No one has to love my pet. They have to tolerate my pet, though.

Hey Funches...Happy Holidays

Not really, I did qualified it and I would only give her up as a last resort... I love being a pet owner and I am a good one, but my dog does not come before the people I love....Fortunately, I have never had to choose, but if I did, I would choose people over animals every time..

I agree Emily , sadly the shelters are full of animals whose owners have that attitude .

the shelters are full because too many pet owners will NOT spay and nuter their animals.

Shelters are full of pets because of irresponsible pet owners. That includes giving up their pet and not spaying/neutering.

I would determine how important the pet is to my date long before she became a "significant other". Either I'm #1 or we remain just friends or f*** buddies. I will not dictate her status in a relationship. She will choose.

This means that if she introduces her "purse pet" as "my baby", I'll be cordial, we'll have a nice date, and we'll part never to meet again.

Out of curiosity, I googled Emily's question....Recent polls find that if "forced to choose", 14% of pet owners would choose their pet over their spouse or significant other ....When the same question was posed to single pet owners only, the percentage jumped from 14 to 25%....Interesting....

Let's see the source of your recent polls.

And if someone didn't like cats, or were too allergic to be around them, I would find that out pretty quickly. I can't see that kind of person becoming my spouse.

And I'd find it weird that someone could become a spouse, then try to force their spouse to get rid of a pet. The only thing I'd find acceptable is if the couple had a child and that child was allergic to the pet, which became dangerous to his/her health. Then, I would hope the pet owners would find a suitable home for the pet.

Perhaps this was what Leigh was talking about.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/01/25/pet-partner-poll_n_813563.html

NEW YORK — Your sweetheart or your pet. Which would you dump if one had to go?

Most current pet owners said they would hold on to their spouse or significant other (84 percent), but a sizable 14 percent picked their pet, according to an AP-Petside.com poll.

Put Sally Roland, 53, of Omaha, Neb., down in the dog-first column. "I'm divorced, so that might explain it," she joked.

The unmarried, like Roland, are more apt to choose their pet over their mate – 25 percent among unmarried pet owners versus 8 percent among the married.

Count Fidel Martinez, 30, of Akron, Ohio, as forever loyal to Killer. That's his mix-breed, 100-pound rescue dog.

"I would absolutely give up my girlfriend for him," Martinez said. "I know it sounds insane but I've had numerous relationships with women. My dog has never let me down."

For the record: Martinez and Killer have been together for seven years. Martinez and his girlfriend have been together for four. The two-legged pair have no immediate plans to cohabitate, he said, but she does like the dog a lot.

Women are far more likely than men to say the human-pet choice would be a tough one (40 percent among women compared with 26 percent among men). Both genders were equally likely to go with their spouse or significant other, according to the poll conducted by GfK Roper Public Affairs and Corporate Communications.

There was also no difference between dog and cat owners: 35 percent of each said the choice would be a hard one and more than eight in 10 would choose their spouse.

Urban dwellers (47 percent) are more likely to say they'd have a difficult time choosing than did suburbanites (35 percent) or rural residents (25 percent).

Giving up a pet for any reason can be really tough – unless you are the owners of Princess the canine escape artist.

David Rosenthal and his family in Missouri City, Texas, were ready with what they considered an ideal fenced backyard when they welcomed the 2-year-old American Eskimo from a shelter. Then things went from pretty good to not at all.

"She kept getting away," he said. "She'd dig underneath the fence, sneak out through every little crack. It would usually take about an hour or so to corral her."

Even worse, the 49-year-old Rosenthal discovered the hard way that the bushy sago palm plants in the backyard were poisonous to dogs (and humans, too). Princess sampled them and nearly died. Treatment cost about $2,000.

"Plus she was nipping at kids," said Rosenthal, who has three. "We were told it was friendly to kids." So off Princess went, back to the shelter after a year. "It was sad but we knew there was already somebody there to adopt her."

The family now has two other rescue dogs.

About six in 10 adults (57 percent) have had to give up a pet at some point in their lives, with current pet owners (64 percent) a bit more likely to have done so.

The most common reasons had to do with the pet's health: 69 percent said their pet was too sick to live on, 52 percent too sick to be cared for at home. But there are other reasons as well, including about one in 10 (9 percent) who, like Rosenthal, said their animal was too dangerous to keep.

