Latest / The Birth Lounge Podcast / Ep. 462: How Maximus Met Saggy: Boundaries, Safety Rules & What Actually Worked

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Ep. 462: How Maximus Met Saggy: Boundaries, Safety Rules & What Actually Worked · The Birth Lounge Podcast

Drowning does not need a lot of water.
It can absolutely happen in a dog bowl, and so that should be a space in your home where, you know, it is either a totally off-limits area.
Your child is literally never alone in that area until they have a strong, strong boundary of that area being off-limits.
But also like think about germs.
You know, you don't want Your child to be eating your dog food.
If you're like us, we feed a raw diet, so that would be really unwell if Saggy got into raw meat.
Hello, and welcome back to another episode of The Birth Lounge Podcast.
I love hanging out with you guys every single week.
It's so much fun.
Doing two times a week kind of makes me wanna do a five-day-a-week show, but, ah The f- the feeling of taking on five days a week is just overwhelming right now.
But I want to.
I, like, genuinely wanna hang out with you guys every single day.
Maybe one day we'll get there.
Maybe, maybe one day.
Today, you guys, we're talking about introducing your dog to your baby, and this episode was prompted by you all.
On Instagram, I shared that I had a dog trainer on the show to tell us how to introduce your dog to your baby.
I am not a dog trainer, obviously.
My dog is 13 years old, and so we've had 13 years together.
But I don't know general dog training rules.
I don't know how to step people through introducing their dogs.
You know, I kinda knew the general things that people say.
Uh, bring home a, you know, swaddle from the hospital and introduce it to your dog before introducing your baby, and take your baby out of the carrier when you introduce your baby to your dog, and don't let your dog lick all over your baby.
Don't let your dog be excited and jumping around when you introduce your baby.
But as far as, you know, what were some of the things that you needed to do before your baby got here and after your baby got here, and boundaries that you needed to set, just in general good practice, I did not know those things.
So I wanted to have on a professional to do it, which made you guys ask questions.
"What did you do in your home, hehe? How did you introduce Baby Saggy and Maximus P?" If you're not following me over on Instagram, definitely do that, because I never really talk about my dog here, but he is certainly a main character in our house.
His name is Maximus Prime, and I always joke that, yes, he is a Transformer.
He, um, he is just the love of our life, and he was our baby forever, for years, for a decade, for over 10 years before we had Saggy Boy.
And oh, my gosh, it has just been so sweet to get to see them have a relationship and blossom that relationship and to watch Saggy...
You know, when he was a newborn, he didn't really notice anything other than boobs and a dirty diaper.
And so as he got older and his eyesight came in, and now, you know, six to seven months old, we're really kinda seeing his personality start to blossom.
To watch that imprint on the relationship that he has with Maximus and how he first started to notice him, and then he started to realize, like, wait a minute, that thing barks and it walks around our house.
And then to realize, like, wait a minute, I can do something, and this thing, this dog, will do something back.
Like, there's a reciprocal relationship here.
It has been So much fun.
Saggy loves Max when Max comes down in the morning or when Saggy comes down in the morning, whoever's downstairs first.
They always notice each other and, you know, Max hangs out on Saggy's play mat with him.
It's just so sweet.
So I thought I would tell you a little bit about the things that we did.
You know, in pregnancy I didn't really do very much.
Max actually was the first one to know that we were pregnant.
So we had just gotten home from a vacation.
I came home pregnant.
I had no clue.
Mr.
HeHe had no clue.
Nobody had any clue, and Max comes down stairs at the home of our friends who are keeping him, and he went directly to my belly, sniffed all around it.
He knew instantly, and I thought that interaction was really weird, and I told Mr.
HeHe that, like, "That's weird.
I think he might be mad at us for going away for so long."
We were gone for almost two weeks at that point, and I thought that he might have been a little miffed that we were gone for so long and that we had left him at someone else's house.
Good, good friends, like friends that know Maximus through and through and have kept him many a time.
So he wasn't uncomfortable, but just like, "Wow, you guys were gone for so long."
I thought he might be a little annoyed.
Obviously, just a few weeks later, I found out I was pregnant, and it made sense because he was really...
He was always around me.
