I'm a sucker!

I've never had to stay awake all night listening to a puppy cry for his Dog Mother and Siblings.

I sleep with all 3 of my Dogs. I wouldn't recommend starting it. From experience it was a mistake on my part.

If your Puppy is content not sleeping on your bed, leave it.

My Dogs weigh under 20 pounds each, but still it is hard to change position in bed when they are laying on the covers.

You are also, putting the Dog on the same level as you. They really need to know that they are the Dog and you are the Master. Otherwise you will have no respect from your Pet.

I've broken all the Dog Training Rules by the Pros. They know what they are talking about.

Just like with kids, Parents need their special time.

Just my very uneducated experience.

Gayle

I agree with Gayle. It's sooo hard, but I think you will be better off, Ruby looks like she will be pretty big!!
She is beautiful by the way!! Love the name!!

What a cutie!

I'd recommend no furniture for at least 6 months. A year is better. Let her earn her privileges. Then teach the dog to get on the bed/couch/whatever only when you invite her. Teach her the 'off' command at the same time.

2 of my dogs are allowed on my bed when I say 'ok'. And they get off when I say 'off.' Doesn't mean that I haven't woken up on a few mornings with a dog cuddling up with me :) But for the most part they understand the rules. Dogs like structure.

Be very careful about letting the pup on your bed now. There's a recent post here by someone who is having trouble now that doggie is on the bed. (Growling/resource guarding.)

It's tempting but really not a good idea. I've managed to resist. The snuggling is solely for the human but actually not in the best interests of the dog.

lol Yes, we share the bed with 3. 1 -61lb. lab who is 10 mo old, who was not supposed to be in bed till our guest put her in bed with him the first night so she would not cry.. She had a hard start in life being in 5 homes by the time she was 4 mo.
2, Baby boy Bruno who is only 15 weeks old and is 53 lbs. His previous owner said he would sleep quietly by the bed on his cushion.. yeah, right. lol
3. Daffy our princess who is all of 9 lbs and rules the roost here. She sleeps right on my pillow and I can have the little corner that is left over.
This wasn't an issue because my DH used to leave for work at 2 am which was when I went to bed. Now he works normal hours and there has been a futon added to the foot of our queen size bed for the two big ones. They sit down there and give the gaze of death waiting for him to leave in the morning but they do crawl in when they see a good chance now. Abby the lab will army crawl her way up in between hubby and I and she loves the hugs I am supposed to be getting. lol
The things we let our animals do.
Lorie

All of my dogs are allowed to sleep on the bed, however, only one does consistently. The other two sleep on the floor next to the bed, except for when it's cold or they wanT a cuddle.

My dogs ages are 6 months, 6 years and 13 years old. It's only the 13 year old consistently sleeps on the bed. The other two don't. The 6 month old was allowed into the bedroom at about 3 months.

I have been lucky with dogs in the bed. Megan (gone a year and a half now) would come up andd lay by my feet, but would leave when I got serious about sleeping and turned off my reading light. Casey (65 lb Dalmatian/hound mix) now does the same thing, except he comes up higher for a snuggle before laying by the feet. He jumps down to his bed after a while, then just as I am really falling asleep, sometimes jumps back up. If weather is cold, he will sleep in our bed more. He sleeps where his daddy's feet are supposed to be, keeping his daddy's knees all bent and cramped up at night. Sometimes I have to move him, then wake up his daddy enough to tell him to move his legs down before Casey steals his spot again. He sometimes wants to share my pillow. I have nodded off with his head tucked under my chin at times.

Toby is in bed with me under only a few circumstances - if I am eating in bed, and if I am feeling blah and spending a lot of the day in bed. He is a 40 lb beagle/golden mix, so the food drive is understandable. He also seems to want to get or give comfort occasionally, now. His grandpa has been in and out of the hospital for the past month or so, and he misses him (or at least the handouts grandpa shares with the dogs!), so Toby will cuddle a bit at night sometimes. He also comes into our bed to wake me up if I have been there too long, or to cuddle me if he thinks I am staying there justifiably! I am not sure how he decides this, but he is usually right on.

Bina does not know she has a right to the bed. She has not jumped up on any furniture yet, and we have had her since February. She just started using the communal dog beds in the living room in the past few weeks. She does peek over the top of the mattress at us sometimes!

