Reactive Dog + House Party = Some Progress

[mbc1963]

Long story short: I have a reactive dog. Strangers approaching causes fear. We've worked hard on the reactivity, and he's generally OK now unless a person really invades his space by reaching out or leaning over him - in which case he just tries to jump away, though he will still bark if cornered.

 

The most difficult situation has always been strangers in my house. Buddy can learn fairly quickly to love people and accept them with happiness - but at that point they become friends in my house ("Let me beg for treats!"), and are useless for me in teaching acceptance of strangers. And believe me, it's really hard to find random people to come into the house and let a dog bark at them so I can work on training!

 

Last night I had some girls from work over for dinner. As I expected, Buddy barked upon their entrance, then calmed down while we were all seated for dinner, even giving paw and letting one former-stranger pat him. But all the transitions were really barky: people moving to the kitchen, people going in and out of the bathroom, people entering and leaving. Eventually, Buddy just gave up and put himself to bed: it was very late (10:00 p.m.!) and he's accustomed to being snuggled up by 8. (What can I say? I get up at 4:45.) It felt like he was just too tired to try to keep an eye on the situation anymore.

 

I'm looking at the dog I have now after 4.5 years, and it seems like he's much calmer and low-key about everything. It almost feels like he's barking now out of disapproval ("Stop it! You all need to stay seated at the table! That's how I like it! Stay in one room!") rather than out of fear. And barking out of habit, since this is what he's always done, and we don't have opportunity to practice different behavior.

 

Weird little guy. ::Sigh::

 

Mary

[kelpiegirl]

We all have at least one "weird one" Mine's Kylie. Sounds like progress is made, and you are coming to a compromise

[urge to herd]

It's fun to think about what might be going on in their heads, isn't it? Shoshone is the Queen of Quirk, perhaps she and Buddy are channeling each other.

 

Shonie has a thing about tennis balls being in the exact right spot, thank you. She doesn't do it nearly as much these days, but she used to constantly pick up a ball at the park, and carefully place it 2 ft to the right. The next ball would be placed several feet ahead of where it was, and on and on. She'd drop the ball she was fetching, pick up another ball, place it in the 'correct' spot, grab her ball and come flying back to me.

 

One day there was a ball in the middle of a puddle that was about 8 ft across. Shonie danced around at the edge of that puddle for a full minute, finally tiptoed in, grabbed the ball with her lips pulled back, and tiptoed out as fast as she could. She gave herself a shake, put that ball about 3 feet away from the puddle, (I guess so it wouldn't tragically roll in again) and was ready to play fetch. Work first, play later.

 

Ruth