DH wants to kick the dogs out- What do I do?!?

[listipton]

DH wants to permanently move the dogs outside. I don’t agree. We have a pug (which is not an outdoor friendly breed & is 9 years old…) and a sheltie (which can go outdoors, but are social in nature and need to be around their people). Basically what happened is we moved this weekend into our permanent home. My FIL came up to help and mentioned that our dogs are gross and that this is the primary reason that they don’t come up and visit. Admittedly, I am not dedicating enough time to our dogs. They get the short end of the stick during my human babies first year of life. They used to have free roam of our previous home, but due to poor potty habits (which I accepted long ago as I am the one who gets to clean it all up…) were baby-gated into our laundry room in our rental home. This home was not ideal for problem pets and had I known we were going to be there for 18 months, I would not have moved there in the first place (we were originally only going to be there for 6 months). I’m upset. I see dh’s point in that we don’t want doggie messes all over the new house. But I think this is a little too drastic given that our dogs are not outside dogs. This house has a room that has an easily cleaned room, is not a main entrance to the house, but has access to the backyard and is complimentary to working on improving their potty habits. Ds turns one this week, and if he follows the path that dd took, he will start to become a little more independent in the next few months, which frees up time for me to resume much better care of our animals. I don’t know what to do, really. DH does not help with our animals and he works third shift, so really, we only see each other on Sunday (with small- hi ‘I love you’s’ in between). I feel like he’s taking the easy road (out of sight, out of mind) by sticking our dogs out in the garage (where IMO they are just going to pee everywhere anyway and I’ll still have to clean it up). I suggested that we re-home our sheltie, but dh doesn’t ‘want to make me give up my dog’, but doesn’t want him in the house. Am I being unreasonable/unrealistic to want to continue to keep our animals inside? Should I entertain the idea that our animals can live outside or should we re-home them? How do I work this out? HELP!

[SimonMom]

OK. I'm going to be brutally honest. I would NOT want pets that urinated and defecated in my house. Have you tried training them? Honestly, having two young children is not an excuse for keeping your pets in one room, and having them using it as a bathroom. And also, I'm not sure, but you make it sound like you're not cleaning up after them well. I mean, your fil won't even come over anymore. So, I'm not sure what you should do. I mean, it should be either to give them away to someone who can dedicate time to them, or keep them outside. I think its cruel to keep them locked up in a room all day anyway.

[ZTMOM]

I don't think it's a great plan to hope you will have more time down the road as your little one enters toddlerhood or to let your dogs claim a new room in your new home in the meantime.

Could you look at the yard/garage as a short term solution while you work on finding a long term solution to house training the dogs?

If you know how to train them but need time could you hire a sitter to come in to help with the kids or hire a dog trainer to come in if you're unsure of how to fix this problem yourself? Is it possible a dog walker is needed & this would take care of the accidents?

[PlayaMama]

hmmm... i think the solution would be to fix the potty problems.

though if they've gotten really used to going inside, which it sounds like they have, then it's going to be an uphill battle.

what about a walk in the morning for some interaction, outside during the day, some inside socialization time with intense observation, an evening walk and then crating them over night? basically, don't give them the chance to potty inside.

making them into outside dogs entirely sounds like it's just setting them up for neglect. i think i'd re-home them before doing that, it just doesn't seem fair if they aren't going to have any human time.

[Ola_]

Here's my concern - you said that the dogs don't get very much of your time and attention. That will only decrease once they are living in the garage or outside. Which I'm afraid would result in more issues, like nuisance barking, jumping on people, chewing stuff up and digging.

I think moving to a new house is a great time for a new beginning. You don't have any smelly spots to keep them pottying inside. It will take time and attention, especially since it sounds like they've been doing this for a while. Having your DH's help in this would really really help make it successful. Feel free to use crates, exercise pens, and belly bands/diapers as needed until you get it under control. As a last resort you may consider puppy pads as a way to keep the waste contained in one area and easy to cleanup, but I would try everything else first.

[rhiandmoi]

It seems like your DH is not a dog person, if he thinks putting the dog outside all day and night is a better solution than rehoming, but I would not move them outside, they're just not that kind of dog. I would put the dogs outside during visits by your ILs or anytime when you can't keep track of them (a few hours during the day), but not at night, and not all day. If you can't keep them indoors, I would rehome them to an inside situation before putting them outside.

[listipton]

Originally Posted by Ola_

Here's my concern - you said that the dogs don't get very much of your time and attention. That will only decrease once they are living in the garage or outside. Which I'm afraid would result in more issues, like nuisance barking, jumping on people, chewing stuff up and digging.

I think moving to a new house is a great time for a new beginning. You don't have any smelly spots to keep them pottying inside. It will take time and attention, especially since it sounds like they've been doing this for a while. Having your DH's help in this would really really help make it successful. Feel free to use crates, exercise pens, and belly bands/diapers as needed until you get it under control. As a last resort you may consider puppy pads as a way to keep the waste contained in one area and easy to cleanup, but I would try everything else first.

Thank you all for the great advice! We were talking about it again over lunch and have resolved to work on this problem together. Dh has agreed that they can't be outside all the time and that he needs to help if we're going to get they're potty habits back in line. They really used to have decent potty habits and I firmly believe that it can get back in check, now I just have to prove it to DH. THANK YOU all again for letting me get this out and reorganize my thoughts!!

[betsyj]

I would treat them like new puppies as well. Here is a nice article about house trianing dogs. Forget they are adults-pretend they are puppies.


http://www.mysmartpuppy.com/articles/wontgooutside.htm

http://www.canismajor.com/dog/hsetrain.html

[NaturalMamma]

We don't have a dog, but DD and I have learned a lot about dogs from watching Victoria Stilwell's show "It's Me or the Dog". You can do a search for her website. And you might even be able to find her book (or a video) at your local library.

Best wishes!

[Noelle C.]

If you don't have the time to dedicate to their training, and haven't in what sounds like a long time (even a couple years in dog-time is a very long time), and you don't expect to have time for months more to come, then you really should rehome the dogs. Kicking indoor-only dogs outdoors full-time is mean to them. They're doing nothing wrong. They haven't been trained, and so are only doing what they've been allowed to do. It's annoying, yes, but unless they've been trained and have decided to poo inside out of being mad or something, then they're not doing anything wrong. Your solution so far has been to accomodate their messes and locking them in one room.

You're not being unrealistic in wanting to keep the dogs inside. You're being unrealistic in thinking that months down the road you'll suddenly have the time to basically rehab the habits these dogs have been allowed to develop while taking care of a toddler and his sister. If you don't have time to start now, you won't later on.

Your best bet is really to rehome the dogs and not to get any more until you know you will have time to dedicate to their bathroom training from day 1.