jennaberthoud
New member
We have a 4 month old havanese that we got when he was about 10 weeks old.
When he's not roaming around the main floor under our supervision, we keep him in a pen area with a crate attached to it, water, toys and a litter box. This is where he also stays during the night.
Overall he's been pretty good, but seems like we're strugging with some nighttime anxiety.
When he's out of the pen during the day, he doesn't really calm down enough that he will nap on the floor or couch on his own, so we try and enforce 2-3 naps during the day. For 75%+ of these naps, we put him in the pen and walk away, he will self soothe and take a nap. Sometimes it might take a few minutes and he lays down, others he will play for 20min and then nap, but will barely whine. The other 25% he may yelp for 5-10min and be fine, or we sit outside his pen to soothe him and then walk away and he's fine.
At night its a different story. We put him in the pen the same way for daytime naps, but as soon as we leave his sight, within a few minutes he's having a meltdown. We initially would go down and sit outside the pen to calm him down, then go back up and he's usually fine, but lately even after he's calm and basically asleep, once we quietly and slowly go back upstairs, he gets up and into meltdown mode again.
He had 2 naps yesterday, put himself to sleep within 5min. At night it was the same yelping/crying/shrieking, tried to calm him down twice, but as soon as we left he got back up. Then we let him cry it out for 18-20min and he finally layed in bed and went to sleep.
Any tips on how to make his nighttime separation anxiety better? We were initially on the side of don't let them cry it out, but wondering if its been backfiring on us as it seems the last few nights have gotten worse. Maybe cause he knows if he cries, we go down and sit with him?
Below is an example of his nighttime meltdown:
When he's not roaming around the main floor under our supervision, we keep him in a pen area with a crate attached to it, water, toys and a litter box. This is where he also stays during the night.
Overall he's been pretty good, but seems like we're strugging with some nighttime anxiety.
When he's out of the pen during the day, he doesn't really calm down enough that he will nap on the floor or couch on his own, so we try and enforce 2-3 naps during the day. For 75%+ of these naps, we put him in the pen and walk away, he will self soothe and take a nap. Sometimes it might take a few minutes and he lays down, others he will play for 20min and then nap, but will barely whine. The other 25% he may yelp for 5-10min and be fine, or we sit outside his pen to soothe him and then walk away and he's fine.
At night its a different story. We put him in the pen the same way for daytime naps, but as soon as we leave his sight, within a few minutes he's having a meltdown. We initially would go down and sit outside the pen to calm him down, then go back up and he's usually fine, but lately even after he's calm and basically asleep, once we quietly and slowly go back upstairs, he gets up and into meltdown mode again.
He had 2 naps yesterday, put himself to sleep within 5min. At night it was the same yelping/crying/shrieking, tried to calm him down twice, but as soon as we left he got back up. Then we let him cry it out for 18-20min and he finally layed in bed and went to sleep.
Any tips on how to make his nighttime separation anxiety better? We were initially on the side of don't let them cry it out, but wondering if its been backfiring on us as it seems the last few nights have gotten worse. Maybe cause he knows if he cries, we go down and sit with him?
Below is an example of his nighttime meltdown: