I feel like I'm living for his poop schedule!

[Gizmos]

Hi guys,
I need some encouragement.

How long will I have to take him out every hour? I know I'm just beginning with Gizmo, but I'm organizing my life around this little guy's pee and poop! I feel like I can't be away for too long or I'll make him have an accident. I'm ready to have a little time to myself, go to the movies or something. lol

I've been writing down every time he eats and goes potty. When will I be able to untether him and not have to run outside all day?

[wadeod]

We have had Josie for 1 week and am going through the same thing. Im going bonkers following her around the kitchen and TV room. She hates her xercise pen. I have learned her crate is my friend and allow me some sanity. But nothing like when she sleeps in our laps, makes it all worth it.

We have been having 3 poops early, mid day, late. The pee schedule varies. Sometimes once every few hours, sometimes 5 times a hour

Not looking forward to winter weather

[horsnaround]

Being consistent now will really pay off. It's just a little time out of your life. He will make up for it in all the smiles he will bring to you. It will get better

[Caro]

Going through the same thing! I am finally beginning to see some type of schedule/consistency after about 3 weeks. Like wadeod mentioned, the crate is my friend.lol.

[beck3465]

I really like using a leash with puppies. It makes it easier to bring them to a certain spot in the yard to potty and when they are done we go back in the house right away. Makes it go faster and they associate leash and that spot with potty. When allowed to run free they lose focus and run and play and explore. Sometimes they pee so fast you don't realize it. Also if you travel it is so much easier if they have learned to go on a leash. Little puppies can be prey for birds like hawks and owls, so a leash is for safety also. Frequency varies by dog and age but at least every two hours at first. I do NOT wake up sleeping puppies to potty, but as soon as they wake up out we go. It's like having a newborn baby.....sleep deprivation for a while. My female Husky didn't sleep through the night for a YEAR!!! At least I am retired so could nap in the day some. Best of luck.

[Lovetodream88]

Welcome to having a puppy

[Marhcarter]

I am impressed with your stick-with-it-ness. I wish we had with Huey. We thought we were being clever and bought 2 of the indoor fake grass pottys-1 for the house & 1 for the boat. We started with pee pads but Huey quickly began shredding them. We moved quickly to the indoor fake grass (as soon as he was tall enough to get on it...), but he quickly learned how to shred those, too. We had fake grass shreds all over the house and then he started dragging the grass mat all over, so we gave up on those. So, we started the outdoor-only training way too late and at almost 4 years old, we are still having issues. He knows where he is supposed to go and we do the treat for positive reinforcement every time he goes outside. He will even go outside when no one is watching, then come get one of us & take us to see the potty so he can get a treat. The problem is, although we got him fixed at 6 months old, he has to mark everything he comes in contact with. He is not having indoor accidents, he is marking his territory. It is especially bad when I visit my parents because they have 2 King Charles Cavaliers and he wants to mark their house. I have to carry him almost the whole time I am visiting (or hand him off to someone else) and I take him outside every 30 min, but he still is pushing for a "no longer welcome" there.
So, stick with it. I know all the yorkie instruction books that I bought prior to bringing Huey home talked about how difficult yorkies are to potty train, but I just really had no idea. Our last dog was a lab and he trained himself without ever having a single indoor accident. Sigh...

[ilovejoel]

Hehe, I remember those times with my Joel You sound like your doing it pretty good.
Trust me it gets better and it will be rewarding later. Me and Joel were glued together the first few months during that time(well we still are, lol)and honestly there were times I was so out energy and I just wanted to pass him off to someone, just for a couple of days lol but I kept on going and now he's really good and potty trained(he's 11months). I can finally trust him when he goes off byhimself and not have to worry what he's getting into or if he's pooping behind the couch again!, it's really nice when you get past that part.

What I asked myself was would you rather do it consistantly for 10months to a year(give or take) or would you rather have to do it half a$$ for your dogs whole life lol
Thats what got me through with Joel so you have to hang in there!

[gracielove]

The more time you spend with him the more successful your training experience will be. He is a baby and every baby has to be watched very closely. As he gets older he will not have to go as often but for now he is a peeing, pooing machine.

If you have to go out for a few hours a x-pen is the best thing to have. You can put a pee pad (put the pad in a tight frame to keep him from playing with it) some toys and a bed in there so he does not soil his crate, if that is what you are using. Some people confine them to a small uncarpeted room like a bathroom. These are just short term arrangements. Watching him as much as possible speeds up the process. It helps to train his brain so he will be more accurate as he gets older.

