[yorkietalkjilly]

Here are some thoughts you might use for your dog. You've got to cage her so that her cage is wall-to-wall pads and she has no other place to potty but the pad to start with. After weeks and weeks of going on only that surface, you can remove a couple of pads and make a space for her bed and food on the plain floor within the cage. However, she should still want to go on the pads since that is the surface and scent she's grown used to when relieving herself all these last weeks and it will seem only right for her to use the pads. Eventually, when you see that she has gotten habituated to using only pads, you can begin to let her out and about in a room which is mostly closed off so she cannot escape that room and it is mostly covered in pads on the floor. Watch her like a hawk and when she potties on the pad, praise and treat her and remove the pad. Just before you take it up, however, touch one of the remaining pads to a spot of pee or where a piece of feces had been to transfer a small amount of scent to a remaining potty pad in the room. This should lure her back to the area but just in case, keep taking her over to that pad that is "scented" so that she knows it is there and where it is and watch her like a hawk. If she should try going on an unpadded part of the closed off room, run to her and say "uh oh" in a matter of fact way and pick her up, move her to the "scented" pad and keep herding her back to that pad should she try to wander off it until she's used it. You can also "scent" pads near it too, to increase her area she's allowed to use while housebreaking and this should increase her odds that she will go on a "scented" pad. In time, with you watching her whenever she is in that room and cannot get out of it to parts of the house where no once is watching her, she should become habituated to going to just that area where the "scented" pads are kept and avoid the other, unscented pads. Eventually, you should be able to take those unscented pads up, watch her and have to go to just the "scented" pads area and use only it. When she keeps going to the pads you want her to use and does her business there, really praise and treat her to reinforce this is the place to go. If you do catch her trying to go or sniffing around another area, say "uh oh" and take her right over to the approved pads and say "potty on the pad" or some such command to say every time and then eventually when she does go on the approved place(and you watch until she does and do not look away until she's finished - I don't care it it takes 30 minutes) - treat and praise immediately and take up the used pad(s), scenting from them onto new pads. Just keep this up until she's using only a single pad and going there every time. By this time, you should be able to trust her occasionally and briefly in other parts of the house for short periods of time but then bring her back into the room with the scented pad and point it out to her so she remembers where it is.

Watch her for signs she needs to go and put her on the scented pads when she shows signs of sniffing at the floor, running around in excited circles, standing and staring at you, running back and forth in the same area, those are dead giveaways she needs to go and should be put on her pads and watched until she does. Keep herding her back and telling her gently and patiently she needs to "go potty" until she does, then praise/treat when she does, clean up, scent another pads.

Crate training is still another way and you keep the dog in the crate except when you are watching her, which should be 98% of the time with her in the crate a mere 2% or so - only in that crate when you are out of the room or gone. Rest of that time she's out playing with you and you are watching her for need to go signs and putting her on the scented pad when she does show it and she is confined to a single room, with you being watched or crated. When she is with you in another part of the house, be sure it's not around the time she needs to go potty like after meals or play. Restrict her visits to other parts of the house to just after she's pottied so you know she won't need to go for at least another 15 or 30 minutes or so. This lessens her chances for accidents in other parts of the house. Don't keep her in other parts of the house except briefly - the rest of the time she should be in the approved and fenced off area so she cannot have accidents.

If you don't allow her out of the area covered in pads, with a portion of them scented in the spot you want her single pad to be placed when she's fully pad trained, she can't help but have only success. That's why you have to confine or fence them off to only the covered floor area. Some people use little pens called X-pens to keep the dog in the pad-covered area or a portion of a larger room fenced off. Once she's habituated to using only pads over and over, then you can begin decreasing her pads on the floor to just those in the approved area and watching her, returning her to her approved pad area frequently so her puppy mind remembers where it is and reminds her to "go". Put her on the pad after eating a meal, drinking water, playtime, grooming sessions, loving sessions, naps, after guests arrive, after guests leave, i.e., after every thing that gets her up and moving for a while, after eating/drinking or after any and all excitement.

The trouble arises when dogs are not fully confined to just a the areas covered with only pads and aren't slowly weaned from the entire surface being covered to just a portion of the floor covered and the dog watched to be sure it goes to the approved scented pad when it's showing signs of needing to go or put there and watched until it goes after meals, excitement and activity. Dogs that are given too much freedom too soon don't usually get totally housebroken.

Sorry this is rambling and disjointed but it's late but you get the idea.