May 29, 2025 • 41 mins
Raising dogs before having kids gave us an unexpected crash course in parenting. In this episode, my husband and I talk about how training our dogs actually prepared us for life with our son, from nighttime potty breaks to boundary-setting and patience. We aren't perfect and neither are our dogs but we are constantly evolving and growing.
If you’ve ever wondered how pets shape your parenting mindset, this one’s for you.
Resources
Prefer to read or want to see all the fun pictures we referenced? You can find the full blog post mentioned here:
https://houndingharmony.podia.com/blog
Download your beginner training guide: 7 Day Training Foundations
https://houndingharmony.podia.com/training-foundations-guide
A simple, actionable plan to get your dog from chaos to calm.
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If you're feeling stuck or overwhelmed, I offer coaching to help you create a personalized training plan and gain clarity on your next steps. Learn more here:
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
So the reason that I love having dogs is because I don't have to actually take care of them.
(00:06):
And they just kind of help keep the house clean.
They pick up food and things like that.
Hello and welcome to the Hounding Harmony Dog Training Podcast.
The show that helps you go from chaos to calm with your dog one episode at a time.
I'm Emily, a dog trainer in licensed veterinary technician,
here to give you practical tips, realize strategies, and the confidence to raise a well-behaved,
(00:31):
obedient dog without the overwhelm. Let's jump in and create a calm and connected life with your dog.
I don't know how to start the podcast now.
All right, I'm going to talk to them and I'm going to talk to you, okay?
Okay. All right. Welcome back. Welcome back to the podcast.
I have a very special guest with me today.
(00:54):
Go ahead and introduce yourself. My name is Daniel Holbrooke and I am the husband of my wife,
Emily Holbrooke, who is the creator and curator of this podcast.
And it has been his dream for as long as he can remember to have a podcast and to be on a podcast.
It has. Shout out to him, Hawkins.
(01:15):
So today we're going to be talking about how dogs have prepared us for parenthood.
And we can finally say this because we are parents. I mean, I've always had a suspicion that dogs
and kids are basically the same in a broad sense of it.
And now we have discovered that to be true. Another son is almost two.
(01:37):
We don't have all the credentials on this, but we have enough. We have enough.
We have enough. Daniel, what kind of dogs do we have?
So we have a 56-year-old. 56-year-old. Oh no, wait.
Yeah, that's right. 56-year-old Australian Shepherd.
Yeah, and I think a 21-year-old. He's 23.
(01:59):
Four? I think he's 24.
28-year-old Old English Bulldog. The Australian Shepherd's name is Coda. The Bulldog's name is Drax.
How would you describe your relationship with them?
It's a love-hate relationship for sure. Mostly love, except for every single time that it's hate.
Well, Drax is my actual son. Coda is my stepson.
(02:25):
Stepson. And not to say that, you can't fully love sons and stepson's the same.
But we got Drax together after we were married as a puppy.
And so I've been able to be along for Drax's whole life. Whereas when we first got married,
Coda was like 28, 35 years old, something like that.
(02:49):
Yeah, it was a single mom. I'm gonna do that all episode by the way.
And our son, Judah, is too old, turning to this year. So that's we're gonna kind of talk about that dynamic as well.
What would he be in dog years? Just two divided by seven. No, it'd be the opposite.
Oh. He'd be like, why would you do that?
We'd be like a brand new puppy. That's a joke. We'd have to take the months and then divide it.
(03:16):
Yeah. We'll do that some other time. Well, it's only 24 months.
We'd divide it by seven. So that's only like three months old, dog years.
Yeah. Which tracks because he's just kind of body-drained.
Do you remember what the first few weeks with Drax were like?
Well, so when we first went and saw Drax, it was like that typical, like, how you see it in the
(03:38):
movies or commercials. Love it. First sight. Like, you see this puppy and...
We were not supposed to buy a dog that day.
Yeah. And we did because Drak stole our hearts.
But the first few weeks, I mean, there's kind of like two sides of it.
There's the good side, which is like, oh, wow, we have a puppy.
This is awesome. He's so playful. He's so cute. And then there's the potty training
(04:02):
waking up in the middle of the night side of things, which is still cool because, you know,
like, you're doing it for a reason and for a purpose. But at the same time, it's a good thing
that that only lasts for a while because I couldn't do that my whole life.
Yeah. So I actually wanted us to get a dog because I...
(04:24):
Well, I wanted Daniel to experience the puppy stage and I wanted it to be all done
and over with before we started having kids.
And it actually worked out. You really...
You had it all planned out from the very beginning, huh?
I did. We did have this conversation. I promise.
I'm sure we did. But...
But yes, I have a plan for most things. So what do you think was the hardest thing to teach Drak's?
(04:48):
Well, the hardest thing to teach Drak's is the thing that we are still...
Trying to teach him that we've been still working on all these years later is just getting him to
like not jump on people. But he's like 99% of the time he's great at it.
But when he gets...
Except for when someone really frail that we don't want him to jump on it.
(05:10):
Oh yeah, grandma's, grandpa's, little babies, I'm just kidding.
Kidding about the baby.
Not the baby.
First day we brought you to home, Drak's just jumped on him.
He did not.
He did so good.
Kidding.
So yeah, he just gets super excited.
Even though he's only 28 years old, he is still a puppy in terms of that, I would say.
(05:33):
So yeah, when ever someone comes over, we have to basically put him in his kennel
because he'll want to jump on him.
We could leave him out, but then we just would constantly be hounding on him.
And we're trying to do other things.
So it's just like, Drak's sit, Drak's off like that.
So that is what we are currently still working on.
But he actually did an amazing job training and still does.
(05:59):
We taught him a lot of cool tricks and obviously...
A lot of cool tricks.
Oh yeah.
He's like that.
We'll get to those later.
He's like double at seven.
Or maybe not.
Um, maybe not.
The shark.
You can tell him what shark is.
So, basically...
It's kind of ironic because it's probably part of the problem.
But we basically taught him to jump.
Not me.
(06:20):
I taught him to jump whenever I say the word shark.
But it's not on people.
It's like to grab like a stick or...
I think it started with a belt, honestly.
So...
Yeah, we're learning from our own mistakes here still.
(06:40):
Yeah.
So teaching him to jump,
2020 hindsight may not have been the best thing,
but it was pretty cute and fun when he was younger.
What was the hardest thing to teach Drac's as a puppy?
Okay.
As a puppy, I think the hardest thing was probably just teaching him boundaries.
So we have, for all you listeners out there,
we'll take you inside of our home,
(07:02):
close your eyes and just imagine with me.
We have a rug in the living room.
And we don't want dogs on the rug because it's a nice rug.
And it's like a white rug.
Yeah, we bought a white rug three kids.
Yeah.
I don't know why, but we did.
So I would say that was the hardest thing was
teaching him to stay off the rug.
(07:23):
Yep.
And honestly,
since we've had Judah, I think it's gotten so much worse
as well.
Like he's gotten back into the habit of getting back on the rug.
He just has like random brain lapses where he just like
walks all the way onto the rug.
And then I turn around and I'm like,
"What are you doing?"
(07:45):
Yeah, I would agree with that.
See, my answer to this question was kennel training.
But it only lasted a few days.
But he did not take to kennel training well at all.
If you remember, we had him in the tiny kennel
because he was so little and then he could not.
He like did not take to it at all.
And that was like a new experience for me.
(08:08):
So then we went and got him a bigger kennel
and immediately he was chill.
Yeah.
Was there a moment where you felt like
Drax was starting to like get used to life.
Kind of fit into daily life better where it was less.
We have a puppy at home that we're training
and it was more just like,
Drax is the part of life.
You know what I'm saying?
Yeah.
I would say as of a couple weeks ago,
(08:30):
not just him.
What is 27?
I would say around like year two in human years,
about two years.
So like as of like a couple years ago,
I think he really was comfortable just with us,
with the house, with Kota,
with our rules.
