Until you know what was eaten, try to stop beating yourself up.

Dogs eat things. It’s in their nature. If they eat a sock and it blocks them up, that’s bad. But keeping all socks from them is tough. And they like to eat weird things.

Your job is to give them a good life and to try to keep them safe. You can’t demand perfection from yourself, and if your dog could understand, they wouldn’t blame you.

Finally, if you made a mistake, you can use this as a learning experience and do better in the future a bit. The alternative is closing yourself off to love out of fear.

I did this. One of my cats got out on New Years and was hit by a car.

Im the one who lets the dogs out, and he often snuck out when the dogs go out. I didn’t notice.

I will always have to live with that.

But I’m reveling in the love I get from my other pets, not pushing them away.

I honestly don’t deserve…

You don’t deserve to be this hard on yourself… Maybe you’re right, maybe you’re wrong. This is the wake up call to make a good decision. I don’t know you, but it seems from this post, that whatever you choose to do, it will be the right choice.

Keep the pet and make your home an even better place for it, or realize that it’s not a right fit. With how you seem to feel, It seems that there is no third option in your mind to keep everything the same.

This stranger has faith in you.

That sounds very stressful, I hope your dog recovers quickly and that you’re not too hard on yourself.

This happens to the most neat-freak dog owners too; dogs can find bad things to eat while on a walk, or by chewing something they shouldn’t.

Being angry at past you also won’t help future you or your dog. Figure out a way to improve things instead, preferably something that doesn’t rely on you never making a mistake.

I don’t know your situation, but perhaps you could have someone help you, or have friends over regularly so you’re motivated to tidy up, or make part of your house dog safe and keep the mess contained?

You discovered the problem in time, and you took her for prompt veterinary care. You absolutely deserve your pets!

The only thing more aggressively suicidal than a dog/cat is a human toddler. It’s impossible to stop your pets from getting into everything.

My cats have eaten more than their share of plastic, mainly because my natural state is “wasn’t there something in my hand a minute ago? Where could it be? And what could it possibly have been?! Ooh look I see snacks!” Luckily they’ve always horked it back up, but I worry that one day they won’t puke in time.

So, I try to be careful not to set down plastic, even going so far as to mutter, “Don’t open your hand. Go to the trash. Do NOT open your HAND. You are going to the trash. After that come back and <finish the thing>. DO NOT OPEN your stupid HAND! You are going to the trash can. Then go back and <finish the thing>. But first the trash can. But DON’T open…” and so on, for the entire time it takes me to throw the thing away and (ideally) return to what I was doing.

It takes enormous effort to keep the house perfectly safe. Making housekeeping my hobby didn’t work well for me. So instead I know my pets and their normal behaviors, keep a good pet insurance policy, and call the vet when there’s anything weird that’s taking too long to resolve.

You’re giving your pets a much better life than they’d have at the shelter. So, yes, you DO deserve them, and they deserve you.

“Idk why I thought pets were a good idea” … because you deserve to be loved.