Absolutely they sleep with me! There is nothing like having your best girl pressed up against your legs, or her chin resting on some part of you, or best yet, waking up and she's sleeping right next to you with her head on the other pillow ;)

And then there's the sweet little snuffling and kisses in the morning, because they somehow know the alarm is about to go off, and they want a little love and a belly skritch first :)

When I was married, we actually switched from a queen to a king because we didn't have enough space with us and two dogs.

The down side:

>Hair in your bed. All over your bed. Some dogs shed worse than others, but in any case, you will have hair.

>Dirt on your bed. Dogs' feet get dirty sometimes, and if you don't wipe them off, that dirt (or mud!) will be on your bed. I'm pretty vigilant about wiping their feet if it's wet out, but even so, I have a comforter I don't care about on top of my bed.

>Because of the above, you will need to wash your bedding more often.

>Some dogs are real bed hogs!

>You'll need to teach your dog when it's, um..... important for the dog to not be on the bed.

Despite all of that, the good stuff still outweighs!

No. Maybe.

I have two large dogs---70/80 pounds. They can get on the bed at times, but neither of them sleep on the bed. You cannot be a pack leader and let that happen. They both sleep beside the bed, however. The Alpha dog sleeps beside me on my side and the other dog at the foot.

If either I or LOML are up, the younger non dominate dog hops up beside whomever is still there. When LOML or I come back to bed, the dogs gets down immediately---no command needed. That comes from directing him down every time---every time.

The non dominate dog does sleep with my grandchildren on the sofa bed or on the floor bed---but will immediately get off the bed with just a pointing finger if told. Alpha dog always sleeps by my side of the bed, regardless.

Our two mini labs sleep in their crates at night but if my husband had his way they would be in our bed with us. Amos is a great alarm clock, wakes up within 10 minutes of our time to get up each morning. Unfortunatley, that means on the weekends he also wakes up at that time(6am). So we started bringing them in and letting them get in bed after they have pottied so we can sleep in. Of course, now they get to go back to bed with me during the week, too, since I don't work outside the home anymore.

Even though they aren't that big, Amos(35 lbs) sprawls out on his back and lays with his legs open and MUST have a hand on him at all times. Andi (25 lbs) wants to lay at the highest point in the bed, which is at my feet since I raise the end of my bed up. So even though we have a king size bed, I am crowded by the pups. Do I love it, yes, but it ain't gonna happen all night long I can guarantee that!

My Golden Retriever is 6 years old. She does not get on the furniture (sofa, etc).

She IS allowed on the bed, in the mornings (I sit and drink coffee before getting up). She's supposed to wait for the invitation, but doesn't always.

Yes, she leaves hair all over and I have to wash the bedding more often.

Ruby is adorable, but I'd follow the advice of the poster who said, "Wait". She needs to learn her house manners first, then she can enjoy privlidges.

I have 3 dogs. Lucy is a long haired chihuahua and she weighs 3 pounds. She sleeps in a cat bed that is on the night stand next to my bed. I was afraid she was so small that she might get smooshed sleeping in bed with us. Her mother is Dumpling. dumpling used to sleep with us, but she was too restless at night. She walked around the bed, walked up and down the hall, changed position all night long. So now she sleeps under the bed and seems quite happy there. Bailey is a 75 pound pit bull who can't even sleep in our bedroom anymore. I put up with her LOUD snoring every night for months and months. I even had to start taking Ambien to help me sleep. Finally I decided the dog had to sleep in the livingroom instead. She is perfectly happy there and I don't need drugs to sleep anymore. I love my dogs....but I also need a good nights sleep. So no dogs in the bed.

Not anymore. We tried to let Odo sleep on the bed, thinking he'd stay by our feet. But dachshunds like to burrow, so he'd go under the covers and all the way to the bottom around our feet. All night he'd get warmed up then come out, go back under, then come out, etc. He also tried to lay horizontally between us so that all 20 pounds of him essentially had the whole bed and we were pushed to the sides. Now he sleeps in his own bed next to my side of the bed. He sometimes has nightmares and I reach down to comfort him. What a life.