(08:50):
Obviously, I mean, we were still kind of doing some training.
I mean, I think you kind of always are.
Yeah, I would say around the two year mark,
maybe even a little before that year and a half.
Yeah, that's when his maturity kind of melded with his training.
Yeah.
It got a little bit easier.
Was that around the time that he got snipped?
(09:11):
Did that have anything to do with him?
Yeah, actually.
I don't, I don't claim that getting your pet neutered
will change their behavior much because it's like,
there's such a broad range that they could have already started
that might have been because of their hormones,
but also maybe not.
But also, yes, he did get neutered at two.
(09:34):
Well, there you have it folks.
Looking back, what do you think helped us the most getting through those first two years?
Not that they were intensely difficult,
but just like, you know, it was a time of a bit of upset in our daily lives.
Jesus.
Couldn't have done it without him.
(09:54):
I think the thing that helped us was that we, for the most part, were both
consistent, like individually with what we were doing.
So it wasn't like you had an idea of what to do.
And I had like the opposite idea.
I mean, for the most part, I just kind of lean to you and your expertise,
obviously with your background, that by now all the listeners should know about.
(10:18):
If not, go to the website.
But yeah, I think just the consistency between both of us kind of doing the same thing,
having the same expectations.
Actually, I didn't think that's what you would say.
That's really cool.
What did you think I was doing?
I don't know. I didn't think it was going to be that.
Okay, are there any routines, tools, or systems that you use now that you can't imagine?
(10:40):
Living without.
I think the fact that they're kennel trained really helps.
Like now whenever we need them to go to their kennel, it's not like a huge deal.
They just do it.
Yeah.
And it's actually like a safe space for them so they don't mind.
And when the doors, like when their kennel doors are open, even just throughout the day,
they'll just go in there and just chill anyways.
(11:01):
So kennel training was huge.
And it's probably not even just like in our house either.
I mean, I'm sure it's worse if we have to like take them like at the clinic or whatever,
but like they still, they can do it without like throwing a huge fit.
But it's like you're putting a constant ad for people to listen to the last episode,
(11:24):
which is about how important great training is.
Go back guys.
Listen to it.
Share it with your friends.
Okay, so now we're going to move into how dog training has connected to your parenthood for us.
So tell me what you remember about the first day we brought you to home.
How did the dogs react?
(11:44):
Yeah, I remember it pretty vividly actually.
I think mostly because we just took lots of like lots of pictures and videos of it, but they were
obviously curious, but they could tell like they weren't like super wild or like anxious.
They were pretty calm, kind of just sniffing around them, which I think you had said like
(12:07):
dogs can kind of sense that like they could maybe sense that you were pregnant even beforehand.
Yeah, at least we felt like Kota could drags maybe not because he's just dumb, but
yeah, so I um he's just a bulldog.
He's a drag.
And he's your dog.
You don't know who drags is from Guardians of the Galaxy.
(12:28):
That's who we named him after.
Yeah, and it's pretty perfect fit.
Actually, I might include the pictures that we reference in the blog post so people can go look.
So I should.
So keep that in mind if you want to see his pictures go to the blog post.
Yeah, hopefully I follow through.
Well, yeah, anyway, it's like they just I mean they they were pretty calm, pretty chill.
(12:50):
I mean, obviously kind of curious of what do we just bring home, but yeah.
Actually, do you remember that I perhaps to them a little bit beforehand when I was pregnant?
And I carried around like a wrapped up blanket and I had my phone in it playing baby sounds.
I do remember that.
Yeah, I did that and then I trained them to stay off of baby blankets.
(13:11):
I made that a barrier that there was a baby blanket on the floor.
I didn't want them on it, which now they probably don't remember at all.
Didn't we actually also even bring like Judas car seat in?
Yeah, like sniff that for like a couple of minutes before we brought you.
Yeah, we did.
Just to let them get the scent.
Yeah, and it worked because Judah was born when right before drags turned to.
(13:34):
I think so.
So, so drags was still kind of in that puppy stage and I was worried that he was going to go
pause in the car seat and he didn't.
He didn't.
He just they both got really low, which like they laid down or they they got down on
Judas level rather than like standing over him.
They were very gentleman.
Yeah.
How would you say they are with him now?
(13:57):
Oh, um, so what I've noticed lately is I think Judah and drags are like best friends.
And I think Kota sometimes is still like a little
where he's I how you say that?
Where are you?
Yeah, where are you?
Where are you?
I think a little weary.
A little bit of both.
Well, he's busy.
It also could be because yeah, he's 56.
(14:19):
So there's that.
And obviously he's an Australian shepherd.
So Judah like likes to.
So the way that Judah is with their dogs is he'll like sit on them sometimes when they're laying on the floor.
Yeah, I'm not proud of this.
I don't condone this.
He kind of chases them sometimes when they're excited and playing.
Okay, but disclaimer, if you've ever had a bully breed,
(14:41):
they love to be petted very firmly.
They basically want you to smack them sometimes.
Like they love firm affection and then an Australian shepherd loves affection,
but not necessarily in the same way.
Drax and Judah are on the same page like all the time.
And then Kota's like, I miss when he was small.
(15:03):
Yeah, because Judah can like slap Drax in the head,
not like in a bad way, just playing around in Drax is like, oh, this is fine.
And then Judah can pull Kota's hair and Kota like runs away.
Yeah.
And I'm we are actively I am actively training Judah to be more gentle with the dogs because obviously
(15:23):
you have to protect the dogs, but when it's been better, like even just when Judah first like really
started getting comfortable with them, then we kind of realized like, okay, like we have to show Judah
some boundaries around the dogs.
Otherwise, it will get kind of crazy.
Yeah, it works really well most of the time, but it Kota is just more of a quiet, more
(15:43):
timid dog. So he he loves Judah. He just doesn't always want to be around Judah.
But Drax, on the other hand, wants to be around Judah 99% of the time.
Yeah, especially when he's eating.
When Judah's eating.
Yes.
And dropping food.
Yeah, Drax doesn't want to either when he's eating because Judah pulls all the dog food out of the
bowl.
Yeah.
(16:03):
In what ways do you think our dogs help you get ready to be a dad?
So whenever Judah gets on my nerves, I just throw him in one of the dog kennels
and lock it and kidding.
Although back to kennel training real quick, Judah is pretty well kennel trained by this point
because Judah will also go in the dog kennels on his own.
(16:24):
Yeah, he's been kennel trained to sell.
And he loves to play in there.
I think there's a point there right now.
Okay, the real answer to that question.
The potty training obviously was one of the first ones that I really realized just literally
just starting to get used to like waking up in the middle of the night.
For the dogs, it was to let them outside or most of the time to clean up after them.
(16:50):
Yeah.
Already.
Which that's just how it is.
And for Judah just getting up when he cries, when he needs anything.
So yeah, there was that just getting used to that different.
Getting used to stuff that's not sleeping all night.
Like we used to for the first portion of my life, which was great.
And I would say also more of what it taught me of like dealing with the animals.
(17:15):
Obviously again, like there's there's things that are a little different.
Like you can throw the dogs in the kennel and like whatever.
Like throw is such a firm word.
I feel like I don't want to kick them in the kennel.
You can send them to the kennel.
Send them to the kennel.
We say throw the visuals immediately abuse.
It is.
Yeah, we're not abusive to our dogs, but we do hit them.
(17:38):
Damn you all.
In the way that they like to be hit.
Oh my gosh.
We can cut all out.
Yeah, don't worry.
Well, believe it.
Good.
But no, like just me like getting like learning how to handle my own emotions and like
(17:59):
regulate frustration.
Like because that's a thing that happens like with dogs.
Obviously they don't listen.
You get frustrated.
I mean, it's the same thing with a baby like whether you want to admit it or not.
Like every parent can probably say there was a time where like your baby just
doing something just crying a lot like whatever right now.
