TORTURE!!!

Hi Guys,

reading some of the posts today has cheered me up! i'm a little heartbroken at the moment
we are housetraining coco and have set her up a little home in the utility room and got an extendable gate on the front. we're doing everything by the book but the first night was torture!!! at 4am she was awake crying her head off and it was awful sitting up in bed listening to her
we thought it was best not to go down to her because we didnt want her to get in the habit of crying every time she needed a poop so left her for about 5 minutes until it dawned on me that maybe she was hurt or stuck in the bars!!! i was out of the bed and down the stairs in a flash but of course she was fine, she just wanted to leave her humble abode and go poo on someone else's territory last night was a bit better - she did wake me up crying but it didnt last very long and she hasnt once poo'd or pee'd in her area, she waits till we fetch her and bring her straight out. do you have any other tips for house training? i am hoping it will only take a week or so to get her trained. we make sure to take her straight out in the morning and last thing at night and make sure she empties herself before we leave for work or to go to bed. she has lots of toys in her area and we have reduced her water intake for this week..... is it just me or did anyone else feel so cruel during house training??!! her little face behind those bars just breaks my heart!!!

How old is your little coco?

She very well may not be able to hold it throughout the night. I took Kosmo out in the middle of the night until he was about 5 months old. Exhausting - yes, but every accident in the house is a step back and I would rather be inconvenienced in the middle of the night than make him hold it. It's not good for their bladders to hold it in either.

i am hoping it will only take a week or so to get her trained

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A week is a very unrealistic amount of time to have a puppy be housetrained. I've heard estimates that it takes up to an entire year to have your puppy reliably housetrained. Kosmo is 9 months old right now and I haven't had an accident in the house for a few months, but I am not ruling out the possibilities. He's still very young and learning! :flwr:

You have more strength than me in the whole crying thing - I couldn't take it.. I took him up to the bed when he was about 12 weeks old.. :yikes :yikes I took him out every 2 hours and he didn't have one accident in my bed.

Good luck !!!

Hi Sara!

I never thought it could be done in a week either until i read two books on "how to house train your dog in 7 days"... although i'm not putting all my hopes on it!! an improvement would be good enough for me. i really want coco to be able to sleep up in my room but she has already soiled the carpet tons of times and my other half is going crazy!

Pamela,

I think the books are not literal - LOL. Great reads though.

To be completely honest with you, Kosmo maybe went in my house about 5 times since I had him. That's it - even since he was a puppy.

This is what I did:

He was not allowed out of my sight - for any reason - EVER. Supervision is the key to housetraining. I caught him going poo in the house 2 times and picked him up running to the door while it was still coming out :yikes After that he decided he had had enough and he wanted to poop in peace and that he would go outside - :lol:

He peed in the house a few times without me catching him :sl*p: - can't punish him if he's not caught in the act.. ugh. When I did catch him I let out a very loud "AHH AHH" and took him outside to finish the business. We never had a potty problem in the house really because I took him out ALL THE TIME. I literally lived outside with him. When he was really really young - like 10 weeks - I took him out every half hour if it wasn't night time and he wasn't sleeping. After eating, drinking, when he wakes up, after play time, etc.. we went outside. We were outside a great deal of the time for the first few months.

After he went outside, I would seriously give him a lavish potty dance. I would tell hiim how good he was, give him a MILLION kisses, and give him special "potty treats." Potty treats are wonderful. It got to the point where Kosmo bolted out - took a squat - and then bolted back to me because he was excited to get his potty treats. Even now at 9 months there is never a time I don't praise him for pottying outside. I also always go out with him so I know when he's gone - that way I have a better idea of when he'll have to go again.

What else can I tell you - oh yeah have you treated your carpet with an enzymatic cleaner? Puppies will often sniff and go where they've "designated their potty place" and go again in the exact same spot. Only enzymatic cleaners like natures miricle and a few others work to erase the smell completely.

Maybe others can give you more advice, but until then, good luck!! :flwr:

Also, there was a thread a few days ago about somebody having trouble sleeping because of a "singing" dog. Here's the link to that

http://cavaliertalk.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=4594&start=0

Hey, and congratulations!!

