Counterconditioning doggy fears!

Counterconditioning: IT’S NOT A RACE!

As you may know from personal experience, Counterconditioning and Desensitisation can have marvellous results.

And as you also may know - it takes time!

Don’t be like the reader who told me “I tried that once and it didn’t work”. You need to incorporate it into your daily life with your dog.

You may have read this blogpost of mine from last April:

https://www.brilliantfamilydog.com/blog/do-you-ask-your-dogs-permission-for-handling-him

which explains what to do. In this case I was faced with a fearful dog who did not like his feet being touched at all.

We’ve slowly moved on, just a small bit at a time, and now I am allowed to clip AND grind both Yannick’s front feet!

For the first time he allowed himself to be upended on my lap, when previously it was like trying to wrestle a clawed dragon. He’s since shown that he’d prefer to stay on the ground, so that’s where we do ‘em.

So … we got there in the end!

Smash and Grab!

I was shocked to see a dog trainer’s website recently . . . well, she calls herself a “dog behaviourist, Reactivity and Aggression Specialist” but shows NO qualifications whatever.

Coco steps forward to take his meds

And she said, as one of her benefits, "No need for bulk buying sessions rarely more than two needed"

I dread to think how she transforms a reactive, fearful, and aggressive dog in TWO SESSIONS.

I think we can guess. 😳 💥

And I, for one, am happy to take as long as it takes to bring my dog with me and change his experience of the world for the better.

Want to get started with this?

You can certainly start with The Bucket Game, as shown in the video in this post on treating your dog with respect.

Or you can go much deeper in From Growly Dog to Confident Dog.

Take a look at our free Masterclass for Growly Dogs to get you started!

Are you able to look after a dog?

So exciting, getting a puppy!

But also - especially if this is your first venture into having a companion dog - fraught with hazards!

In my efforts to make the transition from “new dog” to “family dog” as smooth as possible, I have provided you with many, many resources.

There are over 300 articles here, and most important of these are the three-part series on Choosing a Puppy. Start here.

There’s New Puppy!  - a handbook to get you through the first few months.

And there are various free and premium courses

Total mindset change

But the most important thing in preparing for your new puppy or new dog, is the total mindset change you’re going to need to make!

As any new first-time parent will tell you, the whole thing is mind-bending and requires a huge change in your lifestyle.

You have no idea of the effect this new baby will have on your life - till it happens!

This applies to four-footed family members too . . .

Resentment of the invasion?

It’s not uncommon for me to receive complaints from people who’ve just got a new puppy, and can’t understand why they can’t carry on their life exactly as before.

Maybe they think they’re getting a stuffed dog, or a bicycle, or something. Not a living, sentient, being - who has hopes and fears, feelings and sensations, needs and desires.

So seeing the puppy blamed for its distress and the new owner’s lack of sleep is upsetting for me.

Would they blame a baby for crying and disrupting their sleep? Of course not! They’d try to find out what’s wrong and put it right.

Some of these entitled people even re-home their unfortunate pups after only a few days. They seem to think their comfort is far more important than caring for this little creature they have chosen to bring into their home.

Perhaps it shows that they bought their puppy or dog on a whim, with no thought about whether they were suited to have a dog living with them for the next 12-15 years.

You should be prepared for total disruption to your life!

It also tells me that the person who sold them the puppy or dog was simply trying to shovel off excess animals with no care of where they went. This is all too common, I’m sorry to say, with those “greeders” who are just in it for a fast buck.

It’s no good taking five days off work and thinking that will do the trick for your new puppy.

And if you work full-time away from home, how are you going to manage a creature who cannot be left for more than four hours? If you’re relying on a family member to mind your dog while you’re out - for free - I can assure you that such arrangements frequently break down when the person involved realises what a huge commitment this is and that they’re being used.

Is it about you, or about the dog?

If you think your sleep is more important than your puppy’s wellbeing, think again.

And if you think that scamping on food - buying the cheapest and feeding as little as possible - is the way to go: oh oh oh. I hardly know where to begin.

I have had people tell me they feed two meals a day - to an 8 week old puppy! Even giant breed puppies! Then they wonder why the poor starving creature is crying all night.

If you fit this category, I question the breeder of the dog.

A good breeder is concerned about the wellbeing of her pups, so anyone who gets a puppy while being out of the house ten hours a day has clearly gone to a puppy farm.

I had to complete a detailed questionnaire and write an essay before I could be considered for my latest puppy!

This is NORMAL.

A good breeder devotes months of her life to rearing her precious pups. She’s not going to let them go to any-old-body who has no understanding of how to manage them.

Would local authorities hand over a child for adoption without in-depth investigation? One would hope not!

Start the right way!

So start the right way. Read this article and kick off by making some choices about who you want to share your life with. Then do some serious research into where you can source your chosen dog.

The right breeder will be keen to help you learn what you need, to have a great start with your pup.

And a reputable shelter will not want to make a mistake with one of their charges, and find it bounces back for further re-homing.

Starting an adventure with a new dog is a thrilling experience! And just like how the excitement and anticipation of planning a holiday is often as good as the holiday itself, so a preparation period while you learn and research is so important to the success of this new relationship.