(18:20):
Every parent is thawing their head.
Okay, good.
I don't want to be like oh my gosh.
The kennel's.
Oh my gosh, he hates his kid.
Yeah.
No, if you're a parent, you understand.
So even just that like learning just to literally like
regulate my emotions, not let my like frustration or whatever like get the best of me.
(18:41):
That was huge.
That definitely crosses over to both parenting humans and dogs.
I would also say like literally just helping me get used to like the life of just more
responsibilities like more kind of I don't know being on the go is the right way of saying it.
But there's yeah, I mean just more responsibilities more things to do.
(19:01):
It's not just like wake up, get ready, go to work, come home.
Like there's always something else happening now, whether it was with the dogs
and now with Judah and now with both of them.
So yeah, that definitely helped as well.
But that started when you got married.
That is true.
As soon as we got married, it was wake up, make Emily breakfast in bed every morning.
(19:23):
Help her do her hair, make up.
And anyway.
So for me, I agree with everything that you said.
But for me, it's definitely the getting used to being selfless.
Like what you just said, like taking into account other beings needs and just being
(19:44):
more selfless with your time, with your decisions, even with your frustrations.
It's you have to be more selfless to put that down because a lot of time,
through is in your frustrated is out of your control completely.
Patience has been a big one for me.
Oh yeah, for sure.
A lot of patients, especially with, well, I would say especially with Kota, but also especially with
(20:09):
Drax because he's a bulldog and he catches on to things really fast sometimes or takes him forever
just because his walnut brain is probably really smushed on the muscle.
But just being able to have patients with them as they're learning things and to have patients with
myself as I make mistakes while they're learning things, that in itself was a huge plus to being a dog
(20:34):
owner before parenting. Yeah. Yeah. If you teach your job, your dog to jump and then they later start
jumping on people, just be patient with yourself. Yeah. As you adjust people making mistakes.
Fun fact, I let Kota give people hugs when he was like nine months old. Like because he's a big
Australian shepherd so he can touch most people's shoulders and I was letting him do that and I had to
(20:59):
train him out of that. So that that's a great time for patients. Another thing was voice tone.
I learned that I had to control my voice tone more because I mean we talked about this a couple
of episodes ago, but your voice tone affects so much of how they perceive what you're saying,
which is 100% true with the toddler. I have to make sure that I'm not escalating a situation
(21:25):
more than it should be simply because my emotions are affecting me. Right. I have to keep it even
keeled. Yeah. Which you don't you don't really have an issue with because you're the most patient person
in the whole world. Well, that might be true, but I still have to work on it. Yeah. I also think it
helped me with self-reflection and like being able to adjust to what's working, what's not working.
(21:50):
Good answer. Thank you. That's like a super power is being able to have self-reflection and be able
to see where you need to change and then the speed at which you pivot is going to bring that about
quickly. Yeah, I should probably try that every once in a while. Sometimes. What parallels do you see now
between being a dog dad and a human dad? I would say whether it's a dog or whether it's a child,
(22:17):
they they love having boundaries. They might not always act like they appreciate the boundaries
or want them, but deep down they do. They do. Maybe not want, but they need them. Yes. They need them.
The dog to kid psychology is so similar because they want you to follow through what you say. They want
(22:38):
the boundaries. They want to make you happy too. They want to make us, they want to please us.
Yes, absolutely. I think one of the big things that we tried to do with the dogs that kind of parallels
over to with you to a little bit is like, and again, obviously we're not perfect at it. Like if you don't
want your dog to do something, then don't let them do it. It just makes me so happy that you're punctuating
(23:04):
so many episodes, statements that I have made only in the first four episodes. All right. Yeah.
Good job. This is probably only me. I think I think we should be the last one. No more podcasts.
Yeah, this could be, that's, this could be it. You're ending on a high note with me as your special guest.
But no, like it's just kind of that mindset. Like if you don't want them to do it, then don't let them.
(23:30):
Now obviously for a little bit, that's kind of easier said than done because you're dealing with
living things that have some sort of free will kind of. Kind of? Well dogs. They still have free will.
They do. We could go out of this room right now and take someone out of the way.
Dog through the trash, which he only does every like once a year, but when he does this terrible, we put our ice cream
(23:54):
cartons in there. He loves dark chocolate. He's gonna die from eating dark chocolate one day. We need to get
more ice cream at it to the shop. We are out of ice cream. But yeah, again, that's a little different. Like
what you were saying about like due to cry and like, well, I don't want you to cry. So like I'm just
knocking on what you cry. Like that's a little different. Yeah. But like if he's doing something that he
(24:15):
knows he shouldn't be like getting into something whatever like then like, yeah, like don't let them do it.
Kind of that mindset. Yes, I love that. Guys, this is what one-on-one coaching gets you. Listen to the
knowledge. I got all this for free. Not really. Oh, that's true. Your money is my money, honey. Yeah.
Do you think that other people should consider having a dog before they start having kids?
(24:42):
I do. I don't think it's like a rule. Like if you don't like your screwed like sorry,
you just have a baby for the first time. You never had a dog like you're gonna be a horrible parent.
That's not the case. But basically if you have if you just have a kid first, you're gonna be learning
some of those things for the first time with your kid. If you have the dog first, you're learning
(25:03):
those things for the first time with your dog first. So then when the kid comes, you're learning
or you're not learning some of those things. And at the same time, if you fail and you mess up,
then would you rather do that with I feel like you want to clap right now.
If you would you rather like go through it for the first time with a dog where you can make some
(25:27):
mistakes and you can mess up in a human's life. Yeah. Yeah. I think a lot of the problems that young
parents or early parents in the early years have is learning to like die to yourself. Whereas
when you start with a dog, you have already died to yourself in so many ways. Like I mean so when
(25:48):
you get to parenthood, there's a whole new level of sacrifice. But at least you're not shocked
that your life is no longer your own. You're able to kind of like segue into it. And you're able to
throw the temper tantrum that happens just because don't do it. How did you see that?
(26:10):
Is it the air horn app? No, no, no, no. Okay. Is it the praise break app?
Come on. Preach it girl. Preach it. Okay. The temper tantrum then inevitably happens when you realize
that you have to adjust your life in ways that you don't want to. You can have that temper tantrum
(26:34):
early with your dog rather than with your baby. Which you know you're probably so gonna have the
temper tantrum either way. It's just gonna be a little bit less because you've already practiced these
skills and you can move into it. Yeah. A little bit easier. This one's a really fun question because I love
to rant about this. Oh boy. What do you think about people who have a newborn and get a puppy
(27:01):
like same time? Yeah. I mean basically we can kind of go back to like my answer to the last question
of why if you would want to have a dog first. And on the complete like opposite end of the spectrum
of that now you're having both of those at the same time. So now you're learning both of these
(27:22):
things for the first time at the same time. And you're like your energy is trying to go towards both
things at once and you're probably not being able to give 100% towards either one compared to I mean
you're gonna be so stressed so strained. Imagine kennel training while having a newborn and the dog
(27:44):
just wakes up in the middle of the night wakes up the baby. I'd be seeing red. I'd be livid. Because that's
exactly what would happen. Yeah. The other thing too is both with dog training on its own and then
even just like with Judah when he was a baby is we were able to like share the load with it wasn't
like both of us getting up at the same time every single time for Dracks or for Judah you could get
(28:10):
up once and I could keep sleeping. I could get up four times and you could keep sleeping. What?
