roxy, rocking it.

Rob's Dad has a small airplane at a local airport near us, and every year he has a BBQ there. We like to bring the dogs because there is some wide open space in the bark part of the airport that is surrounded by trees and brush.  It's a safe place where the dogs can truly run, because there is nowhere to go.  Sure, we have a yard, but if Roxy were to run at full speed in our yard, she'd hit the fence in 3.2 seconds. So she usually runs in circles, which just doesn't provide her the same ability to run as hard as she'd like to.

The airport BBQ was two weekends ago, and we brought Roxy and Buster, a ton of treats, a ball, and of course, plenty of water.  There were probably 20 people there, plus a handful of kids.  While we were with everyone else, the dogs were on-leash and they were so well-behaved.  They normally are well-behaved anyway, but I was still very proud.  Neither pup jumped on anybody, and everyone had questions about them and remarked on how well behaved they were.

First and foremost, Roxy wasn't fazed by any of the people that were there. Nada. Zip. Zilch. People were coming up to say hi, ask questions, and talk about their own dogs, and both Roxy and Buster were soaking up the loving. Yes, that's right -- ROXY was soaking up loving from STRANGERS.  And multiple strangers, at that.  The owner of the airport came over, and she even commented on how far Roxy has come since the last time she saw her (which was last year).  ROXY WIN!

Could it get any better? Of course it can... and it does!!


There were kids running around, and they were just kids being kids:  running, playing, screaming, popping balloons, crying, and laughing. But Roxy was relaxed the whole time.  We kept our distance from the kids, but even in the past, Roxy would have been very concerned about their erratic behavior.  She would have been hypervigilantly watching their every move; her neck would have been stretched up and out, her ears forward, and she would not have taken her eyes off them.  I could be trying to feed her a steak, and she would take it, all right, but if she had to turn her head to the side, she would find a way to keep her panic-stricken eyes on the strange 2-legged creatures that were running about and screaming.... which meant she was nibbling on whatever I had while subsequently swinging her rear end around to make sure her back was not to the kids at any given moment.

Now, we have been working very hard with relaxing around little kids.  We've done work anywhere from 5-30 feet away from kids, depending on a number of factors.  And when we first started working, she had a super rough mouth when taking treats, and she would try her darnedest to take the treats without ever taking her eyes off the kids.  But on Sunday, Roxy chose to lie down and ignore the kids.  She was relaxed and evidence of that is in my fingers. She had an incredibly soft mouth, even when the kids were running about and screaming.  And really, the only noise that spooked her was a balloon popping, but she perked up for a moment in response to the noise, and then went back to relaxing.  Roxy's ability to recover from the balloon popping really impressed me -- in the past she would have kept looking for whatever caused the noise for at least several minutes.  And her ability to lay down and relax while the kids were running around was incredibly rewarding for me... it was also very rewarding for her considering I was randomly shoving stinky fish treats in her mouth. Nevertheless, Roxy was so relaxed and happily soaking up attention from strangers, despite the added trigger.  I couldn't be happier.

Later on in the day, Rob and I meandered over to the secluded field in the woods.  We dropped the dogs' leashes and just let them run.  Roxy was a dream -- she would run full speed out in front of us, then stop at about 30 feet, turn, and wait for us to come closer. Sometimes she would turn and run back to us to check in, and then off she went again.  Buster just sort of followed Roxy around, being his normal, happy-go-lucky self.

I had brought some awesome treats to do some recall work, because every opportunity is a great opportunity to practice Roxy's recall in new and not-so-familiar places.

 

I venture to say she's doing pretty well.

Of course, there is always more work to be done, but we're making big progress, and she's becoming a more relaxed and happy dog, overall.  All of this makes me incredibly happy, and I can only imagine how much it's helping her to feel better about all these things going on, as well.  I am very proud of her.

all-around update

Roxy's leash-walking skills are getting better and better.  We're now able to do most of our walk with minimal stopping.  We're actually down to walking in a heel position without any treats when there are minimal or no distractions -- and when she screws up, I can mark "oops" and she'll come back into a heel because she knows we don't go anywhere until she's next to me.

She still pulls when she sees something moving (a person, a dog, a leaf, another animal) but we're working on that.  It's tough because once she notices whatever it is moving, I mark "oops" and stop but she stays at the end of the leash, pulling. So I have to come up with a new strategy for handling that because it's not working.  She'll just keep pulling until the moving object is out of sight, or close enough for her to recognize. Then she'll come back into a heel position.  So, we need to work on heeling with distractions.  I need to up the ante with rewards for not pulling with distractions.  So I'll probably start in the house, then in the backyard, then the driveway.... all before working in the street.

