Can’t leave my puppy

[3AndADog]

I’m feeling really trapped. She’s 17 weeks. I thought it would be best to have someone home with her for the first month so we did, we got her at 11 weeks, and it took about a month to get her sleeping through with one of us in the lounge with us - she’s brilliant now and takes herself to her crate at 10.30 and sleeps alone til 6.30. But in the day she’s always hated her crate in the day time. We haven’t got very far with it despite crate games etc, I’ve done the lot. The most we get is 20 mins sleep in there in the day.

She follows me Everywhere (in the lounge/kitchen where she’s allowed) but barks when I leave the room. I decided I needed to get out more so divided up the room with a pen divider and she now has the lounge with her food, her crate, some toys and bedding etc. Yesterday and today I had to leave the house without her - parent teacher meetings - and I set up the dog cam. Yesterday she barked for a couple of minutes and was asleep when my son got in 30 mins later. I thought that was a success. Today she barked for 30 mins and was asleep when DH came back 40 mins later, and I feel dreadful. The neighbours must think we’re awful - 30 mins of (intermittent) barking. She’s been clingy and needy ever since I got back in after that. Barked like mad when I went to the toilet.

Incidentally she’s fine when DH leaves her or puts her in the crate. Doesn’t make a sound. Not that we have done it very often.

We have a trainer, one to one, who thinks she’s too young for separation anxiety and is a little old school. She thinks she should be quiet in her crate for 4 hours at this age and is evangelical about crate training. Her method is to give her a few mins of barking to see if she quietens down, and if she doesn’t, make a distracting noise to quiet her and let her out after she has been quiet for 5 seconds. She disagrees with the constant stream of treats that all the crate games advocate, because she says she’ll never settle and will stay alert and waiting for the next snack (which to be fair is true, she does)

I don’t know what to do. I want to go out. I want to take my kids to a movie at half term. I want to have my hair cut. I want to go to the supermarket without asking my mum to puppy sit.

I am following the separation anxiety/dog training Facebook groups that are always recommended but I find them overwhelming and they are leading me to imagine worst case scenarios when in reality everyone I know with a pup (this breed) has been able to leave their dog for short periods since very early on and think that I’m mad for getting het up over a few barks.

I don’t know what to do…

It does sound more like FOMO than separation anxiety.
I’d practise leaving her with a kong or licky mat. At that age she’ll probably be tired enough to sleep once she’s finished it.

We have a similar breed and she will sometimes bark if she’s left in a different room and knows someone is in the house but (touch wood) is fab when we leave her alone in the house

I know nothing about training puppies but I commend you for being considerate towards your neighbours and not wanting your pup to bark !

Good luck.

Have you taught your dog the command for quiet? First you teach them to bark on command then you teach them the quiet one.

And yeah what a weird attitude above

Oh my goodness, so many comments and so much reassuring advice (apart from the one… there’s always one)

I feel so much better reading all of this, and on the back of some of the advice we have had a brilliant day. I took her for a 25 min walk on the training lead (so basically off lead) after dropping the kids at school, then put her in her crate and she barked once before sleeping for two hours (I let her out at 45 min mark as I didn’t want to push it, but she just shuffled out and fell asleep under the sofa)
Then my mum sat with her while I did the supermarket, then she came out and about with me on some errands and slept in the car, and then we put the pen up and left her with a licky mat. I went to pick up the kids and my mum walked back in after 5 mins and she was asleep on the floor. I know from the camera that she didn’t bark. Result!!! So a tired out pup with a mega treat can do 5 mins no probs. Will stick with that for a few days then try 10, maybe just nip to the corner shop.
Anyway after that mega success I took her on another walk which was a really lovely one, and she has basically slept ever since then bar an hour of the zoomies when the kids had their tea!

Sorry to hear that so many others are going through this but it’s also nice to know I’m not alone! I know I need to take it slow but also maybe be a little more tolerant of the odd bark - it’s hard to see the barks as anything other than anxiety but I need to get over that one!

@WhoWearsShortShorts

Have you taught your dog the command for quiet? First you teach them to bark on command then you teach them the quiet one.

And yeah what a weird attitude above

Trouble is, you’ve got to be there to give the ‘quiet’ command when they kick off. No good if you’ve gone out and they start. Much better to teach them to be calm and fine with being alone for short periods.

I don’t know if the Dog Training, Advice & Support FB group has been suggested yet but their units are very good. Though yes, they will tell you to build up very slowly in tiny steps. Dog training is about tiny wins, it can be really frustrating at times.

We realised recently his sort of howling bark is actually a greeting so we don't mind that one now!
OP I feel inspired by your day, well done!

@BalladOfBarryAndFreda yeah I know I was referring to when her kids say good quiet as the pass the crate. That would be more useful if she has taught the dog a quiet command otherwise they're not really reinforcing anything from the dogs pov by praising it for being quiet

Ours was like this. We just built it up in sort of 10 minutes intervals. They do get used to it. By 18 months we’d happily leave her for the evening, or for a couple of hours to go shopping.

I couldn’t leave my pup until he was almost a year old. He would just bark. He’s 4 now and can be left for 4 hours + (never tried longer). Pup was always better in the car so we’d make him a bed in the boot, park in the multi-storey to avoid sun problems.