Housetraining is a trial, but not all that difficult once you get into a routine. That book you got is VERY practical and the technique definitely works. We had an 8 week old puppy who was almost trained in a week, and well on her way to being fully trained. The only problem is the night time part. A puppy can only 'hold it' for approx 2 hours if it's 2 months old, 3 hours if it's 3 months old etc. This is longer when the puppy is sleeping, but don't worry if coco has an accident
Rio had a couple of accidents and learned from them by us doing exactly what Sara did - picking her up the second we caught her and bringing her outside + lavish praise when she went outside. The night time was no good for me because if I wake up during the night, that's it, I'm awake and there's no getting back to sleep. So we made Rio a pen that attached to the end of her crate with newspaper in it and if she needed to go during the night she went at the end of the run on the newspaper (this is recommended in the book for puppies under 12 weeks).

Theres some good articles in the library on housetraining also.

Don't worry about being cruel... you're not. You're working on moulding a puppy into a reliably trained, obedient and happy adult. 8)

thank you Sara and Cecily for your advice!

coco is 16 weeks old now. we give her lots of praise and little treats when she goes outside and we never leave her out of our sight really, as soon as she starts sniffing the floor we're up and out to the back garden! i must do what sara does and start bringing her out randomly every hour or so - at the moment we bring her out obviously in the morning and night time and after sleep, food and play, or when she sniffs! she absoutely hates the rain and we've had a fair bit of it lately so when i take her out she runs straight back into the house
i'm just hopeing that through this training she will get into a bit more of a routine - i'm so sick of people telling me to stick her nose in it when she goes - that is just beyond cruel and disgusting :yuk:

thanks again :flwr:

Here is my 2 cents:

Limit the dog's access to the house. House training occurs in stages. The dog instinctively will try to keep its kennel clean, so crate training is helpful. Whenever the dog is not supervised, it should be in its kennel. When the dog has grown and can control its bladder and bowel, the dog can graduate to an xpen or a closed off area rather than just the crate. When the dog has learned to associate that this larger is area is part of it's space (like the crate) and it does not mess in that area, then the space can expand to one room in the house. After that, add another room, and so on until the entire house is considered part of the dog's space IN THE DOG'S MIND. All of these stages together could add up to a year or longer.

When the dog IS supervised, it can have access to whatever area you are in and will be watching. It's hard to have a puppy and keep a keen eye on it and do something else at the same time, so a strategy I used was to put the dog on a long lead (tie out). The end of the lead is then attached to me (belt loop or around the waist). It keeps the pup nearby and it reminds me that I have to watch the dog closely.

Catching the in the act of relieving itself or not allowing the action to start in the first place is the easiest way to house train. Anytime the dog has an accident in the house, it will require taking a whole step back in training. For example, if you've graduated the dog into having access to an entire room, but it has an accident or two while unsupervised in this room, the dog needs to no longer best left alone with access. Go back to the xpen or the closed off area that the dog has successfully incorporated into it's "clean space."

It's worked for me!!

My problem is that Cody has the attention span of a flea. If I catch him in the act I say "no no!!" and take him out mid stream (or the other :yuk: ) then when we are outside he was so interested in all the comotion he completely forgets that he had to go in the first place. All he wants to do is play. IT DRIVES ME NUTS!! Then two seconds later he will come back in and finish what he started. grrrr. He is so darn precious but can be absolutely enfuriating. It seems like he has got it in his head that "If I pee on the floor, I get to go outside!! fun!!". When I am home I take him out every 20 minutes or so but he still will come right back in and do his duty on the floor. Even if I am out with him for a half hour, right back inside he goes and squats.

Any suggestions would be GREATLY appreciated.

How about:

After catching mid-act, go out. If he doesnt go, bring him back in. Set him down for 10 seconds or until you see him starting to sniff, then immediately go outside.

If his pattern is go to when he gets back in, just adapt to the pattern. You are not "done" with his outing, until after you've returned in and gone out again.

Eventually, he'll have more control.

You can also start using a command so the dog relieves itself with you say "go potty" or "go poo". Once the dog learns the command it helps focus on the job at hand. (Many humans have been trained, for instance, to associate the sound of running water with going to the bathroom. When they hear the water, time to find a toilet!)