About sleeping on the bed

[deckers007]

I've read countless articles saying that letting your dogs sleep on the furniture (especially your bed) is a big no-no as it hinders your ability to establish yourself as the pack leader, etc, etc.

When the pups were still small, we decided that the cuddling factor overuled all the other bad factors (as mentioned above). So, the dogs have been sleeping with us since they are puppies. :D

We still enjoy it even though we are two humans, two adult boxers and one golden retriever on the bed (makes for MANY nights of sore backs and no blankets...)

But, due to the increasing lack of comfort, and the fact that we are having dominance issues between the two Boxers, we are wondering if it wouldn't be better to train them to stay off the bed from now on.

Do you think it would help? We've tried it once before, but it didn't last very long because the dogs sprung right back up on the bed during the night. I suppose we'd have to crate them to keep them from doing that...

What do you guys do? Where do your Boxers sleep and what are you reasons for doing/not doing it?

 

[Tyler&Haley]

Our first boxer slept in bed with us. It was more difficult the larger he got. My husband and Tyler would squabble over space in the bed... so with this new puppy my husband made the proclamation that the puppy will not sleep in the bed... so we'll have to see how that goes. Right now the puppy is not completely house trained so he is in his crate at night. I hope he cooperates to sleeping on a dog bed in our room at night, but somehow I figure he'll wriggle his way into our bed.... my husband might have to sleep down the hall! LOL...

 

[abbey_eisma]

Mine sleep in bed with me. Harley has always does this, so when we got Duchess it was natural for her to do it too. It made it easier for me to take her outside when she was a baby cuz I could feel her move around. Well once we got Barrett it wasnt fair to make him sleep on the floor, so they all sleep with us.

 

[l8krgirl08]

Your dogs are precious. I would either crate them at night or let them roam free but just stand firm and don't let them on the bed. They will catch on. It's always hard to break something you've allowed. We had the same problem with Bugzy and the couch. He was never allowed on the bed though.

 

[lisasentous]

Lisa is not even allowed in our bedroom, she may sneak in every so often and we did find her in the bed once well evidence that she was in the bed. But it is a big no no as both of us enjoy our space too much.

My mother has always allowed her dogs to sleep on the bed but then she has always had cairn terriers and they are no way big.

 

[Louise501]

I too have read that our position as alpha is not helped by letting your boxer sleep on the bed...Maybe this is true for a dominant dog, Ruby is not dominant and has been sleeping on my bed since she was 12 weeks, she is now 6 months and I can honestly say I have no issues with her at all. We love our bed time cuddles!

As my 2 pups get older, they are 10 weeks, I will have to see how it goes, I think Luka especially is going to be dominant, but then how do you have 1 on and 2 off? This is something that I will have to address in the future!

 

[x19er]

We had the same thing recently when we decided to stop our two getting up on the furniture in our living room – if you don’t want to crate them at night you’ll just need to keep sending them to their beds (maybe you could put them in the bedroom with you) until they get the message. It was tough resisting the big brown boxer eyes but it only took about a week for our two to get out of the habit of being allowed up. As for our bed much as we love our dogs we both love a good nights sleep – so we let them both up when we first go to bed at night while we are reading, then when we put the lights off they go to their own beds and then in the morning before the alarm goes off they both come through for a cuddle in before we get up. Maybe you could try this so nobody misses out on their cuddles once they are in the habit of sleeping in their own beds at night.

 

[harlie'smom]

Just recently we decided that they can no longer sleep in bed with us because we are not getting a good nights sleep, so we got them 2 huge pillow beds and put them at the end of our bed. It only took a couple of nights telling them down or off the bed with a couple shoves but it finally worked....well for one of them at least. Chopper is doing very well with it, when we first get in the room he goes to the side of the bed thinking hes gonna get up there but we show him his spot and he goes straight to bed. Now if you have a crazy one like my Harlie girl than your in for a treat. She paces around the bed a couple times stares at us and then goes and sleeps under the bed and somehow during the night that sneaky brat ends up on the bed and we dont even hear her get up there. Its not so bad with her cuz shes so little and she just curls up in a ball but Chopper is getting way to big. Anyways, just be very persistant with it and eventually they will get it. Good luck.

 

[Rocco's Mom]

We let Rocco in bed with us only in the morning either when hubby leaves for work or on the weekends before we get out of bed to make breakfast. He spends the night in his crate otherwise. We had been letting him sleep on the floor in our room on his pillow but he got sick and we wanted to comfort him so we let him on the bed. So now, we have to crate him at night or he'd be in the bed with us. He loves it in his crate anyway so it's no big deal. He isn't allowed on any of the other furniture in the house though just our bed.
Good luck !