curiousA couple of weeks ago, we decided to start letting Sofie sleep out of her kennel at night. She would sleep with our youngest son, or sometimes get into our bed. I didn't care for her to be in my bed, it wasn't too comfortable and I just didn't like it. She's really cute, don't get me wrong, but I don't think it's cute how she thinks she is a human and likes to share our pillows and lay under the covers! To keep her out of my bedroom at night, (I like to keep my door open since I have kids) I bought a baby gate. That's when the accidents would happen: she would get up in the middle of the night and whine at the gate. We would ignore her, but then in the morning, there would be either a little pile of poop or pee on the floor. Now, at first, we thought, oh--fed her dinner too late, or gave her water too late, so we started to really control what time we fed her and give her drink (cut-off time was 7 pm) and we even took her out really late at night (about 11pm-midnight) to be sure she'd make it through the night. Then I discovered she'd sneak drinks from the toilet (didn't think she could reach!!!!) so we kept the door to the bathroom shut and STILL, she would have accidents! This has gone on for about a month now. We thought maybe she was doing it out of spite since I put the gate up? So the night before was the final straw and we decided to put her back in her kennel and not let her sleep out of it anymore. I mean, she doesn't pee in the kennel, she's really good about that. Last night we went to bed and about 1 am woke up to her whining, so my husband took her out to potty, thinking maybe her whining is a signal she's gotta go since when we ignore her she's had an accident, and he even made the effort, as tired as he was, to stay out with her a while to really empty her bladder. I woke up at 4:30 am this morning to her whining--usually I can ignore it but it sounded different so I figured I'd take her out so she will be quiet-but since she went out just a few hours earlier I didn't think she needed to go. I got to her kennel, and she peed in it, so it was everywhere.
So her accidents are only at night, and it is only since I put the gate up and now in her kennel where she doesn't mind staying in during the day, but I'm assuming its been a month since she wasn't in it at night so she wants to stay out at night and did it out of spite. When I got to her and saw her sitting in her urine, she had her ears back and had that "oh I know I'm in so much trouble" look. I'm not sure and I know this ended up being a really long post and if you read this far--thank you!!! But really I just want to know if anyone has had experience with this??