# Pyppy's first week at home...



## OggDog (Jan 17, 2014)

Hello all,

I would like to hear everyone's experience with the first week or so once their puppy came home. How was the puppy's first night? Did you take first few days to bond and play or did training start immediately. How well was your puppy adjusted to the crate on the first night and how long it took them to settle down?

Please share things you did in those first initial days or any recommendations for newbies.

Regards,


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## Msmaria (Mar 2, 2013)

Welcome to the forum. Cant wait to see pictures. 

My week was alot different because I had 3 puppies first week. I do remember not getting much sleep and feeling dead on my feet. The rest was a blur lol. We didnt do any training other than potty training, but alot of members here also do crate training. I think its good to bond with your puppy before doing too much. Whatever training you decide to do make it alot of fun. You will find out if your puppy is food or toy motivated and go from there. 

Congratulations on your new pup


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## Stosh (Jun 26, 2010)

I kept Stosh in a crate by my bed for the first 4 weeks or so. He's always been calm and quiet so he settled down quickly, but did wake up when he needed to go out. After he was quiet through the night I moved him out of the bedroom (still in the crate) without any problems. I was lucky, he was a very easy pup


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## sourdough44 (Oct 26, 2013)

Unless you need good sleep for work, I'd try to have the pup nearby, crated, while you sleep. You can get up at times to let him/her out for a bit.

It's been about 6 weeks & I still come down & sleep on the couch once I get up about midnight-1 A.M. & spend the rest near the dog. She likes it very much and I have her to myself. I also usually sleep just as well as the real bed.


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## OggDog (Jan 17, 2014)

Msmaria said:


> Welcome to the forum. Cant wait to see pictures.
> 
> My week was alot different because I had 3 puppies first week. I do remember not getting much sleep and feeling dead on my feet. The rest was a blur lol. We didnt do any training other than potty training, but alot of members here also do crate training. I think its good to bond with your puppy before doing too much. Whatever training you decide to do make it alot of fun. You will find out if your puppy is food or toy motivated and go from there.
> 
> Congratulations on your new pup


I do not have a pup yet. I am on a long research quest to find out what I can expect if and when I get one. Hopefully next year.

Once you are back on your regular work schedule and may not be able to come back to let the pup out of the crate for 8h, would it be acceptable to leave them in a playpen with pads where they can relieve themselves? If not, for how long would I have to come back home from work every few hours to let them out until their bladders are capable of keeping it in?


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## LaRen616 (Mar 4, 2010)

I brought Sinister home when he was 11 weeks old, he pretty much screamed the whole car ride home. We bonded immediately, he was totally into me and so sweet, cuddly and so adorable, he was never a landshark so he never mouthed us and he didn't chew on anything that wasn't his. He slept in his crate without a peep his first night and from then on, he loved his crate, we woke up every 2 hours to take him out to potty. He never had a single crate accident. The first week we had him we had 2 potty accidents and never had another one after that. We didn't really work on anything that first week, we started training the second week we had him.

I brought Draco home when he was 11 weeks old, he cried for the first 10 minutes on the drive home and then he fell asleep and didn't make a peep for the rest of the 2.5 hour ride. We also bonded immediately, he was so freaking adorable, he was so sweet, he never mouthed us and I had been waiting a long time to get a Dalmatian puppy. He HATED the crate, he absolutely refused to sleep in it so he ended up in my bed his first night home and he stayed in my bed until he was 6 months old and now he sleeps on a big dog bed on the floor with my GSD. I woke up every 2 hours to take him out to potty only for a couple of nights and then I switched it to every 4 hours. He never pottied in the bed. We also didn't work on any training the first week. I actually didn't start working with him until he was like 14-15 weeks old.

Recommendation, get as much sleep as you can now, get a crate for your puppy, get lots of chew toys, feed a good quality kibble, keep it fun the first couple of weeks and then work on training, don't get frustrated, enjoy puppyhood because it goes by fast!


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## Tim&Marth (Jul 11, 2013)

Are you raising this puppy yourself or do you have a partner that will help raise?

Raising Olivia with my g/f and I helping worked well. For the first two weeks, she went to sleep at 9 and me at midnight. We would each sleep for six hours.

