The Puppy Diaries: 1

If you haven’t seen on social media – WE GOT A PUPPY! His name is Rupert and he’s a King Charles Cavalier and at the time of writing it is coming up to 4 months old.

Jordan and I have been toying with the idea of getting a dog for I don’t even know how long, and we came really close last January, but the timing just didn’t feel right. I work from home usually, not just in lock-down, so it does mean there is someone here most of the time, but I also travel a lot with work so we left that idea for a while.

One of the reasons we decided to get Rupert when we did was that we figured there is never going to be another time that we will both be at home for such a long length of time, which meant that we could make him feel as much at home as possible without one of us having to take time off work too. He arrived home on Easter weekend so it was perfect as we had a few days with him before we started his new routine whilst we worked.

If you’ve been a reader of the blog for any amount of time or follow me on social, you will probably know that we have two cats – Simba and Luna – who were also one of the reasons we wanted to wait a bit last year. They get on well together, although they’ve never really been around a dog except when friends have brought theirs over to the house, which has only been the odd occasion.

We read loads of information and spoke to friends who have brought a puppy into a house with cats and a lot of the information said the same thing that it could take a while to get them all used to each other. In an ideal world, we would have been able to meet Rupert a couple of times before and brought back toys that smelt of him to introduce the scent, but as luck was not on our side in the last few weeks, we only got to meet him once for 20 minutes – but we fell in love with him and decided he had to become part of our family.

I wanted to write this blog in case there are any puppy parents to be out there to give you a real-life insight as to what the past 6 weeks have been like, and also if you have any other animals and if you’re worried about how introducing a dog will go.

First things first… having a puppy is a lot of work! Everyone will say it to you, and even though all dogs are different, it throws your whole routine into the air for a while. One of the things that friends said to us was to make sure the dog fits into your lifestyle and you don’t have to change too much, which I would wholeheartedly agree with, but with us being in lock-down and not having a sense of the ‘real world’ to go off, everything felt up in the air – and still does if I’m honest. Firstly we’re not sure when Jordan will go back to work int he office and I’ll be completely on my own with him in the house and secondly, with my job being based between Manchester and London, I’m not 100% what the next few months look like, but we can cross those bridges when we come to it.

There are a million articles online about what to do on the first day, night and week with him, but what I would say is don’t put too much pressure on it. If you’re lucky enough to both be off work together, start to think about the routine that fits you best in that time, but be flexible as your little bundle of joy will need lots of attention. The first couple of days and nights can be overwhelming, especially because you’ll constantly be on edge about what they want, but as we’d been through it before (albeit it slightly differently) with the two cats, we knew what to expect.

I think it’s still really important if you have other pets to keep them apart from a day or so and introduce the dog slowly. We made sure that one of us played with the cats every hour or so and went on the bed for cuddles. Our cats tend to do their own thing upstairs anyway, which made it easier to split where we were. If you’re worried about how your animals might react, you can get plug-in diffusers which are meant to help their stress levels – we always use Feliway Friends for our cats.

Again, when it comes to where your pup should sleep, there is loads of information online, but we found it best to do what felt natural: We also spoke to friends who had recently got dogs to see what their opinion was, but at the end of the day, do what you think is right. For the first week, we had him in a crate in our room, and he was good at sleeping through with only a couple of whimpers in the night, but once he saw we were there, he went back to sleep. From there we started moving him into the office, which is where we wanted him to sleep when he grows a bit, and he took to it really well – now he doesn’t really care if we’re there or not!

I would suggest getting a crate and a playpen as well as an abundance of toys, as they get bored easily! We found a selection on Amazon which had a teething ring, rope toys and plastic ones (all safe obvs…) We also picked up a couple of different tasting bones, which we bring out when we have a call or need him to be distracted for an hour or so. I would highly recommend getting a Kong and putting treats in it for them to self-entertain – we’ve even started putting peanut butter in.

As with any new animal, it does take a while to get used to, and it’s completely normal to feel a bit overwhelmed – trust me, it does get easier. We had a couple of difficult nights where I thought we’d made a mistake, but you have to remember that your new addition is still a baby that’s been taken away from everything he knew for 10 weeks to come into a new place – and as soon as they look up at you with those puppy dog eyes, any wrong they’ve ever done will melt away!

It can be hard, but it’s so worth it and now I can’t imagine life without little Rupert! He’s turned our lives upside down in the best way possible and I’ve loved getting to know his little character.

If there is anything you’d like to know in particular about getting a puppy or want to read any topic, just let me know and I will do my best!