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Submissive Urination


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I have never had a dog who did this, and don't now. But I recently met someone with a couple of dogs who has asked for my help in dealing with this issue and I told him I would try to find some information. His dogs are brother and sister, and were *sold* to him as "Australian shepherd/Wolf cross". :rolleyes: They look like border collie/maybe some lab/and who knows what, to me. Both are beautiful, good natured, well proportioned, in good health, and about 7 months old now. The female is dominantl; looks the most like a BC. The male is submissive to her and to people, looks more Lab-ish. The owner says whenever he says "NO" to the male dog he rolls over and pees. Both dogs were recently attacked and slightly injured by the neighbor's son (he's dealing with this with the sherriff).

 

What do you think is the best approach to building up the male dog's confidence and stopping the submissive peeing? He wants to start obedience training the dogs, and so on, which I can definitely help him with, but I have no experience with this particular thing. I think it needs to be addressed first, before we can really get into training.

 

Any suggestions are very welcome and I thank you in advance!

D'Elle

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Personally I would ignore the behavior and start the training. Training will help with the confidence and help build the bond between dog and owner.

In the meantime, they should also make sure the dog does not have a UTI or some other medical condition that makes it hard to control urination.

The owner also needs to be patient with the male dog. Submissive peeing cannot be controlled per se. If there ends up being a medical problem then medicine can be given.

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Ignore the peeing. Do what you can to limit the amount of the peeing (empty out the bladder as much as possible before situations where it might occur). Try to avoid setting off the peeing -- in this case, find some other way to correct the dog than saying no. Better still, train the dog what to do so you don't need to correct. Shy, insecure dogs usually thrive with rewards based training.

 

Or at least, that is what I would do.

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Many pups are submissive urinators for some months but grow out of it. As said, ignore the submissive urination, get training with the dogs (this is so good on so many levels), check for UTIs, make sure the bladder is empty, and remember to keep a quiet voice and a positive outlook.

 

Our Megan, when she had this issue when she came to us at 7 months, had to pee at least twice each trip to make sure there wasn't much left in the bladder - it helped tremendously to make sure she went multiple times when we took her out to go, even if I had to take a little more time with her.

 

We had a GSD bitch that was a stray who showed up starving and fearful at our farm in NY. We fed her, vetted her, had her neutered, and so on. This very sweet dog must have spent her life outside as she was never comfortable in the house (did fine in the mud room in inclement weather) and would submissively urinate should anyone raise their voice even slightly towards anyone else and for any reason.

 

I didn't understand how to deal with that problem and so she never did become an inside dog, just contentedly spending her inside time in the mud room and always being happy to be outside with us, where she did not display this behavior at all. I think that, wherever she lived before us, she received a great deal of harsh discipline whenever in the house. Poor girl.

 

You can deal with this problem but it certainly requires kindness, self-control, and patience (and maybe just a bit of growing up on the youngster's part) - but it is well worth it. Best wishes to your friend and his dogs.

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I lived with this for ten years. My BC mix was very dominant dog but occasionally if my husband told him off he would just randomly pee ( he regarded my husband as the boss, he and I spent 10 years debating which one of us was next on the list, Bandit always lived in hope that I would give in :rolleyes: ). He had spent 6 months in the shelter system before he came to us and we did not understand then how long it took for a dog to feel comfortable. As other posters have mentioned you really have to ignore the peeing other wise you can't use commands or any basic obedience.. It is very hard to do, (ignore that is) eventually he just did it less but it never went away. It just became less troubling to us because of course the longer he lived with us the more important he was to us and you always learn to live with the eccentricies of those you love. But it really did just fade away as he became more comfortable with us and his place in our home.

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To everyone who responded, my thanks. I feel I have a better idea of how to advise this person after reading your responses several times. I hear the "ignore it" theme repeated and realize that this is important. I hope that I have the opportunity to help this individual with his dogs. If so, then I am sure they would want to thank you also.

D'Elle

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