When it comes to having a baby, you can prepare for everything and accidentally forget that major changes in your life are like to affect the life of your dog or your cat. When my daughter was born, we had four dogs and all four needed to get used to a new routine. When it comes to arranging things for your baby’s imminent arrival, let’s talk about getting your dogs ready.
- Invest in an Obedience Course – if your dog has never gone through an obedience course, this might be the best time to do it. A young and rambunctious dog is a great thing, but it can be dangerous around your newborn baby
- Make the Baby’s Room Off limits – As soon as we set up the space we were setting aside for the baby, we taught the dogs they couldn’t go in there. They understood the limitation and a baby gate across the door reinforced this – our dogs could jump the gate with no problem, so it was important to reinforce their training
- Introduce the dogs to other babies and small children – you need to know immediately if your dog or dogs will have a problem with small children or infants – it’s very important to recognize these issues immediately. One of our dogs used to get annoyed when the baby cried, but he was never annoyed with the baby, he was annoyed with us – he’d herd us towards the baby to make it better – it was pretty funny
- You can practice with your animal by getting a life size baby doll – teaching them how to not step on or climb around the baby – you can also teach them how to respect your space when you are on the floor with the baby or doing other actions that involve caring for the baby
- Also keep in mind where the dog’s food and water is, even the most laid back dog can get pretty antsy when another creature is messing with their food – you want to prevent any unnecessary accidents from occurring between your baby and your pet
Now, it’s important to recognize that sometimes a pet can’t cope with the arrival of a new baby and if their hostility or aggressiveness increases and becomes a cause for concern – limit the dog’s access to the baby or consider finding them a new home where they will be happier and your baby will be safer.
It’s important to protect everyone in your household, most of the time, your animals will adjust and will accept your infant because the baby will smell like you and in a pack atmosphere, it is the job of the entire pack to rear the pups – but do take the precautions and avoid any potential problems that may crop up.
How did you help your pet adjust to the new arrival?
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