Hi all, I really hope someone can help us.
We picked up our beautiful puppy last weekend and she has settled into our home really well, and we love her to bits. However, she just will not settle at night at all. We want her to sleep in the kitchen, which is a really good size and we have paper down everywhere, she has plenty of toys, and a nice big bed to sleep in - which she sleeps in fine when we are in the room. The minute we leave she starts howling and just will not stop.
Last night she howled continously from 11pm until 4pm - we were going down every hour and a half or so to try and calm her down and give her a cuddle but the minute we left the room she started again. We've put a clock wrapped up in a blanket next to her bed as that's meant to be like the mum's heartbeat but that hasn't worked. Has anyone got any ideas?? Sorry to be so long winded but we really don't know what to try and after 5 nights of hardly any sleep we are beginning to get slightly stressed out!

If you cuddle her, she may think that every time she cries, you will come down to her, you have to stop yourself from giving her attention when you come down. We used the clock method, we also had a heat pad when we had our puppy and also had the radio on.

Also, some probably really won't recommend this, but I used to sit downstairs in the dark until my pup went to sleep and then had to quietly sneak upstairs. It helped us and he didn't wake up as much, but after leaving him and not giving him any attention, he was fine by the 6th night.

My advice isn't great though, lol, so I'm sure there will be people with more experience along soon.
x

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I would reccomend not cuddleing her, leave her alone and she should stop crying. Its just like a child, if a child cried when u were putting it to bed and u picked it up straight away it would continue to do it.
Tonight try not to go near her at all after you put her to bed then she will stop crying. Dont go near her even once or u will have a crying dog every night.
Best of luck!

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RIP Cassie my loyal friend


19.03.08-16.10.10

Sorry to hear you are not getting much sleep at the moment!

As the others have said though, if you keep going down to cuddle her then she is just going to keep down it so she can get cuddles. I know its hard but try to percivere (sp?) for a few nights without going down at all and see how she gets on after that.

Good Luck x

we have this with our dog although he is a bit better now but sorry to say this he is 18mnths and still cries from around 5 in the morning until my alarm goes off at 6.30.

the reason he used to cry was because he was in a room on his own we then moved him in with our other dog at night and in his own bed (he didnt like his crete) this helped and they now both sleep in our room on a large dog bed at the bottom of our bed!

it depends what u want but you need to stick with your decision and i agree with all the other posts ignore as much as you can!

good luck and let us know how ur getting on!

As the others have said try to ignore the crying ( hard we know ) she /he is calling out to her mum and litter mates maybe get a cuddly toy for her/him to sleep with I gave mine an old cushion which he use to cuddle up to.

I would ignore the crying I know its hard but if you go down and cuddle her she will cry for attention and it will get worse. Maybe try putting a t-shirt or something of yours in with her so she has your scent it might help.

are you using a crate. If not it might make her feel more secure if you put her in a crate and maybe cover it too so that she has a secure den. Give her plenty of toys to snuggle up to and leave her to it. If you want to go and let her out half way through the night if she isnt settled then let her out, take her into the garden without fussing her, wait till she does a pee then settle her back in the crate and leave her again. She will soon get the hang of it.

I think your puppy has you in a perfect recall!!
The puppy whines and you appear and give him a cuddle, you have taught him that however long he cries you will appear and cuddle him!!! Perfect recall by the puppy!! LOL
We use a crate with Logan, he has slept through from about 12 weeks of age. Our routine was crate in the bedroom for the first couple of weeks and set the alarm every 3 hours to take him out to the toilet, we used to take him outside but not put the light on or talk to him only to praise him when he went to the loo. Then straight back in his crate, he would whimper for a few seconds but we just said 'bedtime now' and he was reassured just by hearing us and went back to sleep everytime. After two weeks in our bedroom we moved his crate to the lounge and still got up 3 hourly for toilet breaks. He is now 17 weeks old and as soon as we say bedtime he goes in his crate and waits for his bonio and now sleeps through without the need for toilet breaks until 6.30 am, (we go to bed around 10.30pm). He has never messed or wet in his crate and he is now left for 5 hours a day some days in it while i go to work.
I hope this helps, not to say this routine works for every dog but this is my 4th puppy i have done this with and it has worked for all of them.

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