FML it is tough, first time puppy owner, 1 week update

Look, my wife and I are first time puppy owners. Last Saturday we got our 8 week old Welsh Pembroke Corgi. We love him but it is tough.

Human FOMO. There’s so much material training out there, but truth is most of them are with calm puppies, puppies which already went through a certain command training 4 days in a row, or simply older dogs.

My puppy, Mango, is purely food driven, an explorer and really loud, like really loud. Nobody tells you that those demanding barks can make you, the human, feel less confident in what you’re doing, feel your body shake. Yes, he will start going to a puppy school starting with the end of the month (no training spots open around my area). But we’re trying to shape good behavior in him, to build a confident non reactive dog.

We do have achievements, I believe. But the first 2 days I had my cortisol high up in the sky. He was used to pee and poop inside on newspaper/pee pads. I trained him to poop and pee in our backyard, but I had to get out with him every 30 freaking minutes. There are small accidents, but that’s mostly me not paying attention to how long has it been since he peed/had water. Worth noting, because it’s still cold outside, he was having a hard time relaxing outside.

He does sleep through the night, 11pm-6am, only the first night I had to wake up after midnight to get him out to wee. He got used to his crate, and feels very comfortable playing by himself in his playpen with no more barking for attention (wee supervision by keeping a pee/water/poo log). Ironically, he does not bark when needs to go out for potty, still figuring this one out, he seems to be the type of puppy that just stares at you.

And food, geez this needs a book on its own. I am overwhelmed with what and what not and by how much.

And toys, he’s got many, but there’s never enough, I ordered more, and yes, we only keep 2-3 out at a time.

Anyway, enough of this rant, we knew what we signed up for, but FML it is though, and when you watch all those dog training videos and Instagram puppies, you feel like you’re doing everything wrong from day 1, its exhausting.