Roxy's agility class is also going fairly well.  She still gets really excited when I ask her if she wants to go to school.  We've been learning left and right turns, rear crosses, and we've been working on the teeter, which Roxy is doing wonderfully on.  I thought she'd be spooked by it, but she's really doing great.  She'll jump up when it's at the highest height and pull it down, then climb on it with all fours.  We haven't worked up to walking across it yet, we're taking it slow to make sure it stays happy. I'm debating what we'll do after this class, though.  The class is really for competitive agility and although Roxy enjoys agility, she isn't as driven as I think she might need to be in order to actually compete.  I think I need to work on some crate games with her to build her drive a bit and see if that helps.

As far as Sonny goes, his behavior continues to fluctuate.  He came out of his crate once last week and zig-zagged his way towards Rob, who was laying on the couch.  He got close enough to sniff Rob's legs before retreating to his crate.  That's how he started interacting with me, so albeit it's slow progress, but it's progress nonetheless.

He's been playing with Roxy and Buster a lot more, and Roxy is becoming more tolerant of him.  He had been licking her muzzle feverishly and she let him know she didn't like it and he's getting better.... he's down to a drive-by-licking instead of a full-on make out session with her face.  Roxy's also been instigating play with him more, and her and Sonny tear through the backyard, running in circles after each other some days.

Sonny has also been playing and interacting with me more.  He has such personality; there is so much spunk and puppy in him.  He is really a goofy dog and he makes me laugh.  I'm fairly certain he learned to play fetch from Buster because he keeps coming up on the couch with the ball in his mouth, allowing me to take the ball and throw it for him, and then taking a flying leap over me after the ball...  When he comes out of his crate in the morning, he wags his tail feverishly while play bowing and grabbing toys to carry about.  It's nice to see him acting like a dog a little bit.

He is still pretty scared of men.  He's been sneaking about and snatching Rob's stuff and running to his crate with it, and that has helped me devise a plan.  I'm going to start desensitizing and counter-conditioning Sonny to smaller parts of Rob... i.e. his smell, his voice, etc. One piece of Rob at a time.

And Buster is, well, Buster.  He's wonderful.  This morning he was watching me do something on the counter in the kitchen and he turned around quickly to go elsewhere, and in the process he smacked the whole side of his face into the cabinet and then sat down with this pathetic look on his face.  I crouched down and he buried his face into my body and let out a big sigh.  He's a silly dog, but he's really such a sweet, sweet dog.  He loves to just climb right into my lap and snuggle. 

We spent a few hours at the park on Sunday and later on, I caught him sleeping on the couch with his tongue sticking out...

training: never miss a moment

Roxy's training walk yesterday was very productive... not only did we get to work on some stuff I had planned for, we had the opportunity to work on a few things I hadn't planned for.  Namely, the ice cream truck, screaming kids, and basketball-playing teens!

First, Roxy's leash-walking skills are definitely getting better. We've been walking on her martingale collar 90% of the time.  On walks when I don't have time to make sure I'm paying attention to her pulling, we walk on the Halti to prevent her from rehearsing the pulling behavior.  I initially gave her too much leeway on the regular collar, and let her walk wherever, as long as the leash was loose; but we were not having as much success as I wanted.  So I've been keeping her on a much shorter leash, next to me, and simply stopping with a no-reward mark of "oops" and going with our release word, "okay," when she comes back into a heel position.  We've been doing lots of work with rewarding her for her standing next to me, and she's getting better now to the point where if she forges ahead, and I stop and say "oops," she'll come back to my side and look up at me.

Second, we'd been struggling with cars, trucks, etc. on walks.  She watches them so intently, and attempted to lunge at them a few times, so I knew we needed to deal with that behavior.  We worked a lot on "leave it" and today we got to put it to the test with the ice cream truck, while the music/sound was going on.  I asked for, and got, a solid "leave it" -- not only did she look away from the truck, but she wowed me by looking away from the truck and making eye contact with me. Big win!

Third, we had several solid "leave it" trials with dogs barking from their houses, doors, windows, yards, etc.  Not a single reactive moment.  Of course she was on alert when she heard them bark, but she did great, just perking up to listen, and then kept walking!

