Brady begs. Indy waits.
Over the weekend, our son stopped by for a visit and brought along his dog, Brady. Brady has been on a pretty strict diet ever since he became a part of our son's household. Or so I thought.
He'd been losing pounds and looking good, but I hadn't seen him in several weeks. Now it appears that Brady has mysteriously managed to recover some of his previously lost pounds. When I commented on his weight, our son was surprised. He hadn't noticed.
Just goes to show that people can be as oblivious about weight gain in their pets as they can about their own bodies.
An article I read recently indicated that pet obesity is becoming a "big" problem in the United States.
Does this sound familiar? Our pets are so much a part of the family that they do what we do...eat and lounge around in front of the television set. So it's not only people who are getting heavier these days.
Why?
We eat too much.
"Here, Rover. A treat for you and a treat for me. Good stuff, huh, boy? Now let's see what's on Animal Planet."
We don't exercise.
"Let's stay in. It's too (insert word: hot, rainy, cold, windy, etc.) to go outside."
An all too familiar pattern with predictable results.
After we further discussed Brady's weight, our son acknowledged that he had been handing out a lot of "people food" treats from the table. (And Brady begs like a champ in the most persistent way to prove it.) The previous long walks had also decreased.
There you go. It's the same recipe that gleefully glues additional pounds on me.
A solution?
Wouldn't it be great if each of us put down the remote or shut off the computer or closed that book for just 30 minutes each day? And in that 30 minutes Rover and his person could go for a long, long walk outside. (Added bonus: 30 minutes of no snacking.)
We're on a roll now!
Bottom line: you can sit or move. Eat when hungry or eat all the time. Pick healthy foods or junk. It's really all about choices.
And because they do what we do, our pets will travel the same path right along with us.
No matter which direction we choose.
2 comments:
I can so relate to what you say here, Pat. It is all too easy to allow a dog to pile on the pounds. It happened with Barkley. We had been giving him more doggy treats and more people food without realizing he was worming extra treats out of us day after day.
Lady is a shameless beggar, and if that fails, she's a blatant thief! I don't snack much, but if I go into the kitchen to get a so much as a cracker, she hears the box and comes running!
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