Dog and baby

kylith

So I had a baby yesterday and brought her home today. Beforehand I did what I could in terms of preparing the dog: I played the sound of babies crying, which he didn’t bad an eyelid at, OH brought home the baby’s hat for him to smell and he wasn’t bothered.

However the reality is a bit different. He is definitely interested in the baby and OH is helping handle this fantastically, but when the baby cries the dog gets really upset, barking and whining. We have him mostly crate confined for the moment, but this is not sustainable long term and it’s only day one. The long term plan is everyone living in harmony, or at least quiet.

Obviously babies will cry but it’s hard and stressful to deal with a fussy baby while the dog goes ballistic. Any tips? Have a Kong freezing, so hopefully that’ll help and a rake of frozen Kongs will ease the way.

DBB

Awww congratulations Kylith! Welcome to the world Baby Kylith
Would it be an awful pain to have a bowl of treats handy, and every time baba makes noise, chuck treats on the floor at Finn's feet?

kylith

No, and I'll certainly give that a go. Unfortunately in the past he has completely refused food when stressed. Ham may be my friend here. Just stressing myself!

VonVix

Congrats!

Keep an eye on your own body language when the baby cries, try and be calm and natural. I find some dogs can pick up on how we react to things and it can make them a bit frantic/excited/alerted, especially if there is a sudden noise and we start rushing around.

kylith

VonVix wrote: »

Congrats!

Keep an eye on your own body language when the baby cries, try and be calm and natural. I find some dogs can pick up on how we react to things and it can make them a bit frantic/excited/alerted, especially if there is a sudden noise and we start rushing around.

Yeah, we're doing our best to remain calm and soft spoken when baby starts so that Finn sees that we're not bothered by it. Here's to day 2!

lashes34

Congrats Kylith. Dogs trust have a page on their site with tips. Cant seem to link it here.

aonb

Congratulations Kylith. Boy/Girl? Hope you're both doing ok
When we brought our baby home, nutter older dog couldnt deal with the stange
object taking all our time/attention. After a few days, he got used to it, and
eventually he/baby were best friends. As the others have said, treats/calm and
trying to keep Finns routing going

DBB

Yep, I'd imagine aonb's experience will be how things work out for you Kylith. You can just imagine what a shock it is for a dog when a new baba come home!
Hope today was better for you on the Finn front.

kylith

Thanks for the tips everyone. Baby is a little girl and just perfect.

Today was better. Finn was calmer with just ‘this is a new creature in the house’ and had a sniff, but noises from the baby still get him really excited. I’m more worried that he’d nip accidentally or just put a paw in the wrong place cos he’s a big oaf. It’s just all still new and he’s over excited, and the fireworks don’t help.

Tomorrow we are going to change the baby on the high table. This is guaranteed to make baba cry, but the table is high enough that Finn can’t get onto it so we can drop treats and he can get used to the squealing.

Interestingly there was a big firework go off and Finn started barking, and the baby even open an eye. She must have gotten used to the sound of barking before she was born

volchitsa

Congratulations Kylith, how lovely!

Has Shaken Cat seen any of this, she's been through it only a matter of months ago with Ralph and Raven (and a new baba, obv!), and may have some more tips.

IIRC, Finn was a rescue wasn't he? So he may be more stressed by new arrivals and noises and stuff than some dogs who haven't been through the same past experiences, so maybe it will just take him a bit longer to get used to his new life having changed.

(I see you're posting on a small-baby-not-yet-sleeping-at-night timetable! Don't forget to try to get enough rest yourself.)

Turbohymac

You'll need clear boundaries between the dog and new baby..the dog might be fine for a few weeks but in time will realize that he's not the center of attention any longer & its then things can get dangerous.. any dog no matter what size or how friendly they seem just cannot be trusted around babies.
Congrats..and best of luck

Sheepdish1

Congrats on your new arrival🀗
That’s a really good point as a previous poster said about dog picking up on body language and none one I’ve ever thought of actually so great advice imo.

I would also give the dog high Value reward eg ham when he is behaving the way you want him to around the baby.