With Dracks? Because with Dracks I think I said that he was yours to deal with because I wanted you to
have this experience of raising a dog because you never had this experience before. Yeah we kind of
agreed that I would take on the brunt of the which is why you feed the dogs now because when we got
(28:35):
Dracks I was like he's your dog you have to be the one that feeds him because dogs they respect who
feeds them. Yeah and now and now sometimes when we leave the house to go like away for the weekend we
forget until like the last minute to like find someone to come watch our dogs. Shut up to Zach
for me and our last minute go to our always go to but also especially the last minute dogs. We're
(29:01):
still working in that area. We've made a list. Yeah so I was just saying like we with Judah I mean maybe
not as much with Dracks but we were able to like share that load whereas if you literally have like
a dog a puppy and a baby at the same time you're probably both getting up every time like because
if the dog wakes the baby up then one of us taking care of the dog one of us taking care of the baby
(29:26):
we're tired we're angry angry stressed not a good life. Yeah I always look at because I usually
see it on Facebook because I'm in mom groups on Facebook and that's weird. I'm kidding and there'll be
a mom posting about how she has a puppy and a baby and how it's just so overwhelming and I just want
(29:47):
to scream because I'm like who told you that was a good idea. You're with a dog you only have a certain
amount of time to capitalize on that puppy training which is really like the first four months that
you have a puppy you create the habits that you're then going to deal with the rest of the time that
you have them which I'm not saying that you can't you can't change them. If you have a newborn
(30:12):
during that time they're just gonna be out of control crazy and you're gonna hate them because by
the time they get to five months they're little teenagers they're kind of evil no one was that.
We're talking about the dog still or the dog because the baby's not going to be the one that gets
(30:32):
gets the shaft is going to be the dog right and then they're going to get rid of the dog and then the
people that get them have to do with all the bad habits that they let the dog create.
And why is it always German shepherds and huskies yeah yeah you're right you would think that like you
would maybe they would like split and share that load or that not the load like they would try to take
(30:59):
care of both evenly but naturally you're gonna take care of your baby and then the dog is basically
getting let kicked to the curb and not being taken care of in the way that it needs.
Well and I had I'm googling it really quick what the name was. See this is why we need one of those like
guys like Tim Hawkins has where like the sound guy who has the lab. I know we're gonna get there we're
(31:23):
we're gonna start hiring some people this podcast is really gonna take off. We're gonna do big things
here and by we I mean Emily. Right after I had Judah I could not stand the dogs and part of that's
just being touched out and having another being that you're taking care of 24/7 but it took like
(31:45):
I think it was until like maybe six months ago I still did not like the dogs like I mean
yeah that's so true and I felt really bad but then I like I think it was on TikTok I'm
TikTok certified in this topic that someone was talking about how common it is to have this
disorder after postpartum it's like a form of postpartum not necessarily depression but it's just
(32:09):
the hormones that when everything's uneven that you can have this I tried to google it so it's
probably it's somewhere or I'm making it up but it's on TikTok but it's a thing where postpartum
you have very little patience for animals or even the one to be around them and so imagine having
(32:30):
animals husbands so imagine having Judah's a newborn and not being able to even have
any motivation or want to be around a puppy that is eight to twelve weeks old it would just be too much
yeah and it is too much and that's why so many people struggle it's just a bad idea that's why when
(32:53):
we wanted when when Daniel wanted a dog I told him it had to be a year old before we had a kid
and that's why we ended up getting a dog early or like when we hadn't fully like planned on it
is because I was like we he had to be year old before we have kids it was the next logical thing to do
(33:15):
yes and Drax was really easy to train because Koda trained him basically yeah we should do a whole
another podcast about why you should have two dogs but especially why they should not be litter mates
yeah Koda definitely helped us with the training of Drax for sure
(33:36):
yeah like Drax's potty training went a lot quicker than expected especially as a bully breed I
expected his potty training to take until like maybe five months but no he caught on really fast because
I mean Koda is obviously not peeing in the house and so he just follows through Koda's routine
which is funny because now he was learning commands so quickly right yeah because we would tell
(33:59):
Koda the command and he'd say kill to do it and get a treat yeah it was it's so good the second dog
much easier yeah any last dog having a dog and having a child will both bring you joy as long as
it's done correctly and there's not one perfect way to do anything but there's definitely
(34:22):
many ways to do things the wrong way but I mean the the reason that people get dogs is for
I mean companionship because it's I mean I guess there's lots of reasons maybe but like they they
bring joy to your life if you can do it the right way and having a baby having a I mean having our son
(34:42):
obviously has brought so much joy to our life but if we hadn't done the things that we did with
intentionality and in the order that we did them they definitely would have been less joy I mean we
would have got through it because we would have I mean people people people can still get through
things but you can definitely make it easier on yourself or harder on yourself yeah that kind of
(35:03):
sounds like your definition of harmony dude harmony that's right cool so I don't have to ask you that
question yeah because I I don't think I could come up with any better answer than that if you could
encourage a new dog owner or a new parent who's in the thick of just the early stages of still trying
(35:28):
to find that harmony what would you say first all I would say congratulations because you made it to
the end of this podcast which means that you've listened to the whole thing and hopefully you have
some good tips and pointers to think on I would say maybe I'm wrong by saying this but I don't think
it's ever too late too late to do what to change or to change your trajectory yeah that's the best
(35:56):
that's a great way of saying it don't be hard on yourself don't like just say like well I like I'm
this far along and so like I just like it's pointless like the reason that I'm gonna say we but the
reason that Emily is doing things like this it's not for the people out there who are doing it right
already it's not for the people that are having all the successes even though it still is a little bit
(36:21):
for them I mean maybe but this is for the people who need help I love that that you just have to accept
where you are and look at where you want to be and bridge the gap yeah and if you need help bridging
that gap I'm right here literally check the show notes show notes oh all right we have a quick
(36:51):
fire around oh boy this means you're not allowed to really think about these answers you need to
just go okay that's wonderful what's your dream dog breed dream dog breed um would be a old English
bulldog aka drags because he's awesome he's the best what's drags is most annoying habit jumping on
(37:13):
people oh oh no no farting oh my god his fart are atrocious anyone has anyone that has a
bulldog probably understands anyone who has a dog understands dog farts are bad now multiply that
by 10 and that's drags yeah favorite thing to do with drag or any of our time when he was a puppy it was
(37:39):
just like sitting on the couch with him before we didn't let him on the rug and on the couches
anymore he would just like cuddle up with us and that was like awesome and then a week later he was
like 70 pounds now I would say just like any sort of like plan around like fetch we literally like
this afternoon we were just playing fetch things that just keep him active keep his brain working
(38:00):
with a giant fallen branch yep oh also like playing with the dogs and with Judah like all together
like at the same time that's really fun what's one thing that our dogs do that always make you laugh
my brain is not quick firing what does drags do that makes me laugh okay I have one
wincota shouts his face between the couches because he wants to be close to us but he can't be on the
(38:23):
rug yeah just lips like all curled up mm-hmm check the blog post favorite memory of drags and Judah I think
like just anytime that drags like licks Judah in the face and Judah just like loves it so much and it
it got to the point where like Judah was trying to act he still does he tries to like act like a dog
(38:45):
and hill like he literally was like licking drags like for slobber everything and I like saw it
happening in I don't know like just a while back and I was like that not super sanitary okay would
you rather have to completely retrain drags from ground zero or go back to multiple night wakes with Judah
(39:13):
in a strange way I didn't hate the nights with Judah because like it was like just like part of the bonding
of like being able to like comfort him if either if either way I'm gonna have to be waking up in the middle
of the night I would rather see Judah than drags peeing on the floor all right well thank you so much
(39:35):
for being the very first guest on the podcast you are so welcome thank you for having me hopefully
this is not my last time although you're gonna have to come up with a whole new set of questions
to get different answers out of me if I'm gonna ever be on here again but yeah it was a lot of fun
what we're gonna just keep doing this episode over and over like once a year and in my answers might
(40:00):
change a little bit they might like different life stages that would be kind of fun mm-hmm like when
drags is 56 oh gosh I don't want to talk about it code will be dead by then yeah stop it we're okay
yeah that's am I supposed to like give you a kiss or something please no one wants to hear that
(40:22):
in their ears imagine being in your car with your podcast too loud and you just hear a kiss
all right well I hope you have fun thank you for hounding harmony with us thank you so much for
tuning into hounding harmony dog training if you found this episode helpful it would mean the
(40:45):
world to me if you'd follow the show and leave a quick review this helps other dog owners find
the support that they need to for more tips training help and encouragement follow me on
tiktok and instagram at hh_dogtraining or you can check out the resources in the show notes
until next time keep pounding that harmony
you
(41:06):
[Music]
[Music]
So the reason that I love having dogs is because I don't have to actually take care of them.
