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Animals

Pup Fakes Being Sick So Owners Will Stay Home and Cuddle With Him

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You don’t have to convince us that our dogs are smart. They definitely know when to turn on the puppy dog eyes, and according to one pet owner, they’ve learned how to fake being sick in order to get more cuddles.

When Sullivan (or Sully for short) started making an odd choking, coughing, and throat-clearing noise, Kennady Longhurst and Alex Salsberry, his human mom and dad, became concerned. Longhurst first noticed the noise when she returned home at lunchtime, and she immediately called her husband. Longhurst even began researching dog CPR, but Sully’s behavior soon returned to normal, with the dog “wagging his tail, running around acting like himself, besides this weird cough,” she told BuzzFeed News.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BZ9ON0nD1ud/

Salsberry took off the rest of the afternoon to watch over Sully, who occasionally coughed but was for the most part acting normally. By bedtime, Sully was done coughing, and Longhurst and Salsberry thought he was fine. But the next morning while they got ready for work, Sully’s mysterious cough returned. Salsberry ended up working from home, and the couple eventually took Sully to the vet.

Initially, the doctor told Longhurst and Salsberry that Sully might be suffering from kennel cough. But when his test results came back negative, he sent them home with antibiotics in case it was a bacterial infection. Longhurst followed up with the vet, who then told her that sometimes animals will fake being sick or limp for attention.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BbBGB51D_ZI/

“We’re pretty sure he knows that we know he was faking it. So he is just a naughty faker who wanted some extra attention, and boy did he get it,” she told BuzzFeed. “We baby him so much he probably learned that if he acted weird or different someone would spend the day with him.”

https://www.instagram.com/p/BQl4BBaDJCG/

And, apparently, Sully isn’t the only pet who’s pretended to be ill for a little TLC.

https://twitter.com/RoseNoire007/status/926196902122610688?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

Now that we know our pets are secretly conning us into taking time off to shower them in belly rubs and chin scratches, can we even stay mad? After all, they are our fur babies!

h/t Hello Giggles

These pups reuniting with their military moms and dads prove we don’t deserve dogs.

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