Please avail of the many resources available to you, dismiss fanciful notions and deal with facts.

Here’s that Puppy Book for you: 

Are you limiting your dog (and yourself!)?

I was meeting up with a friend recently and met his wife. “And how are you keeping?” says I. “Getting older,” she replied. 

And, I’m sorry to say, this theme was revisited time and again during my visit. Everything was framed as what she couldn’t do because of her age. Sadly, I think that joining a group of older people - who seem to be preoccupied with their health and what they are unable to do - had emphasised her feelings of gloom and despondency.

But you know me! I was not long about filling her mind with more positive thoughts, ways to move forward, make exciting plans, realise what she could do with her life with what she already had.

And she was a very different person when I left, thanking me for what I’d done for her, already full of ideas and making plans for her next project.

Why am I telling you this?

It’s about LABELS.

You may know that I have a bee in my bonnet about how people label themselves, their family and friends, and their dog!

Here are a couple of posts on the subject:

Hooray for change for your dog! Discard the old labels

Labelling your dog and yourself

Labels are limiting!

The thing is, applying a label to something is so limiting. It means it can never be anything else.

This is fine if it’s a table, or a car, that you’re labelling.

But when it comes to sentient beings, creatures interacting with each other, creatures who are growing and developing (or should be!), it is totally inappropriate.

Saying “I’m too old,” is going to prevent you from doing all the things you’re well able to do.

Things that will make your mark on the world, help society, move the world forward.

And saying, “My dog is … stubborn/stupid/untrainable/a rescue” is preventing you seeing your dog as a creature capable of huge learning and growth!

Blanket statements

Making blanket statements tends to be limiting.

“I’m no good at …”

“He always …”

“My dog never …”

We hear these all the time, and it’s equivalent to throwing out the anchor and parking yourself exactly where you are.

No possibility of change!

Replacement thoughts

How about replacing these thoughts in your mind with more enlightening ones:

“I’m open to trying new things.”

“I’d love my dog to … walk nicely on lead/retrieve/calm down ..”

“I have plenty of time left to me - I’m going to …”

“The only constant is change.” Heraclitus

And as Maria Popova says so well,

“A person is not a potted plant of predetermined personality but a garden abloom with the consequences of chance and choice that have made them who they are, resting upon an immense seed vault of dormant potentialities. At any given moment, any seed can sprout — whether by conscious cultivation or the tectonic tilling of some great upheaval or the composting of old habits and patterns of behavior that fertilize a new way of being. Nothing saves us from the tragedy of ossifying more surely than a devotion to regularly turning over the soil of personhood so that new expressions of the soul can come abloom.”

https://www.themarginalian.org/2024/05/15/gardner-self-renewal-meaning/

Budget mentality

Folk sometimes get stuck in limiting themselves to what they think they can afford.

Oh, what a bad road to go down!

You are only limited by your imagination.

If you decide you are going to do anything at all - move house, write a book, start a project - the last thing you should worry about is your budget.

If you leave that out of your calculations entirely, opportunities will present themselves which you would never have seen if you were focussing on what you could afford.

And - here’s the exciting part! These opportunities can bring rewards you could never have expected. Results that far outweigh any investment you made.

Students in the Brilliant Family Dog Academy, for instance, tell me they enrolled in the program because their dog was difficult, or pulling on the lead, or whatever, and what they discovered is a new way of being with their formerly challenging dog that has opened up a new life for both of them.

Here’s what Carol R had to say:

“We have both come a long way, and it is no exaggeration when I say she is a transformed dog 😊. Although we have now worked our way through the whole of the course, we are continually going back to work again through modules, and dipping into Beverley’s books as and when we need to. Our learning will be ongoing for life, but we don’t mind, we are really enjoying it. I’ve found it’s really strengthened our bond, and most of all, it’s fun!!“

We’re exactly halfway through the year - tell me in the comments what you’re going to do with the second half!

How much does your dog sleep?

I make no apologies for revisiting this vital subject! So many of the queries I get can be resolved by simply allowing or encouraging your dog to sleep more!

Dogs need 17 hours of sleep a day to function well.

And this doesn’t mean snatched minutes of shut-eye when nothing is happening for a few moments!

It means proper, deep, uninterrupted sleep, for at least an hour at a time - and, of course, all night!

Teach ‘em young

And this doesn’t just happen without careful management.

In the same way that most responsible parents manage their babies’ and toddlers’ sleep sessions, teaching them that a sleep will cure lots of upsets, we have to teach our puppies how to manage themselves.

This is valuable learning.

We put small children in cots to make sure they can’t race around exhausting themselves when they need to rest.

In the same way, we can use crates or playpens to manage our puppies - who often won’t stop till they’re nailed to the floor!

I honestly don’t know how anyone manages a puppy without a crate or a playpen! I think that without these terrific aids we’re giving ourselves a huge amount of extra work and stress.

If you struggled to manage your youngster over the holiday period, now is the time to double down on teaching him or her how to sleep.

💤 Alone.  

💤  Contained.

💤 Without you.

💤 Without distraction.

You’ll be so glad you did!

