We have 2 dogs, 1 cat, and a bird that all started out as hers. My main problem is that it restricts us (and me) from travelling places I want to go. I don’t feel like I have the freedom to do somewhat spontaneous trips to see friends around the country or even see my family, because she refuses to pay a vet or pet suite to take care of the pets for a while (plus it’s expensive). She doesn’t trust them, so we have to always bring the pets with us.
This means, we can’t stay in hotels, we have to find pet friendly Airbnb’s. Then we have to worry about driving long distances with the pets (plus I’m the only driver). We have never flown, but we’ve discussed it. Our current agreement is that we would fly halfway across the country to drop our pets off at her family’s house, then fly to wherever we actually want to go. That sounds expensive and annoying to be honest. It means we can probably only do something like that once a year, with the amount of vacation time I get (3 weeks).
I’m just wondering if anyone has any suggestions on how to maybe compromise or work through this. I don’t want it to be a dealbreaker but it’s making me a bit unhappy.
TL:Dr GF has many pets that makes it hard for us to travel. Not sure if there is anything that might help us through this
4 comments
Many people have pets and travel. Does she not know anyone in your area you could pay to pet sit or leave the animals with? There are also websites/apps that can help you find someone trustworthy. If she’s unwilling to try any of that, then tell her you plan on traveling alone.
Sounds like you need to get comfortable traveling without her and she needs to learn to drive.
Frankly, unless there is a reason she cannot possibly drive, a responsible adult pet owner in their 20s should learn. Full stop. It’s not really reasonable to leave all driving to you unless there is a solid reason she cannot share that labor, especially with the pets in the house.
You also need to have a serious conversation about what happens as these pets age and pass away. If you’re not comfortable with the current number of animals in the house, you need to have a tentative agreement on the ‘goal number’ you will eventually get down too as they do pass away.
If there are particular pets she’s more concerned about leaving them with a vet or pet sitter, talk about taking only the pet(s) with complex needs or concerns, and leaving the others with a good person.
Flying to drop them off with her family seems obviously absurd and unworkable. That’s not really a compromise. Just a major expense. (At that point, probably cheaper to fly a family member out to house sit at your place… but still. Sesh.)
Someone who absolutely refused to allow others to care for their pets, is someone who is basically saying they will not travel and that travel isn’t important to them. That is fine, but it is that that might really be a dealbreaker.
When you have pets, spontaneous travel is really not feasible. While there are more pet-friendly accommodations available, flying anywhere with more than on pet is expensive and cuts down on that “spontaneity”. Spontaneous travel may be more important to you than to her so this is an incompatibility that you need to address.
It seems like you could hire a pet sitter to watch her pets for the same amount of money as flying them across country. But, if she’s unwilling to make that arrangement, then you travel alone or invite family to stay at yours.
She has made her priorities fairly plain.
I mean we currently have two dogs pretty much same ages genders reversed though. You are right you can’t travel spontaneously because of pets. And I do not trust pet places to board them. Hell they stick them in crates and you have to pay extra for them to get “play time” meaning time out of the crate. Would you really want your animals there? I wouldn’t.
If it’s an issue for you you don’t get to travel then it’s a lifestyle incompatibility dude. Also if you only have 3 weeks of PTO it doesn’t sound like you can do much travel anyways just randomly so I’m a little confused by that.
However if travel means so much then she might not be for you. When you got into a relationship with her you knew about these pets. You need about this restrictions. I do think she needs to learn to drive to. Like wtf is that? My partner and I will take our dogs camping 1-2 times a year and have to travel with them but we don’t mind.
So my advice is to either suck it up because you knew that’s what you were getting into. But communicate she needs to learn to drive. And she needs to do half the driving when you go somewhere because it’s bs if you are the only one driving. Or you need to find someone who wants to travel with you.
Edit: spelling