Nightime Barking Frenchie

[sjtenem]

I have a 10 week old French Bulldog named Wilson who is great - super cute however he has problems at nightime when it comes to sleeping through the night.

I feed him around 6:30/7pm and give him water until about 10 or 11 then he goes to sleep. But... out of the last two weeks, he has only sleep through the night 2x. He wakes up every single night around 3:30 am or 4 am barking like crazy, banging on the cage. It gets so unbearable that we go and let him out. There is usually pee in his crate. Then we let him back in and the barking stops temporarily and then usually continues when we go back into our bedroom (we have a 1 bedroom apt so its pretty hard to ignore the barking).

I feel like our puppy is tired cause he's not getting long periods of sleep and we are tired b/c we are getting only a few hours of sleep night.

help!:

 

[vesper]

My pup is a bit older than yours, but some of this behavior is the same. Last night after i took her out to go to potty she wouldn't settle down and go back to bed (around 2:30 am). I tried everything to get her to go back to sleep, but found that the only thing that settled her down was taking the blanket off the top of her crate so she could see me and know that i was there with her. She fell asleep immediately after.

It might not be the same in your case, but maybe the pup just doesnt want to be alone? Maybe you should consider putting his crate in the room with you, and when he whines and barks like that you can reassure him that you're nearby.

However, she doesn't pee in her crate. She usually whines to let me know that she needs to go out to potty. I think most dogs (potty trained or not) don't like to soil where they sleep. So that's probably making the pup uncomfortable, and putting the pup's crate in your room might help with that too. So that you can hear the pup whining when it needs to go potty, and you can take it out immediately.

Also, i try and play with Layla until she's completely exhausted. That way she doesn't wake up in the middle of the night wanting to play. So when she wakes up its only because she really needs to go potty. I also cut back on those by taking away her water bowl an hour or two before sleep so she won't have to go out as much.

 

[adojrts]

I would feed him earlier for his last meal 5 pm if possible, take up water before 9 pm.
Set your alarm before he wakes up in the middle of the night and take him out then.
As vesper stated, move the crate into your bedroom so he can see you.
You have to be careful, if you respond everytime to his whining barking, it can only get worse..........get ear plugs. Unless he has SA, by ignoring it should stop quickly.
A good site on crate/house training is The American Dog Trainers Network, excellent advice that works.

Good luck
Lynn

 

[elegy]

The easy solution, of course, would be SEND HIM TO ME!

Everyone else had much more constructive advice, but I couldn't help myself.

 

[lizzybeth727]

I just want to stress - puppies almost ALWAYS have to get up in the middle of the night to potty. For a Frenchie, you'll probably be getting up in the middle of the night for about 2 or 3 more months.

Welcome to puppy ownership.

Like the others said, it's also a good idea to put the crate in your room. Puppies are used to sleeping with their mom or litter mates, and dogs are very social to begin with, so they feel very insecure if they're isolated by themselves.