I agree with the above poster. Trying both potty pads and going outside is probably confusing. You can do potty pads and THEN transition outside, or just go outside completely.
I'm going to tell you how we did it. It's not that much different than what you're doing but maybe it will encourage you to stick it out.
We got Franklin as a puppy and started out training him on potty pads. He stayed in a play pen when we were gone so I put a potty pad in there. The most important thing I've found thus far with potty training is confinement. I would consider my dogs potty trained and we still don't let them have full roam of the house. When I am in the living room, they stay in the living room with me also. By keeping them confined, you can keep an eye on them at all times. This is also important. When you can't watch them completely, they need to be crated or confined to a "safe" area. Until they are potty trained, any accidents are your fault. Basically, the key to potty training is eliminating the chance for accidents. Any time we saw Franklin even barely sniffing around, he went in his play pen until he pottied. He could come out as his reward. We were lucky and he pretty much caught on pretty quickly.. Once he caught on, we would leave the play pen open so he could go as he pleased. If there was an accident, we went back to square one.
Now, after we moved to our apartment, we decided we wanted to switch to outside completely. We started out by finding a treat they loved. This was cheese. Cheese is their special potty treat and they don't get it any other time. Afterwards, we went out every two hours religiously. We stayed and walked until they pottied. Once they did, we would cheer and go crazy and give them their special treat. After a couple of weeks, we increased the time by a half an hour every couple of days and they did fine. Now they can wait 4-6 hours between potty breaks. We still have accidents every couple of months when I forget to take them out, but for the most part, we are golden!
In the mean time, maybe invest in some diapers/belly bands to save your sanity?
I hope this was helpful at all.. I know you're already doing a lot of this stuff so I don't know if it will, lol. Sorry it's so long, too. |