Anyone deal with hating their SO's dog?
I try so so very hard to tolerate my fiance's dog! The dog (I'll call her Spot) is a 60-70lb lab mix and everything about her annoys me. Shes big, loud, doesn't listen to me (although she listens to my fiance perfectly), is super hyper, and the most annoying part to me: she stalks my fiance around the house. This drives me crazy. I want to watch a movie with him or eat dinner, without having to deal with the dog every second. I feel like I never get a break from her... I feel like my house is a high stress environment and I dread coming home and dealing with her when I just want to come home and relax. The dog was living with his parents and only coming on weekends (which was hard enough to deal with!) until it started to have behavioral issues so it moved in with us a week ago. I am home way more than my fiance since I am in grad school so am often studying or doing research at home all day so I am the one dealing with her.
I have never been a dog person, even as a kid I didn't want them near me. Well, a couple months ago, before Spot moved in, my fiance found a small (15 lb) dog in the middle of the road and put it in his car for fear of it being hit. We ended up deciding to keep the dog and I actually fell in love it. It is the easiest dog ever, sleeps all day while I study and cuddles me at night when I sleep. It doesn't eat the cat food or get into the litter box... basically she is the perfect dog for a nondog person! I hate that I can't feel this way about Spot but no matter how hard I try, i still feel nothing but annoyance for this dog. It drools which grosses me out and pants loudly while I try to study. Part of it is probably just that it doesn't feel like my dog, it stalks him and listens to his every word and ignores me. He got it before we started dating so it just doesnt feel like my dog... it feels like extra, annoying work. It isn't even a bad dog really... its just a loud and large and hyper and for someone like me who generally doesn't like dogs, shes about the hardest dog ever to try to tolerate.
Anyway, that's my rant about the dog. Anyone have any advice other then just deal with it? I know its not fair to ask him to get rid of his dog but its also not far that I have to feel constant stress and annoyance in my home, where I should be able to relax. We are obviously not going to break up over an animal. I think this may be one of those issues that there is truly no good solution but I was wondering if anyone had any advice or has dealt with anything similar.
