Now I'm not saying my dog is the best thing to ever happen to me... but my dog is the best thing to ever happen to me. Let's just say I didn't know what real love was until my dog came into my life. I'm not talking about puppy love. I'm not even sure why that phrase was coined to describe a "shallow romantic attachment" because anyone who has a dog would know that the love they have for their pups is anything but shallow. In fact, it's probably the deepest love they'll ever experience because, for dog lovers, in general, there is no bond like the bond between a human and their dog.

There are a few different types of human/dog relationships. To name a few, there's the "I mean, yeah, I love my 'pet,' but I also love cheeseburgers and rom-coms" love, and then the "I love my dog but there aren't dog-friendly hotels in the place I want to vacation, so it looks like they're staying home" love, and then there is the "I love my dog so much that I will feed them the cheeseburger off my plate and I'll let them pick the rom-com we're going to watch together and I can't imagine going on vacation without my dog because they deserve this as much as I do" love.

Listen, people, this last type of love is the love I'm talking about, and if you find yourself agreeing with every sign I'm about to list, that means you'd share your cheeseburger and surrender the remote and give up on your dream vacation... all for the happiness of your dog.

1. Every time you come home, no matter if you’ve been gone for an hour or a week, you squeeze your dog so hard it starts to growl at you. But the growls don’t scare you, you squeeze away anyway.

2. When you’re away from your family, you call them just to say hi to your dog… and if you forget to check in with your dog, you get so mad at yourself for not thinking about them 24/7 like you know you should.

3. All of your friends who haven’t met your dog have the absolute highest expectations for your dog because of how frequently you talk about them.

4. You feel guilty when you come home to them after petting another dog. *I promise, she wasn’t that cute anyway*

5. When you’re bored, you find yourself scrolling through photos or watching videos of your dog… and the people who know you well know that the smile on your face isn’t because your crush texted you.

6. You have 400 “pet names” (haha get it?) for your dog… enough that your dog is probably beyond confused as to what their real name is.

7. Every problem you’ve ever had in your life, your dog knows it… they’re the first to hear about the good, the bad, and the ugly.

8. You get personally offended and enraged when people think their dog is cuter than yours.

9. You’ll gladly give up your day’s activities so that you can do something to make your dog happy. They do say you know it’s real love when someone else’s happiness comes before yours…

10. You won’t let your family send out a holiday card unless your dog is smack in the middle of it. Hey, they’re part of the family, too.

11. You’ve celebrated birthdays and planned playdates for them.

12. You couldn’t imagine getting another animal in fear that the OG would feel hurt.

13. Most of your family dinners result in recounting what your dog did that day.

14. You constantly think about how lucky you are that you and your dog ended up together and that they're all yours.