Anxiety incontinence/stress piddling

[Reallybadidea]

I'd really appreciate advice on whether it's possible to stop a nervous dog from dribbling/leaking urine. We adopted a 5 year old ex-stud poodle cross from a rescue about 9 months ago and he's come on an incredible amount (had never lived in a house before we got him) and he's a very easy dog now in most ways.

One thing we're struggling with though is him leaking urine. It happens more when he's nervous or anxious about something but it also seems to happen a fair bit with no obvious trigger. OTOH it doesn't happen constantly, so I don't think it is general incontinence iyswim.

He's walked morning and afternoon and we chuck him out in the garden every few hours which does seem to minimise it, but I wonder whether he has sort of low level anxiety. I read somewhere that antidepressants can help, but not sure whether this is true or whether there is anything else we could be doing to help him?

Are you sure it’s anxiety? Could he have a mild dose of cystitis? Might be an idea to pop him in the vets with a urine sample. You can get nappies for male dogs but wouldn’t recommend except as a last resort.

Yes, that's a good point and I will check. It does mostly seem related to stress though - eg I just found him on my bed and told him firmly to get off. As he did so he let out a bit of wee having been out in the garden 30 minutes earlier.

I just found him on my bed and told him firmly to get off

That might be your problem right there. What sounds like firm to you induces fear in him. I'm not saying he should be allowed to go on the bed if you don't want him to but you might need to be kinder and gentler that a kind and gentle thing on kind and gentle day.

Yes, I totally get that and I'm not surprised that despite me trying to be gentle he peed. But it can happen even when the trigger is something that we genuinely can't control like someone knocking on the front door. It's not a massive issue for us, we're happy to just put towels under him when he's on furniture etc (getting on the bed is new!). I suppose I'm asking whether anyone has experience of this being improved with medication, pheromone collars etc?

Massive issues with our street dog rescue, stress weeing. We just ignored it, cleaned up, gave her love so she knew it wasn’t a big deal (she was clearly ashamed of doing it or expecting to be told off) but ensured lots of garden wees (and praised those!). It resolved itself, dogs like to keep their homes clean instinctively.

Thanks, fingers crossed this resolves itself too!

How do you react when he does it?

I don't think I do normally, just clear it up. I don't think he even notices he's doing it and it isn't necessarily just anxiety or fear that triggers it - any "big feelings" like getting his food out, someone coming home can lead to drips. It's like he's got a faulty washer in his willy that needs replacing, rather than him completely losing control of his bladder iyswim.

I wonder if his bladder capacity just isn't particularly amazing because until he came to live with us, he wasn't house trained, so presumably just had a wee whenever he felt like it.

You say you chuck him out in the garden every three hours but does anyone actually go out with him and make sure he's peeing and praise him when he does?

I would normally watch to make sure he's been but I can start going out with him and praising him.

He won't learn that outside is the right place to go if nobody tells him

Oh he does very much know that he goes outside, we haven't had any big puddles in the house for months. It's just these little drips when he's excited/anxious.

But if nobody goes out with him, you don't know whether he's doing proper wees or whether there's any issues or pain when he goes.

Fully trained adults can be left to toilet alone but one like yours still needs supervision and lots of praise.

Basically, you need to treat him as a puppy, not an adult.

He gets two long walks a day - definitely no issues with pain and doing proper wees when we're out. But we will go back to praising him for doing wees in the garden like we did at the start.

Our rescue Maltipoo did the same. He was almost a year old when we got him. He knew to wee outside mostly but had a few secret wees and poops in the first month or so. We learned his way of communicating his need to go out as we got to know him better. He was always more comfortable with me than DH and was nervous around sudden movements especially feet, and DH's firm voice. The only thing that stopped the stress wee was a complete u turn from DH in how he dealt with him. The dog knows DH is the boss but also gets tons of cuddles and a gentle voice from him now and they are both more relaxed around each other. We've had him 15 months.