UPDATE — 8/25, 5:45 p.m. ET: Days after first revealing she returned her rescue dog, Allen clarified that the dog was quickly rehomed.
Lily Allen is speaking out about the “really tough” time she has been experiencing as a result of backlash to her recent admittance that she returned an adopted puppy to the shelter.
In a post to X on Sunday, August 25, the “Smile” singer, 39, said “people have been furiously reacting” to her decision to send back the dog, due to the fact it destroyed the family’s passports, and the criticism has “impacted [her] family.”
“We rescued our puppy Mary from a shelter in NY and we loved her very much, BUT she developed pretty severe separation anxiety and would act out in all manner of ways,” Allen explained in the post.
“She couldn’t be left alone for more than 10 mins, she had 3 long walks a day 2 by us and 1 with a local dog walker and several other dogs,” she continued. “We worked with the shelter that we rescued her from and they referred us to a behavioral specialist and a professional trainer, it was a volunteer from the shelter who would come and dog sit her when we were away, and after many months and much deliberation everyone was in agreement that our home wasn’t the best fit for Mary.”
Allen further clarified that the puppy was rehomed almost immediately with a trusted individual. “The person that she was rehomed with was known to us and that rehoming happened within 24 hours of her being returned. We couldn’t meet Mary’s needs and her happiness and welfare were central to us making that decision, as difficult as it was.”
“I’ve had rescue dogs pretty consistently throughout my life since I was 4 years old, I’m pretty good at ascertaining a dogs needs,” Allen emphasized.”I have never been accused of mistreating an animal, and I’ve found this whole week very distressing.”
Original story:
Lily Allen recently admitted that she returned an adopted puppy after it destroyed some of Allen’s very important documents.
Speaking on the August 21 episode of her “Miss Me?” podcast, which she hosts with friend Miquita Oliver, the “Smile” singer, 39, explained that after rescuing a dog to join her family, the animal “ate” her and her children’s passports, resulting in her returning the pup to the shelter it came from.
“We actually did adopt a dog already, but then it ate my passport and so I took her back to the home,” she clarified.
“She ate all three of our passports and they had our visas in,” Allen added. “ I cannot tell you how much money it cost me to get everything replaced, because it was in Covid and so it was just an absolute logistical nightmare.”
Allen, who currently lives in New York with her two kids and husband David Harbour, further fumed that the dog’s actions kept her children away from their dad, her ex Sam Cooper, who resides across the pond. (Allen and Cooper, 46, share daughters Ethel Mary, 12, and Marnie Rose, 11.)
“Because the father of my children lives in England, I couldn’t take them back to see their dad for like four months, five months, because this f–king dog had eaten the passports,” she recalled.
“I just couldn’t look at her. I was like, you’ve ruined my life,” she said of the dog.
Allen didn’t specify the dog’s name, but according to the Daily Mail, she adopted a pup named Mary from a New York City animal rescue in 2021. The outlet pointed to an Instagram account that was started to share pictures of the puppy, and abruptly stopped updating without explanation.
Allen, for her part, defended her decision to return the pet by explaining that the animal was a bad overall fit for her family, behavior-wise. “Passports weren’t the only thing she ate, she was a very badly behaved dog and I really tried very hard with her,” she said. “It just didn’t work out and the passports were the straw that broke the camel’s back so to speak.”
Allen and Cooper welcomed Ethel Mary in 2011, followed by Marnie Rose in 2013. She and Cooper separated in 2016 and their divorce was finalized in June 2018. She was first linked to Harbour in August 2019, confirming their engagement in May 2020 before the couple tied the knot in Las Vegas that September.
