Don't Lose Sleep Over Your Dog

What's warm, soft and on your dogs top 5 list of favorite places to be? No, its not your lap, its your bed!

According to experts, not only does allowing your dog to sleep in the bed with you have a negative impact on maintaining your leadership role in the household, it can also have a negative affect on other pets in the household. Granting your dog a space in your bed places him on a equal plane with you, meaning he will challenge your authority more often, and a higher plane with other pets in the home—pets that should to be treated equally.

My snuggling, snoring, licking partner, and no, I am not married, dominates the sheets. I start out with good intentions, both dogs on their beds, lights out but then, after I am asleep, Duke sneaks slowly across the sheets and finds his place next to my pillow. Not only does this interrupt my sleep cycle, when you allow your dog to sleep in the bed with you, you are also allowing your dog to bring a host of dirt, bacteria and other substances from outdoors right into bed with you. Most professionals would agree that this practice is very unhygienic. I will be the first to admit, I brush and groom as good as the next guy but that still won't prevent the

hitchhiking critters from joining the sleepover. Not only can you body suffer from bacteria, but any conflict between your and your dog's sleep cycles, or the sound of your dog's snoring or his movement on the bed, can prevent you from getting the deep, sustained sleep you need.

How can you break this cycle ? Provide a dog bed or blanket that fills his need for a comfortable night's sleep. If his issue is that he misses your companionship, give him a few extra-special "good night" toys to distract him from loneliness. The final step is teaching your dog where he should sleep at night. When you remove a behavior from your dog's repertoire — whether it's digging, barking, or jumping on the bed — you're creating a hole in his routine. If you don't fill the hole with something you want him to do, he'll replace it with something equally entertaining. To him. So if you only teach him not to jump on your bed at night, he may decide to hop up on someone else's bed. Worse, he may become restless and decide to take up chewing as his newest hobby. Prevention is the key here.

By the way, I would love to see pictures of your sleeping pups. They sleep in some pretty strange positions and places. I am going to start a pooch picture page and I need to see your best pet entries. Email them to gerry@austincitypaws.com .

Write with your comments and bed times stories. Maybe even some suggestions to share with our readers.