A Puppy’s Dream (& Nightmares!): 7 Crucial Facts + Help Tips

When you watch your sleeping pup, you can see twitches and hear little noises, some happy and some sad.

What is that about, do puppies dream?

What is Dreaming?

All humans dream every night, but often these dreams fade away when you open your eyes.

Human dreaming isn’t fully understood, but researchers have plenty of theories about why humans dream.

Dreaming is:

• A way to sort out and record the day’s events.
• Rehearsing responses to future troubles.
• Working out how you feel.
• Practicing different ways of looking at problems.
• Possibly spiritual with messages from the unconscious.

What About Puppy Dreams?

Sleep is an essential function for humans and animals. Sleep allows time for your body to repair and renew, and it provides time for dreaming.

You and your puppy sleep and dream in similar ways – puppies dream, and so do mice and rats.

In sleep, there is:

• Reduced consciousness.
• Reduced movement – the brain switches off the ability to walk.
• Reduced sensory input – no smelling, tasting, or vision.

During sleep, your puppy cycles through REM (rapid eye movement) and non-REM sleep. Dreaming occurs during the REM cycle in puppies and humans.

What Do Puppies Dream?

No one can know for sure what puppies dream about, but it seems evident that a puppy dreams about its experiences, possibly that day or in the past.

Dreaming links to memory for a puppy, and although a newborn puppy has limited life experience, it still has the memories of being with its littermates, being born, and drinking milk.

Newborn human babies and other animals also dream – dreaming is not age-related.

Both you and your puppy share similar brain structures – one of these, the pons, is linked to dreaming. This part of the brain controls the sensory and voluntary muscle switch-off during sleep.

In young puppies and older dogs, the pons is weaker, so it seems to an observer that puppies and older dogs dream more than middle-aged ones.

In practice, your puppy (like you) dreams every night but is probably not aware of dreaming.

Do Puppies Dream About Nursing?

Many people (particularly Labrador puppy owners) see their puppies sleep suckling:

• Lips and nose twitches, and the tongue may stick out.
• Gulping motions as if regularly swallowing.
• Paws are moving as if needing a stomach.
• Feeding noises like slurping or whining.

You are more likely to see this type of dream in young puppies – newborn puppies or newly weaned.

This dream occurs because the puppy is hungry and about to wake up looking for food or having a happy, soothing dream.

However, what looks like a nursing dream may indicate an obstructed airway – flat-faced breeds like bulldogs may be having breathing difficulties rather than a nursing dream.

Do Puppies Dream About Their Mother?

How your puppy “sees” its mother in dreams is another matter.

Your puppy dreams about experiences, and when it first comes to live with you, it may dream about its mother as an essential dog in its life.

Human dreams can be a whole sensory experience, visual or narrative.

No one knows how a puppy experiences dreaming as an experience, but it is probable that the puppy dream replays experiences from its life and probably relates to scent memory.

A puppy likely dreams about its mother until other experiences, dogs, and people replace the mother in importance.

What About Their Owners?

Most of your puppy’s experiences will involve interacting with you as their owner, so naturally, you probably feature in the puppy’s dreams.

Scientists think dogs dream in complex sequences, but whether this is an actual memory or a created one is unknown.

Human dreams can create new narratives from past experiences. No one knows if your puppy can imagine you chasing the ball instead of remembering itself chasing the ball.

The puppy likely dreams of actual events in which you had the starring role.

Can Puppies Have Wet Dreams?

Wet dreams in humans are a biological response to fluctuating hormones and are often more prevalent during puberty and the years following.

Both males and females can have wet dreams in humans, although it is more noticeable in males.

Your puppy goes through puberty to develop into an adult, and part of that development may result in wet dreams and a white sticky mess from male dogs.

A teenage male dog may have regular wet dreams that persist into adulthood (even if neutered).

Some puppies show little movement while having a wet dream, and others are pretty graphic, showing what their sleeping brain is experiencing.

Your puppy’s wet dreams are a natural part of its growth, and you don’t need to worry about them. Ensure that the puppy bedding is easy to launder.

If the puppy is peeing in its sleep (yellow liquid like water), it may be suffering from a urinary tract infection and not experiencing wet dreams. In this case, a trip to the vet to treat the underlying infection is the best approach.

Puppy puberty depends on the dog breed and can start as early as five months with full maturity between 12-15 months.

Wet dream frequency is likely to peak between these ages but can continue throughout your dog’s life.

Do Puppies Have Nightmares?

Not all dreams are happy ones, but nightmares are a stage above having a bad or disturbing dream.

Nightmares are infrequent in humans and usually confined to small children as “night terrors.” Clinically a nightmare is a bad dream with enough impact to cause you to wake up.

Of course, you forget bad dreams that don’t force you to wake up.

Can your puppy have a nightmare?

If your puppy has experiences that frighten or upset it – having a bath, being attacked by a cat, or getting sick, then it has the raw material for a bad dream.

It is hard to tell if your puppy is having a bad dream unless it makes sounds of distress.

If you think your puppy is having a nightmare, don’t be tempted to wake it up.

Whether good or bad, dreaming results from the brain processing information – a bit like a computer running a program. Interrupting the process is worse than letting it run its course.