Fourth, there were kids playing basketball and she walked (almost) perfectly by them on the leash.  We stopped a short distance before them (about 20 feet) and did some basic obedience and then we moved on.  She did great walking by them, although we need to work a little on walking loosely on the leash around people, because she gets excited and wants to check everyone out.

Lastly, a few houses from home, there was a family outside with 5 young kids (between 5 and 10 years old), 2 adults, and a walking toddler.  They were all on the front lawn, playing, randomly screaming, running about, and just plain being kids. I definitely hadn't planned for it, but I couldn't miss out on this perfect opportunity to do some desensitization and counterconditioning, so we stayed across the street and I just kept popping treats in her mouth.  She got extra treats when the kids screamed, made random or unexpected noises, and when they moved (they were stopping and going a lot).  We stayed across the street until I was almost out of treats, and then we left.

We ended on a great note, she walked next to me for 3 houses straight without any reminders and sat perfectly at the front door waiting to come inside.

an up-hill battle

Sonny and I have been struggling a lot lately.  He seems overall better inside the house.  He's more relaxed with me, Roxy, and Buster.  He's slowly getting more relaxed with Rob, in the sense that he'll come out of his crate when he's around, as long as Rob isn't moving or talking.  He doesn't cower in his crate when Rob walks around, but he's still obviously uncomfortable and watches him like a hawk, just in case.

Outside is a different story.

Sonny's walks have been shorter lately because he seems to be becoming more fearful and anxious than he used to be.  We've just been going outside for potty and back inside because he literally will potty and then drag me back inside because he doesn't want to be out there. Any noises he hears outside set him into a panic where he will lay down on his belly and try to leap-frog away, despite being attached to me by a leash.  I've learned that the moment he hears a noise or see's a human, it's over.  We have to go back inside, he will not go potty after that, even if the person leaves or the noise stops.

Some mornings, I'll jog him a few houses up in the, to get him some sort of exercise; but it really depends on what time we get out in the morning, how he's doing, and if there are people out there.

We went to the veterinarian on Thursday to discuss his loose stools, and after much debate and argument with the rescue Sonny is being fostered for, I was given permission to discuss the idea of medicating Sonny as part of his treatment.  It has been almost 6 weeks and although there is some progress, he was definitely regressing in some areas and he was obviously suffering mentally.  I went and talked to the force/aversive trainer that the rescue uses, despite my protests in using him because of the force and aversion techniques he uses.  But I was told he needed to see their trainer before discussing medication.  I spoke to the trainer without Sonny and explained that I thought bringing him there would be too stressful, and after telling him about Sonny's behavior, he also said it sounded like Sonny was a good candidate for medication and "the gimmick" of clicker training, even though he doesn't really like gimmicks.

(Ironic note here, I brought Roxy with me to see this guy, to get an idea of how he responds to fearful dogs in case the rescue refused to medicate him unless the trainer actually saw him.  I was less concerned about her, because she's at a point where even if he went to pet her before she was ready, I could easy mark and treat her for the interaction without doing damage.  Anyway, it worked out nicely, the trainer was great with her and very polite in his actions towards her, which made me feel better in general.  But he was saying how clicker training was a gimmick, and he doesn't use it, but it might work for Sonny. In the same breath he was saying how wonderful Roxy was, and how well she was trained, etc... so I politely let him know that she was clicker trained, with a marker word instead of the click... he didn't know what to say. I giggled.)

Anyway, at the vet Thursday, I explained Sonny's situation, and we spent over an hour discussing his behavior, our struggles, and his overall anxiety.  I explained how Sonny is too afraid to learn, that I haven't had success with any desensitization or counterconditioning, that I couldn't even teach him to sit or target my hand, that he wouldn't reliably approach me or anyone for food or anything, we can't approach him at all, etc.  I also explained to her about his loose stools that he's had since he came home with me, and she decided to put him on a prescription diet in order to "reset his digestive system."  He can't have any other food or treats for the next week while we work out his stomach issues.

When it came to discussing his behavior, it culminated in the vet telling me that she didn't want to medicate him because he wasn't showing any signs of aggression -- she told me how she has several fear aggressive patients that she's chosen not to medicate, and they are much worse than Sonny.  I asked her how long she wanted to wait, and she said he might need to be medicated "down the line."  So I told her I honestly didn't care about any other patients, that we're not here to discuss how Sonny's behavior compares to other patients, we're here to discuss the fact that Sonny's quality of life sucks, and will continue to suck since we can't make any progress training wise.  I don't understand, does she want to wait until after he bites someone? Medication is not a solution to aggression, it's a training aid meant to bring Sonny's mind to a point where he's relaxed enough to actually learn to prevent him from becoming fear aggressive....  And as she forcibly pet Sonny, she told me, "he looks like he's going to be just fine," and then told me that when he's afraid, I should have him sit.  Right. Because he knows how to sit, or I'm able to teach him to sit.  I can't even approach the dog, let alone attempt to teach him to sit!