Imo the most important thing is supervision and management of animals around babies / children. I would strongly recommend you also build positive association with crate, having the frozen kongs ready is great for this so that is great you’re doing this. I would never send dog into crate as punishment for example.

As said above things get bad when we let our gaurd down, some of us think that dogs have reasoning like humans but it’s unfair.

Personally I adore animals and babies growing up together and I think it’s wonderful as long as humans aren’t expecting the dog to think like ourselves.

Well done for being so proactive best of luck x

faceman

Congratulations on the new arrivals.

There are some tips with transitioning the dog to the new arrival in the house.

When baby is in the room give the dog lots of attention, rubs etc. When the baby is not in the room give the dog zero attention. This will reinforce to the dog that having baby around is a good thing.

The dog will be incredibly curious of everything baby but some dogs don't like babies crying. If the dog gets distressed don't reinforce the behaviour by giving him attention but do give him space to leave the room.

You probably know already you can't leave them both unattended together even in a pram as dogs get curious.

Oh yeah many dogs like eating baby's nappies especially soiled ones. Be warned!

Also babies are a reason why dogs get fatter! Food gets dropped on the floor and dogs work this out pretty quick!

muddypaws

Congratulations. Nothing to add as there is already lots of advice

Sheepdish1

Some great advice. The positive associations with the baby is great advice:D

I found it easier to have very clear rules that can't be deviated. For example, no dogs around baby unsupervised full stop even when baby is asleep. Babies squirm and make noises even when sleeping and its not fair for us to think that dogs ''know they are human'' if that makes sense.

A lot of people think that they can 100% trust their dog will never do anything and I think this is really unfair on the animal as it moves the responsibility from the human to the dog:(

When my babies were *very* small I also tried to have baby higher than dog. Nothing to do with silly outdated dominance theory.For example , I just found that babies are quite vulnerable if baby was on floor and big dog was on couch for example incase the dog jumped down or got spooked:)

kylith

On the off-chance anyone was wondering how we were getting on: we are all currently on the sofa together There is always someone between the dog and the baby, on top of the person holding the baby. If the baby has to be put in her moses basket the dog is crated. Treating when the baby cries has gone great and he now loves it when the she makes noise - he takes himself off into his crate and awaits snacks. He is a lot more relaxed about her being here, though he still enjoys sniffing her and her blankets.

DBB

Great news Kylith! I'm sure I'm not alone in saying you've been on my mind since you last posted... Just didn't want to harangue you for an update as I'm sure you've just a tad more than normal on your plate right now
Well done... Great to see your work paying off

jimf

cant offer any advise

but congratulations on the birth of your little baby girl

Sheepdish1

kylith wrote: »

On the off-chance anyone was wondering how we were getting on: we are all currently on the sofa together There is always someone between the dog and the baby, on top of the person holding the baby. If the baby has to be put in her moses basket the dog is crated. Treating when the baby cries has gone great and he now loves it when the she makes noise - he takes himself off into his crate and awaits snacks. He is a lot more relaxed about her being here, though he still enjoys sniffing her and her blankets.

That is fantastic that it is working so well for you. Animals and babies are brilliant together as long as they are managed properly by us. Lovely to hear that it is going so well for you all. Positive associations with the crate is brilliant as it means you know exactly where dog for that period of time and dog is not stressed out, it just makes everything easier and less hectic which is always a plus


Well done op

volchitsa

That's brilliant Kylith, I'd been thinking about you, but like DBB I didn't want to be hassling you, so I'm delighted you're getting there. Great that he doesn't mind being crated, that's another reason for using the crate even before any need for it, isn't it?

Any chance of a picture some time?

Congratulations. You’re doing great.

Just a note of caution when little one is teething, watch out for the dogs tail. My husband had the baby on his lap while on the phone. Doggie snuggled up beside them. Just caught little one as doggies tail was about to be chomped on!

Zapperzy

Congratulations Kylith

kylith

volchitsa wrote: »

That's brilliant Kylith, I'd been thinking about you, but like DBB I didn't want to be hassling you, so I'm delighted you're getting there. Great that he doesn't mind being crated, that's another reason for using the crate even before any need for it, isn't it?

Any chance of a picture some time?

