Will My Puppy Outgrow This or Do I Need to Worry? 10 Behavior Problems Explained

This guide will help you make sense of some of the stressful, confusing problems we help puppy parents solve in our online dog training school.

Because when you have a puppy and EVERYTHING feels chaotic, it can be hard to tell the difference between normal stuff that they’ll outgrow… and an actual problem.

You wish someone would give you some straight answers:

Is my puppy’s behavior normal?

Will they outgrow this?

Do I need to step in before it gets worse?

And WHYYY does nothing I do to stop the biting actually work?!

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW FIRST

Here’s the deal

This is not a guide to solving all these puppy problems. Instead, it’s about helping you recognize:

• What you don’t have to worry about
• Early warning signs of potentially serious issues
• What to prioritize
• Signs that your current approach might be making things harder than they need to be

I’ll also alert you to the things you shouldn’t try to handle on your own

Of course, having the right dog trainer on your team would make solving any of these problems easier. But some issues really aren’t safe to figure out with the DIY trial-and-error approach, because too many errors can turn them into much bigger problems.

For the best chance of a good outcome, some things need professional guidance. That can be us, but it doesn’t have to be. Look for the “⚠️ professional help advised” tags throughout the post.

If all that sounds like a good use of the next 15 minutes of your life, let’s go!

“Is [insert behavior here] normal?” That’s too simple of a question

None of this is black and white.

Every problem is a spectrum. All behaviors have harmless versions and not-so-harmless versions.

And the underlying drives for a lot of these behaviors are something puppies outgrow. But the expression of those drives -and the way their owner chooses to deal with it- CAN result in bad habits.

Are you making mistakes? Probably! And that’s okay

I’m defining a “mistake” as something you do, with the best of intentions, that ends up backfiring.

These mistakes are often things we’ve all been taught to do. There’s a lot of conflicting advice out there and it can be hard to know who to trust.

This is a judgment-free space, my friend.

We actually like it when we uncover a mistake a student has made. Why? Because it means there’s a solution to their problem! They just have to stop doing that thing, and do this thing instead.

THE PROBLEMS

1. Freaking out when you leave them alone for two seconds (is it separation anxiety??)

Your puppy might cry and bark when you leave them home alone, put them in their crate, or even just step out of the room. This makes it really hard to live your life.

Is this normal?

Sure is. You can relax – in the vast majority of cases, it isn’t true separation anxiety disorder. It just isn’t natural for puppies to be totally alone. And it’s really not natural for them to be confined alone in a crate.

To live successfully in a human family, all puppies need to be taught how to handle alone time and confinement.

Something has to change if:

• The puppy panics when confined in a crate, or
• Ignoring the crying makes it worse and they get more agitated the longer it goes on
• It’s been more than two weeks with no improvement
• Your mental health is suffering

See: Help! My Puppy Freaks Out When I Leave the Room. Will I Ever Get My Freedom Back?

2. Assorted potty training troubles

House training isn’t going as smoothly as you’d like. Maybe it seems like your puppy needs to relieve themselves every five minutes. It might be keeping you up at night because they whine to go out at 3am.

Or maybe they refuse to pee outside but as soon as you bring them inside, they pee on the floor.

Or maybe they did great with potty training at first, but then started having accidents again.

Does potty training drama get better with time?

Yes and no. Puppies don’t have the physical ability to hold it for very long. As they get older, they naturally develop the ability to go longer between bathroom breaks. That means they also outgrow the need for 3am bathroom breaks.

It’s normal for them to do the thing where they’ll only pee indoors after you bring them in from an outdoor trek. One of the reasons for this is that the outside world is still really distracting and overstimulating to them.

And it’s normal to have some regression. Puppy did great for a week, then suddenly you’re back to square one? Pretty typical. They haven’t had enough time for the habit to stick yet.

Your puppy may also have giardia or other tummy troubles that cause frequent poop explosions. If so, that’s DEEPLY unfortunate and you have my condolences. But once the condition is treated, they’ll need to go much less often.

And occasional accidents are no big deal.

But that doesn’t mean that a puppy who’s having multiple accidents per day will just outgrow it. The more accidents they have, the more of a habit this becomes.

