges, etc.).
posted by metasarah at 12:17 PM on April 7, 2023