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Oh gosh yes. My Pomeranian was my life before kids. I got her when I was 18 and she was literally like my baby. We also have a 3 year old golden doodle. I feel like some days we just barely tolerate the dogs. They always seem to be causing some sort of trouble! Haha

I have very little patience and it kills me.

After I first had LO1 I tolerated our pup and then felt guilty. Now we've made time for her so she feels loved and she sleeps with us nightly which she never did before kids!

I have a lot less patience for my cats, but I'm not totally sure that it's because of my son, I think it's because we had to put down our best and favorite cat when my son was 5 months old and I've liked all the other cats less since then because they aren't as sweet as Riggins was. But I do think that after having a toddler physically attached to me all day I have less interest in having a cat in my lap.

We're a lot less focused on (/obsessed with) our dogs than we were before. We try to still be kind to them but to be honest there isn't the patience that there was. We certainly aren't hauling them off to obedience classes multiple times a week anymore.

This is refreshing to read. I'm feeling some major guilt as a new mom because I have so little patience with my dog. When I'm nursing and he runs to bark at the front door and can't hear me shushing him, while I wake my nursing sleeping baby with the chaos ..... cue anger. I feel terrible, he is 13 and we still love him dearly but I know his little doggy world has been rocked with our LO

I've definitely lost most of my patience with our cat, and especially since I got pregnant, but D picks up my slack

They were our fur babies. They're just our dogs now. Taken care of and loved but no longer appreciated and snuggled with enough. I just don't have energy for it anymore.

I get impatient with our dog much more quickly and I hate that. He's 8 years old and has adjusted so very well to being a "big brother!"

She was my everything prior to kids. I had a month off work before having LO and she and I would often just put around the house and cuddle all day and I love love loved her. After we had DD1 I was much less tolerant and lost my patience with her often. Right before DD turned 1 we had to out her down. But i think that was for the best all around. We found out I was pregnant with DD2 shortly after and I don't think she would have gotten the love she needed in a house with 2 kids. I think about getting another one a lot but I just don't have it in me to be nice to yet another being lol

I think I'm just as concerned about their physical health as I always was. But I'm definitely less concerned about their emotional health now. Before if I thought one of them was being unreasonable I was still pretty likely to be concerned about it. But now I'm like.... live with it dog.

I can definitely relate to the guilt of not spending enough time with my dog once DD was born. My dog was great with my daughter and was so patient, but I felt like she went from being my baby to being just a dog like others have said. Not to be a downer, but 2 weeks ago she passed away very suddenly (she was 13 so I guess it wasn't a total shock) but now I wish I could go back in time and give her so much love. I'm suffering from major guilt now that my dog is gone and wishing I had paid more attention to her.

@BabyTsMom: I hear ya. we had issues with behavioural regression too. Aggression to other dogs when we were out with LO etc. Spent a lot of money on training and a lot of daily training exercises. This was so stressful for me. I ended up in tears a LOT! but thankfully months of daily training paid off and he's amazingly well behaved now and adores LO. But I can't help but feel it was all related. He gets a lot of love from the general public when we walk him so I try and take him out daily now. But when it doesn't happen it just doesn't happen.

My dog is driving me mad. I don't have the time to walk her daily any more. As a result, she toilets in the garden or, worse, in the kitchen. I'm sick of cleaning it up and get mad at her.... but then I feel bad because I know its not her fault and there's a simple solution (walk her).

I wish we didn't have a dog now.

We lost our 8 year old cat very unexpectedly two weeks ago and I have been having so much guilt about this He definitely got downgraded when DS was born 3 years ago and then even more so when DD came along 6 months ago. I am wishing I had found the time to give him more snuggles instead of seeing him as a nuisance. But like @blackbird: said, I'm trying to take comfort in the fact he slept with me every night and knew he was loved. It's so hard when you just only have so much left of you to give at the end of the day.

I don't think too much has changed. I personally probably have less cuddle time with our dog but dh probably cuddles him more to make up for it lol. He still sleeps with us so we get that time alone with the dog. We take him out with us a lot and lo adores him. Sometimes I think he might wish it was quieter like before lo but I hope he's happy! It's easy to feel guilty though, that their lives definitely change when you have kids.

I'll be honest, I borderline can't tolerate, stand, or like our dogs now that I have a child. Granted they have a lot of fear aggression and it's really hard to cuddle with the dog just got done growling at your baby. DH still feels a lot of guilt and wants to be better dog parents, but I really really am pushing to rehome at least one of them. It's more than I can handle it it makes me angry on a daily basis – I don't even feel guilty about it anymore.

I LOVE LOVE LOVE our cats. I am so glad we got them. (We committed to getting them two days before we found out I was pregnant, so we thought about not going through with it.) They were my therapy pets during my pregnancy, and they are still my fluffs!

I used to spend even more time with them, but I think/hope I still manage to give them enough attention. One of them asks to play with our "da bird" toy every.single.night, and some nights I am just too tired. But they sleep in our bedroom and get lots of pets and cuddles and overall it is a good situation.

We have 3 dogs and just don't have the patience for their bs because kids 20 months apart. It doesn't help that I got a lab/weim mix at 18 months of IF...and got pregnant 2 months later; We tried to train her and she's just crazy, we have acreage so she has room to run and she's just crazy and riles up the 2 smaller dogs,

@jetsa: it's strange isn't it! I didn't think anything would change either - but it has shifted. We still love him & include him as much as we can, but the crazy focus has definitely come off him and he's just there with us rather than being the star of the show.