Pet owners: Preparing your pets for new baby

DottyBlue · June 2012

After the cat post below, I wanted to make sure that you see this blog entry:

https://babiesandbeasts.blogspot.com/search/label/The%20MOST%20IMPORTANT%20post%20in%20here

There are great tips on preparing your pets before the baby comes, helping pets adjust after you bring the baby home and how to allow your child to interact with your pet. It's dog specific, but many of these things apply to cats as well.

iadanza · June 2012

Thanks for the post. My husband and I have been concerned with how one of our dogs will react to the baby because he's so spoiled right now.

Mrschica · June 2012

We have two morkies... One of them is a daddy's boy, but as soon as DH gets out of bed, he goes straight to my belly and lays right next to it. The other one has always been a momma's boy and growls whenever a stranger comes anywhere near me. Since they are only 9lbs each, I'm not too worry about them hurting baby. We will bring the baby blanket and have them slowly approach the baby as soon as we bring him home. For my, my morkies are my first two babies, and there would be no reason for me to treat them any differently unless they did something that could seriously hurt anyone.

jerseygirl612 · June 2012

Thanks. I have been doing A TON of reading about this since we have a large Rottewiler who is spoiled. I am actually even going to buy a crying baby soon just so she can start adjusting to the noise.

milkandhoney77 · June 2012

Thanks for posting, there's some good advice here. I'm a little worried how my furry baby is going to handle the new baby. He gets A LOT of attention right now. A friend brought her baby over the other day and my dog just would not stop barking at the baby. Not a good sign!

legalbeagle1 · June 2012

There was a really good Pregtastic podcast about this where they brought in an animal trainer. Her voice was so soothing and what she said made a lot of sense. My big takeaway was there is no such thing as a "good" dog. You should always monitor your baby and your dog even if your dog has no history of aggression/has played well with baby before and whether you have a small bundle of fluff or a large dog.

hboo2011 · June 2012

Mrschica:
We have two morkies... One of them is a daddy's boy, but as soon as DH gets out of bed, he goes straight to my belly and lays right next to it. The other one has always been a momma's boy and growls whenever a stranger comes anywhere near me. Since they are only 9lbs each, I'm not too worry about them hurting baby. We will bring the baby blanket and have them slowly approach the baby as soon as we bring him home. For my, my morkies are my first two babies, and there would be no reason for me to treat them any differently unless they did something that could seriously hurt anyone.

There's no such thing as a morkie. You mean a maltese yorkie mix, aka a mutt...

OP, thanks for the info. I have two spoiled rotten pups at home, we have 20 weeks to get them used to the idea of a baby in the house!

Mrschica · June 2012

hboo2011:
Mrschica:
We have two morkies... One of them is a daddy's boy, but as soon as DH gets out of bed, he goes straight to my belly and lays right next to it. The other one has always been a momma's boy and growls whenever a stranger comes anywhere near me. Since they are only 9lbs each, I'm not too worry about them hurting baby. We will bring the baby blanket and have them slowly approach the baby as soon as we bring him home. For my, my morkies are my first two babies, and there would be no reason for me to treat them any differently unless they did something that could seriously hurt anyone.

There's no such thing as a morkie. You mean a maltese yorkie mix, aka a mutt...

OP, thanks for the info. I have two spoiled rotten pups at home, we have 20 weeks to get them used to the idea of a baby in the house!

yes, they are mutts... however, according to the vet and their insurance, there is such a thing as a morkie! either way, they are my little twin munchkins!

julieklu · June 2012

Some of that advice is just ever going to happen. I mean..."don't walk around with snacks?" I doubt you will be able to find ALL of those hidden cheerios your LO has...hahaha.

hboo2011 · June 2012

Mrschica:
hboo2011:

Mrschica:
We have two morkies... One of them is a daddy's boy, but as soon as DH gets out of bed, he goes straight to my belly and lays right next to it. The other one has always been a momma's boy and growls whenever a stranger comes anywhere near me. Since they are only 9lbs each, I'm not too worry about them hurting baby. We will bring the baby blanket and have them slowly approach the baby as soon as we bring him home. For my, my morkies are my first two babies, and there would be no reason for me to treat them any differently unless they did something that could seriously hurt anyone.

There's no such thing as a morkie. You mean a maltese yorkie mix, aka a mutt...

OP, thanks for the info. I have two spoiled rotten pups at home, we have 20 weeks to get them used to the idea of a baby in the house!

yes, they are mutts... however, according to the vet and their insurance, there is such a thing as a morkie! either way, they are my little twin munchkins!

Thank you for acknowledging they are mutts! (that's not snarky, I actually do mean that).

I volunteer at a shelter. You have NO idea how annoying it is to hear people come in requesting to see 'morkies, shi-poos', or whatever else puppy stores are coming up with these days. Once you mush two dogs together, they're a mutt. Morkies, or any of these other crazy mix dogs, are not registered with the AKC b/c they're not a breed. I've worked in a vet office, as well, and trust me. People come in with the absolute craziest dog 'breed' names, and will try to convince the staff 'it's a real breed because I paid $1,500 for it!'. The vet office and pet insurance will put down whatever you tell them to for the dog breed.