9pm walk with first person going to sleep
Midnight walk with second person going to sleep
3am first person wakes up and walks (6 hours straight sleep)
6am second person wakes up and walks (6 hours straight sleep)
9am first person wakes up and walks

After the second night, Olivia caught on and knew it wasn't play time, but rather get business done and back to sleep. By week three, her bladder allowed for 6 hours of sleep.

Obviously, YMMV on times, but it worked as well as we could've hoped.


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## blackshep (Aug 3, 2012)

I won't lie, my first couple of weeks with my pup were hellacious. 

My pup HATED her crate, would cry if I tried to leave her even to have a shower and she was on the other side of the shower door. Don't give up on the crating though, if your pup is the same. Now my dog is WONDERFUL in her crate.

It did get better, and it didn't take long, so my advice would be not to despair if your dog is similar to mine. I think they feel very clingy because they suddenly have no littermates or mom to protect them.

It's probably not unlike bringing your first human baby home as a single mom and feeling a bit overwhelmed. You get into a routine pretty quick, so not to worry, the strangeness wears off pretty quick.

I kept my pup's crate next to my bed on a chair, so I could put my fingers in through the grate on the door, if she was fussing.


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## OggDog (Jan 17, 2014)

Tim&Marth said:


> Are you raising this puppy yourself or do you have a partner that will help raise?
> 
> Raising Olivia with my g/f and I helping worked well. For the first two weeks, she went to sleep at 9 and me at midnight. We would each sleep for six hours.
> 
> ...


I have a partner that would help and this would be my wife.

So far there is only two of us and maybe in a year or few maybe we will have a baby. For now I am concerning myself if possible for two people like us to raise a solid dog.

No one touched on this subject yet, but how do people deal with leaving their puppy home when they go to work?

If both of you work 9-5, what do you do with your puppy during that time? This especially concerns me when they are at their early stages and can hold their bladder for 4-6 hours! yet you are away for 8 hours ? Any solutions to this other than hire someone?


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## LaRen616 (Mar 4, 2010)

OggDog said:


> I have a partner that would help and this would be my wife.
> 
> So far there is only two of us and maybe in a year or few maybe we will have a baby. For now I am concerning myself if possible for two people like us to raise a solid dog.
> 
> ...


I used to come home half way through my day to let my Dal puppy out, I did that until he turned 5 months old.


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## Shade (Feb 20, 2012)

Oh my, Delgado's first day home was pure ****

My plan was go to work, after work go home and pick up Jazzy, head off to the breeders and pick up Delgado and head home.

I got to work at 7 AM as usual, got a text from my father at 3 PM saying my grandmother had passed away, left work and went home. Cried for a while then packed up and headed off to the breeders, was much later there than planned staying there and headed out from there straight to my parents place which was a 2 hour drive. He howled and whined for the first few minutes then fell asleep in the crate, about halfway through the ride I hear him wake up and all I can smell is . He had apparently eaten a whole stomachful of horse crap before leaving and threw it up right then. 

Might I add this is end of March in Ontario, we still had tons of snow and it was cold. Drive the last hour with the window cracked freezing my tuckus off and trying not to heave from the smell. Finally got to my parents and met up with my family there, basically running past them to bathe the pup. Finish the bath and take him outside again where he poops out a buttload of worms (the breeder had just dewormed them again and warned me about this). Got rid of the disgusting pile while puking and spend the rest of the evening with family talking about my grandmother and making arrangements.

Get to bed late and I'm sharing a room with my sister. We're both exhausted and I crate Delgado who's passed out cold and crawl into bed. Not even 30 minutes later I'm woken up by 'HURKA' noises coming from the crate and snap up just in time to see Delgado vomit more horse crap all over his brand new bed. I take him outside quickly, take the bed away and lay down a towel in it's place for now. Go back to bed and turn off the light and less than a hour later I hear the 'HURKA' noises again, this pattern continues throughout the night. My sister is literally moaning "don't turn off the light! Every time it goes off he throws up!" multiple times. I think I literally got an hour of sleep the entire night. I ended up throwing out the bed in the morning, it was totally soaked and ruined.

