It was bitter sweet as on the one hand Valeri was more and more attentive and loving but also more insecure, jeolous and paranoid!
He went from one extreme to the other!
Valeri was getting more abusive and aggressive on the bad days and yet more loving, caring and kind on the days that were good!
My dog Lula was becoming a problem to him as he felt it was unhygenic for her to sleep on my bed. In fact he felt that she shouldn't even be in the house! Claiming that you wouldnt have chickens or pigs inside!
In Bulgaria dogs are not seen as pets but as working animals that are there to guard property and therefore are usually chained up outside. They are not seen as anything different to the chickens, goats, pig etc that are common in most gardens in rural villages in Bulgaria!
In my opinion dogs as well as other animals such as horses and donkeys are treated poorly especially by the standards we are used to in England! However I am of the opinion that this is due to poverty! To have a dog merely as a pet and as part of the family is pretty unheard of and thats probably due to being an unnecessary expense, even a luxury that most Bulgarians cant afford!
Valeri was however pretty OCD about cleanliness, amongst other things, so if Lula had been on the bed, he would strip it down and change the bedding!
In the car he would sit on a sheet rather than the seat if she had sat on it!
Whenever she went to lick him, he would push her away and scrub his face and hands!
It did not help that he was also very jealous of the attention I gave Lula!
He would say that she was very clever at manipulating me and wanted to come between us as she was used to all my attention and did not want to share me with him!
Of course I laughed it off as absurd but read between the lines that he was just jeolous as I did, to be fair, give Lula most of my attention and did not go anywhere without her and did not restrict access to her anywhere in my home!
On a few occasions when he shut her outside or locked her in a room and even told her to get off my bed or furniture, I stood my ground and would not give in to his demands.
I did understand that as he was not a dog lover like me, that being covered in dog hair or being licked by Lula who was by my side 24/7 was perhaps too much for him to come to terms with especially with his cultural views of dogs being there to serve a purpose so
in the end, we reached a compromise with me agreeing to having time with Valeri alone and leaving Lula at home while we went out for a meal together, played tennis or some other kind of activity or quality time with him as the focus!
I even allowed him one bedroom in the house that Lula would not go into so he could put his clothes there and have a nap knowing that she hadnt been in there and on the bed!
This solution did not stop him from complaining about Lula and me 'treating her like a child' but it did make him feel less threatened, so he was more tolerant and even kinder to her!
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