Need some advice please.


aldo247

New Member
Hi, I'm new to the forum and I wanted to see if I could get some advice. My wife and I recently adopted a miniature 2 year old long-haired daschund, the little guy is very sweet and loving but I have the feeling he was abused by the previous family.
Every time I firm up my voice to tell him to do something (off the couch, wait, stop, etc) he will get extremely nervous and crunch down and wag his tail and then, he just pees himself, sometimes it'll be a couple drops, sometimes it'll be a lot. Sometimes when I'm going to pick him up or try to pet him, the same thing will happen, very rarely my wife and I will raise our voice to yell at the dogs, but you can just imagine that if we do that, that will also be another cause for him to have an accident.

We are not sure as to what the cause of the problem is, but we have been trying to reaffirm good behaviors and we don't really reprimend him when the accident happens we try to calm him down.
Is this something that can be corrected? What should we be looking for and be aware of when trying to fix this problem?
For what is worth, this is our second daschund, he gets along very well with our other dog and there's no issues on that area. We are very familiar with their characters and attitudes, but this is just not normal.

Thanks in advance for your help!
 

vizzla

New Member
It sounds like he has been abused. When did he come to you?

I believe that you should not use your voices just show him of the couch with your hands.
I believe that he in time will be less nerveus around you if you dont use sounds that he remembers as punishment or pain. Give him time and lots and lots of love. If he does wrong just ignore and praise good behaviur. He needs to feel safe.

Be gentel around him without pity him.

My best advice is not to use any vocals around him. Dogs dont speek to eachother anyway so just use body language :)

Good luck!
 

aldo247

New Member
Thank you for your reply, we just got him this past weekend, so he's been in our family for only 3 days now. We will try the gestures method and se how it goes. We are aware that this may take some time and lot a of cleaning, lol, but we wanted to know if it can be corrected.


It sounds like he has been abused. When did he come to you?

I believe that you should not use your voices just show him of the couch with your hands....

...Good luck!
 

Vonoepen

New Member
Three days is not very long bless him. Sounds as if he has had some rough treatment. However some dogs do pee when they are spoken to even if its nicely and I really don't think they can be cured. I know the mother of ours was a dreadful pee-er, thank goodness ours hasn't inherited that. But it does sound as if your wee (no pun intended, it's a Scottish expression!) chap has been verbally/physically abused. As said before, plenty of tlc and hand signals which become useful in old age when dogs become deaf !!!
 

Noodles~Mom

New Member
I agree with the others, be paitent.. he has only been there for three days. My Nalla (my big dog) submissive pees all the time, one time right in my brothers shoe (just happened to be there when she peed). Time, and love and more love and voice tone, calm no raised voices, gental pets, treats will all help.

If you want him off the couch guide him with a treat, you might even want to leash him to you so you can praise him all the time for good things and he will learn to trust you because he is with you and he will learn you will not do anything to hurt him.

Give him time, and hugs and kisses from me and my crew.

GOOD LUCK!!!
 

babysis

New Member
It sounds like he was abused from previous owners with lack of attention as well. Also with new surroundings, different noises etc, it is going to take a bit for him to adjust. He will get used to things with time. A family member of mine has a 4 year old mini/midi and when he first showed up at the age of 2, he was doing the same exact thing. Now he is doing better, has occasional accidents but it's because he gets too excited. Try getting down to his level meaning getting on the floor and sitting with the pup. Instead of you getting to know him, let him get to know you. He'll probably ignore you or sniff you or jump all over you, or have the look of "what the heck is this person doing?" It will get better. Best of luck!
 

jax's_mommy

New Member
Hi! And welcome!
I've rescue a litter of pit puppies (they were 6 1/2 months when we found them) from being abused. They had the some degree of being frightened with new people. From crouching, urination and one had tried to bite in fear. But i was patient with them and instead of scolding I just showed them with body language and let them decide at their own pace that not everyone was cruel.

I agree with what the others are saying. It does sound like he was abused in his past. I also agree with just using body language instead of words, they understand that more than anything.

Try sitting on the floor at his level, and let him come to you. Sounds funny. but it works. I had a skeptical dog a couples yrs ago and when i had to find her a new home. That was the only thing that worked with her to finally accept someone new. (had her since she was 6 weeks to almost 2yrs old)

Just be patient :) It'll work out fine!
 
PD is a submissive pee'er.

He quit peeing with us pretty quickly, and no longer pees when I lean over to pet him. Anyone who drops by frequently can bend over and pet him with no problems.

When an infrequent visitor drops by, however, it is water works if they bend over to pet him. If they ignore him until he gets over his excitement, then he is usually safer to pet.

However, there was the incident with my wife's sister. She is a little obsessive about cleanliness, and is not crazy about dogs. She came to our house to watch a movie we had rented that she really wanted to see. So she was on her best behavior, and even allowed PD to sit in her lap. When she decided to make eye contact and give him a bit of praise ...

... well she sat through the rest of the movie with a wet blouse. Pretty amazing for her.

I'm not sure that my wife didn't teach him that trick ... She certainly reveled in the memories.
 

PrettyPenny

New Member
You need to work on building his confidence. Teach him new tricks, teach him to excel at something he enjoys... This is the best method for helping a soft dog overcome fear. Eventually most dogs outgrow it.

http://www.paw-rescue.org/PAW/PETTIPS/DogTip_Shy.php



And just as an aside...

Submissive urination does NOT always mean abuse. Sometimes dogs are just soft and they behave that way. It doesn't always mean that someone beat them. ;)
 
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vizzla

New Member
Maybe he will adjust to your family in the future. You only had him for a short while. Give him time and space to get to now all of you so he knows you wont hurt him :)
 

aldo247

New Member
Thank you everyone for all the responses and useful tips, they have helped plenty! We tried yesterday and today the whole signal language and it seems to be helping, surprisingly, he understood very quickly when I wanted him to get off the couch, LOL.
He gets very excited and nervous when I get home so I try to just come into the apartment and ignore him while he's at his high and then once I come in the house and he settles down, I'll greet him and he will actually do good in that instance.
My wife and I are very happy to have him and he is such a good boy, He's been getting used to our hours and schedules and I think having our other dog there has helped him ease to the new place too.
 
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