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Hi! We have a super sweet podenco puppy, around 5–6 months old. We don’t know her exact age because she was found as part of a litter in the mountains.

She started teething about a month ago with the incisors, but now it’s really kicking off: both upper baby canines are gone, the lower ones are about to go and has the adult fangs already next to them, and even molars seem to be coming in. She’s literally losing about one tooth a day, so it feels like we’re right in the middle of the heavy phase.

It definitely affects her. She’s biting a lot more, seems uncomfortable, and even has an upset gut (we suspect from swallowing blood, plus some vet stress). On top of that, she’s showing what feel like early “teenager” traits already, loads of sniffing outside (very sighthound), more stubbornness (i hear you but whatever i want this stick), and she sleeps less deeply and more restlessly. (I reckon because of the pain)

My question:

• How long did this phase last for your pup?

• Did your pups show early teenage behaviour during teething, and did it come in waves?

• Any tips to help her through the teething?

She loves ice cubes, which seem to help a bit 😅

Would love to hear your experience.

Thanks!

I really need help — I feel like our potty training has completely regressed.

Last weekend I posted here and followed the advice I got: I removed the pee pads on Sunday night and blocked the areas where she used to pee. Since then, things have gotten worse instead of better and I feel defeated.

Updates this week:

• Monday night: I found pee in a new spot in the apartment.

• Tuesday morning: we went outside and she peed, but when we came back inside she jumped on the bed, started digging, and then peed on the duvet.

• Work days: I leave from 9am–4pm. Some days I come home and there’s pee, some days there isn’t.

• Wednesday: she didn’t want to pee before bed, and I woke up at 2:40am to find she had already peed the bed.

• Thursday night / Friday morning (today): she refused to pee before bed again, and when I woke up there was pee on the bedroom floor.

I always take her out before bed around 10pm.

Poop is another issue I can’t figure out at all — it feels random and I can’t get her on a schedule or get her to consistently go outside.

About her routine:

She’s a 7-month-old dachshund puppy.

• Wake up: ~6–6:30am

• Breakfast: 7–7:30am (she often doesn’t want to eat right away)

• Potty: 8:30am before I leave for work

• Alone: 9am–4pm

• Potty when I return: ~4pm

• Dinner: 7–8pm

• Last potty: ~10pm before bed

I praise and reward when she pees outside. I removed pads because she was still using them even when I was home and taking her out.

Also — in the last few days there were two days where she didn’t pee inside at all and held it until I got home. Is that a sign of progress, or just random?

Right now I feel like everything regressed after removing the pads and I don’t know what I’m doing wrong — especially with poop timing and the accidents.

Any advice on:

1) Whether removing pads was the right move

2) How to stop peeing inside at random places

3) How to build a reliable poop schedule

4) What I might be missing in her routine

Thank you — I’m trying to do this right but feeling stuck.

Hi, we’ve had our puppy for 1.5 months. She’s a black lab/AmStaff mix but there’s a good chance there’s some pit in there, too.

She has downstairs and overnight potty training down pat. Downstairs she rings a bell to be let out. Overnight we originally had her crated but lately she’s been sleeping in our bed. In the morning she goes straight outside. No accidents.

Here’s the problem: when I’m going about my day if I have to be upstairs I let her out, she goes, then I leash her to me and we go upstairs. And… sometimes within minutes she pees up there!

Do I crate her while upstairs? How do I proceed?

Thank you for your advice!

My beagle is between 1 and 2. She's pretty good about not having accidents under supervision. She can go for a morning walk, sit with me until lunch, go for a walk, etc. However when allowed to free roam she happily will sneak off and pee somewhere. How do I overcome this habit?

I'd like to make it a bit easier to track my pup's sleep. Currently I'm just using the stopwatch on my phone to sort of time how long she sleeps and how long she's awake. Then I have do math. Sleepdeprived math. I'd love it if there was an app or something out there where , for example, I can click a button when she's asleep and again when she's awake and then the app nicely adds it all up and tells me her total sleeping and waking hours. Something like that.

I'm very tired and I don't want to do more math.

