We adopted a Lab mix in May 2020. She is our first dog and we love her to pieces.
However, she will get up during the night at random times and walk around the bedroom, digging furiously at the carpet. She digs so hard that the carpet is fluffy where she's been. When she started doing it, our vet at the time said it was behavioral so tell her "No" and lure her back to her bed with treats. She'd take the treats then get up again.
The number and length of times she gets up is truly random. It could be once a night or three times a night. It could be 10 PM or 3 AM. I think the longest she's been up was two hours. She paces, pants, and drools as though she's anxious about something. Trying to get her to lie down is like playing whack-a-mole. She may lie down but a minute later she's back up and digging.
I talked to my new vet a few months back about what I could give her during a thunderstorm since Benadryl wasn't working so she prescribed 100 mg Trazodone, which helped if you could get it to her an hour in advance. We have a Thundershirt that she'll wear but it doesn't calm her down. I tried the Adaptil plug-in which didn't help. There have been no major changes in our house. No long trips and we're all still working from home. She goes to daycare once or twice a week but that doesn't tire her out.
Before my vet would refill the Trazodone I had to bring the dog in for a checkup. The vet called me and said she thought my dog is senile. After talking with the vet we concluded she behaved oddly because I wasn't there with her, although she did allow the vet to examine her. That just confirmed for me what I basically knew; my dog has separation anxiety. We agreed that I'd give her Trazodone at night and try some CBD oil.
I stopped giving her Trazodone because it wasn't helping her relax enough to sleep through the night. I've been giving her CBD oil for 2 weeks but I haven't noticed a difference so it could very well be that I'm underdosing her. (She weighs 55 lbs and gets 0.5 mL with each meal.) Because she's a rescue we know nothing about her background but I'm sure there's some past trauma hanging around. We think she's 8 or 9 years old so who knows what could have happened to her.
If you've read this far, thank you. I have yet to find anyone else who is dealing with this behavior in their rescue. The animal behaviorist my vet recommends charges $415 just for an initial assessment. That's is way out of our budget. The pet psychic our pet sitter recommended charges $300 a session. Again, not an option. I could try a holistic vet or ask my vet for Prozac or Xanax. At this point I don't know what to do so I'm hoping crowdsourcing some solutions might help.
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from Pets https://www.reddit.com/r/Pets/comments/prbkxy/our_dog_digs_at_the_carpet/
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