Sorry if my vent sounded bratty. It's just a huge pet peeve of mine, beyond belief; once you volunteer in a shelter, and learn the true meaning behind pet stores/puppy mills, you tend to be a bit bratty when it comes to anyone talking about the made up designer breeds, ya know? Ok. Vent over. Thanks for listening

teamsweet · June 2012

I did a lot of research before DS was born (including reading Pittieboo's blog post). And in the end, it ends up making sure your pets are trained and well-behaved before the baby comes home.

When we brought DS home, we had two dogs a 50lb boxer and 90lb rottweiler. Both dogs were from the shelter and during our time with them, we've worked on separation anxiety, dog aggression, fear aggression, etc. But the thing is that we worked on all of their issues years before the baby was around. They didn't have any behavior issues (guarding, jealousy, whatever) when DS was born.

So when we did bring him home, it was no big deal but we were vigilant. We don't leave our dogs alone with our son (who is now 2) for more than a few seconds at a time. We don't let him put his hands in the food bowls when they are eating. We don't let him play in the dog crate. Our dogs have a special place that is DS free (it's our bed currently). And we make sure the dogs keep their distance when DS wants to play alone.

Sure, he's gotten knocked down by accident but they have a great relationship. We recognize when he's making the dogs uncomfortable and do a lot of positive reinforcement on both sides. Our rottweiler passed away a few months ago and we're doing these same things with our new dog.

We've been lucky b/c our son is very gentle with our dogs and cat and we spend a lot of time with the dogs and son together.

LBoogeyBride · June 2012

Great information! Thank you so much for providing this!

Mrschica · June 2012

hboo2011:
Mrschica:
hboo2011:

Mrschica:
We have two morkies... One of them is a daddy's boy, but as soon as DH gets out of bed, he goes straight to my belly and lays right next to it. The other one has always been a momma's boy and growls whenever a stranger comes anywhere near me. Since they are only 9lbs each, I'm not too worry about them hurting baby. We will bring the baby blanket and have them slowly approach the baby as soon as we bring him home. For my, my morkies are my first two babies, and there would be no reason for me to treat them any differently unless they did something that could seriously hurt anyone.

There's no such thing as a morkie. You mean a maltese yorkie mix, aka a mutt...

OP, thanks for the info. I have two spoiled rotten pups at home, we have 20 weeks to get them used to the idea of a baby in the house!

yes, they are mutts... however, according to the vet and their insurance, there is such a thing as a morkie! either way, they are my little twin munchkins!

Thank you for acknowledging they are mutts! (that's not snarky, I actually do mean that).

I volunteer at a shelter. You have NO idea how annoying it is to hear people come in requesting to see 'morkies, shi-poos', or whatever else puppy stores are coming up with these days. Once you mush two dogs together, they're a mutt. Morkies, or any of these other crazy mix dogs, are not registered with the AKC b/c they're not a breed. I've worked in a vet office, as well, and trust me. People come in with the absolute craziest dog 'breed' names, and will try to convince the staff 'it's a real breed because I paid $1,500 for it!'. The vet office and pet insurance will put down whatever you tell them to for the dog breed.

Sorry if my vent sounded bratty. It's just a huge pet peeve of mine, beyond belief; once you volunteer in a shelter, and learn the true meaning behind pet stores/puppy mills, you tend to be a bit bratty when it comes to anyone talking about the made up designer breeds, ya know? Ok. Vent over. Thanks for listening

Totally not offended! we picked them mostly because we have a tiny apartment, and were concerned about allergies... and I agree with you, I totally side eye people that "only" want "designer" dogs just because they are "in style." We picked these solely because I saw them and absolutely fell head over heels in love!!!

cwallac · June 2012

We've already started buying things to have out for our animals to get used to. We have three cats and two dogs. We haven't gotten any of the big furniture yet but we've gotten a carseat and a few other things. The dogs didn't care after they smelled it a bit but the cats thought it could be their personal bed! Ha ha. So after a bit of checking it out... we put it away. I don't want it covered it pet hair already!

We've also started playing crying baby sounds for them and surprisingly.... none of them cared. Only one of our dogs even looked in that direction. Kind of surprising.

The blog entry was interesting but sadly.... I have done pretty much all the things the blogger said not to let kids do to your dog. We did all those things (minus teasing of course) to help prepare our dogs when we got them as pups for kids and people. We didn't want aggressive dogs at all and they are big boys! 75lbs a piece. Not saying we'll let our baby do those things all the time and whenever they want but should it occur, we wanted to know that our dogs would tolerate it. We didn't want to worry about how our dogs would be once we had kids.

KorieAngela · June 2012

Thank you!!!

runningmango · June 2012

Thanks for posting this! We have 3 dogs, a pitbull, golden retriever and mini-Aussie, and of the 3 we're pretty sure our golden will take this child the worst. Don't get me wrong, he'll love him and everything, but our dogs are SO spoiled I'm pretty sure the golden will cry real tears when he realizes little one is here to stay

fragile1000 · June 2012

Great post and blog!! When Sarah was on her way I used a book called Tell Your Dog You're Pregnant: An essential guide for dog owners who are expecting a baby. It was really helpful and came with a CD of sounds. Molly took some time to get used to the sounds but the book helped on how to do it. Maybe that will help someone else! Cool

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