Buying Your Kids a Puppy or Kitten?

Posted on 10. Apr, 2009 by TheCuteKid Photo Contest in Parenting, Toddlers, Tweens

Your Kids want a Puppy or Kitten…

Is a family pet for your kids more fun, or just more responsibility?

by Jarrod Thalheimer

I am not a pet guy. I don’t want a dog, a cat, or even a fish. I realize this likely identifies me as a special kind of bastard among “pet people,” but I will plead my case thusly: I grew up without pets in my house or even in the immediate vicinity. My father before me was raised on a farm so, in his world, animals were divided into three categories: food, farm employees, or predators to be dispatched of. There was no time or place for a domesticated anything.

Don’t get me wrong. I actually like animals. I’m partial to dogs over cats, yet I still enjoy a kitten curling up on my chest and falling asleep. I once toyed with the idea of installing a super-cool aquarium in my living room after having such a good time watching Finding Nemo, but ultimately I just bought the DVD (way less maintenance). See, I’m just not a pet guy.

Then I had kids.

Pets Need Kids and Kids Need Pets

Now I am being forced to re-think my long-held position. Friends with pets are obnoxious in insisting the best thing for kids is the loyal friendship of a family pet. Apparently, no child’s life is complete without some dog padding around the house while everyone sleeps.

Christine Hierlmaier-Nelson, an author and parenting professional at NatKnows.com, an ID site, explains that pets are great for teaching kids responsibility, empathy, and even genuine lessons about life and death. “By learning to feed, brush, and walk their pet, children are taught to focus on service to others and their own personal responsibility in caring for another life.”

The real problem is that our day-to-day lives are simply insane. Soccer practice, dancing, back and forth to school, play-dates, meetings, PTA, you name it. We’re on the road more than Willie Nelson is and when you figure kids themselves are more often than not leaking or dripping bodily fluids of some kind already, there is no room for another passenger that drools every time we pass a hot dog stand.

What Happens When You Leave Them Alone?

There’s more though. I know I’m fixating on the worst of the worst, but I do have a heart, too. I think about the sad look that would be on Spot’s tiny face when we head out the door in our daily tornado of activity. Fido or Miss Mew would be lonely as hell and why wouldn’t they be? We’re always headed out here or there. What about vacations? We either have to take them along or figure out which of our friends we could guilt into pet-sitting. And, even if we found someone, it would only set us up for a hairy houseguest of our own, probably with a few vet-ordered suppositories that need insertion twice a day.

I’m trying to change. I want to change. There must be some way to give my children the joy of pet ownership without losing my mind.

Then I realized it. The perfect solution. Have friends with pets. The kids can play all they want with them when everything’s fun and easy, but at the end of the day, the wild kingdom packs its bags and heads for home. It’s like being a grandparent – all the fun without the hassle.

So in the question of “To Pet or Not to Pet,” I know I am taking the coward’s way out. I just can’t do it. It’s too big of a commitment and responsibility to take on right now while the children are young. If there were only some way to test the waters…

Maybe we could start with sea monkeys. I hear they’re really quite quiet and they can even learn a few tricks. Plus, if things don’t work out they seem to be comfortable in the water already so I’ve already got an efficient exit plan in place…

What’s the pet you always wanted to have as a kid but never got?

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