Blog

I got my puppy this morning. I played with her for the first hour home after being with her for 2hrs while I discussed everything with the breeder. She was in between the breeder’s and my arms. She settled in her play pen and was able to sleep 20mins before the neighbor’s dogs started barking and woke her up. After that I did some mental exercise with her food and the crate game. She had her puppy tantrum and I’d only let her out to go potty and back into crate. She settled for another 20mins, took her out and she went potty successfully so she had free time with me for about 2hrs. She’s ver tired because she slept the entire car ride but now we’re back home she went potty before i put her in her crate so she can sleep. But she’s fussing again howling and barking usually i give her about 6mins and that’s when she starts settling but idk if I should stop crate training since it’s her first day and she loves being next to me. What should I do? I don’t want to damage any bonding either so that’s why I’m at a loss.

Edit: the car ride was about 15-20mins

Hi! My puppy will be 17 weeks in a few days and I’ve done my best to socialize him to various environments and things. I’m curious to hear what socialization you wish you had done or are thankful you did do with your puppy during the first 16 weeks of their life?

I have a cockapoo just coming upto 6 months old. I pen trained her from day one and she goes in her pen and settles no problem. However she wont settle or fall asleep outside the pen. Will she eventually learn to do this?

I have tried waiting it out to see if she will settle on floor, sofa or me but she will just keep going and get bitey so have to enforce naps in the pen.

Any advice or similar experience appreciated.

She is a chewer so cant be left to her own devices unsupervised yet

I’ve had my boy for a few weeks now and I’ve realised that he pants ALOT. He does drink water but I don’t think he really understands to drink when he’s thirsty. Should I bottle feed him?..

I’m not sure what to do.. I do tell him to drink his water by leading him to it and when we’re out on walks he does kind of. But yeah a little worried about my boy…

I am writing you today to talk about my experience with puppy blues and maybe help a person or two feel less alone and less guilty.

I got my puppy at 9 weeks old, we were ready, we were prepared aaaaand then life came tumbling down. Between a major hurricane the week I was set to get her, a lung infection the first few days I had her, having to move due to a rat and mold infestion leading to us moving in the first 2 months we had her, going back to school, having a major trauma be investigated for months, eventually slipping into a major depression, getting extremely sick, partner having a slow period of work, so on, and so on this hit us hard with this girl and although I believe she is a very good and resilient puppy it has been a rough year and a half. Training was put on a back burner many times due to life just lifing and truly we had great months and then we had absolutely terrible months. My older dog also regressed in a way that was super disheartening and only added to that feeling of failure and guilt that maybe im not the right home for these girls, that am I selfish for not giving them to someone who is better equipped. But we have bounced back it has taken a while but we are finally back on track and as much as I sat and thought about all the ways I maybe damaged her, shes fine, they're fine, we're fine. Everything is going to be ok. I wont lie it wasnt one of the hardest times in my life but it wasnt her fault truly life just happens and bad things just have unfortunate timing sometimes but that doesnt mean it will last forever. I worried about everything, is she getting enough enrichment, is she getting enough attention, food, exercise, everything. I have cried so much from the guilt of feeling like I wasnt doing enough. But were good.

Somethings I want to say to anyone struggling with the puppy blues:

Prioritize your needs, if youre not good your dogs can feel it and maybe even exhibit not fun behavior due to them feeling the tension. If you need a minute to cool down put them in a safe place and take time to regulate.

Its ok if your dogs is making you feel a certain way that doesnt make you a bad person. Sometimes dogs just do some annoying and sometimes ignorant things, that doesnt mean you love them any less. Dont let people shame you for having feelings.

Do what you can today dont worry about what you cant do today, do your best today.

Dont feel bad that you cant take your dog on 4 hours of walks a day or that you cant give them 17 toppings for kibble or have 4 sessions of enrichment a day. Or take them to the doggie masseuse every 3rd Wednesday. Dont let dog influencers make you feel like a shitty dog owner. Some dogs dont even want that. My aussie god bless her hates water and we live in florida so there are sometimes weeks we are stuck in the house because SHE doesnt want to touch wet grass regardless of if the rain has stopped. Somedays she is maxed out after a 45 minute car ride(we have a route). She isnt about being outside all day so why would I force her to have 4 hours of walk time a day because Kennedyxbinks992 said Aussies require 4 hours of exercise a day NOOOOOO!!! I can guarantee you my dog would plant her butt at minute 45 and id have to carry her home. Sometimes if shes tired from a walk she will infact want me to carry her home and boy is she stubborn. A breed's recommended activity and training is just that, a recommendation, see what fits in your life style and what your dog is into some dogs regardless of breed know life is better if I just sit on the couch and wait for dinner. Comparison has been my main source of guilt. Until I realized just cause other people's dogs need that doesnt mean mine does or even remotely wants that.

It does get better and if it takes a while for things to get better, thats ok, thats normal just dont give up on them.

