I'll make this as brief as possible and seeking responses immediately as I have a scheduled meeting tonight with said dogsitter.

I would love opinions on whether or not I should confront my dogsitter and if so, how to do it.

Situation: I just returned from a 10 day trip and left my 2 dogs (4 months and 7 years) in the care of a dogsitter recommended by his mom who is an acquaintance of mine. I chose this particular 35 yr old man because he had suffered a stroke and his mom told me he loves animals and due to his recovery, he could not work and was home all the time napping and hanging out. Since I had a puppy, this appealed to me because of the supervision she requires and potty training needs. I met with him twice before my trip and had no issues.

Upon my return, my neighbor came over to report that she felt the puppy was neglected and abused in my absence. They witnessed 4-5 accounts of high-pitched yelping coming from the house immediately following verbal reprimands (one they could clearly hear was related to a potty accident). The neighbor spent 4 days building a deck in her yard and said that my puppy was in my yard unsupervised for up to 3 hours at a time (laying next to the fence trying to get her attention). The worst report was that she had dug a hole and dogsitter "laid into her" so badly, she was "yelping bloody murder".

Beside myself with guilt and anger, I called the mother yesterday to discuss. She said that she was shocked to hear this and did not believe it was possible. She and her husband had ALSO helped dogsit when the son had to go to doctor visits. She did, however, corroborate the story about the puppy digging the hole and told me her son reported to her "I really laid into her because I wanted to make sure she wouldn't dig again. She wouldn't come near me for 2 hours afterward". She said there was another incident where the puppy was trying to escape the yard and he essentially smashed her with the door trying to prevent her escape and she yelped for quite a while afterward).

The mom asked me to delay the meeting with her son so she could be in town to support him following my meeting tonight because the stroke has made him extremely vulnerable to panic attacks and she's worried I'm going to traumatize him. I also inquired about his anger aggression which ( I just learned yesterday) is present in up to 30% of stroke victims and she confirmed to me he DID have issues with that in months past but she thought his meds had cured that.

My puppy seems fine except for new fear/ submission peeing. Mother reported this happened in her presence as well. This could be from fear over the incidents ... (more)