5 month old Crate help
Struggling here. We have a 5 month old lab/golden/poodle mix, and she has been struggling with her crate as of late. She will not stop using the bathroom in her crate when we’re gone. Our normal routine has been up at 5:45-6am, feed her, take her out and sometimes multiple times. Then she’s in her crate while we go to work. We have a dog walker stop by at 11am let her out, play with her, give her a 1/4 cup of food as a snack, and hang out for about 30-45 minutes, then she’s back in her crate until one of us gets home about 3-4 hours later. She cannot or chooses not to hold it at all… it feels like every day we come home she has pooped and peed in her crate. We know she can hold it because at night she holds it for 6-8 hours every single night without an accident. She absolutely loses it though whenever we’re not in sight, and we believe this anxiety might be playing a large part in this… any tips? We have tried calming treating, drops, talk radio, shirts that smell like us, fully covered crate to give the den feeling, soft mat in the crate to be comfortable… we’re just at a loss to stop her from going to the bathroom in her crate.
The anxiety is there even without the crate, we tried to pen her into the kitchen one night, and filmed it, and she lost her mind the entire 15 minutes we were gone also.
More background: We got her at 12 weeks and started crate training immediately.