Sundowners in Dogs: What It Is, What Else It Could Be, and What Helps at Night

Written by Marc Brannigan, Co-Founder & CEO of HempMy Pet. Last updated 13 October 2026.

What Sundowning Looks Like

Owners almost always describe the same pattern: a quiet, sleepy dog all day, then a dog who cannot settle once the lights go down.

• Pacing the same loop — hallway, kitchen, back to the bedroom, over and over, often at a steady walk rather than a hurried one.
• Panting with no heat and no exercise to explain it, sometimes with trembling.
• Whining, barking or howling at nothing you can see — frequently a brand-new behaviour in a dog who was never a vocaliser.
• Staring at walls, getting stuck in corners or behind furniture, standing on the wrong side of a door.
• Unable to get comfortable — up and down, circling the bed, re-settling, up again.
• Sleeping hard all day, wide awake at 2 a.m. — the day–night cycle has flipped.
• Not recognising you briefly, or retreating to a closet or a tight space in the evening.

Vets call the underlying condition canine cognitive dysfunction (CCD) or cognitive dysfunction syndrome (CDS). Sundowning is not a separate disease — it is the night-time face of that condition. Aging damages the brain's sleep–wake regulation and the body's melatonin signalling, and disorientation gets dramatically worse in the dark, when the visual cues an old dog uses to feel oriented disappear. A dog with fading eyesight gets both problems at once.

That figure, and the finding that roughly 75% of owners noticed the behaviour changes but only 12% told their vet, comes from a practitioner review in Today's Veterinary Practice. A 2019 review in Frontiers in Neuroscience puts it bluntly: the condition affects up to 60% of dogs over eleven and is "severely under-diagnosed."

What Else It Could Be — and Why That Matters More Than the Label

The 2023 AAHA Senior Care Guidelines are explicit: cognitive dysfunction is a diagnosis of exclusion. Before anyone calls it dementia, these get ruled out first — and several of them are the ones you can actually fix.

More than one can be true. A dog with early cognitive change and sore hips will do worse at night for both reasons, and the hips are the part you can do something about this week. We go through all eight night-time causes and how to separate them in Old Dog Restless at Night.

The Three-Night Log

This is the single most useful thing you can bring to a vet appointment, and it takes a notepad by the bed.

How to Calm a Dog With Sundowning at Night

None of this is a cure. All of it is cheap, and most families see a difference within a week.

• Lights on before dusk, not after dark. A lamp on a timer that comes on at four in the afternoon removes the abrupt change that sets the spiral off. Leave a low, steady nightlight where they sleep and along the route to the water bowl and the door.
• A smaller, enclosed sleep space. Away from stairs, hazard-free, with an orthopedic bed. Counter-intuitively, many confused dogs settle better in a smaller area than a whole house to wander — but only if they are already comfortable with it. Do not introduce a crate for the first time to a dog in distress.
• Earn the sleep during the day. Sunlight, a short walk, a sniffy wander, gentle play, a puzzle feeder. Discourage the long late-afternoon nap. A dog who is genuinely tired at bedtime sleeps.
• Make the evening boringly identical. Same dinner time, same calm walk, same last trip out, same bed, same words. Dogs with cognitive change find predictability deeply reassuring.
• Keep the last trip out late, and be sensible about a big drink right before bed without leaving them thirsty.
• Keep the furniture where it is. A rearranged room is a new maze to a dog navigating by memory. Runner rugs on hard floors stop the slipping that makes old dogs afraid to walk at night.
• Calming aids that cost nothing. Soft background noise, a worn t-shirt with your scent in the bed, a pheromone diffuser. They take the edge off, nothing more.
• Do not punish it and do not over-reassure it. The dog is not being difficult. Calm, low, normal.

The Eight Night-Time Causes →

What Your Vet Can Do

When the basics are not enough, there are real tools. All of them are vet decisions, and here is what the evidence says about each.

