A mom who went to feed her baby in the middle of the night has told Newsweek how she was "scared half to death" after walking in to find someone else asleep in the room.
It was 3 a.m. when Taylor Cook decided to check in on her infant daughter Espy, who was sleeping in her cot. "I was up late so I wanted to feed her before I headed to bed," she said.
When Cook went in to see her, however, she was greeted by another altogether unexpected sight that immediately made her jump: her dog Lee lying out on Espy's changing table.
"I was scared half to death when I first walked in," Cook said. "I ran to my bedroom to grab my phone because I knew it was too funny not to get a video."
The resulting footage was later posted to TikTok under the handle tc9768157, where it has been watched over 16 million times.
"I thought at the time he was in my bedroom on his dog bed where he usually is at night," Cook said. "He's never done this before, it was totally random."
Lee only came into Cook's life in May 2023, when she met her boyfriend, but they immediately developed a bond.
"He was just a little puppy," Cook said. "We became so attached to each other when I was pregnant he would go literally everywhere with me and we did everything together, we still do but now he doesn't get all the attention anymore."
On her TikTok profile, Cook describes herself as "mom to Espy and Lee." She's not alone in taking her pet parenting responsibilities to heart.
In 2022, a survey of 2,000 U.S. adults with pets, conducted by OnePoll on behalf of the pet food brand Pet Honesty found that around one in four refer to their pets as their child.
Since the arrival of Espy, Lee has struggled to get the same level of attention as before and Cook suspects this might explain why he's taken to doing things like climbing up onto her changing table.
"He's such a big baby in general I think he gets jealous he's not the only baby anymore and tries to do things like his sister such as going on the changing table," Cook said. "We've even caught him with pacifiers in his mouth multiple times and have had to throw so many away."
She said there's even points when Lee behaves exactly like Espy, as if he has learned this behavior from his new little sister. "When he wants attention too he's started crying like a baby out of nowhere since we brought her home," Cook said.
While there may be something of a one-sided rivalry for her affections right now, Cook is keen to stress that baby and dog get along just great and that the bond will likely only get stronger as Espy grows up and learns more about her four-pawed playmate.
"Lee gets along great with Espy they're best friends and do everything together," Cook said. "He doesn't understand what she is but he loves her."
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