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I'm writing this at 2am after we had another potty training accident. I got to her on time but she couldn't hold and had an accident at the door. My Golden puppy is 10 weeks. I feel like I'm not getting anywhere with her. It feels like one step forward then another 5 steps back.

I do shift work and I'm so tired. It is a pity because I always wanted a Golden puppy. I know none of this is her fault. Maybe she would do better with another person. I feel like I will never housebreak her. I'm so down in the dumps. The trainer says to throw out the pads and to use artificial grass and we did. Yesterday I had to take her bedding away because she was peeing on it. She doesn't seem to mind having pee on her. None of my dogs were like this. I feel like all the bad moments outweigh the good and I might have done a huge mistake bringing her home.

Does anyone else ever feel guilty about domesticating their rescue? My family pets have always come from breeders and I can say with certainty that those dogs would immediately perish in the wild lol. My current puppy, though, is a rescue that was picked up off the street by animal control. We love her to death and spend as much time with her as possible, but I can't help having this feeling that she'd be happier on the streets where she came from. Obviously, that's not realistic because I'm not the type of person to set my pet loose on the streets. I just think she misses running around free, not being crated at night, being allowed to run up to people and dogs whenever she pleases, and being able to eat whatever garbage and scraps she comes across. We spend so much of our time telling her "no" and training her not to do normal dog behaviors (eating, barking, jumping up, chewing) and I just feel awful about it sometimes. It doesn't help that her favorite (allowable) activity is playing with dogs at the dog park, something we cannot replicate at home, and that she has very little interest in toys. Besides the dog park, it seems like she's only happy when she's being destructive or when she finally tuckers out and falls asleep on the couch in the evening.

I know, intellectually, that we are doing everything we can for her and that she's got a pretty nice life compared to other dogs. Does anyone have any advice on how to get rid of these guilty feelings, though?

To all of you struggling (esp single puppy parents), hang in there!

After a big day at the dog park yesterday, my 7 month old husky mix is currently snoozing on my bed. Not long ago, she was incapable of settling outside her crate no matter how tired she was. She’s still not reliably napping organically, but it’s happening more and more often.

When she finished her vaccines in August, she was so scared of everything that even seeing her leash would send her scurrying to hide in her crate. Though she’s still pretty nervous and won’t go on walks in a busy neighborhood, now she loves her trips to quieter areas and is a hilarious goof with other dogs at the dog park. She’s even let a couple of humans approach her, which would have been unthinkable a couple of months ago!

She let me sleep in til 7:15 today!