I do let the dogs sleep on my bed, but its on my terms.

There were not allowed to sleep on the bed until they were fully pottied trained and comfortable sleeping in their own crates.

If they make too much noise, are too restless or are hogging the covers, they are ordered to get down.

Some nights we cuddle together just before we got to sleep. They get belly rubs and whisker kisses. But when I turn out the lights, they move to the foot of the bed... because they have learned if they stay out of my way, then they get to stay on the bed. If they get in my way, they are ordered off.

Big guy used to snuggle up on the couch with me and sleep at my feet while I slept, when the boyfriend was working night shifts.

I let the little one sleep with me one night at a friends. Almost suckered me into doing it all the time. I put her little blanket beside me, and she layed down on it, nuzzled her head into me, and passed out, and when I woke up she was still on her blanket and still snuggled nicely into mom. If she ever sleeps with us though, she has to have her own blanket. She refuses to sleep without a blanket and refuses to sleep on a blanket unless it's all scrunched and fluffed up into a little nest for her, and she likes to be completely covered and wrapped up. She's not doin that with mom's queen sized duvet, haha.

She's so cute though, anytime she see's any blanket coming out, she runs and throws herself on it. She LOVES blankets.

Yep, I have to admit, my Lhasa sleeps with me. He's a cuddler too!!!

My two small dogs sleep in a giant mess of dogbeds and blankets on the floor of my side of the bed. I can reach my hand down and pet the one closest. In winter, they flap their ears in order to wake me up so I can reach down (and get up) to cover them up. The place closest to the bed is the coveted spot.
But I always tuck them in before going to bed. We have nightly rituals...
I don't miss dog hair in my bed.

No dogs or children in my bed. DH and I deemed that our space and we cherish it. It's the only place in the house that is solely ours. The furkids are crated at nite and they have plenty of squishy bedding all to themselves.

My dog sleeps with me. Or is allowed, to, anyway; she really sleeps more off the bed than on. She does it by my rules, though. Most importantly she is never allowed to wake me up. She learned pretty quickly that if she woke me up before I got up on my own, she got kicked out of the bed. If I want to move, she has to get out of my way. Same thing on the couch, for that matter. If I tell her to get down, she has to get down. I don't think it causes training problems or gives her any illusions of being on "equal" terms with me, or that I'm not alpha. I can't for the life of me think of how a dog would manage to interpret me allowing her on the bed or other furniture as me not really being in charge. I seriously doubt wolf leaders sleep separately from the pack to reinforce their authority. I think sometimes dog training advice looks at things from a human point of view rather than a dog point of view.

The down side; yes, dog hair, lots of dog hair, although no more than from her being on the rest of the furniture. And a couple of times I've been kinda creeped out when I opened my eyes to find her a couple inches from my face just staring at me. A result, I think, from the "not allowed to wake me" rule; she was waiting for me to wake up, sitting so still I didn't realize she was there. She is dirtier than me, although thankfully she doesn't like to be under the covers so her dirt is mostly on the bedspread, not the sheets I sleep in.

My Shih Tzu sleeps with us, as I am a sound sleeper and don't move a muscle once I am asleep he stays on my side (plus I am alot shorter than DH so he has more room at the foot of the bed) he sometimes crawls up to my pillow and sleeps by my head as well. DH gets up before me to go to work and Gizmo will usually take over his pillow at that point. Pearl, my Sons 2lb Chihuahua has the kids rooms staked out, she will go from one to the other taking turns sleeping all night long, I worried all the time about her getting squished when we first got her, but she is a quick one, she moves as soon as she even feels a arm move. I tried to keep her in a crate at first but Kody kept taking her out and putting her in bed with him, when the kids are gone overnight somewhere she might come down and visit me for a bit before bed but she always goes back down to Kodys bed to actually sleep.
I don't regret having a dog in my bed, but I have always had small dogs, I don't know how I would feel about a big dog, actually I do, I wouldn't care but DH is a restless and light sleeper and I am afraid that would not go over well with him.

I don't presently have a dog but when I did it was a no. I am a very light sleeper and even have sound machines in my bedroom. I never started it with the dogs or any of the cats...They had or have their own beds or the furniture. Ruby, my greyhound, had three beds which she took in her mouth and made a mountain out of them rearranging them till they were perfect and then she'd sigh and fall on them after turning around about six times. .

