Mar 20 2008
The “P” Word
Back when we knew Greta was going to be a part of our household, but she had yet to join our lives, I was reading a lot of “dog training” books.
A lot.
One of them (who can remember which one?) mentioned that when training your dog to “go” on command, you need to choose your wording wisely, because these will be the very same commands you will be using years later…in front of your friends, neighbors and strangers.
Of course, I chose two baby-like commands (”potty” and “poo poo”).
While I don’t regret my word choices, I have found myself, on occassion, embarassed as I’ve had to let Greta out to go “potty” and followed her around the back yard in the wee hours (no pun intended) of the morning, whispering ”go potty” a million times.
These days, Greta is fully “potty” trained.
She does still occassionally get me up in the middle of the night. And when she does, I have to remember that, given the alternative, it’s not a bad thing to be whispering “go potty” in my backyard in those wee hours of the morning.
[...] One of my husband’s biggest issues with getting a dog was the fact that said dog would inevitably “burn” our back yard when it went potty. [...]