And for more gems on managing your dog, check out the how-to books here!

Check other post that might help your brilliant dogs:

I have a new puppy: will I ever get any sleep again?

How much time does your dog spend sleeping?

Errorless Housetraining and Crate Training

Puppy Crate training demystified

I love my dog AND I love my sleep!

Was your first dog your bestest dog ever?

My childhood dog was called Simon.

He was black and white and grey - a blue roan, in spaniel language - though much bigger than cocker spaniels tend to be nowadays, an old-fashioned version.

He was the same age as me, so we grew up together.

Harry Potter-like, he slept in the Singing Cupboard.

This was the same kitchen cupboard that housed the wireless, so he could enjoy “Music while you Work” and other such gems from post-war Britain while he dozed on his blankets. (No, he was never shut in the cupboard.)

In those days - especially in our suburban arcadia - it was normal for dogs to be loose. So our childhood adventures in the fields and on bikes were always accompanied by Simon.

Sometimes he wore sunglasses. Sometimes the poor dog had to wear shorts or a jumper. He took great pleasure in mucky pools and ditches, and he loved car rides.

He’d lie in front of the open fire and occasional coal explosions would result in a column of smoke rising from the sleeping dog’s thick coat. Very little bothered him.

Decades before dog agility was begun as a sport, I had jumps and hoops rigged up in the garden as a “showjumping course” for my dog.

So you can see where all this dog training came from!

Many people look back happily on their childhood, and the dog or dogs that pulled them through it.

It’s natural to want to re-create that for ourselves now, and especially for our family, so that our children can enjoy the same freedom and joy of having a devoted companion through the trials and tribulations of growing up.

But there are some things you need to keep in mind. 

🐾 There’ll never be another Simon.

There have been plenty of other charming canine individuals in my life - and I wouldn’t want to change a thing about them - but it’s not possible to re-create Simon. Each new dog brings his own personality to the party, and you have to work with what you have, not what you may wish you had.

🐾 Things have changed.

The happy-go-lucky life we enjoyed as children does not happen so much now. Dogs tend to be banned and barred from so many places that they don’t have the same social skills Simon had.

🐾 Breeds have changed.

What was once a suitable family pet is not necessarily now the case. You will have to dig deep here to find out what you need to know before inviting a particular breed into your home.

🐾 Memories are selective.

And as a child there’s an awful lot that I never knew or understood. My mother may have had a different view of having Simon - coloured by all the extra housework and possibly expense he may have caused. I never had to clean sick off the carpet - maybe it never happened. Maybe it happened a lot. I have no memory of that.

 🐾 On the plus side,

advances in understanding of dog behaviour and training have been so enormous over the past couple of decades, that all the help you need to rear the Brilliant Family Dog you want is available to you.

You just need to know where to look. Hint: keep reading!

By all means cherish the memories of your beloved childhood dog, and try and find his essence in a present-day equivalent.

That warm fuzzy glow of endless summer that I remember is far from being the whole picture!

Harness your dog's imagination!

Here at Brilliant Family Dog we hear so often about the woeful things dogs have got up to.

It’s all about the dreadful things they’ve dreamed up and the bad things they’ve done. They’ve chewed things up, they’ve managed to escape, they’ve re-arranged your flowerbeds …

Perversely, I’m pleased to hear these stories.

Why?

Because it shows that the dog is exercising his imagination!

In the absence of being given interesting things to do, he’s making up his own entertainment.

This shows that he is resourceful, enterprising, thoughtful, and eminently teachable!

What can I teach him to do instead?

Let’s have a look at a really simple, basic, but highly amusing “toy”: a cardboard box. Get one big enough for your dog to clamber into - at least get his front paws in. Check it over for sharp staples.

Now let’s see what he can do with it! Some of this will need your input, some you can happily let your dog discover.

• front paws in

• front paws on

• all paws in

• all paws on

• whole body in (box collapsed yet?)

• find hidden toys in it

• find toy amongst masses of screwed-up paper

• find toy amongst loads of empty plastic bottles, or smaller boxes

• hide food in cardboard tubes or small boxes - to be found and shredded

• put toy in

• take toy out

• hide a toy in a smaller box

• put smaller box into large box

• crawl through a cut-out “door”

• teach scent by hiding something in one of many boxes

• push it

• curl up in it

• drag it

• chew it up . . .

For your older, bored, dog, this is going to be heaven!

For your young puppy it’s an essential stage of getting her used to strange surfaces, wobbly things, things that slip and slide, noisy things, crunchy things, rattly things. I call this Puppy Gym and it’s a vital part of my puppy classes and the Brilliant Family Dog Academy

Some older dogs, especially those who’ve been used to being told what to do, will be perplexed by this box. You’ll need to spice it up a bit to pique their interest - perhaps toss a few treats in to get them interacting with it.  

And please don’t worry about mess! Mess is a by-product of living, and this is going to be a controlled mess, of your choosing.

Isn’t that far better than the mess you find when your bored dog entertains himself by chewing your computer cables, or loving your slippers to death?

Let me know in the comments how you got on with this possibly new game!

And for more fun for your dog, get our free email course here

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