Ruby is gorgeous and I love her name.

Both of my boys started sleeping in the bed with us very early. Oldest boy - we were head over heels in love with and he was sooo good at night he slept on our bed from 9 wks. Youngest has slept on our bed from about the same. It actually cut down on the middle of the night peeing for us. They were well behaved and didn't think it was play time during the night so it worked for us. I wouldn't think it would work for every dog/owner. You have to be pretty laid back to take the leap of faith to put an 8 week old puppy on your bed. You may end up sleeping in a puddle if things don't go as expected.

Now that they are close to 100 lbs, they come up before lights out and again in the morning. Our backs are getting too old to twist up to accommodate some of the sleeping positions the dogs choose.

Enjoy your girl, she's a beauty!

Thanks for all the input! there are a lot of good points to think about. But for now I think I will keep Ruby, and now I have a Golden ret. Lilly, in there crates. Maybe I will rethink the idea once they are trustworthy to leave in the house alone, just in case I don't wake up when they do at night!

I have 2 small dogs and they both sleep with me. I was raised with dogs in my bed and so to me it is just a natural thing.

Honestly, I think it just depends on the dogs involved. Many dogs are not going to push pack issues, so this is a non-issue. A typical pet dog isn't going to become a face-eating monster from one night in your bed. If you are having any sort of dominance/pack issues with your dog, it needs to stay out of your bed and off your furniture. Otherwise, as long as no other issues are present, who cares? Do whatever makes you, the pack leader, happy.

When we had a dog (Belgium Tervuren) he was not allowed on the furniture or the bed. He shed so bad that I can't imagine having that hair everywhere -- especially where I sleep. However, once in a while my DH would "invite" him onto the bed to say hello. Then he would tell him to get down and down he would go. He was extremely well trained and well behaved.

Your puppy is so cute but once your bed is full of dog hair you might regret inviting her into it.

Our Westie sleeps on my husbands' bed. The Pitt and the Peke slept on my bed till the hair just got to be too much.
I covered the daybed in my pc room with an old washable comforter and the Pitt sleeps on it. The Peke sleeps in a basket beside my bed. They all seem happy with their space and I'm not coughing up hairballs anymore.

Our Lab sleeps with us- shares my pillow, actually. The ownly downside for us, is when we're getting intimate- she thinks it's playtime! We have to lock her out of the room. Our German Shepherds, on the other hand (we have one- but have had several over the years), couldn't care less.

I have 2 large dogs that sleep downstairs, the cats and I sleep upstairs. The cats are not allowed around my head/face/chest ... taught them early to sleep at the end of the bed.

The cats were here first, they don't go downstairs where the dogs reign, so the upstairs is their space.

ok...I have broken every rule in the book too...I have a huge giant schnauzer, who I allowed on my bed when she was a puppy...big mistake! Now she is 8 years old, 100 pounds, and she actually believes she owns my bed! After I re upholstered the living room furniture, I taught her to stay off it, she actually stays off it, unless she wants to get even with me...But no success on my bed...So don't do it, then you can't get the dog off your bed, and if your dog snores and pushes, you are in for long, uncomfortable nights!!

One of our dogs, Tatya, graces us with her presence when she so desires. She is very good and stays at the foot of the bed and doesn't move all night. She has her own bed next to ours, as do the other 3 dogs. Most nights she sleeps in her bed, but sometimes she wants to sleep with us. She's our smallest dog, a ~35# Husky. The other 3 can't get up into our super-tall bed, but the height is no problem for our jumping bean! It's a king sized bed, otherwise I don't think it would work. And she absolutely would instantly and permanently lose all bed privledges if she gave even a squeak of protest to the OFF command.

We have two small shih-tzu's and they both sleep with us. One is five and started when she was about three months old and the other is one and has for quite awhile. They both have doggy beds and the 1yr old will sometimes get off the bed and go to her bed. They both like to nap in there own beds but at night it's our bed. They don't shed so that's no problem but the youngest is a licker. Not her self, but our hands. She will lay and lick my hand forever. We have done everything to break her of this licking but so far haven't found anything that will work.