There’s a good chance your fur baby knows he’s about to get a two-legged brother or sister. One UK canine, in particular, has a reputation for sniffing out pregnancies. Meet Chesney, the “pregnancy detecting dog.”
Chesney, a Yorkshire Terrier-Jack Russell-Chihuahua mix, is typically very shy. His owner, Angie Keay of Stockport, England, says that the only time he’ll leave her side in the presence of strangers is when they’re pregnant—whether or not anyone else knows it.
Most recently, Chesney detected one of Keay’s coworkers was pregnant. She was just 8 weeks along and had not yet announced the news.
“Chesney usually sits on my knee and won’t go near anyone else. But he kept going to sit right by (my coworker) Freya,” Keay says. “I kept moving him off her, but he was adamant—every time I pulled him away, he went straight back to her. He didn’t leave her side.”
Sure enough, Freya announced her pregnancy five weeks later.
While Chesney may be making headlines, he’s not the first dog to behave differently in the presence of a pregnant woman. The Bump users have been discussing this trend among their pets for years.
“I have been pregnant three times and each time, my min pin has walked around the house in between my legs so I practically trip over her,” one Bumpie writes. “She did this about a week before I got each positive pregnancy test. In fact, this pregnancy was a surprise, and when she started doing this my husband was like, ‘OH MY GOODNESS, YOU ARE PREGNANT!’ And I was!”
“When I found out I was pregnant, my dog kept staring at me and sitting by me,” another user writes. He started sleeping on my side of the bed when he usually never leave my husband’s side. And—I fully realize how crazy this sounds—we were watching a movie and in it, a baby starts to cry. My dog jumped up, looked around the house and then stared right at me as if to say, ‘Where’s the baby?’”
As another comment indicates, cats have this sixth sense too.
“My cat and dog both acted very weird even before I tested. They don’t want to leave my side, they meow and whine constantly to me, not my husband. My dog even had two accidents inside and she never does that. She is so well-behaved and trained but lately has really been acting up for attention, it seems. My OB says she thinks animals can definitely sense the change in hormones.”
That OB is onto something. Your changing hormones result in a lot of other changes, however slight: odor, body language, mood. And animals—dogs in particular—are especially perceptive when it comes to these changes.
“Dogs have an astounding ability to sense change in the world around them, and that includes when their owner is pregnant,” a Pedigree post explains. “This shouldn’t be surprising. After all, dogs are excellent at reading human body language and behavior, and there is even some evidence that dogs can detect when a person has cancer or is about to have an epileptic fit.”
H/T ITV News
Please note: The Bump and the materials and information it contains are not intended to, and do not constitute, medical or other health advice or diagnosis and should not be used as such. You should always consult with a qualified physician or health professional about your specific circumstances.