(00:06):
And they just kind of help keep the house clean.
They pick up food and things like that.
Hello and welcome to the Hounding Harmony Dog Training Podcast.
The show that helps you go from chaos to calm with your dog one episode at a time.
I'm Emily, a dog trainer in licensed veterinary technician,
here to give you practical tips, realize strategies, and the confidence to raise a well-behaved,
(00:31):
obedient dog without the overwhelm. Let's jump in and create a calm and connected life with your dog.
I don't know how to start the podcast now.
All right, I'm going to talk to them and I'm going to talk to you, okay?
Okay. All right. Welcome back. Welcome back to the podcast.
I have a very special guest with me today.
(00:54):
Go ahead and introduce yourself. My name is Daniel Holbrooke and I am the husband of my wife,
Emily Holbrooke, who is the creator and curator of this podcast.
And it has been his dream for as long as he can remember to have a podcast and to be on a podcast.
It has. Shout out to him, Hawkins.
(01:15):
So today we're going to be talking about how dogs have prepared us for parenthood.
And we can finally say this because we are parents. I mean, I've always had a suspicion that dogs
and kids are basically the same in a broad sense of it.
And now we have discovered that to be true. Another son is almost two.
(01:37):
We don't have all the credentials on this, but we have enough. We have enough.
We have enough. Daniel, what kind of dogs do we have?
So we have a 56-year-old. 56-year-old. Oh no, wait.
Yeah, that's right. 56-year-old Australian Shepherd.
Yeah, and I think a 21-year-old. He's 23.
(01:59):
Four? I think he's 24.
28-year-old Old English Bulldog. The Australian Shepherd's name is Coda. The Bulldog's name is Drax.
How would you describe your relationship with them?
It's a love-hate relationship for sure. Mostly love, except for every single time that it's hate.
Well, Drax is my actual son. Coda is my stepson.
(02:25):
Stepson. And not to say that, you can't fully love sons and stepson's the same.
But we got Drax together after we were married as a puppy.
And so I've been able to be along for Drax's whole life. Whereas when we first got married,
Coda was like 28, 35 years old, something like that.
(02:49):
Yeah, it was a single mom. I'm gonna do that all episode by the way.
And our son, Judah, is too old, turning to this year. So that's we're gonna kind of talk about that dynamic as well.
What would he be in dog years? Just two divided by seven. No, it'd be the opposite.
Oh. He'd be like, why would you do that?
We'd be like a brand new puppy. That's a joke. We'd have to take the months and then divide it.
(03:16):
Yeah. We'll do that some other time. Well, it's only 24 months.
We'd divide it by seven. So that's only like three months old, dog years.
Yeah. Which tracks because he's just kind of body-drained.
Do you remember what the first few weeks with Drax were like?
Well, so when we first went and saw Drax, it was like that typical, like, how you see it in the
(03:38):
movies or commercials. Love it. First sight. Like, you see this puppy and...
We were not supposed to buy a dog that day.
Yeah. And we did because Drak stole our hearts.
But the first few weeks, I mean, there's kind of like two sides of it.
There's the good side, which is like, oh, wow, we have a puppy.
This is awesome. He's so playful. He's so cute. And then there's the potty training
(04:02):
waking up in the middle of the night side of things, which is still cool because, you know,
like, you're doing it for a reason and for a purpose. But at the same time, it's a good thing
that that only lasts for a while because I couldn't do that my whole life.
Yeah. So I actually wanted us to get a dog because I...
(04:24):
Well, I wanted Daniel to experience the puppy stage and I wanted it to be all done
and over with before we started having kids.
And it actually worked out. You really...
You had it all planned out from the very beginning, huh?
I did. We did have this conversation. I promise.
I'm sure we did. But...
But yes, I have a plan for most things. So what do you think was the hardest thing to teach Drak's?
(04:48):
Well, the hardest thing to teach Drak's is the thing that we are still...
Trying to teach him that we've been still working on all these years later is just getting him to
like not jump on people. But he's like 99% of the time he's great at it.
But when he gets...
Except for when someone really frail that we don't want him to jump on it.
(05:10):
Oh yeah, grandma's, grandpa's, little babies, I'm just kidding.
Kidding about the baby.
Not the baby.
First day we brought you to home, Drak's just jumped on him.
He did not.
He did so good.
Kidding.
So yeah, he just gets super excited.
Even though he's only 28 years old, he is still a puppy in terms of that, I would say.
(05:33):
So yeah, when ever someone comes over, we have to basically put him in his kennel
because he'll want to jump on him.
We could leave him out, but then we just would constantly be hounding on him.
And we're trying to do other things.
So it's just like, Drak's sit, Drak's off like that.
So that is what we are currently still working on.
But he actually did an amazing job training and still does.
(05:59):
We taught him a lot of cool tricks and obviously...
A lot of cool tricks.
Oh yeah.
He's like that.
We'll get to those later.
He's like double at seven.
Or maybe not.
Um, maybe not.
The shark.
You can tell him what shark is.
So, basically...
It's kind of ironic because it's probably part of the problem.
But we basically taught him to jump.
Not me.
(06:20):
I taught him to jump whenever I say the word shark.
But it's not on people.
It's like to grab like a stick or...
I think it started with a belt, honestly.
So...
Yeah, we're learning from our own mistakes here still.
(06:40):
Yeah.
So teaching him to jump,
2020 hindsight may not have been the best thing,
but it was pretty cute and fun when he was younger.
What was the hardest thing to teach Drac's as a puppy?
Okay.
As a puppy, I think the hardest thing was probably just teaching him boundaries.
So we have, for all you listeners out there,
we'll take you inside of our home,
(07:02):
close your eyes and just imagine with me.
We have a rug in the living room.
And we don't want dogs on the rug because it's a nice rug.
And it's like a white rug.
Yeah, we bought a white rug three kids.
Yeah.
I don't know why, but we did.
So I would say that was the hardest thing was
teaching him to stay off the rug.
(07:23):
Yep.
And honestly,
since we've had Judah, I think it's gotten so much worse
as well.
Like he's gotten back into the habit of getting back on the rug.
He just has like random brain lapses where he just like
walks all the way onto the rug.
And then I turn around and I'm like,
"What are you doing?"
(07:45):
Yeah, I would agree with that.
See, my answer to this question was kennel training.
But it only lasted a few days.
But he did not take to kennel training well at all.
If you remember, we had him in the tiny kennel
because he was so little and then he could not.
He like did not take to it at all.
And that was like a new experience for me.
(08:08):
So then we went and got him a bigger kennel
and immediately he was chill.
Yeah.
Was there a moment where you felt like
Drax was starting to like get used to life.
Kind of fit into daily life better where it was less.
We have a puppy at home that we're training
and it was more just like,
Drax is the part of life.
You know what I'm saying?
Yeah.
I would say as of a couple weeks ago,
(08:30):
not just him.
What is 27?
I would say around like year two in human years,
about two years.
So like as of like a couple years ago,
I think he really was comfortable just with us,
with the house, with Kota,
with our rules.
(08:50):
Obviously, I mean, we were still kind of doing some training.
I mean, I think you kind of always are.
Yeah, I would say around the two year mark,
maybe even a little before that year and a half.
Yeah, that's when his maturity kind of melded with his training.
Yeah.
It got a little bit easier.
Was that around the time that he got snipped?
(09:11):
Did that have anything to do with him?
Yeah, actually.
