Dog ownership 101

-Be sure to spend your entire day with your dog. Leaving for work and only coming back at lunch is basically animal abuse. Even working from home next to the dog with breaks to play, etc., risks ignoring teachable moments and otherwise screwing your dog up for life. Don't have 24/7 to devote to this? Get a stuffed animal.

-Don't spoil your dog. Keep your dog in a crate for hours at a time, to prevent accidents, excessive barking, and more. This shows you're "pack leader." Feed your dog in the crate to make it a no-poop zone. Leave your dog alone frequently, so your dog can handle it when eventually something will come up that requires you to leave its side. You don't want your dog traumatized by separation anxiety every time you're gone for 30 seconds.

-Socialize your dog as much as you possibly can. Other dogs, cats, babies, the works.

-Keep your dog, whose series of vaccines will seemingly never be finished, and who apparently has a parasite (but has finished her meds for it!), from interacting with anyone. And be sure that each time you pet her, you follow that up by washing your hands with warm soapy water. Don't pet her too often, or you'll never eat/work yourself.

-Give your dog lots of toys to play with, to help keep her occupied during the occasional moments you must, for example, eat something yourself, or take a shower (see above).

-Toys, even ones designed explicitly for dogs, are too dangerous to be used unsupervised, like even if you're just in the shower, and thus are of no use in the owner's absence, and are at any rate a poor substitute for your attention. Even the most highly regarded toys are basically death traps for dogs. Beware!

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In other words, I'm probably doing it all wrong. But Bisou is slowly wrapping her tiny, fluffy head around the notion of "outside potty," and that she's only allowed to bark to announce she sees our neighbor, not for the next half hour. And once we have the all-clear from the vet re: vaccines, etc., we will take her... somewhere. Here? She'd no doubt make friends. We'll see.

I experienced something of a post-puppy depression after picking up Bisou, which I was reassured at the time to see that some on the Internet have also experienced (including people who've had other dogs, which strikes me as bizarre, yet extra-reassuring), commentators likening it to postpartum depression, only to get shot down, not entirely unfairly, for YPIS:* there's on the one hand a real medical condition, on the other spoiled sorts - women goes the cliché - who purchased dogs as accessories and are stunned to learn that they have digestive tracts and personalities of their own. Don't get a dog if you don't want to put in the work and all that.

When in my case, no. I'd dog-sat before, and have always loved dogs, like, actual dogs, not just puppy photos online. My husband and I are both putting in the work and then some. We're reading. We're following that expert advice. And I have not even attempted to get Bisou - even though she is indeed a tiny and adorable dog - into a handbag.

The issue initially was that the first vet who checked her out post-breeder thought she might have a serious health problem that would necessitate worst-case-scenario bringing her back to the breeder before we'd bonded... but the specialist we had to take her to was a while after that, meaning limbo, meaning we'd already become attached even on the way to the first vet, meaning, ugh.

So there was that, which was 95% of it. But also, even though I wasn't surprised by any of it, the fact that I now must deal with gates and rambunctiousness (or, adorably but frustratingly, a pup curled up on my foot, although this she seems to be outgrowing already) every time I go into the kitchen has taken some getting used to. Things like opening a hot oven or putting a sharp knife into a dishwasher go from being mundane chores to potentially traumatic experiences. (As well as evidence in favor of a two-owner home, or at the very least a crate.)

Also frustrating: despite her overall good temper, lack of aggression, etc., the remaining issues we'd like to address with her - barking at distant strangers, and not quite understanding that when she's outside, that means it's go time - are improving, but to be totally fixed would require taking her out into the world, something that (see list above) we've told is imperative but also irresponsible until all vaccines are complete. How is she supposed to meet new people and dogs if we can't take her for a walk, let alone to obedience school? We carried her around and showed her children, pleased that she did not bark at them, but we can't yet full-on introduce her to anyone other than adults who've assured us they like and know dogs. And experts say, apparently, that if whatever imperfections are not addressed immediately, your dog will be screwed up for life. Hmm.

And I can't quite figure out which toys/practices are indeed necessary, and which are anthropomorphizing (washing and brushing are self-evidently important with a dog, especially a poodle, but opinions differ re: canine toothbrushing, the necessity of an infinite as opposed to varied but limited supply of toys). Obviously putting a bow on her is not necessary, while pee pads are key, but short of that...

Oh, and Bisou is almost completely uninterested in treats, but also kind of low on teeth at the moment, so maybe it's not the treats. Maybe these are the wrong treats? See! I'm doing it wrong!

I have dealt with objectively far more stressful and upsetting situations in my life, ones without a nice upside like, now here's a sweet little pet asleep by my side, but this has been quite the whirlwind. I have no interest in being a helicopter dog-owner, the Tiger Mom of miniature poodles. But with every book, article, and (gulp) podcast explaining in no uncertain terms that if you do err however slightly, your dog will become neurotic, impossible, and possibly vicious, no doubt violently ill or worse, I'm not making any promises on that front.

 *"Your privilege is showing," in WWPD-speak.