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This is the tale of Jodie Marsh, her long-suffering parents, six dogs and two houses in Essex.
After years of living in the parental home, Jodie is finally ready to move into her own place. But while her and bulldog Paddy have set up home together, she's less keen on taking her pack of naughty chihuahuas with her. As well as fighting and picking on poor Paddy, their favourite pastime is to pee on anything and everything, and Jodie fears for her new white carpets. Instead, she’s left them to continue using mum and dad’s dining room as their own private toilet. And it’s not Jodie who’s doing the mopping up. Dad: “I’m up to my neck in wee every day, all day” . To make matters worse, Jodie has added to the pack problems by buying a new bulldog puppy Lyla. Mum and Dad Marsh are at the end of their tether and something drastic has to be done before they drown in a sea of pee.
Help arrives in the shape of tough-talking dog trainer Victoria Stilwell. Within minutes of being in the house, Victoria gets to experience the full range of the chihuahuas’ bad behaviour, breaking up a fight and experiencing the peeing first hand (or rather first foot), when one of the dogs takes a tinkle on her foot.
Lunch at the Marsh household has the dogs literally eating out of Jodie’s hand, as she feeds them off her plate and even off her fork. But as she points out to Victoria “they’ve got cleaner mouths than any boyfriend I’ve ever had”. She loves to show off favourite Paddy’s ability to ‘Hi Five’, but is less good at getting the chihuahuas to do what she wants. Victoria is so sure she can turn things around that she bets Jodie £5 she can get them all sitting to attention by the end of training.
Having seen enough, Victoria lays things on the line with Jodie. Abandoning the problem for her mum and dad to deal with is no longer an option. As her dogs, they must go where she is, white carpets or not.
The next day, training begins in earnest, and first on the agenda is putting a stop to the river of pee. Victoria gives Jodie a ‘tinkle timer’, so that every hour she can take the dogs out to do their business. She also gets forensic with the family, using a UV light to show up the persistent pee marks despite the constant cleaning. To banish the marking once and for all, Jodie gets scrubbing to remove last traces with a specialist cleaner.
Judicious use of treats and ignoring the dogs works to put a stop to the infighting and bullying of the bulldogs. And to show Jodie just how obedient a chihuahua can be, Victoria takes her to see a perfect specimen in action – a champion chihuahua who leaps over jumps and through tunnels in a miniature agility course designed especially.
The family continue working hard, with Jodie taking on responsibility for her doggie rabble for the first time. By the time Victoria comes back, Jodie is looking much more the pack leader and Mum and Dad are thrilled by the calmer, cleaner atmosphere. And Victoria wins her £5 bet by getting all four former tearaways sitting to attention.
It’s time for all the dogs to leave the family nest and move into Jodie’s new house. And amazingly, they manage it without a single wee. As a final test Jodie poses for a photoshoot with all her dogs for K9 Magazine. In contrast to their doggie deliquence just a few weeks before, they’re the model of good behaviour and make the magazine cover.
