I am really slack & didn't read all 4 pages of posts on here but just thought I would jump in blind with what I feel is some important information for pet owners bring home a new bub.

Like Christy I am also a vet nurse. First I introduce my house hold.
When I fell pregnant with Evan we were living in Nth QLD & we had Missy, a mini foxy, she was about 6 and as spastic as they get! and Kojack, a foxy x border collie, he was about 5 and didn't really like kids. We also had Luna & Ares both DSH cats. When we decided to move to NSW we thought it was best to find the dogs new homes as Missy was a dog who needed alot of attention & as much as I hated it I knew she wouldn't be happy once Evan had arrived. She went to a old couple who owned a caravan park & had another mini foxy, so I am pretty sure she would have been happy there. Kojack didn't like kids. Again it was a hard thinkg to do but i knew that his future may have ended up being put to sleep after biting one of our kids. So he also went to a new home with a young women who was a sports nut & Kojack loved his walks & was very smart.

(the next two stories are sad)
The cats made the 3 day trip in the car to NSW with us. Luna was a little bit of a scaredy cat and she went from being a cat who was comfortable in her home to a cat who spent most of her time hinding or hugging the walls while going to her food/ litter tray / new hiding spot. The poor thing sat under our bed growling the first night Evan was home. over time she got a little better but sadly she was hit by a car on one of her rare occasions out ( so rare was it to be up near the road we really couldn't believe that this was what had happened, we thought it more likely for her to have been kicked by the horse that lived inthe paddock next door while chasing field mice or something). She didn't show up for dinner one night & Luna being Luna we didn't think much of it but she didn't call at the door like she normally did if locked out after dark that night nor was she about in the morning. By afternoon she still had not been seen so we started the hunt, we thought that maybe she had gotten stuck between the garage & the back patio area so that was the firt place we went to look but needed a flood light to see down between the wall. When we went to get it from the shed, there she was huddled up in a ball, it freaked me out, even though I am a vet nurse I was too scared to touch her as I didn't want to hurt her. I got DH to put her in the cat box & called my boss to meet me at the clinic. She was really messed up. we put her on fluids for the night & then the next day I decided to put her to sleep. She had fractured her jaw in 4 places, she had bleeding behind one of her eyes, she didn't seem to have any control of her bowls or bladder as she had not passed any urine even though she was on fluids. And also my boss (the vet) believed she would need to have her salivary glades removed from one side of her mouth. It was going to be a job for the specialist in Ryde & 1000's of dollars later she might not have regained the use of ehr bladder etc and need to be put to sleep anyway. While the $$$ were also an issue my desission was more based on the fact that her recovery would have been terrible for her, she wasn't a cat that would have coped with being handled so much. We miss her dearly but feel she would not have been happy to go through the mass of surgeryshe would have needed. She was buried at my work. Then we have Ares. He spent almost my whole pregnancy purring on my pregnant belly, he was a beautiful cat, our neighbours had even nick named him "Mr beautiful".
On the trip down he sat at my feet the whole way occasionally popping up to ask "are we there yet". He loved Evan put up with everything the kid could dish out. Never used his claws, although he would bite but never hard. On 2 or 3 times he did get in trouble for puttin ghis paws around evans head but on each occassion he really didn't feel he had any other choice as Evan had him cornered. But again he never used his claws he was just holding him with his paws. He was such a good cat, he would sleep at our feet and be this bif lump of cat that would grunt and moan if you tried to move him to get some of the cover's & when it got could he would come up he wriggle under the donor with you. This cat would purr & purr & purr. When I was about 7 months pregnant with Glenn I watched him cross the road & he just casually walked across & made a car stop for him to pass & I had said to DH that he was getting ****y with cars. We lived on a terrible road and about 2 weeks later I had some kids knock on my door & when i asnwered the boy just said I think your cats been hit by a car. I ran outside and up the drive way & there he was just lying there on the grass where the boys had been kind enough to move him off the road. My nighbour was there & said she thought he was gone. I picked him up & took him inside and just broke down in tears as my poor Ares had been killed. I called my boss to see if he was still at the clinic so I could take him in to burie him with luna. while we got ready I tried to put ona brave face in front of Evan, who thought it was funny to see Ares wrapped in a towel. We let Evan see him be put in the ground but I took him away while DH filled in the hole. It made me feel a little better when again Evan a giggle at Ares in the ground. He had no idea what was going on as he was not yet 2. I miss him so much just writing this up had me in tears. I miss Luna as well but I think because Ares was killed made it so much harder. With Luna it didn't feel like it was one of my animals because she was on the surgery table & under anaesthetic and she looked different from her injuries. I don't know why but It was just harder to loose Ares. He would have been 6 last spetember.

Now we have Zoe she is a super spastic boxer who will be 2 this year. She is great with Evan have never had a problem with her as far as he goes, she is a bit of a digger though!

When I was pregnant I avoided changing the litter trays but you can only get toxo from cat poo that is more then 24 hours old so If you keep up with keeping your cats loo clean every day & wash your hads after you really have very little ris. You have more chance of getting toxo from working in a sloughter house then you do from owning a cat. Chancer are if you own a cat you probably have been exposed to it anyway. You can have a blood test to check this. if you have had it while not pregnant its like having the flu. Get it while you are it can cause birth defects or miscarrage & still births so while the risk is small always keep it in mind. just as little tag as to how unlikely you are to get it. I have worked in vet surgeries for almost 9 years & the last time I was tested for exposure to it I hadn't had it.

A screen door on babies bedroom door is a good way of keeping the room open but the cat out for those who are worried about kitty suggling up to bubby.

Worming your pets every 3 months is very imortant when you have kids. Canine & Feline worms don't like to live in humans so they tend to do nasty things to your body if you get them & they are left untreated. round worm for example can travel to your eye & make you blind. Don't be fooled by the super market "All wormer" or your monthly heart worm that also does intestinal worms, not all of these product cover ALL the worms.

Small dogs are more likely to bite then a big dog. this is because the only way they can tell an anoyin glittle kid to leave them alone becasue they are not a puppy ( little kids tend to think little dogs are puppy's) in to bite or growl. Most dog bites are provoked. Even though the dog bit doesn't mean they will do it again unless little tommy shuves that stick up his bum again that is. Dogs don't like there ears being pulled or the feet being touched or tails being yanked. the best way to prevent a dog bite is to WATCH YOUR KIDS. I see so many dog get put down because they bit the child.........what was the child doing??

Well thats about all I can think of for now so i will leave it there, sorry to have turned my Cats stories into a sad story
I love my cats