Hi,
My husband and I have recently acquired our first puppy, a 7 week old pomeranian - Stewie, last Saturday. My husband's family never had dogs while my family used to have 1. In general, we are not very experienced with dogs.
We are currently having a problem with his barking/wimping/whining in the night time. On Saturday night, we put him to bed at around 11pm and he was barking/wimping/whining for periods of 30 mins to 60 mins before stopping for 30 mins to 2 hrs before the cycle starts again. We ignored him and as we did not want to encourage his barking with our attention. However, last night, he could stop at all. He just went on and on the whole night long...on the top of his voice. It's loud and high pitched and echoed through the whole house.
I had read through several threads in "Puppy Problems" and knew that crying at night is common, but I didn't expect him to get worst instead of better. I read that many puppies take up to weeks before the condition improves. This may be a problem as my husband is a very light sleeper and he had zero sleep since we brought Stewie home. Also, we are very afraid that his barking may disturb the neighbours since it went the whole night long. I think my husband will cook Stewie stew before my neighbours get to it.
Also, Stewie managed to jump over a 60cm tall wood screen which my husband built to barricade his movements within our games room. I think Stewie has tried all night and he managed to jump through at 5am and came running to outside our room, scratching at the door. We had no choice but to open the door and carry him back to "his area". I've read that we need to ignore him when he cries, but we can't possibly ignore him when he's outside our room as we are afraid that he may venture elsewhere in the house where it's carpeted and pee on the carpet since he is not toilet trained yet. Getting him to pee has proven to be another mission impossible.
My husband and I are very tempted to sleep outside with Stewie (perhaps place a mattress near his screen) as he keeps absolutely quiet when we are near him (even if he can't see us from the other side of the screen), but we are afraid he may get into a habit and we will need to sleep with him always.
Although it's only been 2 days since we brought Stewie home, it's pretty discouraging that he seems to have only gotten worst instead of better with the barking. During the day, he is very good if we barricade him and ignore him. He will bark but not lasting 10 mins and he will stop when he knows he is not getting what he wanted. In night time, nothing seems to help. We tried to leave him dimmed lights so he won't be scared or something, but that doesn't seem to help too.
Is there anything we could do to improve the situation? At least my husband can get some sleep even if it's not the usual 5-8hrs sleep. My colleague suggested a clock which I've seen some people suggested here. Does it really work? I'm definitely heading to the shops to get him one.
We are now most concern with the barking than the toileting. We do not want it to get to the stage where neighbours come knocking on our door or screaming at us to get our puppy to keep quiet.
I'm trying not to give in to his barkings as my old dog used to bark and my parents let him into their bedroom, since then, he was never going out of the bedroom for bedtime. And everytime, he would bark to get what he wanted. He won't even go on walks and wanted to be carried. I certainty do not want that behaviour in Stewie.
Any suggestions or experience with young Pomeranians is greatly appreciated!! Thanks!
