Is “give it time” really the solution to the puppy blues?

By Jake Buvala | Published December 28, 2025

The puppy blues is the part of getting a new dog where everything is terrible and you think you’ve made a huge mistake.

Well, actually – we don’t call it “the puppy blues” around here. I just used that in the title because that’s what people are googling. It’s a cute term that’s become popular recently.

But it’s the understatement of the century, right?

You’re not feeling a little blue.

You’re feeling exhausted and overwhelmed 24/7. You’re feeling guilt, shame, loneliness, and regret.

That’s why we prefer the name we’ve been using for the last decade or so:

The “What The **** Was I Thinking?!” Phase. WTFWIT for short.

If you’re not familiar with WTFWIT yet, here are some links to get you started:

• Thinking of Returning Your New Puppy to the Shelter/Breeder? Please Read This First
• Is Your New Dog Making You Miserable? You’re Not Alone

Moving on to the point of today’s post:

For the WTFWIT phase to get better, do you just need to give it time?

Yes, to some degree. Your brain needs time to adjust and the puppy needs time to mature.

BUT.

Giving it time only works if you’re on the right track in the first place. If you’re on the wrong track, giving it time makes everything worse.

Getting a puppy is (sort of) like breaking a bone

Johnny gets into an accident and fractures his foot. He knows it’s going to take time to recover, of course. No getting around that.

He goes to the hospital, where doctors realign the bone and put a cast on it. They give him painkillers and a set of crutches.

Then Johnny goes home.

And he gives it time.

Johnny has a moderately shitty few months where literally everything, from going to the bathroom to taking care of his kids, has become a lot more complicated. He’s a little depressed.

But gradually, he starts to feel better. He stops needing the painkillers after a week or two. He learns how to get around pretty smoothly on the crutches, getting some freedom back.

He gives it more time.

The cast comes off.

He does some physical therapy. Which is definitely better than the cast, but still sucks a bit (this is a metaphor for the part where your puppy becomes an annoying teenager). But after that, Johnny lives happily ever after.

Compare that to Tommy.

Tommy gets into an accident and fractures his foot. He throws up his hands and says “well, it’s going to take time to recover. No getting around that.”

So he… gives it time.

He doesn’t go to the doctor. He keeps walking on his broken foot. The pain gets worse every day. His mental state deteriorates every day. Life is miserable, but he keeps on truckin’.

After several long, excruciating months, his foot “heals.” But it was never set properly, so it heals all wonky. It gives him trouble for years. Tommy sees his buddy Johnny fully recovered, living his best life. Tommy feels ashamed and frustrated, wondering why Johnny is just naturally better at recovering from broken bones.

The moral of the story

A broken bone is always going to mess up your life for a while.

But there’s a world of difference between a properly treated broken bone and an untreated broken bone.

We see a lot of “Tommy’s” in our line of work. A lot of hardworking, dedicated puppy parents suffering unnecessarily with their metaphorical untreated broken bones.

And I think some of this is my fault.

See, Erin and I are both sick of all the fearmongering and guilt-tripping in the dog world. All the “do this right or you’re DOOMED,” “one wrong move will ruin your puppy FOREVER.” “There are no bad dogs, just BAD OWNERS.”

Like, really? Enough of this madness. In an effort to not be THAT, we have sometimes swung too far in the opposite direction. Being too reassuring in a way that isn’t helpful.

We get messages like this, from people who’ve read our free WTFWIT content:

“Thank you so much for making me feel so seen! Raising this puppy is the absolute worst experience of my life – I haven’t slept in weeks, he’s terrorizing my kids and my other pets and growling when I correct him but thanks to you, I have hope that everything will be fine if I just stick it out.”

I have such mixed feelings when I read these messages.

On one hand, I’m glad they feel less alone! These emails mean a lot to us, truly.

On the other hand, I feel like I’m watching them hobble into the sunset on their broken leg, headed towards a future of resentment and serious problems. All because they think constant misery is just how puppy-raising is supposed to be.

