Does anyone have any different house training advice other than the usual, because it isn't working and I could cry.

[MrsTumbletap]

I have an 9 month old cavalier that I love to pieces but when it comes to house training it isn't working.

She is only allowed in the kitchen and the lounge as she will wee or poo in the other rooms. She has an accident at least once a week. I'm sure if she had full range of the house there would be accidents almost every day.

All the advice I research, watch on YouTube, read in books, is not working. And as I sit here with the smell of dog poo in my lounge despite the simple solution cleaner, air freshener and windows open in October, I could cry.

All the normal advice, take her out regularly, stand still and be boring, have her on a leash, take high value treats, sing and dance and make a fuss when she does go, have a command word, does not work!!!! Well not consistently anyway.

Is anyone really experienced with dogs or dogs that are hard to house train??? If you are someone that says ''my dog was house trained in 7 seconds and asks to go outside in Portuguese". This thread isn't for you.

Mine was late to house training as we didn’t get him until he was 4/5 months and he had never lived indoors and I’m sure the thing that actually made him get it in the end was picking him up mid wee/ poo and running to the door accompanied by me shouting outside quick ( quick is also our cue word ) . Once I’d done that a couple of times he seemed to get it and he’s not the brightest of dogs .

My pup was about 9 months when he last toileted inside.
He knew to go outside but sometimes couldn't be bothered!

Mine would poo inside if it was raining so had to watch him like hawk/keep him on lead indoors/take him out every couple of hours.

And mine would wee inside if he got too excited (like a visitor to the door/or the cat walking past .

LIke you he had to stay in the washable floor kitchen/utility (behind a baby gate) whenever not directly supervised.

So in your case what's the circumstances around the toileting inside?

• time of day

• before/after food

• before/after sleep

• was your house quiet/noisy

• was she being played with straight before

• outside weather

• is there anything to be scared of where she goes out to the toilet e.g dog next door

• how does she ask for the toilet - might be you're missing the first requests (my dog would silently look at the back door which was unhelpful if we were at the other end of the house) and only come and whine at us once desperate

• any chance of leaving the back door open for her for a week or so (if your garden is secure!) to get her confident in being able to go out as soon as she needs?

I wonder if, because she doesn’t go in the other rooms, she sees them as ‘outside’ and not part of the house so thinks it is ok to use them as a toilet.

When my latest dog was a puppy and we were training him, I had a shag pile rug. He did a wee on it a couple of times and I think he thought it was grass. I got rid of it and he never did the same with the replacement. I think dogs don’t see or think of things as we do.

What are you doing inside?
We’ve had a few hard to train dogs - adult rescues who have got to 3/ 4/ 5 without ever having lived in a house and are used to just peeing and pooing anywhere. One or two of those have been very hard.

I pretty much ignored the standard advice as mine were so used to peeing near where they slept (and preferred to do that then eat it) it just didn’t work.

Instead I bought those puppy pads impregnated with a scent to make them pee and covered the whole house/ room/ downstairs with them, including all round their beds. Gradually I took one, just one, away, starting with removing the nearest to their bed and praised when they used a puppy pad. High chance when most of the room is pads - just make sure your praise isn’t distracting the dog. I had one I had to say nothing but I’d just silently hand him a treat each time immediately after the successful event. Gradually you can move the pads towards the door. At the start watch like a hawk and edge them onto a pad if they look like they’re going to go, then praise. In my experience they get the pad idea pretty fast and it doesn’t take too long you can just have a couple by the door. Don’t rush the process or make the dog feel stressed over it at any point. Try to relax.

Once you’ve got the pads by the back door only, it’s time to move them outside and we always found this the hardest part. To start with I’d put them inside the back door and pretty immediately outside the back door, so the dog has the choice of both. Then take the dog out regularly on some non pressured pretext or other (oh look, I’m hedge trimming) and eventually they will think “OH puppy pad!” and use it. At that point I praise and treat like mad. For a long time I praise for using the outside pad but make no comment about the inside pad. Eventually they click on “oh I get a treat if I go outside” and you can get rid of the inside pad.

We’ve never had a dog we couldn't train this way, even ones the rescue warned us might always be a problem. It took maybe 4-5 months with our longest one (though she had a ton of other issues compounding the situation) so you need a bit of patience. It’s not always a long drawn out method - our puppy was fully trained this way in only a week or two but she was bright and young and came to us without issues - a 9 month old might be more like our rescues. The beauty of the puppy pads is that your rugs and carpets are protected from accidents. You can get washable pads if you worry about the environment aspect - we have a couple of them, or you can use newspaper but you need tons as it’s not so waterproof and if you do, spray it with a pee attractant to get them to use it.

A lot of people don’t like it as a method but it’s always worked for us.

Is there any pattern to the pooing inside. Our first dog was mainly house trained but had odd poo indoors. I suddenly realised it was the same time each day. I was giving puppy and my son breakfast at the same time and my son needed changing straight after breakfast. Soon realised that the puppy had the same urge to poo straight after breakfast as our son and I was missing it as was changing my son’s nappy. We changed the feeding routine slightly and all was fine. It is worth just noting what you were doing/time of day etc to see if their is pattern.

@Floralnomad I'm definitely trying to do that, did it last night as she was mid poo.

@thalassoma there isnt anything she is afraid of in the garden, she has grass and bushes and a patio area and has pooed in all of those places quite happily.

