NicoleS
Posted : 1/18/2007 5:53:24 AM
Good luck. the one major thing that was hardest for us, is that you can't exactly leave them alone in the same situation while you are trying to countercondition, because they get anxious and it reverses all your work. But, that was impossible for us. So we set up an extra crate in another room to be a place where he could stay, but any anxiety associated with the place wasn't harmful to training him to be okay in the first location. (did that make any sense?) And depending on how severe the situation is, it might be like 6, 8, 10 weeks to get to a good point, and I couldn't afford doggie day care for that long.
Wouldn't you know, though, as soon as we got a different style crate in a different room he improved like 250000%?
We also consulted a behaviorist, but there wasn't too much she could tell us that we hadn't already learned online or with books. There were some little tricks, like feeding dinner in his crate and playing a radio or tv, that we hadn't stuck with for convenience sake that she wanted us to do, but nothing she suggested actually worked to any great extent. Mostly she reinforced what we already did.
We are also in the process of weaning Sammy from the anti-anxiety meds we put him on. We had come home to a couple of *really* *really* bad days and couldn't handle it... so meds were our option until we could train him out of it. little did we know a new crate and new room did so much more than meds. As did him just getting into a better routine.
One helpful thing is, we videotaped him nearly every day and I took notes so that I could look back and see what worked over a period of days and what didn't. When we took the window a/c out for 2-3 days Sammy went NUTS and moved his crate around the entire room and chewed my desk chair from inside his crate, etc, etc. That's the only thing that we can think of that changed for those few days.
Anyway, best of luck, it might be a bit of a battle but when you start seeing improvements it's all worth it.
Keep us updated, I'm always interested in hearing what works for others.