olliebollie Report post Posted April 25, 2013 Hi everyone - I've not posted on this forum before but have used it many times for advice, hopefully someone may be able to help me. We have just recently (after many months of discussion!!) brought a puppy into our family. Our DS seems to like her but only if she does exactly what he wants - sleep when he wants her to is the biggest issue. I understand that it's a massive upheaval for him - it's always just been the him, me and Daddy and he's always been the centre of our world. At the moment we are living seperate lives, me in the garden with the dog and Daddy in the house with him. He's always struggled a bit with things that are unpredictable and she is certainly that, he just cant relax when she is around. I was wondering if anyone else has experienced similar problems and could give any advice. Thanks in advance xx Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Isobel Report post Posted April 27, 2013 Sorry what's your DS? Is that your child? Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
olliebollie Report post Posted April 27, 2013 DS stands for Darling Son x Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Suze Report post Posted April 27, 2013 Hi welcome xx..........how old is your son ?.......what breed of dog ?..........have you had a dog before /any previous experience ? ...........ok its gonna help if your pup is socialised and given KC recommeded training classes.If your son is older it would be fab if he could go along to the classes and learn how to help train and teach the pup.Are you using a dog crate for your pup ??............this will help as the pup will benefit from having a quiet chill out place.Don,t force them together your son may not like the pup till it is a well behaved adult dog.The better behaved and trained you pup is the more confident your son will feel around it.Its also ok the split areas up and have puppy free zones and vice versa,its important to lay those ground rules now and stick to them. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
olliebollie Report post Posted May 2, 2013 Hi thank you for your response. My son is 8 and Flo is 13 weeks and a Cavapoo. My husband had dogs when he was growing up but I've never had one so it's all new to me!! I have finally managed to find a puppy training class which we start next week so hopefully that will help. We have always used a crate for her but she likes to be around us and the crate is in the kitchen for night time so Ive brought a big dog cushion and have started to train her to sit on that when she is in the lounge with us. He still finds her to unpredictable but I am hoping as she gets older/trained that will become less of a problem. Thank you for your advice x Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Paula Report post Posted May 10, 2013 We have a dog and my son is a lot older 19 so he handled a dog comeing into the house ok plus our dog was 7 months old when he arrived as he was a rescue dog. I have a freind though with a autistic son who was in the same postition youre in with a 9 week old puppy in the house.her son loved the puppy but foound the fact that he couldnt control or predict what the dog did unsettleing.It took a good while for the young lad to come round but as the dog got older things improved.So im sure things eventualy will work out in youre house too. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Sally44 Report post Posted May 15, 2013 Can you limit the puppy to a certain room in the house - so that he can get away from it if he needs to? And then allow him short periods with the puppy under supervision, and for you to be doing something with the puppy ie. grooming him, or playing with him etc. We have dogs, and my son has been okay with that. But there have been other things, specifically toys that he could not tolerate and which had to be removed from the house. These were toys that made sounds/spoke when activated by someones movement. It totally freaked him out because it was such a shock when they made the noise or spoke. Does your son typically get upset if his concentration is broken eg. if he was doing something, or watching TV and you called his name or touched him, would he get upset about that? If he does, then the puppy maybe causing that type of experience for him ie. breaking into his world/concentration and he is not yet capable of dealing with multiple "input" sources. If that sounds like a possibility, I would suggest no puppy when he is doing something/watching TV etc. But when he is not concentrating on something else, that the puppy is allowed in and you "do something" with the puppy. Also if he is hypersensitive to touch the puppy could be hurting him with its sharp teeth and claws. And its barking could be hurting his ears if he is hypersensitive to sound. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
MelowMeldrew Report post Posted May 15, 2013 My lad won't have any animal in the house, particularly dogs. We did 'loan' a friends well trained dog while they were on holiday to see if my boy would take to one, he near killed it ! by pushing it out of the front door at every opportunity hoping it would get lost and not come back, as it was he spent hours in his bedroom to avoid any contact with it. In the end and to save the poor animal, we gave it to someone else to look after, it lasted 17 hours in our home. A side issue was his mum wanted an assistance dog as she was deaf, but they refused her because the entire family has to welcome it or you don't get one. No-one but her wanted an animal in the house, and the boy was deemed an danger to it. Successive attempts by the special school to involve him at farms etc were all failures and just stressed him,he doesn't like animals so that is it. There issues between us and the school as they kept trying to get him to interact with animals, it was clearly upsetting him and causing a lot of distress. we called a halt to it, we had no choice. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites