I Cook Food For My Dog Every Single Day
I was 12 years old when my family got Tyler, a shih tzu. He was the best thing that ever happened to me, and I remember the day my parents told my sister and me that he was sick. At two or three years old, he’d been diagnosed with cancer. We were hysterical over it.
Right away, the doctors told us, “Even if we treat him, even if we take out his tumor, he won’t live past the age of five.” Still, he underwent a surgery, had his tumor removed, and had chemo. He was completely hairless.
He wouldn’t eat anything at that time. Nothing! [My mom, my sister and I] had to test random foods to see what he would end up eating, because we knew we had to make him eat something [while he was so sick]. He ended up liking a lot of things, like for example, he really liked hot dogs, but we didn’t want to keep feeding him hot dogs. He also ended up liking chicken. So we began feeding him boiled chicken thighs for every meal, and it eventually got to the point where he wouldn’t consider dog food his food. He didn’t even know what it was. I don’t actually remember him ever eating dog food.
That was about ten years ago now.
To this day, my mom, my sister, or I cook for Tyler every single day. Beyond cooking, we also buy him rotisserie chicken. I bought him some yesterday. So either we’ll buy him chicken thighs and boil them, or we’ll buy him a full rotisserie chicken and that’ll last maybe three days. We put [the chicken] on a plate (a human plate!), and we chop it up and put it in front of him. He’ll smell it, back away, and sit down. It’s a game. He doesn’t just all of a sudden eat it. We have to hand feed it to him sometimes.
His human food schedule is super well-regimented. He eats chicken (straight boiled, unseasoned) twice a day. Sometimes we melt cheese on it (he likes mozzarella, by the way) if he’s really not eating and that generally works. He likes brisket if my mom is making it, but that gives him bad diarrhea. Sometimes he likes burgers, so we’ll cut up ground beef for him.
He will never eat [dog food] as a meal, but because dog food still has health benefits, we call [kibble] his “nuggets” and he knows what they are and will eat it as a treat. He gets a little riled up by them, so he’ll scratch and gnaw at the bag and sometimes stick his head in the bag because it’s a game for him.
At no point did my family try to reintroduce dog food back into Tyler’s routine. Sure, we would not have done this if he hadn’t been sick, but his entire ordeal lasted about a year, and he was so young when it happened, it didn’t seem worth it [to not cook for him anymore].
Plus, he’s lived so long. He’s so old! And he’s healthy! He’s happy! He has a lot of energy for a 13-year-old dog! Feeding your dog human food every day sounds ridiculous and everybody who knows him and knows us knows he’s crazy, but it’s worked. He has proven it works.
Sam Netkin lives in New York City. Her mom and her sister “share custody” of Tyler between the city and Long Island.
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