Hi all, it's 10 days now since I've had my 2nd canine family addition. The 1st is a Sterilised well behaved, friendly, sociable 2 yr old male Golden Retriever and the latest is a 10 week old female Pomeranian with the sweetest temperament. She was the runt of the litter and last to leave staying back a week after her brother and sister were homed. The seller had her confined to a newspaper/ puppy pad laden spacious baby crib with the occassional romp in the rest of the bedroom.
I've recently hit a brick wall with toilet training, trying very hard to be positive, patient, diligent and consistent but there is a moment even a minute or 2 when she manages to urinate/ defecate on undesirable surfaces i.e. Concrete, gravel, white rocks, dirt and mulch. I constantly watch her like a hawk while she's outside but feel the strain on myself as it's very time consuming and I'll put everything else on hold but eventually succumb to my desires to get on with household chores thinking it's safe because she'd relieved herself 15 minutes ago. Even when she decides to sit down with a little pause before her backside touches the ground I swear every time my heart stops.
She's never had any accidents inside the house partly because I restrict her to her den, a small confined space just big enough for her to sleep in 5 different positions and give her toys a smack down. Since the 1st day I've taken her out on the grass after a nap, play, before bedtime and when wakes up roughly every 3 hrs. She's had over 5 urination fines and 1 defecation ticket to her young life here. It's pretty much 6 accidents I've caught her over a 9 day period. And only 8 hours unsupervised so who knows how many more that have landed and evaporated before the evidence could be seen.
That's the background information and here are some questions that plague my mind.
Is there a glitch in my training?
Are my expectations too high?
Was the first 8 weeks of her life conditioned to relieve herself on newspaper/ puppy pads in such close proximity to her play and sleeping quarters a factor?
After these accidents will she continue throughout her maturity to use these surfaces as a toilet despite 9/10 times it's on the desirable location, grass?
Should I treat the concrete and the rest of the undesirables like our dwelling and restrict, restrict, restrict?
Am I being too hard on myself?
I feel like I'm failing and losing the battle to a little chipmunk!
Thank you everyone for your time and future responses, greatly appreciated.
XOXO
