5 Reasons Why Cuddling Your Pet Is Good For You

Have you ever wondered if cuddling your pet is good for you?

 

Most if not all pet parents would wholeheartedly agree that cuddling your pet is good for you, but they may not know exactly why it’s good for them.  In this short blog we share with you 5 reasons why cuddling your pet is good for you.  Grab a cuppa and have a read.  How many of these can you relate to?

Reduce stress and anxiety

It has been shown many times with various studies that our furbabies reduce our stress and anxiety, which is so important.  Cuddling your pet in particular is very effective in calming us humans leading to us feeling less stressed and less anxious.  Just knowing your furry friend is there is comforting and therefore reduces our feelings of anxiety.

 

Reduce blood pressure

Similar to reducing stress and anxiety, spending time and cuddling our furry friends is known to reduce our blood pressure.  Having high blood pressure is bad for our health and can lead to more serious health complications.  Therefore, lots of cuddles with your cats and dogs are very much what the Dr ordered!  There are of course other ways in which you can lower your blood pressure, like a healthier diet, more exercise and more sleep but you may as well add in pet cuddles as well as they really do help lower blood pressure.

 

Causes the release of Oxytocin (the cuddle hormone)

Oxytocin is a hormone, a bit like a chemical messenger inside our body and release of this hormone makes us feel good.  The nickname for oxytocin is “the cuddle hormone” as it is released in the body when we hug our friends and family, cuddle our furbabies and play with our pets.

 

We thrive on social interaction and connections

As humans we thrive on social interaction and connections, face to face communication as well as physical contact like cuddles.  2020 was a particularly tough year when we really had to stay distanced from those we love and care about in an effort to keep everyone as safe as possible.  We are still in that situation now in 2021 and a lot of people are really struggling with the lack of physical contact and face to face communication.  Whilst still in this pandemic it makes it even more crucial we spend as much time as we can cuddling our furbabies so that we can still have some connection and physical contact with someone who cares.

 

Improved mental health and happiness

The benefits of pet ownership to our mental health and happiness have long been known.  The benefits of cuddling your furry friend are just one of many ways in which owning a pet improves our mental health, wellbeing and happiness.  Caring for our pets gives us a reason to live, a reason to get out of bed in the morning.  They are always there for us to cheer us up and give us lots of cuddles.  You can read more about why owning a pet is great for your mental health in another of our blogs.

 

Next week we will be looking at cool outfit ideas for dressing up your pet!