Moving is stressful, but moving with pets is even more stressful. I know this all too well, because I’ve been a renter for most of my life, minus two years when I owned a home. That’s a LOT of moving, and when I developed environmental sensitivities, we moved even more, sometimes across the country.
We’ve always had dogs and other pets, so we’ve always moved with them. Unfortunately, this can put major stress on them. Their whole environment is changing, and big changes like this can cause pets to feel confused, scared, nervous, and stressed. Use our easy moving tips to keep your dog stress-free during your move, whether it’s local or out-of-state.
Both you and your pets are losing a home, daily routine, comfort and your sense of safety. It’s a lot to go through for both humans and dogs, but the first thing you can do to keep your dog calm is to keep your own stress levels low. Dogs, especially, can feel your stress, and then they become stressed too.
Be sensitive to how the move affects your pets, and making minor adjustments to keep them feeling safe and calm.
1. Let Them get Familiar with the Packing Supplies
If your dog tends to be nervous around new items, furniture, or doesn’t do well with small changes, then it’s a good idea to introduce some of the supplies and sounds that might be heard during the packing process. Let them sniff out the boxes, paper or bubble wrap, trash bags, moving blankets, and tape (and whatever else they might be unfamiliar with).
2. Keep Up Your Pet’s Routine During the Move
It’s helpful to try and keep up routines while you’re preparing to move with your dogs or other pets. Doing things like feeding them at their normal times, walking them, making sure they still have their favorite place to rest or nap, and taking a short breaks to play with them will help keep their lives still feel somewhat normal. The short play breaks will help relieve some of your stress too!
3. Get an Early Start on Moving
The most important thing to remember is to start early. Why? Because you want to ease your pets into this big change slowly, and with care. You want them to hardly notice what you’re doing. If possible. start a month before the move and just organize and sort through everything, one room at a time. Think of it as a big, Spring cleaning! This will help you weed out the things you don’t need or want to take with you. These items should be donated or trashed. And, your pets won’t find it the least bit interesting.
4. Mindful & Slow Packing
Next, you want to work on the packing part, but, again…slowly. Always do only one room at a time. This is important because, again, we don’t want to create chaos in the home. Focus on the least-used rooms first…spare bedrooms, second bathrooms, closets, storage areas, etc. Packing these room won’t alarm your dogs at all, but they may follow you around a little bit, to try and figure out what you’re doing. Reassure them with attention, treats, and play.
5. Dog Enrichment When Moving
Enrichment is great to keep your dogs busy so you can do some packing, but also helps keep them calm. Enrichment is great for both physical and mental stimulation, which reduces energy levels, gets them to engage, and forces them to problem-solve. All of these things give them a “job” to do, depending on the type of stimulation you give them.
Sniffing wears them out quite a bit, both physically and mentally, so scatter feeding in the grass or on a snuffle mat (that imitates grass) is easy and quick to do and will keep them occupied for a little while. You can also hide treats around the house and encourage them to “find it”.
You can also use paper, paper towel and toilet paper rolls, egg cartons, and rolled shipping paper or towels, etc to hide food and/or treats for them to forage through. If you have an extra smart dog, like I do, wrap them in paper, and then put the paper (with treats inside into another box and close the box (make sure no tape, labels, or staples are in/on the box because they’ll be tearing it apart and you don’t want them accidentally swallowing anything they shouldn’t).
If you’re walking your dog between packing, walks are a great form of enrichment too, but try not to walk them on sidewalks. Walk them in the grass, gravel, dirt, sand, etc. (assuming it’s free from pesticides and herbicides). This allows them to naturally sniff their way around, using their brain, learning new information, and it’s more enjoyable for them this way. In fact, the woods is the best place to walk dogs, but I understand that’s not available to everyone. Do the best that you can, given the circumstances.
Moving with Dogs or Other Pets Doesn’t have to be Hard
You being in the home already keeps your pets calm, to some degree, but when you start moving things around, and making things too chaotic, they will notice, and when they do, you’ll have more on your hands than you need. Keep this guide in mind, and maybe you’ll come up with some of your own ideas, while you’re figuring it all out, and if you do, let us know!