Something has to change if:

• The puppy sneaks away to poop in other rooms where you can’t see them
• They avoid toileting in front of you – even outside in the correct spot
• They have multiple accidents a day, for several days in a row
• They frequently have accidents in their crate or pen
• They have an accident at a specific time of day, like clockwork. Probably the early evening (see problem number 8)
• Your training method relies on catching them in the act and telling them no
• You’ve been trying to house train them for a week or more with no improvement

For a look at our overall house training strategy, see: House Training 101: The Basics

3. Refusing to walk properly on leash

When you take them for a walk, they… don’t really walk. They might stop every five seconds, resist the leash, bite the leash, bite you, or plant their butt and refuses to move.

This is a surprisingly strong trigger for the WTFWIT phase.

Like, with all the not-so-pleasant chores that come with puppies, walking them was something you looked forward to, and you can’t even do that.

Is this normal?

Yes.

There’s a reason that a parent might bring along a stroller when they take their toddler on adventures; even though the toddler is technically capable of walking, they get tired and overstimulated easily.

Puppies are the same. Plus, walking on leash is unnatural. It’s gotta feel weird to have their movements restricted.

Does it get better with time?

Yep!* In a few months, your pup’s stamina will greatly increase. And you will very quickly forget this phase ever happened. Careful what you wish for?

See: This Is Why Your Puppy Sucks at Going For Walks (And What to Do About It)

*What to watch out for:

There is a walk-related problem that does not get better with time. Which brings us to our next problem:

4. Barking or growling at people or dogs in public

⚠️Professional help advised

You take your puppy out of the house, and all is well…

Until they see a mysterious stranger. Doing something suspicious and horrible like watering their petunias!

Puppy freezes and stares, or starts barking.

Does this get better with time?

Unfortunately no, not by itself. There are a few different motivations for this behavior. It could be social thing where they really want to go say hi. If that’s the case, you’ll probably see a lot of wiggly body language.

It could also be fear or uncertainty. If so, you’ll probably see tense body language. Stiff movements or freezing in place. They may still wag their tail, so don’t let that fool you. Some puppies will try to run away first, and only resort to barking when the leash prevents them from escaping.

Either way, these are early signs of reactivity.

I had this issue with my puppy, River. And because I was filming everything I did with her in order to make the puppy program, we ended up making a lot of how-to content on this for our members.

Don’t panic, but you have to act quickly.

If your puppy shows signs of reactivity, especially fear-based, it needs to be your priority. Because it’s harder to deal with once it’s well-established in an adult dog.

The good news: it’s easier to address in puppies. It often goes away completely with the right approach.

Having said that, there’s frequently a genetic component involved in reactivity. Which makes it harder to shake. But the earlier you get solid force-free professional help involved, the better the outcome will be.

See: How Our Online Puppy Training Courses Can Help Your Scared or Reactive Puppy

5. Fear of you or other people in your household

⚠️Professional help advised in some cases

Your puppy seems really nervous or shy. Maybe they hide in their crate or behind the furniture, and seem reluctant to explore the house. Or they cower out of reach and freeze up when you try to pet them. Or maybe they trust one member of the family, and seem scared of the others.

Is this normal? Will it get better on its own?

It’s hard to say. Some level of nervousness is normal; this is a baby animal who just had their world turned upside down, after all.

But there’s nervous, and then there’s fearful.

After a few days to get used to things, well-adjusted puppies should be pretty fearless when it comes to exploring their home and engaging with people.

Signs your puppy’s fear may need professional help:

• They don’t start improving after a few days
• They growl, snap, or bite when frightened
• Their fear seems to spread – what started as nervousness about one thing (like strangers) now includes other things (like noises, handling, or animals)
• They came from a traumatic/deprived background. Abuse, hoarding, feral, puppy mills, serious injury, etc.

Significant fear issues (caused by poor early socialization, genetics, trauma, or even stress the mother dog experienced during gestation) don’t get better on their own.

In some cases, their fear will never be completely “cured” – a puppy who’s terrified of strangers will probably never be a social butterfly, but you can still have a great life together. It just might not be the life you initially envisioned.

See: What to Do When Your New Dog is Afraid of You

6. Eating trash or other forbidden mystery snacks off the ground

Taking your puppy outside is a nightmare because they try to eat every bit of random sh*t they find.

Sometimes actual sh*t.

You might be constantly pulling things out of your puppy’s mouth. Rocks, sticks, wood chips… it just never ends.

Does this get better with time?

Yeah, pretty much. Puppies learn about the world by putting everything in their mouth. Just like human babies.

