Percy and the Mystery of the Great Regression

Regressions. Oh my goodness, everybody who has a dog with separation anxiety just dreads

the idea that their dog might regress. But what happens when you're a dog trainer who

specialises in separation anxiety and you've written books on the topic? What the heck

do you do when your dog who was previously fine suddenly has a massive wobble? Well,

that happened to my dog Percy back in the summer of 2022. And the good news? Well, the

good news is he is absolutely fine again. The bad news? Well, there isn't really any

bad news. In this episode, I'm going to dive into exactly what was going on, how I became

a detective to work out what was going on, why when your dog wobbles, it might not be

the bad news that you think it might be. And I'm going to share my tips for what you can

do, if or more likely when your dog has one of these regressions.

Hello, and welcome to the Be Right Back separation anxiety podcast. Hi, I'm Julie Naismith, dog

trainer, author and full on separation anxiety geek. I've helped thousands of dogs overcome

separation anxiety with my books, my online programmes, my trainer certification and my

separation anxiety training app. And this podcast is all about sharing my tips and tricks

to help you teach your dog how to be happy at home alone too.

So just a little while ago, my husband and I discovered that out of the blue, Percy could

no longer be left alone. Now this is Percy, the dog who many, many years ago couldn't

be left, but after lots of hard work from us, got to a position where he was fine, where

we could leave him, where we could come and go as we please, you know, that freedom that

you get when you've got a dog who doesn't worry about being alone on his own. Well,

that disappeared and he's no longer that dog. So this episode is all about how the heck

that came about, how I felt, but there is some good news because it turned out to be

a temporary thing. So do listen to see how we got him back to being a dog who was okay

on his own. Alright, let's start with what happened a few months back. He's actually

had a massive, massive regression. Now, I hear the word regression used all the time

and I'm always saying to members of my Separation Anxiety Heroes Club, is that really a regression?

So when people say, you know, he was fine, he was doing two minutes and now he can only

do 20 seconds. It's just a massive, massive regression. I will say to them, no, no, that's

not a regression. That's just natural and normal variability. I've done lots of other

podcast episodes where I've talked about normal variability. So you should definitely check

some of those out. When dogs are first learning to be home alone, in fact, when they're first

learning anything new, particularly when it comes to a change in emotion, so a new association,

the learning is never a straight line. And especially very early on where the new association

is fresh and it's new and it's not really hardwired into the dog's brain yet, what can

happen is they revert to the old association. So we see this pinging around and people get

very panicky about it. But luckily I've seen it so many times that it's really easy for

me to say truthfully, no, that's fine. It really has just the natural, normal up and

down of early training. And in fact, not just early training, but as we continue training,

we're going to see dogs going from longer times to shorter times. And it doesn't mean

anything other than learning is not a straight line. However, when you have a dog who has

been fine on his own for the longest time, you know, we're talking about a really big

portion of Percy's life now. He's been a dog who's been fine to be on his own, who then

out of the blue can't handle being alone. And this would be, it doesn't have to just

relate to alone time. This could be a dog who was formerly frightened of strangers or

didn't like thunderstorms, but got to be okay with them. So when the fear returns, when

the behavior that relates to the fear comes back out of nowhere after a very long period

of time, then I think we're justified in calling it a regression. So those early blips or those

training blips where you go from longer times to shorter times, shorter times to longer

times, they're not regressions. But my big worry was that a few months ago, something

was happening to Percy that looked very much, very much like a regression. The thing is,

it wasn't obvious at first. You're going to find that when you get your dog to a stage

where you can leave without worrying and you do it over and over and over again, it just

becomes the new norm. You're not as in tune to your dog being alone. Now this isn't going

to happen quickly. I can't remember how long I kept checking Percy's, the Percycam after

we knew Percy was okay, but it was a long time. That doesn't disappear in a matter of

weeks. It was maybe months and months, probably longer, that I would still need to peek into

Percycam, both because I'd wanted to check. I always wanted to check, make sure he's okay.

But also because of the little thrill it used to give me when I did check and then he was

asleep. And what you'll find is the more you get used to him being okay on his own, the

more he's used to being home alone on his own and being okay, the less you will check

in. And the period between checking in, you might go months without checking in. So you

kind of stop. And I say you become less in tune with what they're up to when you leave

them, but that never entirely goes. Maybe it's because I'm a separation anxiety trainer.

