Is It OK For A Dog to Eat Chocolate?

My husband is a chocoholic—white, milk, or dark he loves them all. Halloween is bigger than Christmas for him. Bags and bags of assorted chocolates are sampled all week as he waits for the kids to come. He eats candy between trick-or-treaters and then polishes off what is left when they stop ringing the doorbell. I don’t know why he doesn’t weigh a 1000 pounds or puke for days after gorging on M&Ms, Reese’s, Snickers, and Hershey bars. I know this can’t be healthy for him, but if he only does it once a year I guess it can’t do too much damage to his body.

Whom I worry about more is our girls—Abby and Gracie—two wonderful little Bichon’s that will eat anything we eat. Abby loves watermelon and Gracie would eat Cheerio’s every meal. I know, we shouldn’t feed them people food and I’m very careful about how much and what we let them have. This is their only their second Halloween and Hubby is not as careful about not letting them have foods they shouldn’t eat. Fortunately, I stopped him from treating them to a handful of M&Ms. Geesh! I thought everyone knew dogs couldn’t have chocolate! When dogs eat chocolate it can make them so sick they need to see a vet. If they eat enough—they can even die. Chocolate contains theobromine and caffeine which are both stimulants that can speed up their heart rate, increase their blood pressure or cause irregular heart rhythms. Miss Gracie already has an irregular heart rhythm, and chocolate could be especially harmful to her.

So, if you have a dog that accidentally gets hold of some chocolate, here’s a great Chocolate Toxicity Calculator and tips on how to use it. Be careful with your dogs around candy or chocolate. You gotta’ watch after them like you watch after little kids—or should I say like you would watch after a husband!

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