Then, when we were leaving, Sonny was running back and forth in his typical panicked state of mind, and I was just talking to him, "It's okay, Sonny," and "Let's go see Roxy and Buster," and "It's okay, buddy."  I know ultimately if he's that afraid he probably doesn't hear me, or doesn't get any benefit from what I'm saying, but it's natural to want to console your pet.  And the veterinarian told me not to do that because it was rewarding his fear.  I politely told her that you can't reward fear.  I don't think she expected it, to be honest.  But she said she would send me the behavior evaluation and we would see about putting him on meds, but I got the impression she wasn't interested in medicating him.

Late last night, the vet emailed me information on desensitization and counterconditioning, and a tranquility protocol that was similar to Dr. Karen Overall's Protocol for Relaxation.... I wrote back letting her know I've more than familiar with d/cc due to having my own fearful dog at home, and I'm working with her on the Protocol for Relaxation right now, but that Sonny is not capable of handling any of that work at this point because he's always in an anxious state and I can't even approach him or toss or roll treats in his general direction without sending him running.

We're supposed to go back for a follow up next Thursday. I expect that once she's read my email, her mind will be a bit more open to the fact that Sonny is not going to just "be fine" and even if he would be "fine" in several months, that he will be mentally suffering in the meantime and that's unacceptable.

Even today... he was laying in the Papasan Chair, with one of his ever-so-watchful eyes open.

a play bow, a hike, and little victories for sonny

I'm slowly getting to know Sonny's personality, and I'm totally in love with him.  He's adorably playful and he's starting to show some excitement when he sees me in the morning.  He bounds out of his crate and follows me to the backdoor, where we commence play session #1 for the day.  He bows. I bow. He half-jumps, with his front paws in the air like a puppy who has no clue how big he is, or even what balance is, for that matter. I put my head down and he comes over and nuzzles my head a little, licks my fingers, and runs back a couple of feet and play bows again.  At this point, Buster usually runs to me, half tackles me for the morning cuddles, and then Sonny runs over and licks my toes.  He's totally adorable, with his mouth open just a little, his ears relaxed, and his tail up. And the whole time he's observing, watching what's going on and trying to figure this "home" thing out.

Then we go outside, and he eliminates right away; something that was previously took upwards of 30 minutes. I've been taking him out back in the yard on the retractable leash to give him some space because he seems to prefer to go further away from me, rather than closer.  Lately I've been taking him out with Roxy and Buster, now that our introductions are done... and they go off running and he so badly wants to join them and play.  He bounds and leaps after them, with that same goofy, puppy-antic-style leaps and bounds, and I do my best to keep up, but when they start running under and around bushes, I can't follow and neither can Sonny because the leash will get tangled.  I feel awful when he wants to run with them and can't.  But he can't be off-leash, not even in the yard.

The problem is, Sonny has shown that he's easily capable of jumping and climbing 7+ foot fences.  My fence is only 3.5 feet tall. So there's no way I can trust him.  So far, the only way I've got him to approach me is if I'm squatting down and loving on Buster and Buster gets super excited.  So I have that as an emergency backup plan, but I'd really rather not have to go combing the woods in the middle of winter (or any season, for that matter) with Buster, my 3-legger, hoping Sonny will come to us.  I can't risk it.  He's way too much of a flight risk. 

Yesterday, Rob and I took Roxy and Sonny for a hike.  I took Buster for a long walk earlier today, but the hike would have been too much for him, especially with all the ice. Plus, I wanted Roxy and Sonny to be out there together; walking together, getting treats together, and smelling stuff together.  Sonny did really well, overall.  We avoided the few people that were out there, but he was taking treats and drinking water with us right there, which has previously been difficult for him to do.  He even took a few treats from Rob.

