Everyone feels stress, it's just how you decide to handle it. This is especially the case if you don't want your dog to get affected by your stress as well. It comes down to recognizing your stress and learning to calm down – so that Fido will calm himself too. The lovely thing is, some of these tips you can do with and for your doggie!

9 Tips to Reduce Your (and Thereby Your Pet’s) Stress

When you reduce your own stress, you thereby reduce your pet’s stress. The following tips can help you adjust your mood for the better:

1) Interact With Your Pet: Cuddling with your pet, petting her, or playing a game of fetch is calming for both of you. Better yet, take your dog for a walk, which adds the stress-busting benefits of exercise into the mix.

2) Breathe Slowly and Intentionally: When you breathe deeply, it stimulates your parasympathetic system, which lowers your heart rate and blood pressure and helps you relax.

3) Try Meditation: Meditation helps to lower levels of anxiety and depression and improve symptoms of stress-related disorders.5 You can also try mindfulness, which is a less formal variation of meditation that involves actively paying attention to the moment you’re in right now.

4) Play Calming Music: Pets and people respond to music in similar ways, and both of you can benefit from the stress-relieving benefits of calming music.

5) Take Five Minutes to Recharge: When your day is getting overly hectic, take five minutes to stop and regroup. You might step outside to get some sunshine and fresh air, read a few inspirational quotes, jot down your thoughts in a journal or have a chat with a positive person.

6) Engage in Meaningful Activities: Having a sense of purpose and focus is important to your emotional well-being. Try a new hobby, volunteer, or mentor those in need or join a local community group, such as a church or recreational club.

7) Nurture Your Human Relationships: Pets provide unconditional companionship and love, but it’s important to develop strong relationships with other humans too. Take time to nurture important relationships and create new ones throughout your life.

8) Get Support When Stress Is Overwhelming: If you feel you’re nearing burnout and can’t cope, get help. This might mean talking to your spouse, another family member or a friend, or you may want to seek the help of a therapist.

9) Tap: Also called Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT), this simple exercise can have profound benefits that decrease your anxiety level and overall attitude about stressful or negative situations or thoughts. For more information, check out Dr. Mercola’s website on EFT. This technique can also benefit pets!

It’s also interesting to know that as well as being submissive a dog, attempting to make you feel better, will also lick your face or roll onto her back when you’re sad and crying. Next time your dog tries this, while you are feeling badly, don’t push him away. He is simply, in his own innocent way, attempting to be your BFF.

To learn more, including 4 Stress Relief Tips for Your Dog go to Healthy Pets.