If you are asking yourself how to train a dog with separation anxiety, you will find that there is no shortage of conflicting information. Often, it appears that no matter what you do, your dog will never be completely relaxed. In fact, some people find that their dog possesses more separation anxiety than some other breed of dog.
Typically the first sign of separation anxiety in dogs is how they behave when left alone. In many cases, they exhibit destructive behavior. This destructive behavior includes digging, barking, and chewing. In most cases, the discovery comes too late and the dog has been exhibiting this sort of behavior for quite some time.
One thing that owners often don’t realize is that dogs use many different types of barks to announce their presence. Some of these barks are actually excited barks. An example of this would be a dog that is in the garden. The dog will often make a series of high-pitched barking noises. It is this high-pitched bark that is used as a communication tool.
The dog may also use destructive behaviors like ripping up things, digging, and tearing down fences and walls. This last behavior is actually used as a sort of response to being left alone. As the dog realizes that it is causing its owner and other people to be aware that it is being destructive, it then becomes anxious about the prospect of being left alone.
The answer to the question posed in the title is quite simple. You should never leave a dog alone in the home. If you have to leave for work or to go somewhere, take along a friend. Don’t keep your dog at home alone all day by itself. Even if it is calm and content during the day and even if you think that it is perfectly content, do not leave it alone.
Dogs suffer from separation anxiety even when they are very healthy. When you leave the house, they feel anxious and frightened. If the dog has full-blown separation anxiety disorder, it suffers from separation distress even when you are not home. A dog who is suffering from separation anxiety will do everything possible to be close to you. It will whine, cry, and even urinate. It may even dig at things and scratch.
How to train a dog with separation anxiety is very much like how you would train a dog with panic disorder. If your dog is in the early stages of panic attacks, do not punish it. Do not yell at it. If the dog tries to escape, do not try to catch it, but rather allow it to free itself and go away by itself.
This is the best advice that anyone can give to someone who is a dog owner. Separation anxiety is often caused by traumatic events that a dog went through in its past. If you can discover the core event, you can train a dog with separation-related behavior problems. Lexi, the dog with separation anxiety is now completely normal.
The problem with her behavior was that she was left by herself for so long a period of time, without any human contact. When this occurred, she developed what is referred to as a stress response. She developed what is called a coping response. A dog with separation anxiety may try to avoid social interaction all together, because she feels uncomfortable if she is the only pet in the house.
How to train a dog with separation anxiety is to gradually increase the amount of time that you leave her alone, and back again. If you leave her alone in your home for longer than is necessary, she will develop a fear of being alone and will have no choice but to go back to being a problem dog. However, if you leave her alone in your home for an extended period of time, she will slowly become comfortable in the situation. As long as you remain calm and don’t punish her, she will eventually learn to go back to being a nice dog.
Training a dog with this issue can be quite a challenge if you have never dealt with a pet owner with this type of behavior before. In order to get through this, you must have patience and be very consistent. You may have to spend several weeks training her to go back to being a dog that is very loving and calm. You will need to be prepared to be very firm with her if she does not learn to behave properly after several weeks of being left by herself.
How to train a dog with separation anxiety is not hard if you understand the different behaviors that are associated with the problem. Dogs that exhibit excessive barking are often fearful dogs. Your goal will be to teach her that she can be around people without becoming anxious and become anxious when she is with them. The first step to doing this is learning how to recognize when she is having a bad day. You can use a clicker to give her positive reinforcement when she behaves in the proper manner. This will help her to learn quickly how to deal with separation anxiety.