We brought home our now-14 week old puppy at new year. He's done amazingly with housetraining, and we haven't had any accidents indoors for a week or two. He does all his business outside our back door, which is decked. This has been great for training but the area is revolting now – we clean it down every day but it's started smelling and the constant rinsing, along with endless rain, has made it slimy and slippery. Ideally, we'd put a couple of paving slabs down and teach him to use those instead (easier to clean and replace), but does anyone have any tips for how to go about this?

Somewhat related – he also wont pee or poo on walks, or really anywhere other than the deck outside our back door! Normal?

My Australian cattle dog turned 8 months a few days ago, everything has gone great so far. She’s pretty much potty trained, has a great routine and is the most fun part of our family so far. Well I guess this morning she woke up and decided to be an asshole, chewed up my finances favorite hat and then got up on the coffee table and chewed up a remote. She’s gotten ahold of little things here and there, but every time I turn my back she’s rooting around to find something else to chew. Any advice on how to make sure this doesn’t become a bigger problem?

Hi! We’re bringing our puppy home soon and i’m still overthinking our set up. We’re planning on having her crate in our bedroom (easiest for night time) and a pen area downstairs in the kitchen for play, hanging out, giving me a break haha. The plan is for the pen to have blankets, a mat etc in it but the crate will be her nighttime space.

I’m just wondering about what to do during day time naps, should i take her up to the crate in the bedroom to get her used to the crate? In the longterm, i don’t imagine she would ever be in the bedroom in the day because she’d be with us in the living area, kitchen or home office.

Probably overthinking but i’d love to hear other peopels thoughts or experiences

I literally was speechless the other night. I came home and for the second time my puppy (9 month old Corgi) had escaped her crate/pen setup. She is regressing a little and we are attempting to work through it. But, upon further investigation when looking at how she could be doing this, I found poop ON TOP of her crate. She's got a makeshift crate cover that was hiding the evidence a little bit. So, she had literally jumped on top of it, took a poop, jumped down and decided to do whatever else. It could have been the day she pooped two more times in the house. Think she had a belly ache or something. Still, coming home from an hour of sitting in traffic to that is just not what my brain had the capacity for.

I do have a camera but I don't have the 24/7 recording subscription. Unfortunately. I was just baffled lol things have been such a rollercoaster with her recently and I am so exhausted. I feel bad she has anxiety but the amount of anxiety and issues I also have are adding up. I'd recently posted about becoming allergic to her. I was officially diagnosed with being allergic to dogs and I am just not sure I can live in this constant state of uncomfortable all the time. Spending so much money on things to make it better too when everything is so expensive right now. Sometimes these things feel like they are snow balling into too much. But there are days when I can't imagine life without her. It's so hard.

I am one week into owning my very first dog – a golden retriever puppy. She is now 9 weeks and is adorable. She is taking to training pretty well – we have "sit" nailed without needing treats and decent recall if she isn't overtired. Crate training is going very well.

But since this is my first puppy, I think I am putting so much pressure on myself for her to be perfectly well behaved, especially because she is a golden. She has had a total of 3 pee and 3 poop accidents inside in the last week – which I think is pretty good considering how many times a day she poops and pees! One time she was halfway through eating breakfast after just having pooped 10 minutes earlier outside, and ran over to our rug and pooped – that one really threw me for a loop!

She gets overtired and crazy girl energy after about 45 minutes of being awake typically, so we have to put her in her crate to nap since she doesn't usually self-settle into naps outside of the crate. She likes biting clothes and we haven't learned "drop it" yet, just wants to run to spots outside that aren't snow covered so she can find rocks and sticks to chew on (I intervene for her safety), and will jump around and not potty if she's too overstimulated. She's also been digging at her puppy bed and ripping up some of the fabric cover.

I was describing the anxiety of being a first time puppy owner to my new therapist (it was only our second session) and she kinda dismissed it as "well you have a golden so you'll be fine." And I have two coworkers with goldens and they have said things like "she just slept at my feet all day while I worked" or "he didn't have any potty accidents inside when I got him".

I think I'm just looking for solidarity with golden puppy owners who don't have perfectly behaved angel puppies?? Is this all normal puppy behavior within week 1 of owning her?