[RileyDC]

My Vet had told me that their bladder is not fully formed until 16 weeks old....
I think what she meant was they don't have bladder control until they're at
least four months old...

I found this online:

Bladder control and your puppy
To put it simply, your little guy just can't hold it — at least not for very long. A puppy under the age of 4 months doesn't have a big enough bladder or sufficient muscle control to go more than a couple of hours without eliminating. As he gets older, though, a pup's ability to control himself gradually increases. And by the time he reaches adulthood (at about one year of age), a healthy dog usually has plenty of self-control.

Cluing into a Puppy's Housetraining Instincts - For Dummies

[chachi]

You have to put the time in to get your pup properly house trained. A little extra time now will save you lots of frustration later so just hang in there and remember its not forever

[Verbena]

They relieve themselves at least once in the number of hours that corresponds with their age in months. If that is any help. Patience right now will make a big difference later.

[yorkietalkjilly]

Been right where you are! I do the hourly things literally for weeks and then start to incrementally increase the times in between and still watch the dog every moment he's walking around. Getting him out often will WAY decrease his accidents and set him up for success. You just have to accept that to housebreak a Yorkie, you have to change your life for a while now in order to ingrain the idea in his brain and make lots of pathways of habit that later in life, he will NEVER vary from. It is worth the sacrifice now to later have a totally reliable, clean-in-the-house dog.

[DBlain]

Originally Posted by beck3465

I really like using a leash with puppies. It makes it easier to bring them to a certain spot in the yard to potty and when they are done we go back in the house right away. Makes it go faster and they associate leash and that spot with potty. When allowed to run free they lose focus and run and play and explore. Sometimes they pee so fast you don't realize it. Also if you travel it is so much easier if they have learned to go on a leash. Little puppies can be prey for birds like hawks and owls, so a leash is for safety also. Frequency varies by dog and age but at least every two hours at first. I do NOT wake up sleeping puppies to potty, but as soon as they wake up out we go. It's like having a newborn baby.....sleep deprivation for a while. My female Husky didn't sleep through the night for a YEAR!!! At least I am retired so could nap in the day some. Best of luck.

could not agree more, Lola is my fifth yorkie and the only one 100% house broken and the first one I started taking out to poppy via the leash. LOL in the bad weather I hide inside and she goes out on the retractable leash. But I know not everyones home is set up to make that possible. Not only do we use a leash to potty, but I also have a ribbon on my front door with a bunch of jingle bells attached to it, she rings this when she has to go potty. I started ringing it at first before we went out and would say Lola go potty, Lola go potty. then would touch her paw to it each time and then after about two weeks she finally did it herself. And boy can she ring it with vengeance if I take to long to get there. My house is three levels so now that she has free run I don't always see her at the door, so having a bell rung is better than trying to catch her prancing around the door, and I do not want to encourage barking, so for me this works best. Also on the plus side when I travel to visit family I bring a set of bells and after she sees where they are the first time she always returns to that door to go potty.

She also knows the difference between go pee and go poop, in the morning she will often just pee then several hours want to go poop, but since we are out there I want her to go pee again so I don't have to take her out a short while later, so I keep walking her around and say go peep, go peep and finally she will. I tell my husband to do this, which of course he will not, he will take her out to poop in a min they are back in, I say what about pee, he said she did not need to she wanted to come back in, so 5 min. later she rings the bell to go out again, I say see you did not tell her to go Dog are funny they will go out side when they need to potty and often not do it, so telling them to firmly sometimes does help. Also when she was a puppy I would often have her tethered to me when in the house, so I could keep and eye on her. I just kept putting her out about every hour and then just kept increasing the time in between.

Many of my friends just use the pee pads and I can understand when left alone all day that is a good idea but I think it is still a better choice to at least have a dog understand that when the owner is home they go out to potty, I say this because bringing a dog to someone elses home that is not trained to go outside is challenging, so often my yorkie friends that visit have to have their dogs in diapers and bring pee pads, I find while at home the dog will use their pad, but often in a new place will not.

There is light at the end of this tunnel, yesterday Lola went out around 8 am and did not need to go out again till a little past 3 pm when I made her go, she probably could have lasted longer. Anyway sorry for such a long winded response it's but I am so happy with how well she is housebroken I like to share my ideas with those currently facing the challenge.

[Gizmos]

Thanks everyone. I will keep doing the method we're on. It's good to know that there's light at the end of the tunnel. He just has to grow up.

I'm just going to have to put him in the xpen sometimes, even though he gets riled up. We'll see.