Your Dog Pees When Excited? Here’s Why!

If your dog pees when excited, you’re not alone. Luckily this behavior can be handled with patience, understanding, and support. Here's how!

If your dog pees when excited, you’re not alone. Luckily this behavior can be handled with patience, understanding, and support. Here’s how!

There are few things more joyful than a dog that’s happy to see you. You come home after a long day out, open the door, and you see your beloved pet with tail wagging.

But a whipping tail, floppy tongue, and dancing paws may conceal an embarrassing truth. When you bend down to pet – it’s happens. They unleash the pee or you step in the puddle. In some cases, it’s just a few drops, while in others it’s a lot more.

Well, while your dog might be your best friend, that puddle on the floor sure isn’t. Dogs will do this in any body position. In fact, you may not even notice that the dog urinated until you see the pee on the floor.

We’ll help you understand this behavior, and how you can help your pet grow out of it.

Why Dog Pee When Excited?

Dogs, especially puppies but sometimes adults, too, will often urinate when excited or frightened. Both males and females exhibit this behavior.

When dogs occasionally pee on the floor for no apparent reason, it’s usually because of:

  • Excitement Urination
  • Submission (Fearful) Urination

Excitement Urination in Dogs

Excitement Dogs Urination

When your dog pees when they first see you or someone they really enjoy, or during play, they are simply releasing urine because they’re happy. This is known as excitement urination.

This occurs when highly excitable dogs simply lose control of their bladders during activities that involve social stimulation or put them in a state of arousal.

Accidents that occur during play or greetings without the attendant fearful body language are usually due to excitement urination.

The good news for you is this usually happens to puppies under one year of age. Most puppies will outgrow excitement urination as they get older and have better control of their bladders. The bad news is that it’s not going to happen overnight.

If an accident does happen, clean it up with an enzymatic cleaner which neutralizes the odor, and some paper towels.

How do you stop a dog from peeing when excited

Just try to keeping your greeting short and low-key when you return, as well as diverting their attention and distracting them with a treat. This helps reduce their excited peeing over time.

Stay calm and quiet when greeting your dog. Wait until he has completely calmed down before interacting with him. Avoid eye contact, crouch down to their level, and stay neutral.

Do not scold or punish the dog while he is urinating as this may actually worsen the behavior. Use a calm voice, no baby talk or high-pitched speech and don’t reach over the dog’s head.

Take your pup outside and give them praise and treats after they urinate.

Let’s now focus on the other side of that coin, called submissive urination.

Submissive Dog Urination

Submissive Dog Urination

Submissive urination is normal canine communication. Dogs do it to show social appeasement.

Submissive urination occurs when a dog feels threatened. Dogs that urinate submissively are trying to appease someone they see as socially dominant and to escape being punished. It’s a way to avoid confrontation.

Submissive urination is most common in puppies, but some adult dogs submissively urinate as well, especially those who seem to lack confidence. 

As an excited peeing, submissive is almost always triggered by human interaction with the pet. This is a common reaction with shy, anxious and timid dogs.

Situations when submissive dogs may pee include when they are greeted or when someone approaches. They will also pee if they are reprimanded or hear raised voices, or when there is a history of rough treatment or punishment after urination.

The dog may also roll over on its side or show its belly when greeting an unfamiliar person.

How to stop a submissive dog from peeing

Puppies can outgrow submission urination with a little patience from their owners. If not, veterinarians will first ensure that there’s no medical reason for the behavior and only then begin to suggest ways to address the problem. Here are a few steps.

When arriving home acknowledge your dog with a soft hello. Then avoid eye contact and ignore the dog for the next 10-15 minutes.

Remember, punishing submissive urination, even with just a loud verbal reprimand, will only make the problem worse by motivating the dog to submissively urinate in an attempt to make you less angry.

Clean up the urine with a product designed to remove companion animal odors and stains. Ignore your dog while you are cleaning up the urine.

Reward confident behavior. Provide your dog with alternatives to submissive behavior and reward his or her efforts.

The key is to build a dog’s confidence with positive reinforcement and avoid all punishment. Slowly socialize your dog with other people and pets to reduce his stress and anxiety.

Conclusion

Definitely, excitement or submissive urination can be a frustrating and embarrassing problem. Fortunately, it is often easily corrected. Most dogs can overcome these problems relatively easily with appropriate management and modification techniques.

If your dog urinates indoors or at inappropriate moments, it’s important to visit your vet to rule out medical causes before trying behavior modification.