Of the dog or the baby?

Today we went to the park:

kylith

And yes, I cannot recommend crate training enough. I got a crate when I got Finn and familiarised him with it immediately. It's an absolute godsend at this time of year with the fireworks going off. It's also great when we have visitors who are nervous of dogs, or when we have a lot of visitors and Finn wants some space, or when we're having dinner, or in a million other situations that a nervy dog would want somewhere he feels safe.

Some people think crates are cruel, but 90% of the time he's in there the door isn't even closed; he's chilling out and relaxing of his own accord. The only difficulty we have with it is in getting him to come out sometimes.

Sheepdish1

kylith wrote: »

And yes, I cannot recommend crate training enough. I got a crate when I got Finn and familiarised him with it immediately. It's an absolute godsend at this time of year with the fireworks going off. It's also great when we have visitors who are nervous of dogs, or when we have a lot of visitors and Finn wants some space, or when we're having dinner, or in a million other situations that a nervy dog would want somewhere he feels safe.

Some people think crates are cruel, but 90% of the time he's in there the door isn't even closed; he's chilling out and relaxing of his own accord. The only difficulty we have with it is in getting him to come out sometimes.

I actually had my little cat crate trained and it was so handy and she was quite happy to go in. I used to give her high value food in it so she had a positive assocation with it (She’s missing now but I’m still looking for her)

She’s extremely nervous of people but not animals which I always found strange. I used to call her into the crate when I needed to so I knew where she was for example when people were calling over. I had her trained to go into it and she slept quite happily in it at night.

She was very nervous of people and was quite happy sitting in it tucked in under a box when we had visitors etc. people used to see her and think it was cruel that she was in it but on one occasion I didn’t put her away and someone picked her up and got scrabbed by her quite near their face.
People just assume it’s cruel but it’s a great way to let an animal have space from people too which is what my cat wanted.

I saw someone on the Internet and that put a nice light blanket over it to make it more like a little “Cave” for them which I liked so think I’ll do this is she finds her way home as I think she’d really like that

aonb

Delighted to hear dog/baby are settling well.
I visited a friends house this week: 2 German Shepherds and a totally neurotic Pointer. I was so funny seeing their tiny daughter, (17 mos) tottering around the garden with the 3 dogs flanking her every step. She babbling away, 3 dogs engrossed in every word - she'd stop and give one a stick/leaf/stone to sniff, then totter on, with them glued in her wake!

When our daughter was tiny, a mysterious disappearance of a single sock (tiny newborn one) every single day had us stumped - convinced the washing machine was gobbling them up - then we discovered when we changed the dogs beds, a lovely little wad of tiny baby socks stuffed under the lining pad of the dog basket

borderlinemeath

Congratulations Kylith! Great that everything is going well. Crate training is a godsend in situations like yours, for us it was stairgates. I still have them everywhere, except the stairs! They are so handy as a room divider or just even running to the loo while baby is down.



Our dogs took to our little madam really well. Benson wanted to cuddle in beside her at every feed and Coco was trying to train her to throw a ball at 6 months. These days she loves giving them their food, I hand her the bowls and she knows by the colour of the bowl which is which. One really cute thing that happened recently was when we came home from holidays, Madam was asleep so we got the full force of the dogs enthusiasm on seeing us again. Turned on heat and got pjs ready etc so it was about 10 minutes before we brought her in out of the car - well the dogs were delighted to see her, full body wags and the same enthusiasm that we got. It was the first time that we got to see how much they actually adore her.

kylith

Dog and baby still doing great. Now she’s more mobile I spend most of my day saying stuff along the lines of ‘We don’t eat Finn’s feet’ and ‘Finn doesn’t like having his ears pulled’; poor sod is definitely more in danger from her than she is from him

His crate is a proper haven for him now because he can get some peace. She is utterly obsessed with him.

He’s Very fond of her at meal times!

Stop moaning ffs

This is brilliant op.

Congratulations on your baby
Just be careful and as other folks have said keep it all low key.
Doggo will be fine and even over protective of her in time.
Big adjustment period for all of you.
It’ll be fine.
Lovely story though thanks for sharing