Greyhounds and Little Humans: Introducing your baby to your dog

Hello, everyone! It is so lovely to be writing again after a hiatus following the birth of our child. For this reason, I thought to myself… What better topic to reignite Berry’s Wonder Hounds with than sharing our experience of introducing our baby to our gorgeous snooty, Niko? This is something that did cause me some worry before our child was born and my mind would fret with a myriad of concerns – Would Niko take to the baby? What if he did not accept him/her? What if he felt forgotten about? Would my relationship with him change? Therefore, I thought the following tips, which worked for us, might be useful for anyone with a greyhound (or any other dog), who is perhaps expecting a child or considering growing their family in the future.

1) Introducing the baby’s smell – An often recommended tip, which I believe really helped Niko, was bringing home items which had our baby’s smell on them and placing them in his dog bed. We were unfortunate enough to have an extended stay in hospital, but the hospital staff were fantastic in allowing us to take our baby’s bed sheet home each evening for Niko to smell and to help him acclimatise, so that when we did bring our baby home, the smell was not uncommon for him.

2) Niko being greeted by me first (as the mum) – Another tip, which can be easily forgotten in the excitement of bringing your baby home, is to allow the mum to walk through the door first and greet the dog before the baby enters. As I had been away from Niko more than my husband had been, it was important that Niko received fuss from me before we introduced our baby to him. My husband waited in the car for a few minutes to give us that moment. Then, Niko met our baby.

3) Guests greeting Niko first – Similarly, when any guests came to visit our baby over the next few months, we made sure that each one greeted Niko first and made a fuss of him, before they made a fuss of our baby. This kept business as usual for Niko and made any visitors a positive experience for him, which was particularly important as there were a lot of them over that time.

4) Setting up some baby equipment before the baby arrives – We were not the most organised with our baby equipment, but we did make sure that items such as our next-to-me crib in our bedroom and a Moses basket downstairs were set up before our baby came home. This gave time for Niko to adjust to some changes in the landscape of his home.

5) Playing baby sounds ahead of time – We did not do this, but many of our friends played baby noises to their dogs in their third trimester, giving the dogs a chance to get used to these strange, new noises! Playlists can be found on Spotify or Youtube.

6) Practising walkies – This is something that we only did a couple of times, but is something that I feel helped Niko to adjust. Walking next to a pram, at a good pace, is something that does require some practice and I feel that, by trying this before our baby came home, it meant that it was one less situation for Niko to be introduced to. We gave him lots of praise for walking well next to the pram (and reassured him when he accidentally had his toes run over!).

7) Including Niko – Before I had our baby, I promised myself that I did not want Niko to suddenly become “just the dog” when he had always been our first baby. We, therefore, tried to include him in all things that we could do when bringing our new baby home. For example, allowing him to sit next to me on the sofa as I fed our baby or continuing his daily walks, just with the pram. I feel that this all meant he recognised that we still cared about him just as much as ever, but also that some of his “normals” were shifting slightly.

8) Quality time with Niko – As well as striving to include Niko, we also made sure that Niko still had quality time with us, as we were aware that, in all honesty, being around a new baby constantly must have been a lot for him to process. In particular, I would take him out for a couple of walks each week just the two of us, giving him the reassurance that we still have time for him.

9) Quiet space for Niko – I always kept in mind how overwhelming it must have been for Niko to suddenly adjust to a new, loud, tiny human calling the shots around our previously very chilled household! Therefore, we always made sure that, as well as his dog bed downstairs, Niko always had access to his other dog bed upstairs in our bedroom, giving him somewhere quiet to escape to if he needed to (which he did!).

10) Dog gates – Finally, and this seems pretty obvious to say, but dog gates have been so important for us. Not just for the obvious reason of safety for our child in some necessary moments, but also to give Niko clear boundaries (for example, during dinner time when we started to wean our baby). We put these gates in before we brought our baby home, in order to once again give Niko time to adjust.

So, there we have it! Some tips and ideas which helped us when introducing our baby to our greyhound. I hope that they may be helpful to some of you. (Disclaimer: of course, all dogs are different!) Moreover, I hope you enjoy this precious time, as your family perhaps grows, and the beauty in watching the bond between your first baby and your new baby develop!

Until next time… (which will not be as long as the last!)

Love and snoot kisses,

Berry x