I don't, I don't claim that getting your pet neutered
will change their behavior much because it's like,
there's such a broad range that they could have already started
that might have been because of their hormones,
but also maybe not.
But also, yes, he did get neutered at two.
(09:34):
Well, there you have it folks.
Looking back, what do you think helped us the most getting through those first two years?
Not that they were intensely difficult,
but just like, you know, it was a time of a bit of upset in our daily lives.
Jesus.
Couldn't have done it without him.
(09:54):
I think the thing that helped us was that we, for the most part, were both
consistent, like individually with what we were doing.
So it wasn't like you had an idea of what to do.
And I had like the opposite idea.
I mean, for the most part, I just kind of lean to you and your expertise,
obviously with your background, that by now all the listeners should know about.
(10:18):
If not, go to the website.
But yeah, I think just the consistency between both of us kind of doing the same thing,
having the same expectations.
Actually, I didn't think that's what you would say.
That's really cool.
What did you think I was doing?
I don't know. I didn't think it was going to be that.
Okay, are there any routines, tools, or systems that you use now that you can't imagine?
(10:40):
Living without.
I think the fact that they're kennel trained really helps.
Like now whenever we need them to go to their kennel, it's not like a huge deal.
They just do it.
Yeah.
And it's actually like a safe space for them so they don't mind.
And when the doors, like when their kennel doors are open, even just throughout the day,
they'll just go in there and just chill anyways.
(11:01):
So kennel training was huge.
And it's probably not even just like in our house either.
I mean, I'm sure it's worse if we have to like take them like at the clinic or whatever,
but like they still, they can do it without like throwing a huge fit.
But it's like you're putting a constant ad for people to listen to the last episode,
(11:24):
which is about how important great training is.
Go back guys.
Listen to it.
Share it with your friends.
Okay, so now we're going to move into how dog training has connected to your parenthood for us.
So tell me what you remember about the first day we brought you to home.
How did the dogs react?
(11:44):
Yeah, I remember it pretty vividly actually.
I think mostly because we just took lots of like lots of pictures and videos of it, but they were
obviously curious, but they could tell like they weren't like super wild or like anxious.
They were pretty calm, kind of just sniffing around them, which I think you had said like
(12:07):
dogs can kind of sense that like they could maybe sense that you were pregnant even beforehand.
Yeah, at least we felt like Kota could drags maybe not because he's just dumb, but
yeah, so I um he's just a bulldog.
He's a drag.
And he's your dog.
You don't know who drags is from Guardians of the Galaxy.
(12:28):
That's who we named him after.
Yeah, and it's pretty perfect fit.
Actually, I might include the pictures that we reference in the blog post so people can go look.
So I should.
So keep that in mind if you want to see his pictures go to the blog post.
Yeah, hopefully I follow through.
Well, yeah, anyway, it's like they just I mean they they were pretty calm, pretty chill.
(12:50):
I mean, obviously kind of curious of what do we just bring home, but yeah.
Actually, do you remember that I perhaps to them a little bit beforehand when I was pregnant?
And I carried around like a wrapped up blanket and I had my phone in it playing baby sounds.
I do remember that.
Yeah, I did that and then I trained them to stay off of baby blankets.
(13:11):
I made that a barrier that there was a baby blanket on the floor.
I didn't want them on it, which now they probably don't remember at all.
Didn't we actually also even bring like Judas car seat in?
Yeah, like sniff that for like a couple of minutes before we brought you.
Yeah, we did.
Just to let them get the scent.
Yeah, and it worked because Judah was born when right before drags turned to.
(13:34):
I think so.
So, so drags was still kind of in that puppy stage and I was worried that he was going to go
pause in the car seat and he didn't.
He didn't.
He just they both got really low, which like they laid down or they they got down on
Judas level rather than like standing over him.
They were very gentleman.
Yeah.
How would you say they are with him now?
(13:57):
Oh, um, so what I've noticed lately is I think Judah and drags are like best friends.
And I think Kota sometimes is still like a little
where he's I how you say that?
Where are you?
Yeah, where are you?
Where are you?
I think a little weary.
A little bit of both.
Well, he's busy.
It also could be because yeah, he's 56.
(14:19):
So there's that.
And obviously he's an Australian shepherd.
So Judah like likes to.
So the way that Judah is with their dogs is he'll like sit on them sometimes when they're laying on the floor.
Yeah, I'm not proud of this.
I don't condone this.
He kind of chases them sometimes when they're excited and playing.
Okay, but disclaimer, if you've ever had a bully breed,
(14:41):
they love to be petted very firmly.
They basically want you to smack them sometimes.
Like they love firm affection and then an Australian shepherd loves affection,
but not necessarily in the same way.
Drax and Judah are on the same page like all the time.
And then Kota's like, I miss when he was small.
(15:03):
Yeah, because Judah can like slap Drax in the head,
not like in a bad way, just playing around in Drax is like, oh, this is fine.
And then Judah can pull Kota's hair and Kota like runs away.
Yeah.
And I'm we are actively I am actively training Judah to be more gentle with the dogs because obviously
(15:23):
you have to protect the dogs, but when it's been better, like even just when Judah first like really
started getting comfortable with them, then we kind of realized like, okay, like we have to show Judah
some boundaries around the dogs.
Otherwise, it will get kind of crazy.
Yeah, it works really well most of the time, but it Kota is just more of a quiet, more
(15:43):
timid dog. So he he loves Judah. He just doesn't always want to be around Judah.
But Drax, on the other hand, wants to be around Judah 99% of the time.
Yeah, especially when he's eating.
When Judah's eating.
Yes.
And dropping food.
Yeah, Drax doesn't want to either when he's eating because Judah pulls all the dog food out of the
bowl.
Yeah.
(16:03):
In what ways do you think our dogs help you get ready to be a dad?
So whenever Judah gets on my nerves, I just throw him in one of the dog kennels
and lock it and kidding.
Although back to kennel training real quick, Judah is pretty well kennel trained by this point
because Judah will also go in the dog kennels on his own.
(16:24):
Yeah, he's been kennel trained to sell.
And he loves to play in there.
I think there's a point there right now.
Okay, the real answer to that question.
The potty training obviously was one of the first ones that I really realized just literally
just starting to get used to like waking up in the middle of the night.
For the dogs, it was to let them outside or most of the time to clean up after them.
(16:50):
Yeah.
Already.
Which that's just how it is.
And for Judah just getting up when he cries, when he needs anything.
So yeah, there was that just getting used to that different.
Getting used to stuff that's not sleeping all night.
Like we used to for the first portion of my life, which was great.
And I would say also more of what it taught me of like dealing with the animals.
(17:15):
Obviously again, like there's there's things that are a little different.
Like you can throw the dogs in the kennel and like whatever.
Like throw is such a firm word.
I feel like I don't want to kick them in the kennel.
You can send them to the kennel.
Send them to the kennel.
We say throw the visuals immediately abuse.
It is.
Yeah, we're not abusive to our dogs, but we do hit them.
(17:38):
Damn you all.
In the way that they like to be hit.
Oh my gosh.
We can cut all out.
Yeah, don't worry.
Well, believe it.
Good.
But no, like just me like getting like learning how to handle my own emotions and like
(17:59):
regulate frustration.
Like because that's a thing that happens like with dogs.
Obviously they don't listen.
You get frustrated.
I mean, it's the same thing with a baby like whether you want to admit it or not.
Like every parent can probably say there was a time where like your baby just
doing something just crying a lot like whatever right now.
(18:20):
Every parent is thawing their head.
Okay, good.
I don't want to be like oh my gosh.
The kennel's.
Oh my gosh, he hates his kid.
Yeah.
No, if you're a parent, you understand.
So even just that like learning just to literally like
regulate my emotions, not let my like frustration or whatever like get the best of me.
(18:41):
That was huge.
That definitely crosses over to both parenting humans and dogs.
