That is very true, but before we had our daughter we spoke with the vet about how best to manage the pets as well and keep Katie safe. He very rightly suggested that we make any necessary changes like no longer able to get up on the furniture, before Katie arrived, so that then the dogs would not associate any changes they didn't like with Katie, and be anti her. Also we were told until Katie started school to worm the dogs 3 monthly instead of 6 monthly, which again was good advice. I believe it is better for children to be brought up with pets, and I understand people think they will bring terrible diseases, germs into the house, but human visitors are more likely to do that. I really do think that some exposure to things like dogs etc actually gets their immune system working more effectively, and they can often be healthier children. My daughter was born end of October and through her first winter months, would be parked outside my horses stable while I saw to her. As long as she was warm, I think fresh air is much better for babies than just being in centrally heated houses, but lots of mums keep their babies indoors too much and don't expose them to things, and yet often it is those babies that go on to be quite sickly children. I felt so sorry for my best friend Marie, because we had our daughters 3 weeks apart, and I just made necessary changes etc, but still carried on as normal, and Marie rehomed the dog and cat, cleaned non-stop and lived in an almost sterile environment, and Emily was a nightmare. Always unwell, intolerences to this that and the other, every time she was taken out in the car, the car would then have to be cleaned thoroughly inside before she could go back in it. It was awful and totally drained Marie, and just proved that keeping your baby in a almost sterile environment, by no means ensures your baby will be healthier, and often because they are so protected and have no exposure to germs, they don't tend to build up such a good resistance. Katie never crawled but walked properly from a fairly early age, because she had the benefit of holding onto Sophie's tail, who would happily walk her around the house in exchange for Katie's banana custard!! What concerns me more with parents taking such drastic action to supposedly protect their child by rehoming pets etc, is they often seem to have very unrealistic fears, and go on to be overly protective, smothering even, and cope very badly when children start school, start to become more independant that kind of thing, and in general grow up which of course is exactly what they are going to do, and their fears can then be transmitted to their child, making the child overly anxious etc. I no of course this is not applicable to everyone, but is what I have seen for myself, and so tend to base my thoughts on personal experience. Being a parent is a massive responsibility and I don't understand why people would want to make it so much harder, by being so irrational.
i must be mad what was i thinking starting again) and we never had any problems then so im not worried this time. 