Maybe that's why it never entirely goes. But I'm always, at the back of my mind, even subconsciously

wondering, is he okay? Yeah. And I would say it's very, very buried. So that feeling of

that thought, is he okay, is there in my brain somewhere? But for a long time, certainly

until a few months ago, and we'll come on through what happened, it was well buried.

But it didn't mean that I was probably, again, subconsciously just looking out for how he

was when we came back, that kind of stuff. But what happened a few months ago wasn't

so much a complete shock. It wasn't like the first time we discovered Percy had separation

anxiety, which is when a neighbour let us know that he'd been barking all day. It was

more of a dawning realisation this time. A dawning realisation that maybe something

wasn't quite right when he was alone. And the first thing that alerted me to this was

coming home, not driving, but walking through the door, but hearing him barking before we

got in. Now, Percy will bark when we come in, because that's what he does. So excited

to see us, he will bark. But I just started noticing that on two or three occasions, he

seemed to be barking before we got in. Now, alarm bells didn't start ringing at that stage,

because I had seen on camera so many times that if he heard us coming up the driveway,

and we've got like stones, I wouldn't say gravel, but we've got stones that we have

to walk over to get into the house. And I'd seen enough on video, you know, years back,

that when we walk on those stones, sometimes he'll hear us and start barking before we

come in. So initially, I thought it was that. But you just, and again, maybe it's because

I spend my whole day, you know, 20, not literally 24-7 looking at dogs with separation anxiety,

but maybe thinking about dogs with separation anxiety. Maybe because this is what I do day

in, day out. I was, yeah, just a bit more on edge about something not quite being there.

He seemed a bit more worked up, but not anxious. When we first discovered he had separation

anxiety, and we came back, and he was, had been upset. So this is way before Percy cam.

One of the things that was really obvious was he'd been drooling. And then it would

take him forever, forever to calm down, like a ridiculously long amount of time. So we

didn't, I wasn't seeing this a few months ago, but it just didn't feel right. So what

did I do? I do what I tell everybody to do if they've got the least bit of concern about

their dog's homeland behavior. I set up a camera and went out, just did a normal, normal

absence, but kept checking the camera. Didn't go too far, and got quite, it was quite a

long duration, I seem to recall. I mean, we're not talking minutes, and it wasn't several

hours. But looking back at my notes, I think it was about 40 minutes, but he barked. He

barked. So I come back, he's still barking. I was about 10 minutes away. He'd been barking

for 10 minutes. I come back. My worst fears are confirmed. Oh my goodness. My dog's had

a regression. My dog is no longer okay on his own. Imagine it. So we stopped leaving

him. That was the first thing we did after we set up the camera again. We stopped leaving

him because I needed some time to collect my thoughts, to work out what was going on.

And as I say to everybody, to buy yourself time, the first thing you've got to do is

you've got to stop leaving them. And I'm, you know, racking my brains, as is my husband,

like, why? And it's interesting because all of my clients and separation anxiety heroes

will say, why? Why did this happen? And I will always say, sometimes we know, and sometimes

we don't. But I can tell you, this is a really good reminder, that when you don't know, it's

just maddening. It's just, it's just crazy making. You assume there has to be a reason.

And as I just mentioned, sometimes there is and sometimes there isn't. But it's definitely

worth investigating. So I did the obvious rule outs, like pain. He does suffer from

a bad back, but we're very on top of that. We have a great physio who helps us and he

gets medication. And we're really aware of the signs of pain in him. So what are the

very specific things he does when he's more in pain? So yeah, we ruled out that. He was

otherwise very healthy, fit and happy. His diet hadn't changed, his exercise hadn't changed,

the weather hadn't changed. It was really, really difficult to know why this had happened.

And it's a very important question to ask, though. If your dog's behaviour suddenly changes,

whether that's a dog who's home alone or whether it's a dog who is worried about people or

reacts on the leash, if the behaviour suddenly changes for the worse, ask, is there anything

else in his life that could have changed? And then one night over dinner, my husband

and I twigged. The one thing that had changed in his world, and in fact, in our world, was

that we had recently got new neighbours. They moved in early in the summer. And before

then, the house was very often empty, and had been empty for quite some time. And when

it wasn't empty, it was used by a couple who would just spend some weekends there. But

there was a difference, because now we've got a family rather than a couple who were

here occasionally, and we've got way more comings and goings. So that's what we conclude.

