Hello All,
I'm hoping that some of you may have some ideas how to deal with this.
My parents went away on holiday, leaving me with the dog and elderly cat for 4 weeks. The cat passed away last week and since then (may or may not be related) the dog has started barking at night.
It's something she has done a lot in the past, only she usually barks once or twice and then stops. She's now started barking and won't stop, to the point where I have to go downstairs (she sleeps in the kitchen) to get her to be quiet. I did that last night and then she started barking again, so my fiance went and put her in the living room. She stopped after that, but this morning when I left for work I fed her and let her out and put her back in the kitchen. My fiance said she started barking again after I'd left and we're reaching the end of our tether now. I am a light sleeper so being disturbed leaves me tired and grumpy in the morning, and my fiance works shifts so didn't get in until nearly 1am and needed to sleep through the morning but was woken by the dog.
He even put her out in the garden but she barked there too.
I really don't know what to do, as I don't want to inadvertantly reinforce the behaviour, but how do we stop it without having too many more disturbed nights?
Any suggestions would be more than welcomed.
Thanks in advance
Abi
I'm hoping that some of you may have some ideas how to deal with this.
My parents went away on holiday, leaving me with the dog and elderly cat for 4 weeks. The cat passed away last week and since then (may or may not be related) the dog has started barking at night.
It's something she has done a lot in the past, only she usually barks once or twice and then stops. She's now started barking and won't stop, to the point where I have to go downstairs (she sleeps in the kitchen) to get her to be quiet. I did that last night and then she started barking again, so my fiance went and put her in the living room. She stopped after that, but this morning when I left for work I fed her and let her out and put her back in the kitchen. My fiance said she started barking again after I'd left and we're reaching the end of our tether now. I am a light sleeper so being disturbed leaves me tired and grumpy in the morning, and my fiance works shifts so didn't get in until nearly 1am and needed to sleep through the morning but was woken by the dog.
He even put her out in the garden but she barked there too.
I really don't know what to do, as I don't want to inadvertantly reinforce the behaviour, but how do we stop it without having too many more disturbed nights?
Any suggestions would be more than welcomed.
Thanks in advance
Abi