# How much petting and lap time is enough?



## Saya126 (Mar 30, 2011)

I'm in my first week with my 8 week old puppy, Saya. My roommate and I are having a debate. While we know Vizsla's are "Velcro" dogs and we want to pour love and adoration on her cute puppy face. I want to make sure she can exercise some independence and self sooth when no one is at home. At this stage can you be too attentive petting and allowing her to sit in laps? For example, my roommates enjoys letting her sleep on her chest at night. But I want to make sure she is to sleep in her kennel without crying and whining all night.


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## Mercutio (Jan 18, 2010)

Ask your flatmate if they want a 30 kg (70 lb) dog sleeping on their chest every night . Cause he'll be that big pretty soon!

I think you're right, you do want to have some cuddle time with them but you need to make sure they are also ok on their own. We were told to make sure the pup had some time on his own every day from when we brought him home and that seemed to work for us. If you think you will want him to sleep on his own bed as a grown up them start making the transition to it now otherwise it will be an awful shock to him one night to have to suddenly be on his own and he will probably let you know all about it.... You can still have lap time but it can't be all the time (I say with my arm resting on my V curled up next to me  )


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## RubyRoo (Feb 1, 2011)

I was worried about the same thing when I brought Ruby home at 8 wks. Only way she would relax is in our laps. We made sure we crated her at night and just dealt with the screams until she got used to her crate (took about a week). I allowed her in my lap any time she wanted but at about 10-11 wks she started to get a little independent and would lay on her pet bed and not my lap as much. I think they grow out of it after a while. Ruby is 14 wks today and she rarely lays in my lap and goes to her bed. At night I tell her to load up and she gets off her bed and walks into her crate.

Enjoy when they are small and can fit in your laps but I think you are fine cuddling for now as long as she is crate trained and has another comfy spot. I have a baby blanket on Ruby's pet bed and she loves it.


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## SandraDee (Oct 19, 2010)

Yep your roommates are asking for it. When the dog is 60 lbs its still going to expect to get to sleep on them, and its pretty hard to move a 60 lb V that is determined to be with its people (says the person who now has a 50 lb 7 month old lap dog)

Our puppy strictly sleeps at night in his crate, because I hvae no interest in having a full grown dog snoring and sleeping in my bed with me at night. It took him a couple of weeks to stop crying at night when he first was put in his crate. We actually moved his crate out of our bedroom and he did much better at night once we did that.

We made the mistake of letting him sit on our laps all the time when he was little, we also let him crawl up on the back of our couch and sit there like a cat. It was cute when he was little, its not so cute anymore. There are times when I don't mind the lap thing, but sometimes its not wanted and trying to get him to not try to climb up is next to impossible because that's what he learned early on was okay.

(and this probably makes no sense because I'm trying to come up with coherant thoughts while having a dog try to climb in my lap and two kids trying to get him to play with them - its chaos )


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## kellygh (Oct 25, 2010)

There are lots of wonderful ways to dish out love & attention; however, SandraDee is right. Do NOT allow your pup to do anything now that you will not want her doing when she reaches 40+ lbs. I am a strong advocate of crate training, and that will be very useful during the day when you are away. If Saya gets to sleep in the bed at night with human(s), it will be more difficult, some cases very difficult, to expect her to adjust well in a crate during the day. You can provide lots of love to your pup without having her sleep on a person's chest. IMO, setting boundaries, crate training etc. IS loving your puppy enough to set them up for training success. Best wishes & congrats on Saya!


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## gunnr (Aug 14, 2009)

You can't give him too much attention at this stage. You will need to set some boundries, as others have suggested.

Play with him on the floor, give him all the attention you want to shower him with on the floor. It's difficult and not fair to a dog to allow it up on the furniture as a puppy and then having to be disciplined for the same behavior as an adult. Unless of course you want to allow him on the furniture.

Crate train your pup. It's a sucky period to deal with, but you'll be really glad you did it a 6 months from now. 
Our dogs are moved around a lot, by truck, and having them in their crates makes it much safer for them. If you ever need to send your dog on a plane, having him crate trained will pay dividends in how he deals with the flight.


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