We think there's something about our new neighbours that is causing, is triggering, is making

Percy respond in this way. So it's helpful to know what a trigger might be, but then

you've got to really work out how is that affecting the behaviour, and then what can

you do about it? So I went back and I looked at the recordings of the absences where he

had started barking. So these were the recent ones, not from 10 years ago. And immediately,

it was obvious to me, there was a really big difference in the bark. There was a really

big difference in what was going on. When Percy used to get upset at being alone, he

didn't bark from the outset. Well, not loudly. He would start with a really quite quiet,

muffled, almost, just like a one-off little bark. In fact, that little bark became famous

in our household because it was the bark that said, OK, we're not going out today. We got

to really know that little, just that short, if he did that off, either when we were getting

ready to go out or after we'd gone out, then we're coming back. And it was great because

that little off always led to full-on howling. So it was a really good piece of data and

it helped us progress training quicker because no longer were we guessing and leading it

too long and then he'd get into a howl. If we were doing training or an actual absence

and we still heard that huff, we came back. So he wasn't doing this in these recordings

earlier in the summer. He wasn't doing them. The bark was immediately loud. It was what

I call a reactive bark. He's barking at something. He isn't just vocalising to say, is anybody

there? It's a response and it's a big, explosive response. He's heard something. But I can't

hear anything at all on the video. So I don't know what he's barking at. The doorbell hasn't

gone. There's no car doors slamming. I can't hear anything. But it seems like he's really,

really barking at something. Problem is, though, he's not stopping. So in the past, he would

be able to bark at a car door outside or the door going and then settle down. He's not

stopping. So this is different. And that's why I start to get really anxious because

this is new. He's now barking at something. We don't know what that something is and he's

not stopping. So then my husband and I chatted again. Well, we were obsessed with this. But

let's be honest, we're talking about this over and over. It's like every day, most minutes

of the day, we're thinking about this or chatting about this. We're crestfallen. We're

sad for our boy. We're sad for us. And honestly, given what I do right now as my profession,

it's pretty embarrassing, right? I've got a dog that suddenly can't be left. And I don't

know how to say this to you without sounding super unscientific. But I just didn't feel

like it was the same as when he was really anxious, though. So that was the only glimmer

of hope that I had. And how can I tell you that? It's just when you really, really get

to know your dog. And if you're a separation anxiety trainer and you've had a dog with

separation anxiety and you look at dogs with separation anxiety every single day, you really

get to understand your own dog. And then one night, my husband went out and he came back

through the garage. The garage door opened and Percy lost it. Explosive bark and couldn't

stop barking. Now, this had become a fairly common reaction in, say, the last couple of

years. Just Percy going, Dad's back. Or if it's me going out, Mum's back. Yoo-hoo. And

it's also what he would do if he heard us coming in, if we both went out. So he could

be fast asleep on the sofa, like dead bugging on the sofa. And in fact, he was the night

that this lightbulb moment occurred for me. He's dead bugging on the sofa. But then he

hears the garage door go. He hears Jason come in and just so excited because he loves people.

He loves it when people come into the house. He gets super excited. He's just got more

and more excited barking in the last couple of years. It's just him. As he gets older,

he seems to just not be able to control his barking. And you know what I always say, he's

12 years old now. I'm fine with this impulsivity because he's not going to be with us that

much longer. So if he wants to explode with joy every time people come in the house, so

be it. But of course, now we're thinking, wait a minute. He's excited. He's really expectant.

Is that what's going on? Got new neighbours, got more activity coming and going. Is this

all it is? I mean, all. We've still got to work out how we can deal with it. But is this

what's triggering? Well, I needed to test it, but I wanted to test it safely. And the

good news is there was an obvious way for me to test it. And that was I was going to

work out what time typically my neighbours would come and go. And then I didn't need

to leave Percy alone to test this. So I knew that one of us or both of us could be there.

I thought it would be more powerful if my husband went out because if my, so here's

my theory. Let me tell you what my theory is. My theory is that our neighbours are making

noises now that sound like one of us coming into the house. So that gets Percy excited.

He then can't calm down because he thinks, well, where are you? And in fact, I see this

when say, for example, we go out for a mountain bike. I come into the house first and my husband

continues to tinker in the garage on the bikes and Percy won't calm down until Jason's come

in. It's like, come on. I know you're in there. Come and say hi to me. I'm so excited. So

my theory here is that that's what's happening. He thinks that we're hanging out outside or

in the garage and we're not coming in. And he's like, come in now and come and say hi.