The rest of the week went very smoothly, I had already booked a few days off from work so I was able to set a schedule up right away. We spent the first week basically bonding and laying down basic rules like no jumping and biting.


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## Tim&Marth (Jul 11, 2013)

OggDog said:


> I have a partner that would help and this would be my wife.
> 
> So far there is only two of us and maybe in a year or few maybe we will have a baby. For now I am concerning myself if possible for two people like us to raise a solid dog.
> 
> ...


Having two parents will definitely help take some of the strain off of you raising the puppy just by yourself. Find what works best for you - shifts worked well for us and Olivia had zero accidents in her crate. We did have plenty of wee wee pads on the floor in the beginning during the day. Eventually, we moved them closer to the door and now Olivia knows to sit at the door when she has to go outside.

On the topic of also having a baby... When Olivia was 3 months old, we made every effort to socialize her as much as possible. Farmers market, town gatherings (Nowhere that she could contract rabies etc). It was not until we saw a puppy in the pet store shaking did we fully understand the importance of early socialization. The parents of the dog wound up having a baby a month after getting the dog and focused the majority of their effort on the baby. The puppy was never socialized and would shake whenever it went outside of the home. Moral of the story - this puppy will feel like a baby when you see how much effort is involved. Warmer weather, get that puppy used to seeing people, nature.

As far as the work schedule, I myself went home during lunch. Even now at 11 months, I still go home twice a week to eat lunch (And mainly that's to get away from work and get my mind off work). 

Welcome to fatherhood :hug: You're going to have a blast


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## Kgoodman512 (Mar 8, 2014)

Oh man, this is the first time I have ever owned a GSD puppy, and let me tell you I don't think I was entirely prepared for it! I picked Archer up at 8 weeks old and while he may be the cutest little guy you have ever seen while he sleeps, he is a little terror while he is awake! I am not crate training him, as I don't feel it is entirely necessary to lock him in a small box every time I leave. He does fallow me around a lot and he whines very minimally when I leave him alone thankfully. So far we have had very minimal issues with him chewing on furniture, but when he plays you really gotta watch out for his sharp ends, though I think that may be partially my fault as I tend to like to be physical with my animals, but we are figuring alternatives out as we go. He is super awesome when I have company over and loves other people thankfully, though I am having issues with him groping everyone's leg that he meets, T_T that is another thing we need to work on in time. I am in the second week now, and we have already established the sit command quite well, though, the transition from sit to lay, and sit to shake are proving to be a real challenge, and he does have a tendency to get upset/frustrated in the middle of our sessions and throw little temper tantrums in his water dish! XD For the first week, he never wanted to leave the front yard area so I had to pick him up and walk away from home with him, each time going a little further away then I would let him dink around as we made our home which he always seemed far more excited about than leaving, but now in the second week we are doing so much better on the leash, and he doesn't just stand there with a derpy look on his face as I try to coax him away from the door... I never thought another creature could make me feel so stupid! XD All in all, I would have to say I love him for who he is, and I would not trade him for the world, we are in this together, and I am happy to say that things are progressing quite nicely, but, I don't think I was expecting this much of a challenge when I was planning on getting a puppy.


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## wyoung2153 (Feb 28, 2010)

Oh the first week!  Ours was actually pretty good. I got Titan on a Friday morning at just shy of 8 weeks old. Took the day off so I could have 3 days of bonding with him and seeing how he works and what worked best for us. would have taken more if I could have. That weekend was pretty awesome. I learned his potty routine and got him used to his crate. He was all around a very good puppy. I really lucked out. That first week of work, was a little more complicated but I lucked out again with a roommate and my boss. My roommate came home once to let the pups out (she bought one, and I bought one). I went home a couple hours later to let them out and my boss was very understanding for the first few months. 

I did start working with Titan almost immediately. He learned sit, down, and come within the first week. He had a large motivation for Chicken. I was making grilled chicken one night and he was so insanely intrigued I let it cool and took him outside and made him work for it. Maybe too early for some people, but it worked for us. He learned so quickly. Just set the bar for what to expect from him. 

We did have some accidents, but that was lack of attention on our part. But he knew his place in the house, he had his crate and bed and his toys and never really ventured from that. The first week really set the bar for our relationship


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