I would also say like literally just helping me get used to like the life of just more
responsibilities like more kind of I don't know being on the go is the right way of saying it.
But there's yeah, I mean just more responsibilities more things to do.
(19:01):
It's not just like wake up, get ready, go to work, come home.
Like there's always something else happening now, whether it was with the dogs
and now with Judah and now with both of them.
So yeah, that definitely helped as well.
But that started when you got married.
That is true.
As soon as we got married, it was wake up, make Emily breakfast in bed every morning.
(19:23):
Help her do her hair, make up.
And anyway.
So for me, I agree with everything that you said.
But for me, it's definitely the getting used to being selfless.
Like what you just said, like taking into account other beings needs and just being
(19:44):
more selfless with your time, with your decisions, even with your frustrations.
It's you have to be more selfless to put that down because a lot of time,
through is in your frustrated is out of your control completely.
Patience has been a big one for me.
Oh yeah, for sure.
A lot of patients, especially with, well, I would say especially with Kota, but also especially with
(20:09):
Drax because he's a bulldog and he catches on to things really fast sometimes or takes him forever
just because his walnut brain is probably really smushed on the muscle.
But just being able to have patients with them as they're learning things and to have patients with
myself as I make mistakes while they're learning things, that in itself was a huge plus to being a dog
(20:34):
owner before parenting. Yeah. Yeah. If you teach your job, your dog to jump and then they later start
jumping on people, just be patient with yourself. Yeah. As you adjust people making mistakes.
Fun fact, I let Kota give people hugs when he was like nine months old. Like because he's a big
Australian shepherd so he can touch most people's shoulders and I was letting him do that and I had to
(20:59):
train him out of that. So that that's a great time for patients. Another thing was voice tone.
I learned that I had to control my voice tone more because I mean we talked about this a couple
of episodes ago, but your voice tone affects so much of how they perceive what you're saying,
which is 100% true with the toddler. I have to make sure that I'm not escalating a situation
(21:25):
more than it should be simply because my emotions are affecting me. Right. I have to keep it even
keeled. Yeah. Which you don't you don't really have an issue with because you're the most patient person
in the whole world. Well, that might be true, but I still have to work on it. Yeah. I also think it
helped me with self-reflection and like being able to adjust to what's working, what's not working.
(21:50):
Good answer. Thank you. That's like a super power is being able to have self-reflection and be able
to see where you need to change and then the speed at which you pivot is going to bring that about
quickly. Yeah, I should probably try that every once in a while. Sometimes. What parallels do you see now
between being a dog dad and a human dad? I would say whether it's a dog or whether it's a child,
(22:17):
they they love having boundaries. They might not always act like they appreciate the boundaries
or want them, but deep down they do. They do. Maybe not want, but they need them. Yes. They need them.
The dog to kid psychology is so similar because they want you to follow through what you say. They want
(22:38):
the boundaries. They want to make you happy too. They want to make us, they want to please us.
Yes, absolutely. I think one of the big things that we tried to do with the dogs that kind of parallels
over to with you to a little bit is like, and again, obviously we're not perfect at it. Like if you don't
want your dog to do something, then don't let them do it. It just makes me so happy that you're punctuating
(23:04):
so many episodes, statements that I have made only in the first four episodes. All right. Yeah.
Good job. This is probably only me. I think I think we should be the last one. No more podcasts.
Yeah, this could be, that's, this could be it. You're ending on a high note with me as your special guest.
But no, like it's just kind of that mindset. Like if you don't want them to do it, then don't let them.
(23:30):
Now obviously for a little bit, that's kind of easier said than done because you're dealing with
living things that have some sort of free will kind of. Kind of? Well dogs. They still have free will.
They do. We could go out of this room right now and take someone out of the way.
Dog through the trash, which he only does every like once a year, but when he does this terrible, we put our ice cream
(23:54):
cartons in there. He loves dark chocolate. He's gonna die from eating dark chocolate one day. We need to get
more ice cream at it to the shop. We are out of ice cream. But yeah, again, that's a little different. Like
what you were saying about like due to cry and like, well, I don't want you to cry. So like I'm just
knocking on what you cry. Like that's a little different. Yeah. But like if he's doing something that he
(24:15):
knows he shouldn't be like getting into something whatever like then like, yeah, like don't let them do it.
Kind of that mindset. Yes, I love that. Guys, this is what one-on-one coaching gets you. Listen to the
knowledge. I got all this for free. Not really. Oh, that's true. Your money is my money, honey. Yeah.
Do you think that other people should consider having a dog before they start having kids?
(24:42):
I do. I don't think it's like a rule. Like if you don't like your screwed like sorry,
you just have a baby for the first time. You never had a dog like you're gonna be a horrible parent.
That's not the case. But basically if you have if you just have a kid first, you're gonna be learning
some of those things for the first time with your kid. If you have the dog first, you're learning
(25:03):
those things for the first time with your dog first. So then when the kid comes, you're learning
or you're not learning some of those things. And at the same time, if you fail and you mess up,
then would you rather do that with I feel like you want to clap right now.
If you would you rather like go through it for the first time with a dog where you can make some
(25:27):
mistakes and you can mess up in a human's life. Yeah. Yeah. I think a lot of the problems that young
parents or early parents in the early years have is learning to like die to yourself. Whereas
when you start with a dog, you have already died to yourself in so many ways. Like I mean so when
(25:48):
you get to parenthood, there's a whole new level of sacrifice. But at least you're not shocked
that your life is no longer your own. You're able to kind of like segue into it. And you're able to
throw the temper tantrum that happens just because don't do it. How did you see that?
(26:10):
Is it the air horn app? No, no, no, no. Okay. Is it the praise break app?
Come on. Preach it girl. Preach it. Okay. The temper tantrum then inevitably happens when you realize
that you have to adjust your life in ways that you don't want to. You can have that temper tantrum
(26:34):
early with your dog rather than with your baby. Which you know you're probably so gonna have the
temper tantrum either way. It's just gonna be a little bit less because you've already practiced these
skills and you can move into it. Yeah. A little bit easier. This one's a really fun question because I love
to rant about this. Oh boy. What do you think about people who have a newborn and get a puppy
(27:01):
like same time? Yeah. I mean basically we can kind of go back to like my answer to the last question
of why if you would want to have a dog first. And on the complete like opposite end of the spectrum
of that now you're having both of those at the same time. So now you're learning both of these
(27:22):
things for the first time at the same time. And you're like your energy is trying to go towards both
things at once and you're probably not being able to give 100% towards either one compared to I mean
you're gonna be so stressed so strained. Imagine kennel training while having a newborn and the dog
(27:44):
just wakes up in the middle of the night wakes up the baby. I'd be seeing red. I'd be livid. Because that's
exactly what would happen. Yeah. The other thing too is both with dog training on its own and then
even just like with Judah when he was a baby is we were able to like share the load with it wasn't
like both of us getting up at the same time every single time for Dracks or for Judah you could get
(28:10):
up once and I could keep sleeping. I could get up four times and you could keep sleeping. What?
With Dracks? Because with Dracks I think I said that he was yours to deal with because I wanted you to
have this experience of raising a dog because you never had this experience before. Yeah we kind of
agreed that I would take on the brunt of the which is why you feed the dogs now because when we got
(28:35):
Dracks I was like he's your dog you have to be the one that feeds him because dogs they respect who
feeds them. Yeah and now and now sometimes when we leave the house to go like away for the weekend we
forget until like the last minute to like find someone to come watch our dogs. Shut up to Zach
for me and our last minute go to our always go to but also especially the last minute dogs. We're
(29:01):
still working in that area. We've made a list. Yeah so I was just saying like we with Judah I mean maybe
not as much with Dracks but we were able to like share that load whereas if you literally have like
a dog a puppy and a baby at the same time you're probably both getting up every time like because
if the dog wakes the baby up then one of us taking care of the dog one of us taking care of the baby
(29:26):
we're tired we're angry angry stressed not a good life. Yeah I always look at because I usually
see it on Facebook because I'm in mom groups on Facebook and that's weird. I'm kidding and there'll be
a mom posting about how she has a puppy and a baby and how it's just so overwhelming and I just want
(29:47):
to scream because I'm like who told you that was a good idea. You're with a dog you only have a certain
amount of time to capitalize on that puppy training which is really like the first four months that
you have a puppy you create the habits that you're then going to deal with the rest of the time that
you have them which I'm not saying that you can't you can't change them. If you have a newborn
(30:12):
during that time they're just gonna be out of control crazy and you're gonna hate them because by
the time they get to five months they're little teenagers they're kind of evil no one was that.