I noticed that, you know, pre coming home from that trip, there were hours during the day that he was either downstairs sleeping or outside or on a bed in the home.
And since coming home, he was always with me.
Not, like, right up under me, but just around me in the vicinity.
If I was on the second floor, he was on the second floor.
If I was showering, he was sitting right outside of the shower.
If I was in the kitchen, he was sitting in the kitchen.
He was never too far.
And obviously, then I found out I was pregnant, and I was like, "Oh, my gosh, that makes so much sense."
And I thought he would just be attached to the belly, but I was really surprised to know that he was never really, like, directly interested in the belly.
You know you get these sweet pictures of dogs that are always laying on the belly or sleeping with the belly, or they have their head on the belly and then feel the belly kick.
You know, Maximus did that a handful of times in pregnancy, but he was never directly interested in the belly until I got super near to my due date, and then he was at my feet.
Enough that I remember in those last few weeks of pregnancy, I would say, like, "Maximus, you're gonna make me fall, and then it's n- that's not gonna be good for anybody.
Like, you have to stop walking right under my feet."
Of course, I speculated, like, "Ooh, does this mean I'm in labor? Does this mean the baby's coming?" And it did, but not imminently because he did do this for, you know, the last couple weeks of pregnancy.
And then it came time for labor, and, uh, again, he was just always like in the vicinity.
He hung out mainly in the doorways guarding, and he was never, you know, overprotective or he never growled or didn't want people to be around me.
I know that I hear, you know, stories of, of dogs that do that, but he didn't.
He just sat in the doorway guarding.
And when people would come, our photographer, our midwives, our doulas, which he knew all of those people.
None of them were familiar, right? Because I was getting that in-home care.
All of these people have been to our home many times by the time I've gone to labor because we had the care of the home birth midwives.
And so he would just sit in the doorways or right outside the door and he would greet the people that were coming into my birth space with a waggin' tail, and he'd get up and he'd want, you know, pets from them and give them kisses and all the things.
And then they would come into my birth space and he would just lie down again.
And he was just always kind of there.
We got some of the cutest pictures.
He would come in intermittently and check in on me.
And if I was somewhere where, you know, my hand or my face was hanging down, then he would give me kisses.
But otherwise, he was not intrusive.
He did not do any growling or the overprotectiveness.
He was not a nuisance by any means.
But he was just always near, quietly and just kind of in the background guarding, but he was always around.
And as soon as Saggy was born, Max jumped up on the bed to check it out, and then he just laid down beside the three of us and just watched.
He watched the midwives, he watched the photographer, he watched our doulas, he watched us, he watched Saggy, and he just kind of hung out.
And it was so fun just to see that progression of, I don't know, him like welcome a little baby into our family.
'Cause you know, during pregnancy we didn't do much, but I have this history with him where I just knew that he would take my lead and if I was cool, calm, and collected, then he would be as well.
And so I didn't do anything super different in pregnancy.
He already had a place, so I didn't need to train him on that.
We had already taken him off of our bed, sleeping in our room, and so he slept on the guest bedroom bed.
And so I didn't need to do anything there.
Eventually, that bedroom would have just turned into the baby's nursery, and so that bed was going away.
So it was gonna be a natural moment where I didn't need to train him out of using the bed.
He already doesn't really get on the couches because, again, he's 13, so it's hard for him to navigate different spaces like that, getting on and off things.
And so, I don't know, he's never had any moments of aggression, anything like that.
I just didn't feel the need to train.
And It was just really sweet to see it all kind of unfold.
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Okay, so then we get to postpartum and you have this new baby, right? And you want your two children to be able to interact because Maximus is He's my baby too.
He's like my first baby.
And so I wanted the two of them to interact, and so we did have a couple of like boundaries.
You know, we never really let Max kiss Saggy.
Even now, we are never really putting them in positions that make it easy for Max to kiss Saggy, and every now and then he may kiss him, you know, but it's never on the face, and we don't let them put their faces in one another.
I don't think anything would happen, but that is the famous last words of every family that has had a, a dog or an animal do something to a child, right? And so I don't think anything would happen, but in an abundance of caution, we don't let them ever have their faces together.
And along those same lines is we don't let Saggy pat Max's face or his tail.
He's only allowed to give pats on the back.
