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I need some advice on our pug. We have a 4 year old spayed female who was house trained however we recently bought a new house and moved. Since then she started peeing and pooping downstairs. We bought a baby gate to block it off and I've tried taking her on more walks. Our new yard isn't fenced in but has an underground dog fence with a shock collar. Now when she gets put outside she is afraid to move and our neighbors dogs constant barking scares her so it only makes it worse. The gate was working but just in the past couple days she has now pee'd upstairs in the living room and today on our sons bed. My husband has had enough and wants to find her a new home but we have had her since she was 6 months old and it breaks my heart. We have been in our new home for 3 months now and there has been no improvement. Just looking for some tips and suggestions as I really don't want to have to give her up. Thanks!

Though you can't smell it if there were other animals in the house that marked their territory she may be doing the same thing. Or she could be stressed. Hopefully something can be done to help, it's a horrible thing to have to deal with.

I would never give up a pet for that type of issue, I hope it doesn't come to that. Instead of just putting her out with the shock collar on, maybe treat her like its potty training a puppy again. walk around the yard and make sure she does her business before bringing her back in. Walks every hour and maybe try crate training when she's alone? Big hurrahs and treats when she does her business outside.  
If all else fails ask your vet for advice.

She is just stressed. Went through this with my dogs and cats when I moved into a new residence. Give her about 6 wks. If she doesn't get better go to the vet, she may have picked up an infection. I do agree with the other posts it will take time for her to adjust and praise her huge when she goes outside.

Nothing really helped. We just barricade the area when we had to leave the house. It helped really loving him up when we got home. We also started doing and saying the same things when we were about to leave the house and that really seemed to calm our dog down.

There are so many solutions to try first other than re-homing. We are experiencing some issues with one of our dogs as well. Brought a new dog into the family and a move as well. He started marking indoors. He has every opportunity to get out regularly and he's not sick. He's just marking stuff. He never started out this way. He was always the dog that was insisting you follow him to the door to open it so he could pee outside.  
But...we can't figure this one out. One thing I know for sure? He's part of our family. For us, the solution has been making him a male wrap. Just a nice little belly band that keeps our house free from his little puddles.  
Do I wish we didn't have to deal with this? Totally. But I couldn't even think of placing him with someone else. Just imagine how scary that would be for a dog already having some struggles. Hope you find some answers!  

I'm not trying to sound rude, so I'm sorry if this comes off as such or if my assumption is way off. But did you do any training with the fence? Or did you just allow her to get shocked over and over until she learnt? That could explain why she's scared. She was never trained on the boundaries so she doesn't know what's going to shock her. Your supposed to have flags up for awhile and train the dog to stay within the flags, and then they learn and you take down the flags. The whole point of the underground fence is to teach them boundaries, the shock collar is just back up incase they decide to not listen. It honestly should rarely be used if they are trained properly.

Jeeper said "I'm not trying to sound rude, so I'm sorry if this comes off as such or if my assumption is way off. But did you do any training with the fence? Or did you just allow her to get shocked over and over until she learnt? That could explain why she's scared. She was never trained on the boundaries so she doesn't know what's going to shock her. Your supposed to have flags up for awhile and train the dog to stay within the flags, and then they learn and you take down the flags. The whole point of the underground fence is to teach them boundaries, the shock collar is just back up incase they decide to not listen. It honestly should rarely be used if they are trained properly. "

I had the same thought. She's clearly afraid of the shocking, and that would be the first issue I personally would address.  
 
Also, if your yard doesn't have a fence, and she hears/sees the neighbour's dog barking, she might not feel secure.  
 
The solution might be to ditch the collar and build an old-fashioned fence, then start from square one and re-train her.

Hi. We had a pug that passed away this past summer. He was sensitive to change and would regress. We had similar issues when ever there was any changes. He required a lot of attention, especially aa he got older. They can also can be quite stubborn. Hopefully things get better. Please try to get rid of the shock collar as soon as possible.  
 
