You are listening to episode 29, Baby's Best Friend,

Creating a Healthy Bond Between Dogs and Kids.

Hey everyone, Welcome to the PED's Doc Talk Podcast. I'm your host Dr Mona where each week I hope to educate and inspire you in your journey through parenthood with information on your most common concerns as a parent and

interviews with fellow parents and experts in the field. My hope is you leave each

week feeling more educated, confident, and empowered in the decisions you make

for your child.

Hello and welcome to this week's episode. I am so excited to welcome Michelle, the

founder of pooch parenting on Instagram. She has her own company that helps us raise amazing children,

help us raise amazing dogs. I'm so excited to have her here. Welcome Michelle.

Hello, I'm so excited to be here.

And I, you know, I obviously have a dog.

His name is Shiloh.

He's three years old.

And so when I found your page, I was so excited and when we connected, I was just so ready to talk to you all about dogs and kids because I'm a pediatrician. I'm a mother so I understand children child behavior. I understand pediatric issues, but I know nothing about dog behavior.

You know it's a crazy combination so parenting just kids is super hard and you know that because you comfort a lot of parents who are worried about day-to-day issues sleeping eating all the things

But then you add a dog into the mix and it makes life even more complicated than you could have possibly imagined.

You're essentially raising two species of children all at the same time and then taking on all of the behavior issues,

the sort of emotional dynamics between the two of them, let

alone safety.

And that's a really big issue.

Absolutely.

And you brought up exactly why I think it's so important that a pediatrician and a certified professional dog trainer need to have this conversation because of the safety component that I always see, you know, we see a lot of dog bites and pediatrics and well-meaning dogs that obviously never had that sort of behavior before and then accidentally or, you know, a provoked or unprovoked on a dog bite.

...