Are shelters and rescue groups driving great homes away with their adoption restrictions?

That was the experience of one popular parenting cartoonist and blogger, Amber Dusick, author of Parenting: Illustrated with Crappy Pictures.

On her blog, Crappy Pictures, she tells the story of how she thoroughly researched all her options for getting a dog for her family of four, and finally settled on adoption from a shelter or rescue group because “it feels like the right thing to do.”

The first few rescue groups she contacted, however, didn’t seem to agree. Her children, ages 6 and 3, were a deal-breaker even for groups that listed their dogs as being “good with children.” When she asked them about that, she was told, “our listings are a general assessment of the dog’s personality and some are good with kids but we do not place our dogs in homes with children. It is for the safety of the dogs.”

She wrote:

I get it. Sorta. Well, not really. I mean, I totally understand not placing a fragile puppy or a teacup pomeranian in a home with rambunctious kids. But this particular org didn’t even have any toy breeds. Or puppies. They advertised “good with kids” yet they wouldn’t even consider us. Wouldn’t even take the time to meet us.

They have oodles of dogs sitting in cages who need homes and yet we aren’t better than a cage. Because we’re a family. A totally-prepared-fully-educated-loving-responsible … family.

I was pissed. Angry.

Did she abandon the idea of a rescued dog and head for the nearest pet store? She did not; she stuck with it until she found a rescue group that believed the right dog and the right kids were a match made in heaven: Pug Nation Rescue of Los Angeles. And now her Crappy Family of four is a family of five with the addition of a sweet little black Pug mix dubbed, of course, Crappy Dog (presumably only on her blog!).

Read the whole piece here, and consider: If Crappy Mama had called your organization, what would she have written about you?