Roxy struggled a bit when we saw some people with dogs, unfortunately, and made me realize how far we still have to go with her.  I was actually quite a bit surprised by her behavior, because she's been otherwise doing great when we see other dogs.  But this was a new environment, and Sonny was there and his anxiety probably didn't help.  I can't wait for the weather to get nicer so I can do some more work with her.  It's been so cold I haven't been able to find anyone else outside (with or without dogs) to do some desensitization and counterconditioning.  We also walked her on her flat collar because we figured the halti head collar would get frustrating on her face for 2 hours or so, and boy, do we need to start working on her heel.  She's great on the halti, but once we get on the flat collar, she pulls like a freight train! So rather than having her try to learn "keep the leash loose," I'm just going to train her to walk next to me (in a heel position) all the time.  I think she needs more exact instructions about where she should be walking, as opposed to the general "loose leash" work we've been doing.

Sonny, on the other hand, seems to be leash trained.  Go figure...

play bows and tail wags

This past week was a very "progressive" one for Roxy.  I've been noticing how different she's been lately.  Her tail seems to wag a lot more, and faster, for a longer period of time.  She seems overall happier and more relaxed.  Sonny's presence has definitely brought her up one level in anxiety, but that was to be expected and her and I have been working harder to keep her comfortable and happy.

First, Roxy did amazing at her agility class.  The training facility's owner came by, and he's a big, loud, scary, "walk-with-a-purpose" sort of guy, especially to a dog who's unsure of herself or unsure of people.  Roxy hadn't met him yet, and he was walking along the line of dogs and had been saying hi to most of them as they approached him.  As he came nearer to us, I told him Roxy was fearful, and he said no problem, and stopped within smelling distance for her while interacting with the dog next to Roxy.  Roxy immediately approached him, sniffing and wagging her tail, and after her sniff, she turned her butt towards him, happily asking to be petted.

This is HUGE progress for her. Contrast that to 7 months ago when, if someone had even walked in her general direction, she would have backed up with whale eye, scared and unsure.  And, if she had chosen to sniff the person, there would be no petting allowed, as per her lack of a request.  And if the person moved unexpectedly during the sniffing process, it would have been game over; she'd have scampered away, never to return.

It was seriously a huge moment for her and I.  The walk-in, informal class has a lot of the same people each week, and the people who are there frequently were giving her lots of complements on how far she's come.

Sunday's walk provided another victory.  I had Roxy and Sonny out on a walk and it was a little chilly so I wasn't expecting to see too many people.  But there was apparently an open house down the road from us, so there were a good amount of cars on our dead end street...

As we approached the open house, there was a couple getting out of a car and Roxy spotted them.  We had stopped and turned around to avoid stressing Sonny too much; Roxy, on the other hand, turned and watched the people carefully as she immediately and feverishly began wagging her tail and whining to get closer to them... I couldn't believe it.  She whined a lesser version of her "Mommy's home" whine.  It was an "I want to say hi!" sort of whine, and she's never done that for anyone aside from a few choice people she already knows and loves.

She's also been more interested in playing with Sonny, who she previously was very happy to ignore completely.  She is overwhelmed by playing with Sonny and Buster at the same time, so I've been doing lots of 1-on-1, mixing it up with the three of them.  Sonny play bowed and play-growled when we came in from our morning potty break yesterday, and Roxy immediately perked up, as if she was waiting for him to make that noise. She ran right up to him, slammed both her front paws on the ground and rolled her head around and let out a small growl, which is what she does with Buster when she's excited and really wants to play.  Sonny was so happy, as if the girl he's been pining over finally noticed him, and Roxy and him played for a good 10 minutes before I decided to end it on a good note.

Roxy has really come so, so far compared to where she was, who she was, when I adopted her. All the desensitization and counterconditioning work that her and I have been doing is paying off, and I'm so excited that I want to scream and tell the world how proud I am of her!!

another training session

Yesterday was our 3rd session with Erica.  I crated Roxy and Buster, like usual, when she was expected to arrive.  When she came inside, Roxy was in her crate barking, but once she saw who it was, she was wiggling her little wiggle butt to see Erica!! We let her out and she ran to Erica... she was so excited to see her, it was pretty amazing to see such a huge change in her.

We tried to go for a walk but Roxy was struggling, a lot, with the walking piece of it.  She was dragging me down the road.  I think she was just excited to show Erica how good she was doing.  Erica also said Roxy was a totally different dog than she met a few months back.  So, I'm glad to say I've done something right with her.  We still have work to do; in fact, I think we'll always be working, but I'm so proud of her.

