Founder
Who Keeps the Dog
Imagine this scenario, if you or someone you know hasn’t already been in it: You and your ex have decided to go your separate ways. Whether a divorce or a breakup of a long-term partnership, the relationship is over and now you are faced with the horrible question no one wants to even consider: “Which one of us is keeping the dog?” If your separation is peaceful, or relatively peaceful, your first impulse might be to agree to share your dog. After all, you both love Rover and you are reasonable people, right? Here are some things to consider if you are thinking about sharing your dog with your ex.
As a Certified Dog Behaviour Consultant and pet custody mediator, I work with people going through divorce to navigate, and resolve, what will happen with their pets. Some have just decided to separate and want to resolve the question of their dog in the most fair and peaceful way possible, or they have children and want to come up with a plan for their dog that will allow the dog to move with the children between homes that will keep the dog’s routine consistent and happy for them. Others realise that, while they both want the dog, they do not want the decision to come from court where a judge decides for them.
My most heartbreaking type of clients are people who have already tried to share their dog and it is no longer sustainable, either for them or for their dog. The initial intention may have been made as a kind-hearted compromise, while for others it was the best way to pacify an angry ex who was making threats about fighting over the dog. By the time these people reach out to me it has sometimes become so stressful for the dog that they have become highly anxious or sick. Or things have become so toxic between the people they can’t rationally talk to each other anymore or worse, when it has become clear their ex is using the dog to keep tabs on them and force them to stay in their life. Sometimes their ex has simply taken the dog and moved away in secret.
What people may not recognise initially is that sharing the dog with your ex may keep the wound of your relationship open for months or years, not allowing for the space that is needed to heal or move forward. Without realising it, fighting over the dog can be a way to keep the relationship going with their ex. Constant conflict about the dog can be easier than simply saying goodbye. The connection over the dog has been described to me as “the last thing that is keeping us together”, “the final nail in the coffin”, “the symbol of everything that was good about us”, “they took my heart with them, I can’t let them have the dog too.” etc. Keeping the dog may feel like a victory, allowing your ex to have the dog means you are the looser. This can feel especially harsh when there were issues of infidelity, or if one of you moved quickly into a new relationship while the other has not.
If you are thinking about sharing your dog with your ex, ask yourself the following questions:
- Will you be able to move on and heal from the divorce if you are in regular contact with your ex for as long as your dog is alive?
- Do you want to know when they are in a new relationship and with whom or vice versa? How will it feel when you do have a new relationship for your ex to still be a constant presence in your life?
- What if either of you have children, or buy a new house, do you want to have to share all those details of your life with them?
- What if you decide to move to a new city because of a job promotion? (Imagine driving for hours to visit your dog.)
- And the most important question of all – if your dog starts to become stressed or anxious by moving between two homes, do you love them enough to accept that one of you will have to say goodbye to allow your dog to live with one of you?
People, deliberately or not, may use a dog as a weapon against their ex for revenge, for power, or as a sneaky way to keep close tabs on their ex because they refuse to let go of the relationship. Carol called me in tears and told me an all too familiar story. When she asked for a divorce, her ex-husband agreed Carol could keep Charlie, her beloved dog. He would pay for their dog’s expenses for the rest of Charlie’s life provided he could come visit the dog when he wanted to. At the time, Carol was so relieved that he didn’t fight to keep Charlie that she signed the agreement as part of their divorce. Four years later Carol is trapped, emotionally she can’t move on from her divorce because her ex keeps dropping in to “visit Charlie”, often with a new girlfriend or fresh from an expensive exotic vacation. For Carol, the visits to Charlie feel like an assault. “He was never that interested in Charlie when we were together. It always feels like he is using Charlie as an excuse to punish me for leaving him. I never want to see him again, but I know that as long as Charlie is alive, I have no way to keep him out of my life.”
Carol is too scared to tell him to stop the visits because she is worried he will try to get custody of Charlie is she broke the agreement she signed. He has the money to pay for a lawyer, she doesn’t. She was constantly anxious / and on edge / about this. “If I had only known what I was setting myself up for I never would have granted permission for this man to stay in my life in this way. I just want to move on with my life.”
Now, let’s talk about the biggest missing piece of this conversation and the reason I started doing the challenging, but necessary, job I do. The dogs themselves. The first question when people are considering sharing their dog should be “will this be good for the dog?” When I ask my clients if they think their dog is happy moving between houses, most feel that it would be easier on the dog if they only had one home. I hear things like, he seems to tolerate the transitions okay, it only takes a few days for her to settle down, she seems to get used to the routines. And upon reflection, most of my clients tell me they wished they had never agreed to share the dog in the first place, that the dog would be much more content in one home, but they need help to work though the emotional entanglements to figure out a way forward.
Some dogs show their stress about moving homes in subtle ways, skipping meals, sleeping more than normal, avoiding people they are normally engaging with. For some it is much more obvious, becoming destructive, running away from the car if they know it is transition day, peeing inside or even nipping out of fear.
Peter was distraught. After months of fighting with lawyers, a judge in California ordered his dog, Daisy, an elderly girl with some health issues, be shared 50/50 with his ex-wife living one week with him, and one week with her. His ex-wife was not a stable person and had never spent much time caring for Daisy. After her first week with his ex-wife, Daisy hid in the closet for two days and refused to eat. She then wouldn’t leave Peter’s side unless he tried to get Daisy to go in the car, and every time he did, she ran back to hide in the closet. When he was forced to take Daisy back to his ex she panted and howled the entire way to her house and had to be dragged out of the car.
Can shared custody work?
Yes, it can, with the right dog and the right people. Certain genetic backgrounds for dogs, those bred for protection or herding work, will make it harder for them to move between homes because their heritage means they bond very strongly with one primary person. Dogs who are anxious or don’t cope well with change will also struggle. Whereas very easy going, mellow, curious and confident dogs can manage home transitions better. Every dog has to be looked at honestly as an individual.
Verbal agreements may be doomed to fail, so if you want to give it a fair shot, get professional help to write up a plan with clear boundaries and fair mechanisms to change the agreement if the dog is not coping, becomes sick or when they become too elderly to continue. To force a dog to remain in a shared custody beyond fairness to the dog is not ethical or fair. Our dogs deserve enough love and caring from the people in their lives that, even if it means one person has to give up the dog, their happiness is the most important thing.
About Karis Nafte
Karis Nafte, CDBC founder of Who Keeps the Dog, Pet Mediation is the worldwide pioneer in pet custody mediation and the first dog behaviour expert and mediator teaching in this field with more than 25 years experience working with dogs and families.
As well as seeing her own clients, Karis teaches professional development courses in pet custody for divorce professionals, mediators, coaches, collaborative practitioners, attorneys and judges. She has taught all over the world, including for the American Bar Association, the South Africa Association of Family Mediators, the Ontario Association of Family Mediators, The Kentucky Bar Association and many others.
Her book, Who Keeps the Dog? Navigating Pet Custody During Divorce available from Dogwise Publishers.