The pup's one of the children

I have detected a sadly sneering attitude to our family's new addition, Coco - our 12-week-old black puppy with two white bobby socks. Indeed, I have been astonished by the sheer numbers of friends who have accused me of only getting Coco so I can drone on about her in print. I can't think where they got that fanciful notion from.

Or that I am, to use a currently fashionable phrase, "muscling in" on pet ownership to curry favour somehow with the reams of readers who own dogs rather than babies. For the record, I was the last in our family to want a dog. I gave in after two years of unremitting pressure, and yes, it is me that does all the dirty work, so no surprises there.

A couple of my girlfriends dropped round in the early days to see the new puppy, just as they do when one has hobbled home with the new baby after one's leisurely four-hour confinement in a London NHS maternity unit.

Both already had dogs, and were supportive and lent me things like the Puppy Raisers' Manual and her cage (yes, English puppies now live in cages, just as English children get sent to boarding school). "Can't wait to check out your puppy," both said at the doorstep, before racing past me to inspect Coco's teeth and hindquarters.

Of course, I immediately wanted to compare my puppy with other puppies - just as my friends had wanted to see mine. The problem was the only other friends with a dog of Coco's age have a dachshund, and our pup is a collie-labrador cross.

Not realising the apples-and-oranges nature of this situation (but rather like a first-time mother who thinks her newborn baby's development requires music group/visits to London Zoo), I made a play date for Coco with Danny.

On the appointed day, we went to pay our respects, me clutching my baby-shower gift of a succulent chewy treat in lieu of pale-blue booties from Bonpoint.

I made a big fuss of Danny, who is about the size of a large grasshopper, and told his mother that he was, without doubt, the most beautiful, charming and accomplished dog in the world, compliments she accepted as no less than his due.

After canine pleasantries had been exchanged, we went out with the puppies. It wasn't exactly walkies. Danny was being carried in the crook of his mistress's arm and Coco decided, at that moment, that she didn't do pavements, but only nice, soft grass. We tried gamely to ignore the hoots of derision and gales of laughter from passing vans, but I cannot claim that Coco's debut doggy social was a tremendous success.

Over the weekend, I bumped into Danny's master in the local park. He was rushing to collect a child from a party, but I hailed him with a sense of eager anticipation, of business unfinished. "How's Danny?" I remembered to ask politely after his own puppy, but then I could not contain myself.

"Our new puppy's just over there, by the tree!" I cried. "Come over and meet her! You haven't seen her yet, have you!" He looked at me, appalled. "No thanks," he said, accelerating past me with a mustdash sort of grin.

I returned to my rug on the grass, feeling rebuffed and protective. I'd been ever so nice to Danny! I whined to myself. I'd told Danny's mistress that Danny was perfect! Why couldn't he at least do me the courtesy of pretending that he was interested in my puppy?

Of course, I don't need to be told the answer. Other people's puppies are as noisy and unwelcome as other people's children. One unaccountably thinks - despite all the evidence heaped to the contrary - that one's own children/animals are perfect, and, of course, the flipside to this natural maternal prejudice is that most other people will find them unattractive, if not actually nauseating.

And while women are adept at finding something to praise (my elder son's ears were much admired), men - well, men generally don't deserve a GoodBoy Choc Drop on that score.

Oh yes - I forgot to mention that all my health-nut, gluten-free and dairy-intolerant friends assumed I got a puppy for a quite different reason. Last week there was a front-page story saying that children with pets took, on average, 18 fewer days off school than their non-pet-owning peers.

"So you got Coco for the kids' immune systems, right?" several chums asked earnestly, before telling me all about Immunoglobulin A, which is higher in children who share their homes with a cat or dog.

Well, as I'm afraid that the puppy has already learnt to lick peanut butter from Milly's fingers, all I can say in answer to that ridiculous idea is, of course, "I should Coco!"