Clearly, there’s a misunderstanding happening somewhere.

Sometimes, I’m learning, the most compassionate approach is the direct approach. So here you go:

Yes, your feelings are normal. No, we’re not judging you for any of it – not even the moments when you hate the puppy and wish they would disappear. We understand. There’s nothing wrong with you.

And I guarantee you’re on the wrong track. The people who have the worst WTFWIT experiences always are.

When “giving it time” helps and when it doesn’t: a tale of two WTFWITs

To give you a better idea of what I mean, let me tell you about two WTFWIT experiences from my own life.

My first puppy, Friday

Like most first-time puppy parents, I dealt with the mental stuff:

The “I just want my life back” thoughts, the shock of how disruptive it all was, the pressure to “not screw up,” etc.

But the biggest source of my distress was Friday’s behavior itself, and the fact that I could not find effective solutions for any of it. (Red flag number one)

The biting, crying in the crate, crying at night, destructive chewing, jumping all over people…

Nothing I tried made much difference.

I really thought she hated me sometimes. (Red flag number three)

I gave it time, but I shouldn’t have. Friday and I struggled our way through puppyhood. She outgrew the biting phase, she started sleeping through the night. She grew up. We had many adventures and I loved her a lot.

But the damage was done.

I made a lot of mistakes with my DIY, trial-and-error approach. Not to be dramatic or anything, but those mistakes shaped Friday. She grew up anxious and reactive. It took YEARS to overcome all the resentment and lack of trust.

River, my sensitive little behavior case

Many years later, I adopted River.

Objectively, she was a much more challenging case than Friday was. Friday was your average happy-go-lucky little monster, see. But River was an under-socialized, fearful, sensitive rescue Belgian Malinois.

Even though I was a professional dog trainer by then, River still put me through my paces. I still ended up with a bad case of WTFWIT.

There was the exhaustion, of course. I was physically wrecked from trying to keep up with this incredibly high-energy landshark. My brain was fried from doing everything I could to address her fear issues.

There was a stretch of a few weeks where my mental health was bad. I wasn’t happy. I didn’t feel the warm and fuzzies for River. Mostly, I felt numb.

It was really hard. But the distress was nothing like it was with Friday.

Three key differences:

1. Aside from a few self-pitying “I’m not good enough for this dog” moments that I didn’t really mean, I never seriously thought I had a problem. With River, I didn’t fall into a doom spiral about puppy stuff like biting, crying, jumping, separation distress, or her being annoying towards my other dog or cat.

2. Everything I did actually worked. My behavior modification plans worked. When we trained, we made progress. I knew how to get (and keep) River’s attention.

3. Even in the darkest days of my depression, I could tell we were becoming a team. River trusted me and looked to me for guidance. She saw me as her safe place. The person who made the big scary world make sense.

We gave it time. And everything got better.

When you should give it time

If your distress is mostly about the physical exhaustion, temporary loss of freedom, and the disruption to your life.
And you can see your puppy improving little by little (even with the occasional bad day or regression). They’re settling in, sleeping better, responding to your training efforts.
And your training approach feels like it’s turning you and your pup into a team instead of making you both resent each other.

In that case, you’re probably on the right track. Nice work! This is the kind of situation where giving it time actually helps.

When you should NOT just give it time

If any of these apply:

You feel angry, sad, or depleted ALL the time.
You feel like your puppy doesn’t like you or trust you.
Everything you try seems to make their behavior worse.
Your distress is centered around their behavior itself.
You’ve hit the end of your rope and treated your puppy harshly, or have been tempted to.

Time alone isn’t going to fix this, my friend.

But look on the bright side: this isn’t “just how raising a puppy is.” It can (and should) be better than this

You just have to get on the right track. Which, fortunately, almost never requires a huge overhaul of your life. It doesn’t require shipping your little juvenile delinquent off to some expensive boot camp (please don’t do that, actually).

Most of the time, it requires a few simple adjustments.