Anyway... we wound up coming back to the house and I was explaining to her the trouble I was having with Buster, how he'd become a little bit more reactive and we brought him out and did some work with him also, and she pretty much said I should work on the same things with him that I've been working on with Roxy. So, I have more work to do!

Roxy is a true testament to what humane, positive training methods can do and how amazingly they work when applied correctly and consistently.  I'm seriously so happy with how far she has come already, and it's only been 4 months!

busy with training

We've been busy. VERY busy. Which is awesome.

Roxy's making huge progress, as far as I can tell.  We switched from the sensation harness to the halti head collar.  I wasn't having success with the sensation harness, Roxy seemed to just start pulling on an angle instead of like a freight train moving forward.  It's probably user error... but I don't have the patience to deal with that while I'm trying to work on other things.  I'll take a leash puller over a reactive dog any day, so I'll work on the reactivity first, and leash-walking later.

We've been going to public places with her to do some work.  We've been to the pet store a lot, and used the strip mall attached for some desensitization and counterconditioning exercises.  The pet store during adoption events is great for when we want to do dog-dog work, but when I want to do dog-people work, I need to be out of hearing range because the dogs are definitely more interesting to her than the people.

So we sit on a bench outside of Pier 1 and wait for people to pass by. And Roxy eats. And eats. And eats.  Freshpet Vital makes a grain-free fish formula.... it stinks something awful but it's been a great high value treat.  It's dog food, so I don't feel guilty giving Roxy tons of it, and we can just skip a meal if she gets enough during training.

Today we were outside and a nice family stopped by with teenage kids.  Teenage kids are great because they're typically bigger and are more predictable than small kids.  We went through our "go say hi" exercise and she gave all 3 people touches and then even butt-bumped the teenage boy for butt scratches.  This is HUGE for her. HUGE. The guy was a total stranger and she invited him to pet her.

The family loves pit bulls, too... so I think Roxy knew they were good people :)

training: progress!

Roxy seems to be getting better at "look," "touch," and "leave it."  She's also starting to see people and check in with me, which is really awesome.  She doesn't do it all the time without me asking, but she's done it SOME of the time without me asking, which is huge.

We're struggling with leash walking still, but I think I'm seeing a little bit of difference.  The biggest thing I've noticed with the leash walking so far is that when she's walking well on leash, and something makes her nervous or anxious, she immediately starts pulling again. So at least I can start to anticipate those things and work on keeping her focus before that.

Overall her reactivity seems to be slowing down a bit also.  She's getting less nervous with cars passing by, she's less nervous when she sees people approaching, and seems to be doing better with other dogs.  If the other dog is ignoring her, quiet, or around 10 feet away, she seems to do fine.  She still perks up and wants to check them out, but overall seems more relaxed with their presence.  She does seem to do the best, so far, if we stop and do some obedience drills or focus work, as opposed to us trying to keep walking.

There are a few dogs on our street that do seem to cause problems though.... Although, it's more the owners that are problematic.  One is the black lab who is super dog-aggressive.... he's often off-leash in his front yard with the family's children, who aren't quite large enough or mature enough to understand what could happen if he gets close to Roxy barking like that... Or, the psycho little puggle who, Roxy met and played with months ago, but now all of a sudden is chasing and lunging at us on a retractable leash. And the puggle's human? Oh, she doesn't seem to see the importance of stopping the dog from lunging at us... Those are the worst incidents.... they typically happen in the middle of a great training walk, and they totally screw up Roxy's focus and raise her anxiety levels.

I think I need to start looking for other places to train. Our street is becoming repetitive and we don't have enough new people to expose her to. I think we'll start with the strip mall by the Rockaway Mall in the next couple of weeks.

our first training session

Yesterday was our first day of training with Erica. I think I'm a bit overwhelmed, but I guess that's expected. And sort of a good thing. We have LOTS of work to do, but I'm pretty psyched to get to work.  Roxy seemed to pick up on things pretty quickly. And she definitely wants to work, which I think makes the process easier. I mean, who am I kidding, if you've got treats in your pocket, she'll learn just about anything.

And we did a training walk this morning... we definitely need to practice this stuff at home and in the yard before we will get better with it on walks.

I'm really looking forward to the desensitization and counter-conditioning part of this though.  Erica said I probably won't see much of a difference in Roxy for at least several months since I'm trying to change 2+ years of behavior. Which makes sense.... but I'm a little disappointed.  I understand why it will take that long, but damn, I can't wait to see her more relaxed and at ease.

Here we go, Roxy.... I hope you're ready for this!!