Separation anxiety in puppy mill rescue

We adopted one of the 65 puppy mill poodles that were rescued in July in Oklahoma about two months ago. Arthur is the sweetest, most gentle dog. He is thought to be 3. His foster family potty trained him with a doggie door and he was doing well. They decided since they work full time and have busy kids to rehome him. We brought him home with us at the end of September. Since then we have treated him for Girardia and over thanksgiving he was diagnosed with hookworm. Our vet said the Girardia was most likely brought on by stress and he’s probably had hookworm the whole time, even though they all went through a round of dewormer. He will start his second half of the dewormer on Friday. He came with a kennel he could barely stand up in so we’ve moved him into a slightly bigger one. He hates to be in it. He’s pooped in it twice, which we figured were just flukes of a new environment and only being potty trained for a few months. But he has had 3 pee accidents in one week now. Two outside his kennel and yesterday he peed in it. He hates his kennel so is only in it if I leave and then I only do for short periods of time. It is so stressful to me because I always worry about what I’ll find when I return. Because he was a puppy mill dog, he doesn’t avoid it in his kennel and he stands in both the poop and pee. He doesn’t lay in it, though. We’ve also noticed when he comes in from going potty there are drips by the door. Quite a few. 10 or so. We let him out regularly. He goes to a window or door when he needs to go out most of the time. He gets praised and a treat when he does. He’s on a gastrointestinal biome dog food right now, alone with a probiotic in addition to the worm medicine. I assume his issue with his kennel is separation anxiety. I’ve read article after article on it with puppy mill rescue dogs. None of the articles give any insight on how to help a dog through it. We can’t leave him in the house alone, I don’t trust him yet. We have another dog. A 6 year old doodle who is left alone. They get along mostly, but have seen our doodle be done playing with him and he doesn’t quit. So we just feel they need to be supervised at this point. If we leave him in a room with the door shut he will dig at the door and floor. If we put up a gate he will jump and hit it until he knocks it over. We’ve thought about putting a run in the garage with more space, but don’t think that will solve anything. So, two questions if you are still with me. 1. Should I have him tested for a UTI? 2. How do we overcome the separation anxiety and hate of his kennel? Thank you. We have a vet clinic we’ve worked with for years, but they haven’t given us the support we feel we need with taking this dog on. The foster family made him sounds 100 percent ready to go and we’ve found that it was not even close. But, we are willing to put in the work, just need some support. Thank you.

Hello.  You sound to be working hard with your new arrival.    Given his background, I would be unsurprised if your dog's urinary issues didnt have a behavioural componant - in fact, they may be 100% behavioural.  Dogs like to.go where they can already smell themselves, so clean up especially thoroughly at undesirable toilet sites.   Lots of praise for desirable behaviour, while ignoring undesirable behaviour, sounds right to me, but toilet problems can be hard to break for some dogs. Toilet sites are very important - some dogs compete for them, while other more nervous doga will only go in spaces they consider to be 'their' territory - and soiling his sleeping area may long have been his habit.  I knew one owner who moved the crate outside for toileting only!  Have a read of our blog and let me know if theres anything of interest.   However, we would indeed also advise urine tests if your vet thinks so (SG, glucose, perhaps) because if there are medical reasons for excessive urination, these need to be identified.  Your vets need to be in charge of your parasite regeime.  Depending on the details and severity, even checks for a small bladder or other abnomalities may prove relevant.  Wishing you all the best with Arthur.

Ps you might want to call them now for triage, in case they would like to see Arthur earlier