Foxy Dog Singing When Alone

[Katpickles]

9 days in with our Foxy.

 

She's sleeping through pretty much all night. Self entertains when in the house or yard when we are both home. I've done numerous alone training gradually over the past week (to the point I'm now concerned about how many treats she's eating). I've switched to healthy options eg. Kibble with dried liver, carrot, and only sealing with a tiny sliver of peanut butter or cream cheese).

 

So I am back to work tomorrow. I've done as much alone training as possible, she has good times and bad times. The hardest thing is the rooing :-(

 

She'll keep herself occupied quite happily in the beginning, then when the kongs done she howls.

 

My neighbours are being lovely about it, and we'll only be leaving her for 4 hours but it's heart wrenching. I've had a couple of tearies, spoken to my Adoption support people's and they are telling me to persevere.

 

Especially as she's come so far, back to being Ok with walks, not overly long, around 15 mins, but a great improvement.

 

Routine is set. She knows not to leave bed til alarm goes off. Looks at me expectantly if I'm 5 mins late at meal time, and doing lots of zoomie and play in the yard with ropes, fluffy toys, balls and squeak pig.

 

She is also down to one potty break a night at 6 hours in - and she lets us know when.

 

I organised a sitter to come, but have since been told that's probably not the right thing to do, as it's adding more stimulus. So I'm going to have to suck it up, and just go to work and let her howl.

 

So hard! I take my hat off to all those that have come before me and will come after.

 

Love Foxy's Fam x

[3greytjoys]

Fantastic update! Some hounds are fine with a sitter, especially if they have trouble holding urine/bowel, but if Foxy can handle 4 daytime hours -- great! The rooing usually lessens with time as she adjusts to a new schedule, being left alone, and learning her people will return. Best of luck!

[BatterseaBrindl]

 

[EllenEveBaz]

Cookies to neighbors go a long way. Just sayin'.

[greysmom]

Definitely make sure you keep your neighbors updated with her progress. Most people are fine with a bit of disruption as long as they now what's going on. You might ask them to keep track for you, so you know how much Foxy is vocalizing. Don't stint on the praise or the treats. If necessary for a little while, cut back her normal food to take her treat intake into account. If she's food motivated at all you need the yummy treats to reinforce her good behavior.

 

One more thing - an adult dog should easily be able to sleep through the night without having to go potty. Either she needs more exercise, or something is waking her up - being cold, a strange noise inside or outside, another animal roaming the house - so see what you can do to help her stay asleep. A nice long walk in the evening, or a play session with a ball or lure pole will do the trick. Some jammies or a blanket if you're in Australia and it's winter, or you have the AC turned up. A white noise machine or radio left on where she is (if she isn't with you in your bedroom).

Edited August 7, 2017 by greysmom

[Katpickles]

Update... she made four hours without rooing for long at all - stopped by the time I'd walked to the end of the street. She was an excitable pup on the return, but settled in again quite well after hubby ran her round the yard and played with her for a while.

 

So today was a success. Fingers crossed she keeps this up tomorrow! I get that some days will be better than others, but I'm happy with her progress today.

 

The sleeping through is going to be hard, hubby shift works, so she's woken by him closing the front door - as it's close to her racing start time she think it means go time, so I take her for a pee stop and then straight back to be and she'll sleep till the alarm goes off - and yes she wears her yammies, ecen if out winter is lame compared to EU or US (gets down to approx 60F at night).

 

I'll work out how to tackle that one. 🐶