Edited by cmore, 2015-11-09 05:50:12

I have an 8 yr old pug, and they don't do well with change. It will take time with yours. Mine was the same way when I moved back into Brandon. She will come out of eventually, ours did. But other posters are right, pugs are stubborn, and very needy, and get jealous of time you give to others. Hopefully, things will change for you, but if you do have to give her away, please pm me. I really don't think it will come to that, but in case it does, you know of some who im sure would take her and love her, as you do!

WineNot said "I need some advice on our pug. We have a 4 year old spayed female who was house trained however we recently bought a new house and moved. Since then she started peeing and pooping downstairs. We bought a baby gate to block it off and I've tried taking her on more walks. Our new yard isn't fenced in but has an underground dog fence with a shock collar. Now when she gets put outside she is afraid to move and our neighbors dogs constant barking scares her so it only makes it worse. The gate was working but just in the past couple days she has now pee'd upstairs in the living room and today on our sons bed. My husband has had enough and wants to find her a new home but we have had her since she was 6 months old and it breaks my heart. We have been in our new home for 3 months now and there has been no improvement. Just looking for some tips and suggestions as I really don't want to have to give her up. Thanks! "

Have you tried a belly band for her? We used one for awhile and it worked. At least she wont be able to pee in the house until you let her out and take it off her.

WineNot said "I need some advice on our pug. We have a 4 year old spayed female who was house trained however we recently bought a new house and moved. Since then she started peeing and pooping downstairs. We bought a baby gate to block it off and I've tried taking her on more walks. Our new yard isn't fenced in but has an underground dog fence with a shock collar. Now when she gets put outside she is afraid to move and our neighbors dogs constant barking scares her so it only makes it worse. The gate was working but just in the past couple days she has now pee'd upstairs in the living room and today on our sons bed. My husband has had enough and wants to find her a new home but we have had her since she was 6 months old and it breaks my heart. We have been in our new home for 3 months now and there has been no improvement. Just looking for some tips and suggestions as I really don't want to have to give her up. Thanks! "

You should threaten to re home your hubby if he does not get a bit more patient.  
 
Seriously though - as others have mentioned, pugs are notoriously stubborn for training. I have trained many dogs in my days, and that pug we had was the hardest. If your husband is showing signs of discontent with the dog, whether he means to or not - it could be fuelling this dogs' issues.  
 
Dogs are very smart, and they read people. You need to be this dogs' alpha and show it a firm home, but keep routine. She will get it, don't give up on her too soon!!

I've had a number of dogs and yes pugs a quite hard to train, it sounds like she is very stressed, probably from the move. I'm hoping your husband does not shout at her because that will only make things worse. Walk her around the yard for a while and let her do her business. Don't stop her from roaming around the new house as she is part of your family too, shut doors to bedrooms. You may need to clear up after her more but it will be worth it in the end. Try not complain about her to your husband and stop your child from tattle tailing, as if this happens everyone will stress out about the problem. Hoping you never have to give her away as she will never mend and may go from home to home and never have anyone to love her like you love her she's asking you for help.

Who in their right mind would put a shock collar on a little pug, it's not a wonder she's messing in the house, she's scared to go outside! If you are at all concerned about her , then either get a fence or maybe she needs to go to someone who truly loves her and will look out for her health and well being!  

I may have worded it wrong. it's not a shock collar that she wears all the time and we do not purposely shock her. It's an underground dog fence. Our previous neighbor used it for his small dog as well and it worked for him. He explained it to us and as she gets near the boundaries it send vibrations. A neighbor down the street has one for his small terrier as well. She just needs more training on it. & of course we love her. It's been a very hard transition for our pug but things are getting better.

But thank you everyone for all your tips. We have started to retrain her as we did when she was a pup and the past few days have been going better. & as much as I wish we could go ahead and build a fence we have a large yard & fences are very costly. We haven't had any accidents in the past couple days though *fingers crossed* Moving into a new home & within a month having it smell like animal urine regardless how many times she goes out & for walks has made it stressful but things are finally looking up. & she was fully trained before the move. She let us know by waiting at the door when she need out. And she is very smart and will always come back if we leave the collar off & she leaves the yard. However, it's been our neighbors dogs scaring her on the one side (they are in a kennel) & the neighbor on the other side doesn't like her on his yard. -I miss our old neighbors lol. But again, thank you everyone for your help! We have gotten some great training tools!