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Most people know returning a found dog is the right thing to do, right up until they get attached and start making exceptions for themselves.

A woman watched her family take in a “stray,” convince themselves it had been abandoned, and then quietly begin hiding it indoors when missing posters started going up around the neighborhood.

Everyone around them told them to give it back, and they ignored every single one of those people.

She eventually found the number on the poster, called the owner herself, and let the situation resolve the way it should have weeks earlier.

What makes this story worth reading isn’t the dog or even the family’s stubbornness; it’s the question of what you owe the people around you when they’re clearly doing something wrong and waiting for someone to stop them.

Keep reading for the full story.

AITA for doxxing my family?

Everything started with my family “adopting” a dog off the street.

This dog was well behaved, clean, and well fed when they got it. My sister-in-law claimed that she saw when it was abandoned, but there was no way to prove this.

But then something peculiar started happening.

A couple of weeks later, posters of a missing dog started appearing around our neighborhood.

Yes. That one. It was clearly that one.

Her family started getting real dodgy real quick.

They started hiding it from everyone, not letting it go on walks or anything so no one would see it.

Everyone around them started noticing and told them to give it back, even her mom.

Then the truth starts to come out.

Yes, they knew it was the same one, but they had grown fond of it.

I hoped they’d come to their senses and give this five year old dog back to its owners, but it didn’t seem like that was going to happen.

To be honest, as a dog owner, it was painful to see their reaction, their stubbornness, and even their rudeness toward the advice of people around them.

She decided she couldn’t just stand idly by any longer.

So I ended up reaching out to the guy on the phone number that was on the poster and told him what he needed to know.

The situation continued to escalate.

The guy came over and they pretended they didn’t know anything, so he went to the police to file a report on the dog being stolen.

They had to end up confessing and giving it back.

They got their own dog now, but they won’t stop talking about it.

Now she’s wondering if ratting her family out was the right decision.

I did the right thing, but I feel bad, I guess.

I did not get any money from it, by the way, so AITA for exposing personal information out of doing what I thought was right?

Was doing the right thing really that difficult?

Redditors chime in with their thoughts.

This user agrees that the momentary discomfort was worth looking out for the dog.

Maybe it’s best to keep her intervention under wraps for now.

There’s no question in this user’s mind that what her family did was wrong.

This user tries to consider the alternatives.

What’s hardest to shake about this story is that she’s the one sitting with guilt over something Redditors unanimously agreed was the right decision.

If anyone deserves to feel guilty, it’s the family who decided to basically steal a dog off the streets and refuse to give it back, just because of their own selfish attachments.

This family had multiple opportunities to own up to their mistake. And if they had done so right away, it’s possible everyone could have had a good laugh about it.

When you refuse to do the right thing, sometimes someone else has to step in and do it for you.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a tenant who decided to stop returning his neighbor’s misplaced laundry after two years.