Patricia McConnell had me at “separation anxiety.” But not in the way you might normally think. “I do indeed suffer from separation anxiety when I leave my dogs,” the renowned animal behaviorist and author said in her 2014 APDT conference keynote presentation. “I don’t know about you, but I’m already starting to stress lick,” […]
For 14 years, I have specialized exclusively in separation anxiety and isolation distress, and in that time I have heard stories of great success and of heartbreaking failure. Something I often hear in the buzz around the metaphorical water cooler (the dog park, the beach, the trainers’ luncheons) is that separation anxiety is a
The Exasperating Truth – Why Separation Anxiety Gets a Bad Rap Read More »
There’s something symbolic about the remarkable rainstorm that is the backdrop of Ron and Dina as we talk on Skype; the two of them in Florida, me in California. I watch the exasperated faces of Hannah the Beagle’s guardians as they tell me how cruelly their beloved dog suffers when she’s left alone. It’s
One of my jobs is to serve as the initial point of contact for Malena DeMartini and the other trainers. In this job, I walk prospective clients through what a separation anxiety protocol will look like, take some history and empathize, empathize, empathize. By and large, the people who inquire are people whose dogs
Learn more about the use of feeding toys during separation anxiety here, in our new article: The Trouble With Food Toys – A Surprising Barrier to Solving Separation Anxiety In my blog about Guinness the dog (“From Auspicious Beginnings to a Hard-Won Solution,” May 13, 2015), I mentioned the use of interactive feeding toys as
In working with various dog behavior disorders, including separation anxiety, we often categorize the level of severity. We talk about bite severity scales, how much the dog jumps, what the lack of impulse control is, how often he is pulling. We even address the pace of the dog’s learning curve. As a culture, we
My second client ever (circa 2001) was a separation anxiety case. The dog’s name was Guinness, like the beer, and his guardians had found him sickly and tattered, scavenging for food somewhere on a California back road. They rescued him, bought him lifesaving medical treatments and nursed him back to health. Guinness was, under
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This morning’s first new potential client is Sedona, and I ponder what the path to success will look like as I work with her and her guardian, Barbara. Sedona is a healthy 3-year-old Rottweiler-Labrador cross who has been in her home for six months. During that time, she has destroyed several crates. After Sedona broke
Separation Anxiety: The Forgotten Stepchild We Can No Longer Ignore Read More »
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