Don’t get me wrong – there are absolutely adult dogs who like to scavenge for forbidden road snacks. But in most cases, the intensity and frequency of this behavior drastically reduces with age.

Something has to change if:

You are literally pulling things out of their mouth constantly.

Yes, sometimes you have no choice. But it’s important to have other ways to both prevent them from picking things up, and safely get them to drop things they can’t have.

Taking things out of of their mouth multiple times a day can cause problems like hand shyness, increased puppy biting, difficulty bonding, food aggression, and resource guarding.

Speaking of which:

7. Growling or snapping when you take things away

⚠️Professional help advised

If you get close to them when they’re eating or chewing on a toy, they stiffen up, pause while they watch you, and then growl when you get closer. If you ignore the warning, they snap at you or pick up their treasure and try to hide it.

This is called resource guarding.

Is this normal?

To some extent, yes, it’s within the realm of normal dog behavior. But it’s definitely not something you want from a large animal who lives in your home.

Does resource guarding get better on its own?

No, this will get worse if not properly handled. You don’t have to panic or anything; your puppy isn’t a bad dog. They’re just having a hard time learning to communicate with humans.

The silver lining about resource guarding: if addressed by a behavior professional who knows what they’re doing, it’s one of the easiest types of aggression to modify.

But it’s also incredibly easy to make it worse.

Unfortunately, there’s no shortage of terrible advice out there about this. A lot of TV and social media trainers make it look like this really dramatic battle where they’re showing the dog who’s boss.

Drama is great for views, but not so great for creating real behavior change. If you do it right, the process should be really anticlimactic. It can actually be pretty chill and help you bond with your pup.

So yes, without a doubt, resource guarding needs to be addressed.

But your approach needs to change if involves:

• Stepping in front of the object to claim it as your own
• Yelling or saying stern words to the dog
• Proving that you’re the alpha
• Pinning the dog down, using spray bottles, or other forms of corrections
• Avoidance only (like no longer giving them anything they might like enough to guard)
• Getting bitten

This isn’t something you should handle on your own. Even positive methods (where you teach the dog that people touching their stuff is a good thing) have to be done in a very specific way, otherwise they can make things worse.

So for the best shot at overcoming this, you should work closely with a force-free professional. We can do this in our one-on-one private coaching program.

If you’re not ready to commit to coaching, no worries. You can always join the membership and we’ll help you out on the forums enough to get you started and stop things from getting worse, at least.

8. Getting hyper and wild every evening around 6pm

Sparky did pretty good during the day. But right when you’re exhausted and just want to dissociate in front of the TV, he starts ramping up.

Biting extra hard. Having accidents. Destroying stuff. Terrorizing the children. Undoing all of the day’s progress, it seems.

Is this normal?

Yep. Welcome to puppy witching hour!

The underlying cause:

Dogs are naturally most active at dawn and dusk. So fresh little baby dogs (who haven’t adapted to human routines yet) have a natural energy spike before bedtime.

But other triggers stack on top of this:

They could be overtired. Even though it looks like they’ve got endless energy, they’re basically having a meltdown like a cranky toddler.

Or they could be under-stimulated. After a quiet afternoon, the pent-up energy explodes at night. Especially if the humans have been at work or school all day. Now you’re home and they’re excited for ACTIVITIEESS WOOHOO!

And sometimes, it’s more about your energy level than theirs. Raising a puppy is hard work! You’ve been “on” all day, supervising and training constantly. You hit your limits and can’t keep it up anymore, which means accidents are more likely to happen and normal puppy annoyances feel extra annoying.

Will my puppy calm down with time?

Mostly yes. As Sparky matures, they’ll adapt to a more human-friendly energy pattern. Witching hour will fizzle out eventually.

You have to be careful, of course. Some of the annoying behaviors that get practiced during witching hour can become bad habits if they happen a lot.

Building a little proactive witching hour routine can make all the difference. Usually some variation of play, train, potty, then wind down. If you need help building an effective routine, we can help.

8. Harassing your other pets

⚠️Professional help advised in some cases

It’s a tale as old as time:

Someone has a beloved adult dog or cat.

Then they get a puppy. Maybe to be a friend to the older dog, or to ease the grief of the anticipated loss of an elderly pet.