And you know, at this point he, they're either s- they're either together physically, like on the play mat, Max will be laying down and Saggy will be sitting up.
And we're always there, so I guess that's another rule too, but that one kind of happened unspoken.
You don't ever leave the dog and the baby unattended.
They should always be within your sight or separated, and your dog should be in place.
Um, because again, famous last words, I didn't think anything would happen.
But you never know when the baby's gonna knock down toys or fall over and startle your dog, or the dog is just gonna be reactive for some reason.
I mean, they're going through so many transitions too, learning this new human, and then it feels like every time they learn them, this human has new skills, and they're capable of more things, and the toys get louder, and then the child is mobile.
And so you just have to think, you never want your dog to be unattended with your baby.
So that was kind of the unspoken thing.
But for the pets, we just make sure that it is really isolated to Max's back.
Because again, you never wanna set up two creatures that don't have the cognitive skill.
Like, one is an animal.
That's an instinct for them.
And then one is a baby, and they don't know any different.
And so you've got no one in this equation without you, if you remove yourself, no one in this equation has cognitive thinking, nor do they have that forward thinking where you can almost predict like, "Okay, my baby is playing with something loud.
My dog looks a little miffed about it.
I'm gonna move them away."
And so, that one is another thing that we follow.
I just feel really strongly that we're setting up the two of them to have a good relationship, and that they both know that there will be intervention if- Everyone in the party is not enjoying themselves.
And then I think the other thing that we do really, really intentionally, and for some people you are probably gonna be like, "Okay, that's a little, that's a little crazy," but I'm telling you, it works and Max has very clear communication, so we will announce that Saggy is near.
We will say something like "Okay, Max, you're on the mat.
I'm gonna set Saggy next to you."
And then we set him down, and then we say like, "Max, Saggy's right here."
And we just make sure that Max is super aware that Saggy's in that vicinity.
You will notice that a lot of times he just stays and he's just like, "All right.
What's up, bro?" There are times where he gets up and moves and he's like, "Oh, heck no.
I'm not gonna deal with this child today right now in this moment."
And he will get up and move, and that is great.
That play space is Saggy's space, and so if Max doesn't wanna be in Saggy's space, he can get up and move, and he does.
The other thing is, and it's kind of linear to that, is we will ask Max if he wants pets.
So I never just like put Saggy next to Max.
I never just like introduce them where Max is kind of caught off guard.
You also have to remember Max is completely blind right now.
So, he was diagnosed with diabetes in January of this year, so about six months ago, and, um, since then he has become completely blind.
And so he cannot see anything.
And so regardless of whether he was blind or not, you know, 'cause we did that after Saggy was born for the few months that he was not blind, we would still introduce Saggy into the space.
Say like, "Max, just so you know, Saggy's right here."
We would still say, "Max, do you want pets?" Like, "Saggy wants to pet you."
And then we would reach out and pet Max first, and if he was tolerant of that, then we would put the baby next to him and, and, you know, just make sure that he was open to that.
There are times just like the mat where Max will literally walk away.
You say like, "Max, do you want pets right now?" And he may walk away at that moment, or when the adult reaches out and pets Max he may walk away, and then we just tell Saggy like, "Oh, Max doesn't want pets right now.
We can try again later."
Like, you just wanna teach your child to not chase your dog.
You're not trying to, you know, force these pets on your, on your dog or your...
I mean, any pet really.
You just want, again, it goes back to making sure that both parties feel very safe and understand that there's that respect there, and that way you're really easing the tension between the two regardless of the temperament of your dog or your child.
And with that said, you know, the temperament of these two work.
If you have a dog that you know is already not tolerant of children or they already don't love anyone who's not you or your partner or maybe just you Then you need to be respectful of that, but have boundaries into place, right? Like, maybe that's a child that you teach, "We don't interact with our dog."
You know, not to teach them that all dogs are scary and not to be interacted with, but this particular dog, we don't do pets.
Um, the other thing, you know, Saggy is not mobile in terms of crawling.
He's sitting independently and he's able to roll across the floors, and now we're starting to see these little blips of him getting into hands and knees.
Oh my gosh.
And it's so sweet and you just wanna like scoop him up and be like, "Oh my God, I'm so proud of you," and also, "You're growing up so fast.