Its never too late to train your dog. My older dog is going to be 4 this year and she loves learning just as much as my Aussie does, its possibly due to treats and attention being involved. Also possible sibling rivalry as well 😆 Dont think theyve hit a certain age and I cant teach them it now theyre too old. Just try they may surprise you, I know mine did.

Your love for your dog will help you navigate this!!

I hope I've been able to help someone struggling. Seeing post like these were very instrumental in me getting through it with less guilt and more determination.

Struggling so much with getting socialisation right because our town is full of shitty people who can't take no for an answer.

Don't get me wrong, there's of course good people, in fact, my neighbours are amazing humans, extremely knowledgeable on dogs/puppies, so polite if I tell them today isn't a good day to be saying hello. They have joined us in some training by practicing greeting slowly with treats and just hanging around me without invading her space until she became comfortable enough to approach on her own. We practice being her calm and ignoring people when I go out to speak to them.

But Ripley, my mali, is extremely shy with new people, if I'm holding her (we're waiting on her second vaccines so not a lot of ground time atm) she starts shaking when people approach quickly, and trying to climb my shoulders to shy away. If she's on the lead, she begins shaking and sits by my legs and clings to me. This is fine when people back off when I advise or even if they notice she's anxious which we then work on some calmness and rewarding sitting happily which has been going well.

But our outings are never so simle. We went out for a short stroll this evening and a drunk guy started yelling if he can pet my puppy, I said no sorry, she's nervous and we're training. He insisted it's okay and he's chill and friendly. I said I get that but she's nervous and I have to go, we started walking away, Ripley was shaking and standing away to the side and wouldn't follow me so I ended up resorting to picking her up (I believe this was my biggee mistake), which he took as invitation to approach me and come over speaking extremely loudly, he was telling me about his bosses rottweiler etc, stunk of vodka. I just said that's cool but we have to go, shes extremely nervous and we wont be saying hi, and then went to keep walking, he followed to go in front of me and said please can I pet her and threw her hands into her face to pet before I could answer. I pulled back and repeated "I have to go" and kept trying to walk away and he kept stepping in front to try pet her more and ask about her and how important socialisation is (yeah, which you're actively worsening) and I kept turning away. At this point she was shaking and climbing my shoulder to get away and had pooped on me a bit.

The other day we had a disabled lady run up to us and immediately start petting her in my arms and yelling about how cute she was and how she loves dogs before I even had a chance to process wtf happened. I pulled away repeatedly saying "She's nervous, please don't pet." and her caretaker? (seemingly idk) came up and stood in front of me so I couldn't keep walking away saying "Sorry she's crazy for puppies and babies" and also tried to pet her whilst I kept pulling back. I did then say I've to go back to work and somewhat politely pushed past which they calmed down then.

We've had one or two similar where people come up and go "Oh we HAVE to say hi!!" and try to fuss her but some tend to be more respectful but I can tell it does overwhelm her.

I'm stumped on how to handle this. I remain calm and don't obviously spin around or overwhelm her, I move slowly and try to remain confident so I don't increase how overwhelmed she is. I definitely need to work on being way more confrontational and stern and even just not replying to these people at all to begin with, I'm aware of that. I am actively trying.

She's building a lot of confidence with our neighbours, over the last week or so she's gone from hiding to approaching them with a waggy tail and respectfully playing, checking in on me frequently too, and she has no issue walking past people on walks or people being around us if they're ignoring her, she looks at them and keeps an eye but otherwise happily goes on her way and focuses on me; It's just when they approach with her as their target, even more so when they're loud, sporadic or extra tall. And understandably so! She's just a baby.

I prioritise going to quiet areas to socialise her but we have to cross through the high street briefly to get back home which is where the worse of it is.

I've owned malis before and none of them have been so shy around people, hardest part was getting them to be calmer around people if anything. I also trained dogs for almost 5 years but haven't really dealt with the people invading our space so much when socialising a puppy, I worked (and raised my other dogs) in rural Ireland so people were far more polite in towns and parks so it wasn't an issue when I was training puppies but given I worked specifically with leash reactive adult dogs, so I admit I'm less experienced in a puppy when it comes to this sorta thing. Good lord it is so much easier to tell people to go away when you have a grown dog. People see a puppy and they genuinely just bee line and expect a super hyper fun puppy. It's like their brains go to their ass when they spot one.

I'm worried this is going to lead to a people reactive dog and I truly want to avoid this, and we spend a lot of time with my partners family and we do want her to be comfortable settling around people and not stressed, I want her to be happy and comfortable whilst being comfortable fitting into our life.

We don't go out too much so I dont think I'm overdoing it, we practice a lot from our driveway of just watching dogs, humans and cars go by but we are making sure to put effort in to go out to quiet areas or a calm cafe (so far that's been good! people too absorbed in their own thing to stop and say hello) but this has so far been majoritly negative than positive due to these sort of interactions which is getting to me.

Any thoughts or recommendations are highly appreciated!

Right now my blood is boiled by peoples inability to listen and my own lack of confidence to just barge straight past and ignore blatantly. It's hard not to feel like a bad owner/trainer in these situations but tryna keep positive here.