Our 10-year-old male pug, not neutered, started urinating in the house on occasion about six or seven months ago. At the time, it was right after we’d been visited by a friend and her male dog, and we assumed it was a reaction to a new dog in his territory. He peed maybe 3-4 times over a few days, then seemed to stop. Occasionally afterwards, I’d catch him peeing in the house and it was something we’d go :eek: and 
about, but it seemed to happen so infrequently that we put it down to a the very cold winter where it was difficult to get him out as much as he’d been accustomed to and even when we did get him out, he couldn’t roam around very long before his feet started freezing.
Fast forward to last month, when we left on vacation for a week. We left him with our friends who have taken care of him a bunch. All was good, except that they reported that he peed in their house a lot. As in, they had to restrain him in the kitchen a lot of the time because he was peeing on the carpet and their furniture. We were mortified, but again, we assumed it was a combination of a bit of separation anxiety and the fact that it’s not-so-uncommon for an intact male of a certain age to start marking his territory. Still, we kept an eye on him (seemed normal) and made an appointment with our vet.
The appointment unfortunately was delayed a couple of weeks because our vet was not available. Dog seemed fine, we did catch him peeing in the house twice more, but he seems healthy and active otherwise.
Fast forward to now. Our vet appointment was yesterday, and I just got a call back from them. Lo-and-behold, he has a urinary tract infection. Surprised the hell out of me, I was anticipating the not-very-fun talk Mr. Athena and I would have about neutering the dog (I’m for it, he’s not), not an actual physical problem.
So… dog with urinary tract infection. Could a urinary tract infection be behind this whole peeing-inside thing? I would have expected an infection to get bad enough that the doggy would be acting differently within a few weeks of him getting it, not fester for months, but I’m not a doctor or a vet.
We’ll definitely talk more to the vet, but I wanted to get any info I can. Also, any info in general to get him to stop peeing in the house. If it were up to me, I’d get him snipped asap, but that’s an argument I lost long ago and don’t expect to win unless the urination becomes really, really bad. I’m hoping it won’t come to that.