You would not believe how often a new student arrives in Puppy Survival School, convinced their situation is beyond hope or that this is just normal – then we have them make a few small changes, and their relief is immediate.

Case in point: a student who tried hard to follow puppy training advice that just made things worse

When Karl joined our program a couple years ago, he was deep in the WTFWIT phase with his new pup. In his intro post on our member forums, he wrote:

“I have just had an absolute hellish week of constantly being overwhelmed, paralysed with anxiety, depressed, and isolated… “

His biggest struggle was the biting.

“[The biting] just completely overwhelms my senses and I currently have no idea what to do… and my mind begins to shut down from the overwhelm.”

I talked with Karl and identified two core issues:

1. He was relying on some common but oversimplified social media advice for puppy biting. The whole “just redirect them to a toy” thing, if I remember correctly. Unsurprisingly, it was ineffective.
2. He was trying to stick to a specific daily puppy-care routine that didn’t work for the way his brain worked. It was actually the routine that we tell our students to start with! But it was just stressing him out more. So we worked out a new routine that was more aligned with his needs.

Karl got to work implementing our suggestions. After just two days, he said:

“I’m definitely feeling less overwhelmed now I have been provided with a routine and repetitive, easy to follow set of steps… and now seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.”

One week after joining, he wrote:

“Can’t stress enough how much [the program] has helped me, it feels almost like a miracle… Really feels like I have the way forward now. Still quite tense and anxious, sometimes upset about my life before, but definitely entering the ‘we can do this’ stage.”

To get yourself on the right track, you need:

SLEEP, for one thing. Which means a better strategy than the one you’re using. It shouldn’t take weeks to see improvement here.

Community. The WTFWIT phase plus isolation is a brutal combination. You need to talk to (or at least listen to) other puppy parents who know exactly what you’re going through.

And you probably need to stop DIYing this.

Because…

Here I go again, practicing my compassionate-but-direct skills

If you’re experiencing serious distress over any of these puppy behaviors:

• Biting/mouthing
• Crying in the crate
• Crying when left alone
• Not sleeping at night
• Biting and jumping all over your kids
• Harassing your other pets
• House training drama
• Not listening
• Not walking properly on leash
• Destructive chewing

You are suffering unnecessarily.

With rare exceptions, these things only get this bad when something about your approach is off.

I get it, though; it can be tricky to navigate on your own. A lot of dog owners struggle with these things. I certainly did with my first puppy.

I am not a plumber (and you are not a dog trainer)

If my sink starts backing up and water starts leaking out of places it shouldn’t, I’m gonna have a hard time. I’ll try all the random tips online. I might make it worse. I might think I have a defective sink. I might convince myself this is just my life now.

Meanwhile, a professional plumber could walk in, take one look, and fix it in ten minutes.

You see where I’m going with this.

Those puppy problems that are making your life miserable? To any professional dog trainer worth their salt, all of that is easy, basic stuff that they could handle in their sleep.

There are no quick fixes, it’s true. But there ARE more effective strategies

I know it must seem like no one can help you. I’m sure that’s a very lonely feeling. But it’s not reality. There are people like us who have dedicated their careers to finding better solutions to the problems you’re experiencing.

Biting doesn’t have to feel relentless.

You shouldn’t be up all night with a screaming puppy for days on end.

Potty training shouldn’t drive you insane.

Crate training shouldn’t cause an existential crisis.

Training should build your bond with your puppy, not stress both of you out.

Etc.

Don’t get me wrong – this isn’t about finding the one magical, superior dog training method.

It’s about finding what works for you.

Remember Karl, from earlier? He’d already been trying a lot of common puppy training advice, including ours, with little success. Once we tweaked things to fit his situation better, that’s when he saw progress.

We can give you that guidance, if you want. This is why we built Puppy Survival School. But we’re definitely not your only option. No matter what, I hope you’ll get help somewhere.

Because you deserve better than to keep hobbling around on your metaphorical broken foot. You (and your puppy) deserve to enjoy this experience, not just survive it.