On-call dog sitting? Is this a thing?

Post date: 2021-04-08 07:35:12

At some indeterminate point in July, I will allegedly give birth to a human child. This is nice. However, I am having serious anxiety over some logistical questions about the actual process, the most pressing of which (don't judge!) is: how the eff do I find someone to look after my dogs if I don't know when or for how long I will be in hospital? Surely this is a solved problem....but my pregnancy-addled brain cannot figure it out.

I'm sure obsessing about this detail is just a way of displacing my other fears and concerns about birth/parenthood/etc., but let's just let that slide for the time being and consider the following conundrum:
- I have two large, very spoiled dogs. One of whom would be fine (if sad) on his own for many hours, one of whom is not at all trustworthy in the house without human supervision.
- I have no family or friends nearby. (We moved at the start of the pandemic, and have yet to form any relationships that I would feel comfortable relying on for a potentially call-in-the-middle-of-the-night-and-ask-to-stay-at-our-house-for-unknowable-amount-of-time type favour)
- I could potentially be in the hospital for several days (I think? I honestly have no idea how birth works)
- I will most likely not have a planned c-section or induction, and therefore have no idea when I will need the dog sitter, or for how long
- Current COVID protocols at our hospital are that my allowed "support person" (i.e. my partner) can be with me in the delivery room/recovery room, but once they're in, they can't leave and return. So, for example, my husband could not drive home every few hours to check on the beasts.
- If given free reign of the house, the dogs do have safe access to an enclosed outdoor yard via a doggie door. However, at least one dog is really not trustworthy to be given free reign of the house. If left in a doggy-proofed area (our garage), dogs do not have access to outside and are therefore very time-limited on how long they can be in there. But regardless, I really don't fancy the idea of just leaving the dogs alone for many, many hours. That seems incredi-bad.
- We presumably can't "book" a dog-sitter to come stay with the fiends (my preferred option) because we don't have a definite date or duration for needing their services.

So, this is all a very long-winded way of asking: is there such a thing as "on-call" or emergency dog-sitting?? How does it work? Do you have specific recommendations for such a service in Seattle?

Alternatively, if the above is NOT a thing that exists, how do people deal with this obviously very common problem? Surely I'm not the only pregnant person with dogs (or other dependents!!) who require in-person care while I'm off doing horrible labour things?!

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