One-third (34 percent) of current pet owners said it would be "extremely" or "very" difficult if they were forced to choose between a pet and a family member who became allergic. Another 20 percent would find the choice somewhat difficult and 46 percent said it would be "not too difficult" or "not difficult at all."

Christopher J. Hampton, 67, in Bellingham, Wash., has loved Pembroke Welsh corgis since he was a kid. He had a 5-year-old he had raised from a pup when he and his wife realized 40 years ago that their year-old son's asthma was dangerously exacerbated by their pet.

"I couldn't give up my son, so that was it," Hampton said.

The AP-Petside.com Poll was conducted October 13 to 20, 2010 by GfK Roper Public Affairs and Corporate Communications. It involved landline and cell phone interviews with 1,501 adults nationwide including 1,000 pet owners. Results among all adults have a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3.3 percentage points; for results among pet owners it is 4.0 percentage points.

So?...


Here are three out of about 103 links I found...If you want more, you do the time...

http://www.psychworld.com/would-you-choose-your-pet-over-your-spouse-2011-02

http://animalrights.about.com/od/companionanimalspets/a/Poll-14-Would-Choose-Pet-Over-Partner.htm


http://www.pawnation.com/2011/01/27/would-you-choose-your-pet-over-your-spouse/

It's common to provide the source when you start posting statistics.

Anyway, when you get into giving up a pet when you have a spouse, it's a bit different than what I've been talking about. There are definitely bigger issues there. As you can see, this thread was about dating someone who is allergic to your pet. I can't see that turning into something more, unless the pet owner is willing to give their pet up pretty quickly for someone they recently met.

Not having been married, I can't comment on the issues some have with pets and their spouses.

I had a five foot long lizard. Who is allergic to big lizards?

BTW, you can litter box train almost any large lizard!

You are sick in the head to think you can make a "pet" out of an Alligator or a Komodo Dragon though. Those are "Raise and release" animals like a lot of others. Take Raccoons for instance. Only a handful of people can keep one in their house after it reaches adulthood for two reasons, it is granted freedom most "pets" are not, and they likewise are treated like a person which means no petting on the head or perpetual googlies directed towards them. They are a LOT smarter than you think. Even the performing primates are treated more like people than animals because a pissed off Chimpanzee, even the small ones are hellaciously strong and can mess a human up hand to hand easily!

I even gave my pet rats more freedom than most people give their own dogs. No they didn't have run of the house but they did have a spacious cage that had an open top patio that they would congregate and get treats to take to the cage with them. Once in a while I would wake up to a rat licking my nose in the middle of the night. but the thing is they came to me when I called them. AND RATS LOVE M&MS Peanut! At least my rats had personalities. But people don't appreciate animals like they pretend they do. They only like the ones that don't scare them. But wheat is more freaky is I had a Morey Eel that was four foot long living in a fifty gallon fish tank. I named him Cecil because of his habit of sticking his head almost a foot out of the water to look around and take food from me. I would hold on to feeder fish by their tail and he would sniff my hand, and I mean he would put his nose RIGHT ON MY HAND and then would snatch the fish from me at first. He then would take them from me more casually but he never ever bit me and he could have. And to think his species was supposed to be timid!

[imghttp://www.independent.co.uk/migration_catalog/article5252812.ece/ALTERNATES/w460/5044707.jpeg]

And he scared women badly! I had a date over who was staring at my fish and Cecil came up and when he lifted his head out of the water staring right back at her she freaked out and had me take her home!

I think that article is very interesting as it shows how very selfish people really are.
When you take on a pet you should be willing to take them on for life, provide and care for theM.not ditch them for your own selfish reasons .
I also would have major concerns about the person that asked me to give up my pet. Starts with the pets..then what else?Sooner are later you would likely break up anyhow.

yep...when someone has a baby with their significate other that is allergic to their pet...just get rid of the baby..you have 5 days to place the baby on the firehouse steps or the police station without being charged with child abandonment

I would not get a pet if the baby was allergic And the Baby is not my significant other ..so try again

try again?,...sure no problem

you already have the pet then the allergic baby comes...do the baby get tossed out with the bath water?...or do the pet go?

she asked about significant others ..not babies.And At my age babies aren,t something I need to worry about.

It's a tough one, because some people form such strong bonds with their pet where the love is unconditional. If both parties were truly fond of each other, i would imagine a compromise could be found to accomodate both the sig other and the beloved pet.

Do you mean a new relationship or an exisiting one?

I agree with this.