Lily is driving me nuts!! A temper tantrum in her crate!
Since about a couple of weeks now she has thrown a major tantrum for at least 4 hours at a time where she barks and howls and whines and whimpers. We live in an apartment so I'm sure it is annoying the neighbors. I am a very light sleeper and so I always wake up or cnat get to sleep period. My boyfriend on the other hadn could sleep througha herd of elephants stampeeding by. What do I do about this. She also does the same thing when we leave the house for work in the mornings. I give her her bone to occupy herself with, a stuffed kong and leave the TV on for her and the fan. Nothing seems to be good enough. Sometimes she will bark at night when she needs out and she had a lot to drink. That is not an issue, I am glad to get up and let her out to potty but then again when we have to go back in the crate.... trouble starts all over again. I have tried staying up as late as I can with her, I have tried banging on the wall to scare her ( that only worked for so long). We are thinking of getting a citronella collar for her at night so that she gets sprayed when she barks but I really dont want to resort to that and I dont want her to get afraid of her crate. When I do let her out if she has been barking then what she does is she either runs to the living room and lays down on her bed or what she has been doing lately is standing in front of my bedroom door which is right next door. I know she wants to be with us and I would like her to be but she will nto stay off the bed and let us go to sleep. She just wants to be up there. I want to move her crate into the bedroom but I am afraid that she will bark if I get up to ggo to the bathroom at night and that doesnt solve anything. I cant leave her teathered to the door on a leash cause she will bark cause she isnt close enough. What am I to do...... I would love to leave her out at night but she will jump against the bedroom door to be let in and I really cant afford to replace the door after she destroys it like she did the carpet in the living room. BTW she does great when I sleep on the couch. Then all she does is sleep on her bed and leaves me alone. Sorry this is so lengthy but I am so frusterated at her. Any suggestions as to what I am supposed to do with this sheepie?? Any help is welcome. |
|
|
| Clyde did the same thing as he got older. He was fine in the crate at night when he was younger but it was almost like he grew out of it and started thinking that being with us was the way to go at night. After 2 weeks of barking and no sleep, we brought him upstairs with us and things have been fine ever since.
I think you might have better luck training her to stay off the bed than to try to address the nighttime barking (if nothing else, I think you'll get rresults faster!) You can try to work with her to teach her the bed is yours and your boyfriend's domain, not hers. Cesar Milan did a show with someone having the same problem and he explained that you had to "claim the bed as your space." That involved firmly telling the dog off and getting him off of the bed and asserting yourself each time the dog tried to repeat the behavior. Does she bite if you try to get her off the bed? |
| You could put her crate in your room.... |
| Lily doesnt bit when I try to take her off the bed. Usually I tell her before we go into the room if I am cleaning or something to stay "off" ahead of time. then when we enter the room I tell her off again more firmly. USually when I am in there just cleaning or putting away clothes, she lays down in her corner and jsut watches me. When she is in her naughty mood she will jump on and off the bed. Ill tell her off and she will race off the bed then storms back in and back on the bed. After I then take her off the bed and tell her NO firmly she will usually stay off. I have been trying to take pretend naps during the day when I can with her in there with me but all she does is bark and bark or whine and whimper.
Last night we had a quiet night though.. no barking no whining just sleep. I was so glad but thats because I gave her some torb to settle her down and she was fine. I dont have any more torb but if she doesnt settle down at night I really dont want to have to revert to drugging her at night. Ill try bringing her into the room at night. Ill report back after a few days and see how it goes. |
| Bosley would complain at night, before he was house-trainined enough to let him loose in the room. I got fed up with getting up in the night to tend to him, so brought him into my room to see what he would do. He settled right in on the floor and has been there every since he is 4 months old.
During the day he will jump up on the bed in a playful mood or even at night, sometimes, but not for long. The bed is too warm for him, so after a few minutes he gets off by himself and finds a cooler place to sleep. You may be pleasantly surprised if you move her in with you. |
| I am no expert, this is just my opinion and what I have learned from experience. Both my dogs would kick up such a fuss at night time when they slept in different rooms of the house in their crates. It nearly drove me around the bend.. finally, their crates were moved into the bedroom with me.. and night time calm was restored. Both my dogs no longer need to be crated.. but they both still sleep in the bedroom with me at night.. Murphy on the bed.. Dudley across the door opening.
So perhaps it not that she doesn't like her crate.. it could be that she doesn't like to be seperated from you at night. Brenda, Dudley and Murphy... |
| So for the past 2 nights she has been quiet. The first time was because I drugged her and the second because my boyfriend stayed up with her until almost midnight before putting her in her crate. I think it is just a phase she is going through and we just need to sit through it. If that means staying up later then thats what will happen but if that doesnt help I will definitely try moving her into my room and if that doesnt help then its the citronella collar for her. We will see what happens, so far so good but Im sure with saying that that I jinxed myself. |
| You drugged her? |
| Yes, I had some left over Torb from her spay. I mean she wasnt totally drugeed just calmed her down enough. Anyway, she was fine and she started barking again. Last night I decided that we should try something new. I made my boyfriend go to bed earlier and I stayed up with Lily until about 10 pm. By this time I was falling asleep on the couch so I said ok lets go sleepytime. I let her out to potty before. Then I turn off all the lights and we went to her crate. She went right in, got her good night cookie and I said goodnight. I went to the bathroom and then to bed. She only barked once in the middle of the night cause she heard something but not one other time. We also got her a citronella collar to wear at night. |
| not to horrify you, but it's a war of attrition, my guy is 2 and still gets it in his head for about 3 days at a time that it's fun to bark at night, -- my method is to totally ignore it, attention is what he wants (because there's water in there and he gets a long walk every day) and when he sees that it's not happening he usually picks up on that and goes back to bed. |
| How old is Lilly? Could she be challenging you to see if she can get her way? I just lived through a two week temper tantrum, Bailey is 15 months old. He seems to be back to his old self, although we've also been making a huge effort to wear him out during the day. LONG walks (3 miles) and regular dog park visits. As they always say around here, a tired dog is a good dog. |
| Lily is about 7.5 months old. I think she just wants to be with me in the bedroom. I try to ignore her but I really need my sleep and I really dont want to get complaints from the neighbors. I got the citronella collar and it is just a dream. She has not barked since she got it on. OFcourse I give her time without it on so that she can play and bark then and when we go on walks its off and to the park its off as well. She only wears it in her crate so that we can all sleep. She learned really quickly and its been great so far. Last night was her first night with it on and she didnt bark once. I was like thank god for that a quiet night at last..... but then the phone started to ring at 12:30 am for work saying we had a couple sick horses coming in so there went my night but at least I have something to look forward to tonight..... Thanks everyone for your input. Im gonna stick with the collar for now and see how that goes. We will start weening her off the collar once she is used to not barking and hopefully she will be able to go without it after a while. |
Didn't find exactly what you're looking for? Search again here:
Custom Search
|
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|