Avoiding difficult conversations is human nature, even when having them is part of your job.

A 2019 study published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: General found that people frequently avoid conversations they expect to require emotional effort, including empathy.

The Animal Welfare Act 2006 requires anyone responsible for an animal to take reasonable steps to meet its needs. This includes the need for a suitable diet, or to be protected from pain, suffering, injury and disease. When an owner isn’t doing this, it’s often left to an animal welfare professional to have the conversation. And yet, one of the most common indicators of an unmet welfare need is also one of the easiest to overlook

A 2022 study audio-recorded 917 real veterinary appointments in Ontario, Canada, and found that vets raised the subject of excess weight in only 16.4% of the consultations where it applied. That does not mean veterinary and animal welfare professionals do not care. Often, the opposite is true. But sensitive conversations require time, confidence and headspace to do it well, all of which can be in short supply in a sector where burnout is common.

The family, whose pet “likes his treats.” The elderly person who insists their cat is just a bit “fluffy.” The assistance dog owner who becomes emotional when you mention the body condition score chart. It can be one of the most awkward, difficult conversations you’ll have at work, because it isn’t only about the animal. Bringing up a pet’s weight can come across as a comment on the owner’s body and habits, whether you meant it that way or not. That doesn’t mean we get to avoid it. It means we need to get better at having it, and understanding why we’re inclined to avoid it in the first place is a useful place to start.

The scale of the problem

Pet obesity in the UK is a significant problem. Vets responding to PDSA’s 2023 PAW Report estimated that on average 46% of UK dogs are overweight or obese, whilst other studies have put the figure as high as 65%. PDSA’s Weigh Up campaign found that 82% of owners don’t know their pet’s body condition score, but previous PAW Reports have consistently found that around 80% of dog owners rate their pet as an ideal weight. The gap between what vets see and what owners believe is an ongoing problem, with many owners simply not seeing it as an issue at all, which is exactly why talking to pet owners about weight is so important.

Why is talking to pet owners about weight so difficult?

Partly, it’s the nature of the topic itself. Weight is rarely just about the animal, and raising it risks landing as a comment on the owner’s own habits, home life, or ability to care for their pet.

In fact, a 2020 Dutch study found that “permissive” dog owners, those who gave their dogs a lot of affection but few rules, were more likely to have an overweight dog. This mirrors the well-established link between permissive parenting and childhood obesity. Similarly, a 2024 study of cat caregivers found that most people who feed treats do so to show love or strengthen the bond, not primarily to feed the cat. And why would anyone want to show their pet less love?

Professionals often worry, reasonably, that the conversation will damage the relationship with the client or make them defensive rather than receptive.

A survey following up on the Ontario study asked 102 veterinary professionals directly, and found many said they avoided raising weight altogether with clients they judged likely to be difficult or resistant.

It’s not the only hard conversation

Weight tends to come up most often, but it sits alongside a wider set of conversations that anyone working across veterinary, rescue, pet care, or training will recognise:

• Telling an owner their dog’s behaviour means they can’t safely keep it in their current setup
• Raising early signs of neglect during a home visit or foster check
• Discussing euthanasia timing, particularly when an owner isn’t ready to hear it
• Explaining that a much-loved pet’s quality of life has fallen below an acceptable line
• Discussing the retirement of an assistance dog whose owner relies on them for independence
• Telling a hopeful adopter their home isn’t right for this particular animal

The common thread is the same: these are moments where the animal’s welfare and the owner’s emotions can appear to pull in different directions, and where saying nothing is the easier, worse option.

Guidance for talking to pet owners about weight

Watch out for false confidence. Not everyone who volunteers for the conversation is the right person to have it. In practice, the loudest volunteer, the one who says “let me talk to them, I’ll tell them their dog’s fat,” is often overcompensating for the same discomfort everyone else feels, not immune to it. Bluntness can look like confidence, but it’s frequently the opposite: a way of getting the conversation over with quickly rather than getting it right. The person who pauses, asks permission, and reads the room is usually better placed to have this conversation than the person who’s first to raise their hand.

Ask permission before you dive in. A simple “would it be alright if we talked about Bella’s weight today?” hands the client some control and lowers defensiveness before you’ve said a word about the animal.

Use an objective tool, not a subjective label. Body condition score charts exist precisely so the conversation isn’t “your dog is fat,” it’s “here’s where Bella sits on a scale vets use everywhere, and here’s what a 5 out of 9 looks like.” It depersonalises the message without softening the facts.

Lead with the animal’s experience, not the owner’s failure. Framing that centres on comfort, joint pain, energy, and life expectancy keeps the conversation about welfare outcomes rather than blame. Research into veterinary communication styles consistently finds that persuasive, lecture-style talk tends to provoke resistance, while client-centred approaches that explore what the owner has already tried, and why, are more likely to lead somewhere.

Expect ambivalence and don’t argue with it. Most owners already know, on some level, that extra weight isn’t ideal. Push too hard and people tend to dig in, even when they privately agree with you. It’s a well-established pattern in communication research. Studies looking at veterinary and farm settings specifically have found the same thing: the harder a professional argues the case, the more the client argues back. Reflecting what the owner says back to them, and asking what they think might help, tends to get further than a list of instructions.

Watch for what the weight is standing in for. If treats are tied up with affection, or with managing a difficult behaviour, or with guilt about time away from the animal, the plan has to work with that, not against it. Suggesting alternative ways to show affection (a walk, a training game, more attention) can matter more than the feeding chart itself.

Understand what’s actually at stake for the owner. For an assistance dog owner, a weight conversation can feel like a threat to the dog’s working status. By extension, it can feel like a threat to their own independence, not just a health chat. That’s a very different fear to a pet owner’s guilt or denial, and it calls for a different kind of reassurance: being clear early on that the goal is to keep the dog fit for the job it does, not to take it away.

Keep it proportionate to your role. A quick, kind flag and a referral back to the vet is often the right scope for rescue and pet care staff. You don’t need to run the full clinical conversation to be useful; you just need to say something.

Follow up. A single hard conversation rarely changes a habit on its own. A short check-in a few weeks later, without judgement, keeps the door open rather than treating it as a one-off confrontation.

The professional imperative

None of this is about softening standards. Avoiding talking to pet owners about weight because it’s awkward isn’t kindness, it’s a welfare failure with better manners. A body condition score of 8 or 9, BSAVA’s clinical classification for an “obese phenotype”, is equivalent to at least 30% excess weight and is a documented risk to a pet’s mobility, health, quality of life and life expectancy, whatever the reason it got there. The professionals who do this well aren’t the ones who find it easy. They’re the ones who’ve decided that saying something, carefully, is part of the job description, and who’ve built the emotional intelligence to do it without making the owner feel attacked.

That combination, directness without cruelty, and empathy without avoidance, is arguably one of the most underrated skills in animal welfare work. It doesn’t show up on a CV. But it’s very often the difference between an owner who walks away defensive and an owner who walks away and actually changes something.

Learn more

Celeste Headlee’s TED talk “10 ways to have a better conversation”