• Selegiline (Anipryl) is the only drug licensed for canine cognitive dysfunction in North America. The AAHA guideline reports it effective in up to 70% of dogs; a longer trial reported 77% improved after the first month. Given once daily in the morning for a 30-day trial. It cannot be combined with several other drugs, which is why it is a prescription conversation and not a shortcut.
• Diet. Diets high in antioxidants and medium-chain triglycerides are the best-evidenced nutritional approach — older dogs on them performed better on cognitive testing — and they showed the most benefit when combined with environmental enrichment. Cornell's Riney Canine Health Center names the prescription options. Note that a few drops of a coconut-carrier tincture is not a therapeutic MCT diet; the amounts are not comparable.
• Anxiety support. The AAHA task force prefers trazodone and alprazolam for anxiety in these dogs because they act fast and clear fast. We wrote up trazodone's side-effect profile, including the heart-rate finding, so you can have an informed conversation.
• Pain control. The guideline says it plainly: chronic pain contributes to anxiety, so treat the pain alongside the anxiety. Our gabapentin and carprofen guides cover the two most common.
• Melatonin is widely used for the flipped sleep cycle. Get the dose from your vet and use a xylitol-free product — human gummies on a bedside table are a known poisoning route.
• Supplements — SAMe, omega-3s, vitamin E, several branded cognitive products. The guideline describes the evidence for supplements as limited. Worth asking about; not worth expecting miracles from.

For the clinical overview, the Cornell Riney Canine Health Center's page on cognitive dysfunction syndrome is the one to read.

Where Hemp Actually Fits — and Where It Doesn't

We sell hemp for dogs. So we are going to be more careful on this question than most pages you will find, because the honest answer has two halves.

So the practical version: if your three-night log says the episodes end when the dog finally gets comfortable, or your dog is stiff on rising and hesitant on stairs, a joint-comfort plan is worth discussing with your vet — and full-spectrum hemp has a legitimate, evidenced place in that plan. If the log says the dog is lost, vocal and does not settle regardless of position, the evidence for hemp is not there yet, and the night plan plus your vet's options are where the real help is. Our senior dog guide goes through what the research does and does not show in more depth.

If you do use it: given by mouth, most owners see something within 30 to 60 minutes, so an evening serving goes in with dinner, ahead of dusk — not at 2 a.m. once the pacing has started. Serving works from body weight; the serving guide has the chart. And if your dog is on trazodone, selegiline, gabapentin or anything else, read what the canine research shows about hemp and medications and talk to your vet first — hemp can change how fast the body clears other drugs.

Side effects are real and mostly mild — drowsiness, loose stool, and a liver-enzyme change seen in three of the five published trials. We laid out every published finding in hemp and CBD side effects in dogs.

"What Are the Three Stages of Dog Dementia?"

This is one of the most-asked questions on this topic, and the most useful answer is that the premise is wrong.

There is no official three-stage system for canine cognitive dysfunction. That framing is imported from human dementia care. What vets actually use are scored questionnaires. The Canine Cognitive Dysfunction Rating scale (CCDR) scores a dog from 13 to 80: 13–39 is normal, 40–49 is at risk, and 50–80 supports a diagnosis. The CADES scale rates 17 items across four behavioural categories, one of which is the sleep–wake cycle, and the AAHA guideline notes it is predictive of how impairment progresses. The clinical shorthand for the signs is DISHAAL: disorientation, social interactions, sleep–wake cycle changes, house-soiling, activity changes, anxiety, and loss of learned behaviours.

So rather than asking which "stage" your dog is in, ask your vet to score them — and then score them again in three months. A number you can track beats a label you cannot.

How Long Can a Dog Live With Sundowning?

The honest answer: sundowning itself does not set a timeline, because it is a symptom pattern, not a separate disease.

Cognitive dysfunction is progressive, but it progresses slowly — the AKC's summary notes it usually starts with one or two signs and builds over years, and the prevalence figures (28% of dogs at 11–12, 68% at 15–16) show most affected dogs live with it for a long time. Many dogs have good months or years with a night plan, daytime engagement and vet support. What tends to shorten the road is not the dementia directly but the household breaking under the lost sleep, or a physical condition — pain, kidneys, heart — going unmanaged because everything was blamed on "just dementia." That is the practical reason the rule-out table matters so much.

When the nights become severe and nothing is helping, it is a fair and loving reason to have an honest quality-of-life conversation with your vet. A structured scale makes that conversation clearer; a review quoted in the veterinary literature notes that the behaviours that disrupt the sleep–wake cycle are the most distressing of all — for the dog and for you.

