Months ago I posted something silly on my personal Facebook page about how my husband and I had sent a deposit to a dog breeder and my kids were already conspiring to name the dog. Never would I have imagined the backlash it invited. I was told, to my face, by actual friends, that “shopping” for a dog wasn’t very “crunchy” of me. LOL what?

Breast vs bottle. Work Vs stay home. Daycare center vs in-home. Cloth vs conventional diaper. I thought I had seen all the mom-shaming when my kids were babies. But as it turns out, people love to come out of the woodwork with their uninvited opinions on just about every choice you make in life, pet ownership included. Apparently “shopping” for a dog is not in line with the holistic beliefs I am prone to espouse.

It doesn’t matter that I use reusable grocery bags, or make my own beauty care products that I keep in glass mason jars. Or jelly jars. My efforts to reduce my carbon emissions through making all my family’s meals from scratch, obsessively turning off lights and using my vehicle as little as possible cease to make a difference in the world the second I give money to a dog breeder. Eliminating one-time-use paper products from my home, shopping small artisan businesses and supporting local farmers doesn’t mean dick when I’m not rescuing an animal from a life of abuse and neglect.

Listen, I get it. I think it is absolutely AMAZING that there are so many loving, selfless people in the world who foster or adopt dogs. I love that so many of my friends have welcomed dogs into their homes and resolved to help them cope with whatever trauma they have survived. I know there are a lot of really beautiful success stories out there!

I have 3 kids with zero chill. My eldest child has ADHD, emphasis on the H, and my house is a constant cacophony of loud noises. Someone is always yelling or crying. Usually the ADHD kid is escalating a situation that was at one point fun, but has deteriorated into the other two screaming for him to stop while his brain blocks that out and tells him to make it MORE fun and MORE loud. He can’t read social cues from other kids asking him to stop trying to purposefully irritate them and he certainly isn’t going to be able to read a dog’s cues. If I brought a rescue pup into my home it would either eat the sofa out of pure stress or one of my kids’ faces. Or both.

“But Katie, you can register on a rescue site and tell them your family’s needs!”

Oh, can I? Will I know, beyond a doubt, that the dog won’t get stressed and pee all over my house? Will I know that the dog won’t hear fireworks on the Fourth of July and eat through the garage into the kitchen? Will I know that I can have neighbors or extended family to visit and the dog won’t be triggered by some deep cue and attack a small child? I’ve been on the rescue sites. Do I have months to wait for the right dog, checking the sites every day, pouncing on the rescue I hope is right for our family? NO. Time is the last thing I have on my hands these days.

How will I know the dog won’t come with a myriad of medical issues that will have them in pain for the rest of their lives? What if my rescue needs 3 meds and an allergy shot every day? I absolutely do not have the bandwidth for that. There are people who do. God BLESS them and their big, beautiful hearts.

Listen, bottom line, I’m a dirty dog shopper. We paid an exorbitant amount of money for a golden retriever puppy who lets my kids pull on her neck and ears, who doesn’t bark but gives me a particular look when she needs to go outside, who rarely chews on anything but her toys, and who goes right lnto her crate when it’s bedtime or mealtime and I call to her, “Crate!” Zero training. So very super smart, this amazing dog. We love her so much and I’m so very grateful for the breeder who put an extraordinary amount of time, love, patience and knowledge into making sure she sent good puppies to good homes.

It’s amazing to me that people so readily give their unsolicited opinions to others. We are all doing the best we can based on our own circumstances. If adopting a dog works for you, please do it! If it doesn’t work for you and you want to “shop” for the breed that best fits your needs, then by all means do it! In the words of a friend who talked me through how to handle the unsolicited advice of the “adopt, don’t shop crowd,” “You can’t pick your kids, but you can sure as hell pick your dog.”