Please Don't Bite the Baby (and Please Don't Chase the Dogs): Keeping Your Kids and Your Dogs Safe and Happy Together

by Lisa Edwards

Please Don’t Bite the Baby, chronicles certified professional dog trainer Lisa Edwards’ endearing and entertaining journey to ensure that her household survives and thrives when she introduces her son to her motley pack of animals. As Lisa knows all too well, the dog/child relationship is simultaneously treasured, misunderstood, and sometimes feared. In a twist, Lisa's dog training techniques inevitably seep into how she navigates her first year with baby to mixed but enlightening results.

Lisa includes her best training techniques for the everyday pet owner itemized at the end of each chapter. This book is important for parents, grandparents, and caregivers who have dogs and young children together and want to ensure safety for all.

Genres: Parenting, Nonfiction, Dogs, Memoir

1 pages, Audio CD

First published September 29, 2015

Reviews

[Grace · Rating 5 out of 5]

VERY helpful primer for helping prepare dogs and children for co-existing! A ton of great research, tips, and anecdotes on behavior and development of both. Will recommend in my shelter work and to my fellow mom friends !

[Natalie · Rating 4 out of 5]

As the owner of a very sensitive and anxious Great Dane, I appreciated the author's candor in sharing the specifics of her dogs' challenges and how she and her family work to manage and train the dogs. She wrote the book with a lot of heart and I felt like I was with her on the journey, it was hard to put the book down!

The author provides great ideas for how to approach various behaviors related to babies and children...one of the most helpful things she does is explain how a baby or child's behaviors can appear *to the dog* and why those behaviors (running in circles with a noisy toy for example) could trigger otherwise unexpected fear responses from dogs. I will definitely be revisiting the training tips at the end of each chapter, and have already started formalizing the "go sniff" command.

This is not an entry level training guide, and should be used with other books/trainings.

[Jordan Fischer | julietfoxreads · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved this book and read it in one sitting. I can TOTALLY relate to the author, as we will also have 3 dogs (one with potential behavior problems, albeit not nearly as extensive as hers) and a baby in the near future. I was also very worried about dealing with kids and dogs together, having read for years about horrible dog bites in addition to feeling the sadness of people I know re-homing their dogs because they couldn't deal with them and kids. I thought the author's management strategies and tips were excellent, and I will be working with my own dogs on some of them now to prepare for the baby. A lot of reviewers disliked either the memoir aspects of the book, her training tips, or considered her warnings about dogs and babies overzealous. I didn't find this to be true at all; I really enjoyed reading about her personal experiences, thought her training tips were reasonable and described well, and agree that she was right to be concerned about dog-baby interactions.

[Trista · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was more memoir than training guide. It had a few helpful tips, but mostly it made me frightened to let dogs anywhere near my children. Luckily, I have had dogs my entire childhood and was able to remind myself how wonderful they are.

[Heather · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book gave some helpful insights into introducing a new baby to dogs and finding ways to have positive interactions, but it was a lot to handle. It leaves you feeling terrified that your dog is going to attack your child, although admittedly this is not a completely bad thing, since some soon-to-be-parents (like myself) haven't thought about it enough. Still, the book leaves you with the feeling that unless your dog is perfectly trained in about a dozen commands (all of which the author says are 'the most important' at different points) and unless you have mastered the art of reading a dog's body language (I find myself now seeing signs of aggression in every tiny thing our dog does, when in fact she is incredibly laid back), you are setting yourself up for a horror scenario. I absorbed it as much as I could and took away some crucial points that I thought could help us manage our dog-baby interactions in a safe and effective manner. There are a lot of helpful tips in the book, just try not to get overwhelmed.

[Samantha Lefave · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good tips on how to utilize either new techniques I hadn’t heard before or management techniques I can apply in fresh ways or continue to reinforce. Some commenters talk about fear-mongering, but I didn’t get that - moreso the author places emphasis on how important it is for us as humans to properly care for both dogs and babies so families can be kept together. And I appreciated the anecdotal stories included, knowing she has worked with a range of dogs with a range of needs in her own home.

[Jessica · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was pretty specific to having dogs and then bringing home a baby and helping them both integrate together. Wasn't super applicable to having and training a puppy, but some good stuff. And made me grateful that I only have one dog. She had several with lots of health problems and challenges and a colicky baby. Yikes!

[Genny Lee · Rating 3 out of 5]

I got through it. And there were some interesting bits of info. But every chapter included some story of a baby being bit or killed by a dog and this danger was constantly reinforced. I think it was a bit over the top. Yes be wary but the level of fear this book was attempting to infuse felt unnecessary.