If you abruptly wake your puppy, it is still in the dream state and may aggressively see you as a threat or be frightened.

How Can You Help Your Puppy with Bad Dreams?

If your puppy seems to be having a bad dream, you can sit and talk quietly and reassuringly or put on some soft music. During sleep, most sensory input decreases, but your puppy can still hear your voice.

The sound of your calm voice may be enough to dispel the feelings of distress and move your puppy onto a more pleasant dream.

Your puppy may have more bad dreams if it is distressed during the day – this type of dreaming is about dealing with emotion.

Working with your puppy to reduce puppy fears and distress at being alone can help ensure a peaceful and pleasant night’s sleep without nightmares.

How Do You Know Your Puppy is Dreaming?

Dreaming occurs during REM sleep.

If you look at your puppy’s closed eyelids and see rapid flickering movement, you know it is currently experiencing REM sleep and dreaming.

Your puppy dreams every time it sleeps, but some dreaming is more noticeable than others when you notice:

• Sounds – all types of vocalizations, including whining, growling, and barking.
• Body movements – twitching, swallowing, legs running, tail thumping, and trembling.

Can Puppies Dream with Eyes Open?

Some puppies sleep with their eyes open, and sometimes while dreaming, the puppy may open its eyes for a few seconds.

Some dog breeds are more prone to sleeping with their eyes open than others. Hunting dogs like huskies and Great Danes have this habit.

Some breeds with a prominent eye (French Bulldog, for example) have an inner eyelid that may look as if the eye is open when it is still covered.

Although puppies sleep for many hours, they do it in cycles of twenty minutes, so they sleep and wake up regularly.

They are not alert; it’s just a quick flick of the eyes to check their surroundings.

Your puppy can sleep with its eyes open or apparently open and can dream at the same time.

Is It Normal for a Puppy to Twitch, Cry, or Growl While Asleep?

In puppies (and very old dogs), the pons part of the brain is weaker.

The reduction of voluntary muscle movement is less controlled in sleep in a young puppy, so when your puppy dreams of running, its paws and other muscles twitch as the body responds to the brain’s signals that it is running – same with the crying or yipping.

Dreams are essential to your puppy’s health, so don’t worry about the noises and movements.

Some of the reorganizations may deal with unpleasant subjects, but dreams – good and bad, are necessary.

Can Your Puppy Sleepwalk?

The pons is supposed to keep your body still and in one place, but humans produce sleepwalkers – people who wander around enacting the subject of their dreams.

Sleepwalking episodes occur during deep sleep, and the person usually has their eyes open.

Your puppy can sleepwalk, but it is infrequent, and unlike a person, your puppy won’t get up and move around.

Older dogs (heading towards the end of life) may exhibit nighttime behavior like sleepwalking, but this is the result of underlying health issues.

If your puppy gets up in the night, it is because it is awake and either needs a bathroom break or some company.

What If There is Something Wrong?

People get sleep disorders; what about your puppy?

Can your puppy have a sleep disorder?

Your puppy needs to sleep for most of the day, and a lack of sleep (sleep deprivation) can result in some health disorders – but these are rare.

The sleep disorders that can impact your puppy include:

• Narcolepsy.
• Insomnia.
• Sleep apnea.
• REM behavior disorder.

Narcolepsy

This sleep disorder primarily affects young dogs and involves a collapse into sleep after excitement.

It can arise because of:

• Genetic disorder – low hypocretin levels.
• Obesity.
• Immune system disorders.
• Unknown causes.

Some breeds like Labrador Retrievers, Poodles, and Doberman Pincers are more prone to having narcolepsy. It’s rare, non-life-threatening, and incurable.

Your vet can diagnose the clinical signs (you may need to film your puppy’s episodes), advise on managing triggers, and possibly prescribe medication.

Insomnia

Most dogs never suffer from an inability to sleep.

If your puppy isn’t sleeping, there is usually an underlying health issue. Identify and treat the health issue, and your puppy’s insomnia will disappear.

As a first step, increase your puppy’s physical activity before bedtime.

What looks like insomnia may be excess youthful energy.

Sleep Apnea

Sleep apnea isn’t a puppy issue unless your puppy is obese and one of the flat-faced breeds.

If you opt for a puppy from the bulldog, Boston Terrier, or pug breeds, watch its diet and for sleep apnea developing as it gets older.

Sleep apnea is a life-threatening disease, and you will need your vet’s support to deal with it if it develops.

REM Behavior Disorder

It is natural for your puppy to twitch and vocalize in its sleep while it is dreaming.

But in some rare cases, the physical movement can be extreme – getting up and running into walls and attacking the furniture.

It is improbable that your puppy will ever exhibit this behavior while sleeping.

In the rare instances where REM behavior disorder happens, your vet can treat it with clonazepam to reduce physical movement while sleeping.

Sleep disorders in puppies are not typical. Most puppies sleep well and dream happily.

Summary

Puppies dream about their day, what makes them happy and what makes them sad.

Dreaming is essential for your puppy’s health, and although it may look as if your puppy is in distress, it is only the puppy brain rehearsing and reorganizing itself.

Your puppy won’t remember its dreams and will wake up refreshed from another night’s sleep, ready to pack its brain with plenty of new experiences to sort in its dreams.