My husband and I have a lovely cross breed white fluffy dog who has a bit of a problem. She has always gone through separation anxiety and for the most part she just redecorates. She throws the pillows around, jumps all over, well, everything and likes to rip up newspapers. Nothing really gets destroyed but she also pees and poos on the carpet. We ended up crate training her and all was fine. At the time we lived close enough to work that at lunch either my husband or I could go home at lunch and let her out for a bit. We have since moved and now have a nice backyard for the dog to play in but we can’t come home to let her out mid day.
We have lived in the new house for about two years and our solution has been to put her in the spare room. We made it so she could look out the window, always put toys in the room with her, and a bowl of water. It took months before she would stop flinging the water bowl around and she would consistently pee on the carpet. We tried to clean the carpet every time, but the smell just permeated. Now we are expecting a baby in July and the spare room is no longer spare. We ripped out the carpet and put in new flooring in prep for the baby. Since then the dog has had full rein over the house and she has stopped with the redecorating but will still occasionally pee on the carpet. This time she has moved onto the living room.
I can’t have a house full of dog pee but we don’t want to put her in a crate for a full day plus travel time. It’s not that she can’t hold it. I bring her to work occasionally and she can hold it that long no problem when there are people around. She would never go to the bathroom in the house when people are home and I don’t know how to train her not to do something she knows she can’t do, and that she only does when we are not home.
Any suggestions?