But definitely rain has a part here I think. In the summer the doors were open all the time and we had much fewer accidents. But now it's raining she takes one look at the wet floor and walks off, if I pick her up and place her on the wet grass she runs off it straight away. (But will play in rivers on walks happily 😖)

A few weeks ago we got one of those bells you put by the back door for her to tell us, but she keeps ringing it every 5 minutes, you open the back door and she just sits on the doormat, just stares at you and won't go out. Then rings it again 5 minutes later and does the same thing.

If you go outside with her she mostly just whines to go back in.

@HarlotOTara I read that you shouldn't give him access to everywhere when they are young, do you think I should open up more rooms? I fear I would find accidents everywhere.

@musicposy maybe I should get puppy pads, I was told it could confuse them, but she seems confused anyway. Maybe I should get some and put them by the back door.

What is also strange is if we go out, she is confined to the kitchen, and she has never ever had an accident in there it's laminate flooring. Sometimes she is left for 3 hours and she just happily sleeps in her bed.

It's a carpet thing, her favourite places being the dining room, lounge, landing. How can a dog prefer that, to a walk where she knows she will get chicken if she goes?!? It's madness.

How often are you taking her out? You really do need to be persistent and unfortunately that does mean standing outside forever in the pissing wind and rain. You need to have more willpower than they do - at some point, she will have to go to the toilet!

She really needs to be taken outside every half an hour or so if she's not reliable (that's when she's awake, of course). Plus after naps, food, drink, playtime and training. Take her on a lead, no playtime, no toys until she goes to the toilet. Is she generally food motivated? If not, you could try and switch up the reward so if she goes, she gets her favourite toy perhaps?

What else have you used to clean the accidents apart from simple solution? I would really recommend having a really, really thorough carpet clean - so get a rug doctor or similar and wash everything, then simple solution everywhere she's ever had an accident - do it several times. Do everything you possibly can to get rid of the smell - if you can still smell poo, she definitely can and she'll think she needs to re-mark where she's been previously.

It may also be worth getting her a check over at the vets too, just to make sure there are no physical issues causing it. Good luck!

It's a carpet thing, her favourite places being the dining room, lounge, landing. How can a dog prefer that, to a walk where she knows she will get chicken if she goes?!? It's madness.

It won't necessarily be because she likes pooing in carpet, it'll most likely be because carpet is much harder to clean and the smell has gone through to the underlay. Laminate is much easier to keep clean and the urine is much less likely to seep through underneath.

Have you had her checked at the vets to make sure there’s no medical reason for her toileting inside?

If ‘yes’ and it is purely behavioural, I think rather than trying loads of different suggestions on here and getting more worked up (you) and confused (her), my advice would be to get a positive 1:1 trainer in. If that’s not an option, I’d start from scratch again with the ‘out every 15 minutes’ stuff, like you do with a tiny pup. Start her from the bottom up and don’t move on until she’s ready. I wouldn’t be opening up other rooms for her.

I’m sorry, it must be v frustrating.

I would first get her checked at vets to see if she has no illness. If she does not go in garden has anything in garden scared her. Reason I asked is when one of mine was that age he got scared from a barn owl screaming. Perhaps something has scared her?
I know some of here disagree with puppy pads but I've always used them to toilet train. I recently got a rescue who wasn't toilet trained he was almost 7 month old. I went back to basics. After every action for example playing , eating , waking up I took him outside to toilet. I had the pads down initially. I left door open until he went out himself. Dont clean up the poop in the garden straight away leave it so she goes back to same spot. Most important don't be stressed she's still only a pup. Females can sometimes take longer. I have had many dogs I've always found females take longer to house train.

She has been checked at the vet and perfectly healthy.

She does poo and wee in garden the majority of the time, that's what is so annoying. She knows where to go, but has one accident a week inside.

If I completely do the back to basics thing with her on a lead in the garden am I keeping this really short? So she is next to me? She will wee on a lead in the garden but she hasn't so far done a poo. I have a feeling she won't, as she takes ages to find her spot and spins and walks around.

I would keep her on a short lead, but give her enough room to sniff and roam a bit. Dogs can be quite fussy about where they poo sometimes - mine has been known to squat three or four times before finding the "ideal place" 🙄🤣

No tips, but it took our (rescue) lurcher nearly a year to get the hang of it, and we were starting to worry she never would. She's not the sharpest knife in the drawer - don't know if yours is the same.

Lurchers are quite sedentary, so we just watched her like a hawk and let her out every time she got up. Hard bloody work even then.

The one accident a week- what happens?
Does she ask to go outside?
Is there a certain time it happens?
Are you present when she toilets inside?

Or does she just go randomly?

might be you're missing the first requests (my dog would silently look at the back door which was unhelpful if we were at the other end of the house)

@thalassoma I just cried laughing at the mental image of this!

It can be a problem for some dogs if you leave the door open. (Weird but bare with me!) If the door is left open there is no clear boundary between inside and outside.

It sounds to me she understands not to wee on the laminate in the kitchen. You have that sorted.

But she is unsure about the other rooms (although apparently carpet is great to wee on - no personal experience though) so outside and the other rooms are not clearly different in her head.

I would shut the door and go back to taking her out regularly just as if she were a puppy. Give it two more weeks and see how you get on.

You have to absolutely saturate the carpet with simple solution for it to work. I’d get something like a Bissel Spot Clean Pro and their pet solution. A carpet extractor is always going to do a better job than a carpet spray.

I’d also second going back to basics with training.