[Del · Rating 2 out of 5]

It felt less helpful than I anticipated. It read like a memoir of a dog trainer who had a baby. Anecdotes on how a trainer introduced her trained dogs to her baby isn't helpful to non-dog trainers with reactive dogs.

Waste of time and money.

[Laura · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book. Lots of helpful tips in the context of her own experience bringing a baby home.

[Rebecca Dimanche · Rating 4 out of 5]

Definitely lots of good info in here for baby prep with dogs especially with one dog with some anxiety. Here’s to more training and growing our family

[Marie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Please Don't Bite the Baby was such a good read! I really felt like it was such a good investment of my time to read. The author is a professional dog trainer who owned three "special needs" dogs at the time when she adopted an infant boy. The book gives advice from the perspective of a professional dog trainer about how to introduce an infant to a home with dogs, and from the perspective of a new mother bringing home an infant to a home with dogs. It starts pre-baby, when the author and her husband begin trying to anticipate what will happen when they bring home baby, through to the toddler years.

I will go ahead and let you know that the author and her husband have careers that allow them to be home often, and the author does have a slight advantage, being a professional dog trainer. But I love that she owns up to a few mistakes made, and candidly shares examples of times when even the best planning falls through. It made me feel so much better, knowing that there were things I could definitely do now (in my third trimester with my first baby) to help prepare my beloved boxer, and knowing that even with all the prep in the world, there will be things to work out "in the moment" once baby comes home. Even with my full-time away-from-home job I feel like I can accomplish a lot of the advised tips.

Each chapter tells a vignette of life with the new baby (then toddler), followed by a couple pages of practical training tips that anyone can try at home. As I mentioned, the short essays of life in their house made me feel more reassured about my ability to handle my own transition, and the training tips were so much more than just commands/tricks. There was also professional advice about handling all the extra visitors and how to choose a dog-sitter or kennel if needed. While it's not a pleasant or comfortable topic, the author even spends a little under a page talking about how to know when/if rehoming your dog is the only option left.

I also appreciated that the book was about more than just "how to control your dog around your baby." It also often looks at the situation from the dogs' point of view (so to speak); dogs have sensitive hearing, and a baby crying (or toddler screaming) can be upsetting. Even the friendliest dog can get overwhelmed by a constant stream of guests ringing the doorbell to see the baby, and owners should set up a "safe space" or quiet area for the dog.

My dog really is a pretty good dog. He's even been invited to visit the home of a relative who usually does not like dogs! And yet I definitely picked up some tips for things I'm going to try to acclimate him to before baby arrives. For instance, he really does love always being in the same room with people in the house. I'm going to try to get him used to being behind a safety gate while people are in the house, so that our guests can come visit baby without the distraction of an often-overly exuberant boxer. We've also started teaching him "settle," which is kind of like a relaxed "down" that is held longer. That way he can still be at my feet, calmly (hopefully), while I feed or read to baby.

Not too long of a read, and chock full of reassurance and advice, I do recommend this one!

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'd recommend this book, though it's not the book for me. I didn't realize that it is half memoir/half training guide. I like memoirs, but that's not why I wanted to read this book. I also think I need the training guide as we've already learned these things in the classes our dogs have taken. But it could be a good resource for people who haven't taken classes.


I received an ARC from NetGalley! (5/22/15)

[Annette · Rating 5 out of 5]

: This book is beneficial for parents, Grandparents, anyone who has a pet and a child. My cat is so jealous of my Grandkids so I really needed help. This book was just the ticket. A+ to Lisa Edwards After telling my son and daughter-in-law (who are expecting) about this book they both read it and found it helpful not knowing what their pets would do with a new little one in the house.

[Fusspot · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book didn't know whether it wanted to be a memoir or a dog training book. Neither fish nor fowl - it sank.

The training aspect was awkwardly shoehorned in, the memoir aspect didn't have enough of a plot to carry it together. I did finish the book, hoping for some sort of payoff, but regret it.

[Stephanie]

Although I definitely found some information in this book very useful, especially towards the beginning, I started to feel like the tips were just not pertinent enough to my situation (about halfway through). I've had my dog for 8 years (since she was a puppy), she has no real health concerns like the author Lisa Edwards deals with, and I feel like I know her ticks and reactions well enough by now. I still am glad I picked it up, but I don't think finishing it was necessary.

[groundmar · Rating 3 out of 5]

The first chapter is really slow. it picks up a bit after that.