Separation Anxiety

First off, the one with separation anxiety is not me. That should clear up any confusion at the start.

This is not Jasper. But his eyes look like this...

It's poor Jasper. :( You see, on Wednesday Sophie left with Mom and her friend to drive up to Provo, where she had a connecting drive down to Las Vegas with Dan, but the layover is until this morning. Hehe. Either way, Sophie left on Wednesday. And poor, poor Jasper.

I thought he was fine on Wednesday - he played with me all day, with Isabelle (our standard poodle who got over her separation anxiety years ago), with the rest of the family, and all that jazz. Happy puppy = happy owners. He seemed great.

Until bedtime. Jasper and Sophie always slept together, one strewn randomly on top of the other. But this was the first time ever in Jasper's whole life that he slept alone. And he didn't like it. Like, an-hour-and-a-half-of-crying didn't like it. But Angie and I held fast, were firm, and didn't reward his whining with picking him up and cuddling with him (though we wanted to). Even though it was 1:30 in the morning. Ugh.

That was Wednesday night. Yesterday he was very clingy, so I played with him all day. He followed me around all day, like a puppy (hahaha). And again at night he whined, but only for about 30 minutes this time. We thought he was getting better.

We woke up this morning to find he went potty multiple times in his crate last night. Supposedly with separation anxiety puppies will go all over the place, so this is like a textbook example. And today he's like MEGA CREEPY DON'T-LEAVE-ME-OR-I'LL-DIE puppy. So, after trying to run the energy out of him (impossible), and seeing that he wouldn't take his eyes off of me long enough to even take one bite of his food, I left him in his pen so he would eat.

He's been crying for about 30 minutes right now, but I think it's more important that he realize that there's food sitting right next to him in the otherwise empty room and he'd do better eating it. His stomach has been rumbling so loudly today that he would even stop what he was doing and look behind him at his midsection with a look like "What on earth could that be?!?" on his face. So, I though that that would be better for him, to eat, than me being there. I could be wrong.

Any of you feel like putting on the Doggie Psychologist mantle and give some advice? I'm all up for advice - I've been googling Puppy Separation Anxiety for a while now, and could use some advice. :)

Hey, he stopped barking!!! :) Now to check on his food...