Buuut puppy starts being super annoying to the other pets. Jumping, chasing, biting, etc. The other pet struggles with this. The poor owner starts freaking out and shame spiraling about how they’ve made a huge mistake.

Does this get better with time?

It’s normal for puppies to be obsessed with the other pets in the house. Puppies are naturally social and programmed to spend tons of energy bonding with their “elders.”

That goes away with maturity. A year from now, they won’t be mobbing your older dog every chance they get.

However, you need to be proactive over the next few months. If these critters have too many negative interactions now, things will get worse when Sparky grows up and is no longer a hyper-sociable tiny baby.

Something has to change if:

• The older pet can’t walk around freely without being bothered
• There are “trouble spots” where drama happens regularly
• The older dog gives physical corrections to the puppy more than once in a blue moon
• The dogs fight over resources (toys, beds, food, etc)
• The cat feels the need to defend themselves against the puppy
• The puppy is afraid of them

See: Help! My Puppy Won’t Leave My Other Pets Alone: How to Get Your Puppy to Stop Harassing Your Cat or Older Dog

10. The endless, relentless biting

Saving the big one for last. Let’s dive into the most distressing issue for most puppy parents:

THE TEEFIES.

You expected some play biting and teething.

But your puppy has turned into a little gremlin who chases you down to bite at your ankles, shoes, and clothes relentlessly.

You pet them, they bite. You pick them up, they bite. Put their harness on, they bite. And as if that wasn’t bad enough, they also get into these extra-wild moods where the biting gets really painful and uncontrollable.

(We call that Hyper Attack Mode in the Academy. It’s a very popular topic)

Does puppy biting get better with time?

Biting is a normal developmental phase. Part of why puppies bite is because they need to practice controlling the force of the deadly weapons they were born with. So that in a couple years when, say, a toddler steps on Sparky’s tail, and Sparky instinctively whips around to bite the thing that’s hurting him… he bites gently. With no force. Instead of sending that toddler to the ER.

No matter what you do or don’t do, this phase will end eventually. But that doesn’t mean you have to just suffer through it.

Something has to change if:

• They bite in almost every interaction you have with them
• The biting leaves you overwhelmed and unable to enjoy your time with them
• You or your kids can’t walk around your home without being “attacked”
• Your kids are upset and want nothing to do with the puppy
• Everything you try makes the biting worse
• You feel like you’re in constant conflict with your puppy

The good news: all of those things are still within the realm of normal puppy behavior. It’s not true aggression. But for your sake and theirs, it shouldn’t be like this. You don’t have to be miserable.

But the problem is you’ve tried everything and nothing works, right?

Let’s go through the list:

Many of us start with some form of punishment. Sternly saying “no,” holding their mouth shut, pinning them down, tapping their nose, or pushing them away.

If this makes Sparky escalate, becoming more aggressive or growling, or if they become hand-shy and duck away when you reach for them, it’s time to pump the brakes. Because now we’re getting into relationship-damaging territory.

And maybe you’re like “way ahead of you. I don’t want to base my relationship with my dog on punishment,” so you’ve tried other methods like:

• Saying “ouch!” or making a yelping noise when they bite
• Ignoring them or walking away
• Crating them for a nap
• Exercising them more
• Giving them toys and enrichment activities

And STILL, nothing works.

The reason nothing works is partly because you’ve tried everything. You’re throwing a bunch of random tips at the problem to see what sticks.

Random tips rarely work. To make a real difference, you need to change things in multiple areas of your puppy’s life. Which is easier than it sounds, but it’s not as simple as “try this one quick tip!”

Wow, what a long post. Let’s wrap this up

If you’ve made it this far, you’ve probably realized that most puppy problems aren’t disasters. Just standard stuff that can feel scary or overwhelming because no one really prepared you for it. Usually, just making some changes to your approach is enough to start enjoying your time with your pup.

Other problems, like reactivity, resource guarding/food aggression, or serious fear, don’t get better on their own. This is stuff you gotta prioritize and address before the puppy matures. But with the help of a professional, they can often get a lot better.

You don’t have to figure this out alone

This is what we do all day every day inside the 3 Lost Dogs Academy (and the Puppy Survival School program in particular).

We help our members tell the difference between “this is normal chaos” and “okay, we should do something about this,” and get them started on a plan that actually makes things better.

Because yeah, raising a puppy can make you feel like you’ve lost your mind. But it doesn’t have to stay that way.