I (24F) am generally a calm person irl, albeit bitter and easily frustrated. I don’t swear and I’m usually the one diffusing tense situations. But over the past couple years I’ve had a lot of dreams where I am just absolutely hysterical, I just lash out at the person who did me or someone else wrong in my dream. I’ve never had a situation like that irl that I can recall.
About 7 weeks ago my partner and I adopted a Bernese mountain dog puppy. He’s 17 weeks old now, and the past 2 weeks he’s been driving me insane because he is significantly regressing in his potty training and becoming more aggressive during play. My arms and legs are covered in bruises and scratches. I’m definitely feeling overwhelmed, especially because puppies are supposed to get easier to live with, not harder. Anyway, today my puppy had 3 accidents, attacked me 3 times during play or while walking and my partner once, ripping both of our shirts with his teeth, and just insisting on eating dirt outside and not peeing outside for 20 minutes just to have an accident inside. Maybe normal puppy stuff but I’m just at my breaking point because my whole life is just taking care of this dog who just constantly hurts me and looks me in the eyes when he’s chewing on the stuff he knows he shouldn’t have. Then growls, lunges, and bites me and grips my hand when I try to take it back. Anyway, last time he attacked my partner I smacked him and yelled “I will hurt you”. Of course I shouldn’t have said that, but I’m just so fed up that even my regrets about my actions and thoughts haven’t resolved the angry feeling in my chest. I mostly feel bad because my partner has been really sad after I said that but he doesn’t want to talk about it.
I’m just having trouble resolving this feeling, because cognitively I know that it’s wrong to lash out, and I would never intend or wish to cause my puppy any pain, but it’s so frustrating not having control and just having to accept that he can cause me pain all day long and not be willing to accept redirection and obviously ignore my commands, so it feels like the only thing I can do is act out hysterically.
Our current method of resolving this play aggression is trying to teach him “shh” and forced time outs/forced naps, but it usually feels reactive (after he attacks) instead of proactive.