Yet, this sacred trust is challenged by ignorance and disrespect, as her friend’s husband dismisses the invisible struggles she endures and undermines the very essence of Onyx’s purpose. His refusal to understand the gravity of her condition threatens not just the peace of their friendship, but the fragile safety that Onyx tirelessly maintains every day.
So I have severe epilepsy and have a service dog Onyx. Now Onyx does have time to cuddle and relax and be at rest and just be a dog. But when he is working he is WORKING at keeping me alive.
He’s saved my life multiple times.
Now my friend has been coming over a lot recently to visit. I love her but have an issue with her husband. He’s one of those types who harbors the believe that have a dick makes him superior to women.
He also doesn’t believe in invisible disabilities and because of Onyx he’s never seen me have a seizure.
Last week they came over and her husband was being playful with Onyx which was fine as he was at rest. A little while later though the husband began asking if he could dogsit sometime bring Onyx to their place for a sleepover.
I said no and explained AGAIN that Onyx is a service dog and I needed him to ya know…… Stay alive. Her husband got an attitude and told me Onyx wasn’t a machine and I had no right to deprive him of fun.
Then he pulled the I’m a man so I know more than you card by explaining that I was wrong and he was right and I could go one night without onyx and control my seizures. All this time my friend sat on the couch saying nothing.
I asked him to leave and after some huffing and puffing about how rude I am and what happened to manners and Onyx would’ve had fun they both did.
Now today my friend called asking if they could stop by. I explained that I would love to have her over but her husband was no longer welcome. She got upset and told me that he was just like that and it was hard to tell sometimes because he had never seen me have a full blown seizure.
I got kinda mad and sarcastically asked her if I should purposely cause a seizure so her husband was comfortable. She just kept repeating that he meant no harm and wanted Onyx to have fun.
I just told her again that she is welcome but he is not.
I had to work with Onyx for two weeks at a training center before I could even bring him home so he knew exactly how to help me i.e read my body and triggers and so we worked together and we’re completely in synch.
He’s extremely well trained and I feel like that might have something to do with this.
Conclusion
The original poster (OP) is facing a significant conflict rooted in defending the necessary boundaries surrounding their service animal, Onyx, against a friend and her husband who dismiss the OP’s medical needs. The OP acted to protect their safety by banning the husband after he aggressively disregarded the dog’s working role and questioned the OP’s disability, while the friend remained passive during the initial confrontation.
Is the OP justified in permanently excluding the friend’s husband based on his disrespectful behavior and dangerous misunderstanding of a service dog’s function, or did the OP overreact to a situation where the husband, despite his flawed reasoning, was simply trying to interact with a dog?
Here’s how people reacted:
And he’s not “deprived of fun”, Service dogs enjoy working, and pleasing you and helping you and being told they’re a good boy/girl! Unfortunately your friend is with a manipulative person, and I would fear that he would do something to try and distract the dog to cause an episode or because he thinks the dog isn’t having much fun or whatever bullshit excuse he decides to use.
And if you allow him in one more time on the condition he left the dog alone and any discussion of the dog and its treatment and happiness is off the table, I’m sure he’d be an AH and ruin it anyway and no one likes to be fooled twice.
Second, I find it very odd that he would try to arrange a sleepover with someone’s dog. It’s not like you mentioned needing to go somewhere and couldn’t take Onyx or that he would house the dog in an emergency. He just straight up wants to take the dog to his own house for some reason. Am I insane for thinking that’s weird??
You get to choose who you invite into your home.
Since his argument is that you’d be fine one night without Onyx, tell your friend that she’ll be fine for a couple of hours without her husband.
(Thank you guys for the awards! Much appreciated.)
NTA
Your friend’s husband is TA and your friend is as well, quite frankly. How could she have remained silent while he berated you because HE wanted what HE wanted?!
Tell him to get his own dog and leave yours alone!
Also what kind of a friend is she wherein she defends her husband coz he hasn’t seen you have a seizure? It’s enough information to know that you suffer from them and have a service dog for the same.
Friend’s husband is a piece of work.
On the off chance said husband is reading this – a service dog is a vital companion to people. It is not a fucking DVD you borrow when the mood takes you.
Also you don’t need that kind of negativity in your life.
It’s sad that your friend is stuck with a jerk. She seems to think that because she settled for a jerk, you should compromise your safety and tolerate his bad behavior too.
You don’t have to put up with that, much less in your own home. Your friend is trivializing her husband’s behaviour when instead she needs to call him out.
Her: “he’s just like that”
Response: “and he’s perfectly welcome to be like that absolutely anywhere except in my home.”
Service status aside, anyone this pushy with other people’s pets when they’re clearly not being abused is annoying.