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- Feb 15, 2019
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Here's the backstory: My fiancé's 16 year old dog passed away and out of heartbreak and after a few months of moping around, she decided it was time to get a "new" dog. I say "new" because it was "new" to her and being in the animal care industry, everything is a charity case and she wanted to adopt a "hard case" dog. Probably the toughest case imaginable TBH. Well that's Pebbles. She's a 4-ish year only terrier something with three legs. She was found roaming the streets as a puppy with a severely dislocated hip that had healed poorly and warranted amputating the offending rear leg as the best course of treatment. She gets around perfectly fine thankfully BUT her behavior is atrociously bad. I attribute it to her being passed around from one foster mom to another. Literally every caretaker has been a middle-aged woman who has no doubt treated Pebbles like a wounded woodland creature and spoiled her beyond all hope, complete with "OOoogggooo BoooGgOO baby doggie" baby talk... Not surprisingly, the dog is now comprised entirely of velcro and won't stray more than 6" away from my fiancé, while acting like the world is out to get her and must be constantly monitored. She's the poster child of "guard dog behavior" including waiting next to the bathroom door while my fiancé does whatever girls do in bathrooms and going totally berserk if she hears any noise out of her line of sight. She does this as well if she's hanging out with her "security blanket human" on the couch and hears me moving around upstairs. She also chases our cats whenever they get anywhere near her pet human. Also... Pebbles wasn't leash trained or housebroken, which complicates the matter of me trying to make this dog less dependent as walk time becomes an exercise of trying to convince Pebbles that my putting a leash on her after providing cat treats isn't the worst thing in the world. But that's how she is. Massive separation anxiety and constant squealing like she's summoning a pod of whales coupled with protesting to a level that includes turning down actual... REAL bacon while imploding so far into her dog bed that I'm worried she'll trigger a fusion reaction. Any advice on this aside from asking for the Dog Whisperer to come out and be "pathive aggrethive with the dog"?
Some of things I've tried:
1. Randomly dropping treats from my pocket to make the dog associate me with good things.
2. Keeping the dog in close proximity to me for extended periods while offering treats/praise.
3. Making the fiancé "invite" the dog into her space instead of letting it just claim it (which she's done a meh job of)
4. Making the fiancé ignore the dog when she comes home from work and instead me swooping in to provide attention/a much needed walk
Some of things I've tried:
1. Randomly dropping treats from my pocket to make the dog associate me with good things.
2. Keeping the dog in close proximity to me for extended periods while offering treats/praise.
3. Making the fiancé "invite" the dog into her space instead of letting it just claim it (which she's done a meh job of)
4. Making the fiancé ignore the dog when she comes home from work and instead me swooping in to provide attention/a much needed walk