When to Call the Vet

Go now if:

• The confusion appeared over hours, not weeks
• Collapse, a seizure-like episode, or trouble breathing
• Repeated vomiting, a swollen or painful belly, or straining without producing urine
• Sudden weakness, sudden blindness, or severe pain

Book an appointment this week if:

• The evening pattern has repeated for more than a few nights — bring the three-night log
• Your dog is drinking or urinating more than before
• They are stiff on rising, hesitant on stairs, or slow to lie down
• The restlessness starts reliably after an evening medication
• The household is not sleeping — that counts as a reason

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you treat sundowning in dogs?
In layers. First, rule out the look-alikes — pain, bladder, thirst, vision — because those are the fixable ones. Then the night plan: lights on before dusk, a nightlight, a small enclosed sleep space, more daytime activity and less daytime sleep, an identical evening routine, a late last trip out. Then, if that is not enough, your vet's options: selegiline (the only licensed drug, effective in roughly 70% of dogs), an antioxidant/MCT diet with enrichment, anxiety support such as trazodone, and pain control if pain is part of it.

How to calm a dog with dementia at night?
Lights, space and routine do most of the work. Turn lamps on before it gets dark, keep a nightlight by the bed and on the route to the water and the door, and give them a smaller, enclosed, hazard-free sleep area with an orthopedic bed. Keep the evening predictable and the last trip out late. Stay calm and boring yourself — anxious reassurance makes it worse. If episodes still happen most nights, that is when to bring your log to the vet.

What are the three stages of dog dementia?
There is no official three-stage system — it is borrowed from human care. Vets use scored questionnaires instead: the CCDR runs from 13 to 80, where 13–39 is normal, 40–49 at risk and 50–80 supports a diagnosis, and the CADES scale tracks 17 items across four categories including the sleep–wake cycle. Ask for a score, then re-score in three months.

How long can a dog live with sundowning?
Sundowning is a symptom pattern of cognitive dysfunction rather than a disease with its own timeline. The condition is slowly progressive and most affected dogs live with it for years; prevalence rises from about 28% of dogs at 11–12 to 68% at 15–16. Dogs with a night plan, daytime engagement and vet support often have good months or years. The things that shorten the road are usually unmanaged pain or illness that got blamed on dementia, and a household that cannot keep going without sleep.

What are the first signs of sundowning in dogs?
Usually a change in the evening rather than a dramatic event: a dog who starts pacing after dinner, pants at rest once the lights are low, whines at nothing, stands at the wrong side of a door, or sleeps far more by day and then wakes in the small hours. Early on it is intermittent — a bad night, then a week of normal ones. Keeping a log from the first few episodes is what turns "he seems off" into something a vet can act on.

Does CBD help dogs with sundowners?
Not according to any published canine trial — there is none for cognitive dysfunction, and the main practitioner review does not mention cannabidiol. Colorado State University's TRAC trial is testing CBD, trazodone and rapamycin for exactly this, with no results published yet and no involvement from us. Where hemp does have evidence in dogs is joint comfort, and joint pain is one of the most commonly missed causes of a senior dog's bad nights. If the log points at the joints, it is worth discussing; if it points at the brain, the night plan and your vet are where the help is.

Is melatonin safe for a dog with sundowners?
It is widely used for the flipped sleep cycle and is generally well tolerated, but get the dose from your vet and use a product with no xylitol — many human melatonin gummies contain it, and xylitol is toxic to dogs. Melatonin is a hormone, not a sedative; it helps reset the clock rather than knocking a dog out.

Should I crate my dog at night if they have sundowning?
Only if they were already comfortable in a crate. Many confused dogs genuinely settle better in a smaller enclosed space than a whole house to wander, but a crate introduced for the first time to a frightened, disoriented dog adds isolation to fear. A pen, a gated room, or a high-sided bed next to yours usually works better for a dog new to confinement.

The Short Version

Sundowning is the night-time face of canine cognitive dysfunction: confusion, pacing, panting and anxiety that peak after dark in a dog who seems fine by day. It is common and rarely diagnosed. Before anyone calls it dementia, rule out pain, bladder, thirst, eyesight and medication timing — those are the fixable ones. Then lights before dusk, a small safe sleep space, more daytime activity, an identical evening routine, and your vet's real tools when the basics are not enough.

Hemp has no evidence for the cognitive side and we will tell you when that changes. It has real evidence for joint comfort, which is quietly behind more bad nights than most owners realise.

Hemp for Hip & Joint Mobility → All Hemp for Dogs

Old Dog Restless at Night · Why Is My Dog Panting · Arthritis in Dogs · Hemp for Senior Dogs · Serving by Weight

These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. These products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. This article is general information, not veterinary advice. If your dog is unwell, contact your veterinarian.