We're talking about the dog still or the dog because the baby's not going to be the one that gets
(30:32):
gets the shaft is going to be the dog right and then they're going to get rid of the dog and then the
people that get them have to do with all the bad habits that they let the dog create.
And why is it always German shepherds and huskies yeah yeah you're right you would think that like you
would maybe they would like split and share that load or that not the load like they would try to take
(30:59):
care of both evenly but naturally you're gonna take care of your baby and then the dog is basically
getting let kicked to the curb and not being taken care of in the way that it needs.
Well and I had I'm googling it really quick what the name was. See this is why we need one of those like
guys like Tim Hawkins has where like the sound guy who has the lab. I know we're gonna get there we're
(31:23):
we're gonna start hiring some people this podcast is really gonna take off. We're gonna do big things
here and by we I mean Emily. Right after I had Judah I could not stand the dogs and part of that's
just being touched out and having another being that you're taking care of 24/7 but it took like
(31:45):
I think it was until like maybe six months ago I still did not like the dogs like I mean
yeah that's so true and I felt really bad but then I like I think it was on TikTok I'm
TikTok certified in this topic that someone was talking about how common it is to have this
disorder after postpartum it's like a form of postpartum not necessarily depression but it's just
(32:09):
the hormones that when everything's uneven that you can have this I tried to google it so it's
probably it's somewhere or I'm making it up but it's on TikTok but it's a thing where postpartum
you have very little patience for animals or even the one to be around them and so imagine having
(32:30):
animals husbands so imagine having Judah's a newborn and not being able to even have
any motivation or want to be around a puppy that is eight to twelve weeks old it would just be too much
yeah and it is too much and that's why so many people struggle it's just a bad idea that's why when
(32:53):
we wanted when when Daniel wanted a dog I told him it had to be a year old before we had a kid
and that's why we ended up getting a dog early or like when we hadn't fully like planned on it
is because I was like we he had to be year old before we have kids it was the next logical thing to do
(33:15):
yes and Drax was really easy to train because Koda trained him basically yeah we should do a whole
another podcast about why you should have two dogs but especially why they should not be litter mates
yeah Koda definitely helped us with the training of Drax for sure
(33:36):
yeah like Drax's potty training went a lot quicker than expected especially as a bully breed I
expected his potty training to take until like maybe five months but no he caught on really fast because
I mean Koda is obviously not peeing in the house and so he just follows through Koda's routine
which is funny because now he was learning commands so quickly right yeah because we would tell
(33:59):
Koda the command and he'd say kill to do it and get a treat yeah it was it's so good the second dog
much easier yeah any last dog having a dog and having a child will both bring you joy as long as
it's done correctly and there's not one perfect way to do anything but there's definitely
(34:22):
many ways to do things the wrong way but I mean the the reason that people get dogs is for
I mean companionship because it's I mean I guess there's lots of reasons maybe but like they they
bring joy to your life if you can do it the right way and having a baby having a I mean having our son
(34:42):
obviously has brought so much joy to our life but if we hadn't done the things that we did with
intentionality and in the order that we did them they definitely would have been less joy I mean we
would have got through it because we would have I mean people people people can still get through
things but you can definitely make it easier on yourself or harder on yourself yeah that kind of
(35:03):
sounds like your definition of harmony dude harmony that's right cool so I don't have to ask you that
question yeah because I I don't think I could come up with any better answer than that if you could
encourage a new dog owner or a new parent who's in the thick of just the early stages of still trying
(35:28):
to find that harmony what would you say first all I would say congratulations because you made it to
the end of this podcast which means that you've listened to the whole thing and hopefully you have
some good tips and pointers to think on I would say maybe I'm wrong by saying this but I don't think
it's ever too late too late to do what to change or to change your trajectory yeah that's the best
(35:56):
that's a great way of saying it don't be hard on yourself don't like just say like well I like I'm
this far along and so like I just like it's pointless like the reason that I'm gonna say we but the
reason that Emily is doing things like this it's not for the people out there who are doing it right
already it's not for the people that are having all the successes even though it still is a little bit
(36:21):
for them I mean maybe but this is for the people who need help I love that that you just have to accept
where you are and look at where you want to be and bridge the gap yeah and if you need help bridging
that gap I'm right here literally check the show notes show notes oh all right we have a quick
(36:51):
fire around oh boy this means you're not allowed to really think about these answers you need to
just go okay that's wonderful what's your dream dog breed dream dog breed um would be a old English
bulldog aka drags because he's awesome he's the best what's drags is most annoying habit jumping on
(37:13):
people oh oh no no farting oh my god his fart are atrocious anyone has anyone that has a
bulldog probably understands anyone who has a dog understands dog farts are bad now multiply that
by 10 and that's drags yeah favorite thing to do with drag or any of our time when he was a puppy it was
(37:39):
just like sitting on the couch with him before we didn't let him on the rug and on the couches
anymore he would just like cuddle up with us and that was like awesome and then a week later he was
like 70 pounds now I would say just like any sort of like plan around like fetch we literally like
this afternoon we were just playing fetch things that just keep him active keep his brain working
(38:00):
with a giant fallen branch yep oh also like playing with the dogs and with Judah like all together
like at the same time that's really fun what's one thing that our dogs do that always make you laugh
my brain is not quick firing what does drags do that makes me laugh okay I have one
wincota shouts his face between the couches because he wants to be close to us but he can't be on the
(38:23):
rug yeah just lips like all curled up mm-hmm check the blog post favorite memory of drags and Judah I think
like just anytime that drags like licks Judah in the face and Judah just like loves it so much and it
it got to the point where like Judah was trying to act he still does he tries to like act like a dog
(38:45):
and hill like he literally was like licking drags like for slobber everything and I like saw it
happening in I don't know like just a while back and I was like that not super sanitary okay would
you rather have to completely retrain drags from ground zero or go back to multiple night wakes with Judah
(39:13):
in a strange way I didn't hate the nights with Judah because like it was like just like part of the bonding
of like being able to like comfort him if either if either way I'm gonna have to be waking up in the middle
of the night I would rather see Judah than drags peeing on the floor all right well thank you so much
(39:35):
for being the very first guest on the podcast you are so welcome thank you for having me hopefully
this is not my last time although you're gonna have to come up with a whole new set of questions
to get different answers out of me if I'm gonna ever be on here again but yeah it was a lot of fun
what we're gonna just keep doing this episode over and over like once a year and in my answers might
(40:00):
change a little bit they might like different life stages that would be kind of fun mm-hmm like when
drags is 56 oh gosh I don't want to talk about it code will be dead by then yeah stop it we're okay
yeah that's am I supposed to like give you a kiss or something please no one wants to hear that
(40:22):
in their ears imagine being in your car with your podcast too loud and you just hear a kiss
all right well I hope you have fun thank you for hounding harmony with us thank you so much for
tuning into hounding harmony dog training if you found this episode helpful it would mean the
(40:45):
world to me if you'd follow the show and leave a quick review this helps other dog owners find
the support that they need to for more tips training help and encouragement follow me on
tiktok and instagram at hh_dogtraining or you can check out the resources in the show notes
until next time keep pounding that harmony
you
(41:06):
[Music]
[Music]
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