It's crazy."
I mean, I feel like I just birthed this child, and now he is getting ready to like truly start moving.
It's crazy.
But when that happens, you know, there'll be other things, like we don't chase the dog.
We don't chase Max, and his food bowls and his, his water bowls are off limits.
Those are not things to play with.
And not for any reason other than like...
Well, I guess it's a little bit of twofold or maybe even threefold.
Number one, you never want your child to have access to water like that.
Drowning does not need a lot of water.
It can absolutely happen in a dog bowl, and so that should be a space in your home where, you know, it is either a totally off-limits area.
Your child is literally never alone in that area until they have a strong, strong boundary of that area being off-limits.
But also like think about germs.
You know, you don't want Your child to be eating your dog food.
If you're like us, we feed a raw diet, so that would be really unwell if Saggy got into raw meat.
Um, typically when Max is done, there's no raw meat left, um, 'cause he gobbles it all down, but you know, let's just say there was.
Same thing with the water bowl.
Like, there are germs in there.
You don't want your, your child eating kibble.
Or maybe you don't mind.
Either way, depending on the age of your child, kibble can be a choking risk.
Like, there are just so many things.
The main things that come to my mind, like all of those, yes, for sure, that's not actually what helped me make my decision.
That is a Max space, right? So just like we have taught Max that the play mat is a Saggy space, I want Saggy to understand there are Max spaces.
So y- I allow Max to be on the play mat.
I don't allow Saggy to be on Max's bed.
I want Maximus to know that there are spaces in the home where he can go and not have to worry about A child.
I mean, and all the things that comes with it, right? Like, he feels the need to be on guard n- interacting with that child safely and gently and not stepping on that child and just being aware of both of their bodies and space.
Like, it is a lot of mental load, and I recognize that for Maximus, and so I want there to be spaces in the home where he does not have to think about that.
And then there, on the opposite end of the spectrum, there are places where Saggy is frequently and also those are Saggy's spaces.
So in the nursery, if Max doesn't wanna be there, he needs to leave.
In the playroom and downstairs and the, the little mini play mat that we have downstairs, same thing.
If you don't wanna be in that space as a dog, then you need to leave, but this is Saggy's space.
And so, again, talking to your dog, I'm a big believer in that, but I know some people are out there probably rolling your eyes and thinking like, "Your dog has no idea what you're saying."
Maybe, or maybe that's your dog and they don't know what you're saying.
No, I'm just kidding.
I mean, kinda.
I do believe that Max knows what I'm saying.
And I think that us having these intentional kind of moments between the two of them has fostered a really great relationship.
It's super healthy and happy right now, and I wanna keep going with that, and I think both of them feel super safe even with Max being completely blind.
And I can't chalk that all up to luck, and I don't think it was happenstance.
I do believe that our intentional decisions about facilitating how they interact has really impacted that a ton.
So that's kind of my rundown.
I don't recommend that you follow this to a T and then think that your job is done.
I think that you should take this and let it be a starting point, and then you should check out my other episode that we talked to a dog trainer about and take that and apply it to your life.
And then I think you should look into things that are specific to your dog's temperament as well as your child's temperament, as well as your lifestyle and how your home is set up and, you know, in the times of day that your child and your dog will be interacting.
Like, think about the individual things that apply to your family, and that's how I think that you will get the best bang for your buck.
I think you will really be able to figure out what your dog needs and what your child needs and how you can foster a healthy relationship with them there All right, you guys.
I hope that you enjoyed today's episode.
It is always such a blast to share pieces of my story, but I wa- don't want it to be like, you know, I don't want it to be everything that I talk about.
So it is always so much fun when you asked to hear pieces of my story.
You know I'm an open book.
I'm so transparent.
I want you to learn from the things that I have done well and also made a mistake on, and I want to hear what's worked well for you.
So if it works well for our family, we can incorporate that.
Thanks for hanging out with me, you guys.
I'll see you in the next episode.
Be sure to follow me on social media, and you can find me @tranquilitybyhehe and @the.birth.lounge.
Until next time, head to your app store and download The Birth Lounge app for evidence-based childbirth education and data-driven postpartum support delivered straight to your phone.
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I'm HeHe, and this is the Birth Lounge Podcast.