Hey everyone!

Hi friends,

I'm new to the forum and am glad to be part of such an active and knowledgeable community!

My wife and I just purchased our first home and to add some companionship we'd like to add a dog to our family.

The issue is we both work and have school so I want to do my due diligence to ensure that the time requirements for the pup can be met. I'm sure a lot of members work full-time and have raised a puppy before. How did you do it?

I work full-time 8-5 and her schedule is as follows:
M - school 8 to 11 and 2 to 5.....work 5 - 10
T - school 2 to 5.... work 5 - 10
W - 12 to 4:30.... work 5 - 10
T - work 8 to 2
F - work 8 to 2

I'd appreciate any comments/suggestions and are open to putting this off until we have time in the future (don't know if it will ever happen! :lol-sign

You guys actually have a pretty ideal schedule for a doggy (as far as dual working professionals go, at least!) It's sooo much easier when there are two people in the house with different schedules!

Are you set on a puppy, or are you interested in an adult dog as well? My husband and I went for a 3 year old when we got our dog, which was awesome. She was house trained and could hold it for 8 hours without issue. With a puppy, you'll need to have more frequent potty breaks.

Looks like the only rough day for you will be Mondays. Can she come home at lunch to let doggy out? Could you hire a dog walker for a potty break? Otherwise, the rest of the week it looks like the pup will never be home alone for very long.

Congrats on the house and the impending paws!

Thanks for taking time time to answer my questions We'd rather a puppy as in our area there are very slim pickings for adult dogs.

Monday she is able to come home during lunch time so that won't be an issue.

Thursdays and Fridays with the 6 hours seems quite long however as when I had puppies before I would let them out every 2 hours or so!

My husband and I got a puppy last year. Both of us work ~8-5, but we work only 10 minutes away from home so it was easy enough to come home during lunch.

For the first month, my husband would work from home a bit in the morning and go into work at 9. I would come home at lunch, then I would come home at 4 and work from home for an hour. Basically, our goal was to not leave him in the crate for longer than ~3 hours at a time for those first couple weeks. He did have a pee accident once or twice, but overall it worked for him. He probably could've gone 4 hours at a time, but working from home and hour a day wasn't an issue for us and I wanted to minimize accidents in the crate.

Once he was about 12 weeks old, we went back to our regular work schedule of 8-5, and I continued to come home at lunch so he was in his crate for 4 hours at a time. This is pretty much the schedule we have continued with, though at this point he can hold it all day and I only come home because I enjoy eating lunch at home with him.

It seems like your schedules will make sure one of you is home approximately every 4-5 hours, so I don't think you guys will have much of an issue (less so than people who work a standard work day and can't get home at lunch). You could always hire a dog walker for any day you think might be too long for him (like Thursday and Friday) until he's older.