Hi,
I have a 16 month old Japanese Chin who has recently not been sleeping through the night, waking at 3am banging on her crate to come out - she jumps around and plays for awhile, then has to go to the toilet.  The vet can't find a physical reason why this is happening, so I have consulted a behavourist.  Apart from giving me some training advice for getting her to settle back down in her crate, she has advised me to change from her current diet of Royal Canin dry/James Wellbeloved pouch to nothing but Nature Diet.  She seems to think BeBe might be getting too much carbohydrate in her diet?  I'm not keen particularly to change, as she has always been very picky and it took me a long time to get her settled on this regime.  She has no health problems with this diet and my vet says she is thriving.

Does anyone have a view on this advice?  BeBe has been on the same diet since she was a puppy, and the waking is a recent occurrence, so I'm confused as to how this can be a food issue?

Thanks.

Hi Miranda,

TBH I can't see that (from a quick google!) that anything in JWB pouches would set off this behaviour - dogs don't need carbs and certainly ND is a higher source of meat content than many other brands but even so I don't see the connection :)

ND is a good food and it may be worth changing over just to see if it makes a difference - even if only to satisfy your behaviourist that your open to suggestions LOL.

I'd be inclined to wonder if there is something happening within your dogs earshot at around 3-00am which is waking her?  The CH boiler kicking in, one (or more) of the local fox population wandering around, etc?  I know around my garden there are lots of goings on at this time (dogs sleep well enough but I'm an insomniac!) so perhaps this has happened recently and even if not ongoing has changed your girl's bodyclock and become a habit for her now.

HTH,
regards Teri

Thanks Teri,
One of the issues is that DH is a night owl and often up until 2 or 3 in the morning, although this has always been the case and never bothered her before.  Now she either wakes up when she hears him getting himself a midnight snack or when he comes up to bed.  I worry now that she has been let out so many times she has come to expect it. 

I've been looking at Naturediet and it does look good but pricey, although a tray might last her at least a couple of days.  I think I might at least try changing her JWB for Naturediet and keep her on the RC dry for the moment although frankly, I don't think it's going to make a bit of difference vis a vis the nighttime waking.