And the big difference between our new neighbours and the old neighbours was the number of times

that they use the garage and the garage door. And we have the same garage doors because

we're semis, we're attached homes. We have the same garage doors. So you can see my hypothesis,

right? Percy's hearing the garage door. He thinks it's our garage door. It's not, but

he thinks we're there. And he's like, come in. I'm so excited. Come back in. So I wanted

to test it. So Jason went out and we waited. And sure enough, Percy explodes with that

bark, bark, bark, bark, bark, bark, bark. I looked out. I couldn't hear anything. I

couldn't hear anything, but he clearly had. I looked out and I saw the neighbour's car.

Coming in to the garage. Yes. Result. It's a result. At least we've worked out what's

going on. He can't stop barking. He can't calm himself down because now he thinks my

husband's coming in. OK, so we know what's going on, but how am I going to work on it?

I mean, big relief at this moment. Big relief because now I'm thinking, no, no, no, we haven't

got a dog who's suddenly anxious of being left. We've got a dog who is now suddenly

excited at all this extra activity outside. But now I've got a different problem to deal

with. Great. No, but it's all doable. So what I did was, again, something that I encourage

everyone to do if they've got a dog to react to outside noise. You just have to double

down as much as you can on masking the outside noise, because it's really hard, especially

when you've got an impulsive dog like Percy. And like I say, he's just got more like this

in the last couple of years. Maybe he's maybe he's getting a little bit senile. Who knows?

But he certainly finds it harder to control his excitement these days.

It's much easier to control the trigger than it is to control a dog who's super, super excited.

And I can't hear the noise, but I'm going to assume that he's going to hear noises when

we don't hear them. So it was all about masking the noise, even though we thought we were

already doing that. So layering the noise, adding a fan back into the equation because

we just had music on, adding some white noise on a different device, and that still wasn't

helping. So we ended something which we hadn't done for a long time. I said, well, we've got

to move him. He is separated. Percy and India are separated from Tex because they don't get

on very well. And we definitely don't want them all being left together when we go out.

And so Percy and India stay in one room, which is closer to the garage.

So we realized they've got to be in the same room. It's a room that's further away from

the garage, but it's the only way to save all our sanities. And that's what we did.

This sounds really simple, doesn't it? There was a lot of thinking and a lot of heartache

and a lot of up and down emotion to get here. But we figured it out. So we created Tex.

We popped India and Percy into the same room. We put a guard, a guard. We put an extra barrier

around Tex's crate so there's no wandering up to Tex's crate while he's in there.

And we tested it out. And guess what? He just slept through it all. We opened and closed the

garage door, watched him on the camera. We left. We watched him on the camera. We went further.

We watched him on the camera. He was out. And that was it. Oh my goodness,

that sounds way too simple, doesn't it? But it wasn't. It wasn't that simple.

It was hard to work out. It was depressing and mortifying and upsetting because we, you know,

it could be, it could have been that he regressed. It does happen.

It would have been shocking if he had, but we had to be aware of the fact that it could have been.

And luckily for us, it had a really, really good outcome. We worked through it and we were

able to resolve everything by just changing up the environment, changing up the situation.

If you find that your dog's having a regression, are you going to be able to fix it with just a

few changes to the environment? Maybe not. But do do what I did. Ask yourself, could anything

have changed? If you've been working with me in Separation Anxiety Heroes and you've been using

my Be Right Back training app, you'll have been taking notes on each session. You can look back

and see had anything changed. Now, for us, it's been a long time since we've needed to do any

training with Percy. So the data wasn't in front of us. We got into forensic mode when we realized

there was a problem going on. So ask yourself, could anything have changed? If anything could

have changed, then try and isolate the variable. So if you think two or three things have changed,

work out, is it this one? Is it that one? Is it the other one? And when you hit a regression,

don't panic. If your dog has been acing long times for a considerable amount of time,

the chances are it's going to be just like it was with Percy. It's going to be temporary.

And you will get your dog back. You're not going back to square one. It is just a case of working

through it and sticking with it. So I hope that's given you a little bit of insight into what it's

like to have a dog who's been recovered from separation anxiety for a long time, who then

scares the heck out of you because there's a wobble, and how you just have to stay calm,

get forensic and work your way through it. Good luck with the training. You've got this.

Thank you so much for listening to this episode of the Be Right Back Separation Anxiety podcast.

If you want to find out more about how I can help you further, head over to julienasmith.com.

Meanwhile, if you enjoyed listening today, I would love it if you would head over

to wherever you listen to your podcasts and consider rating my show.

Thanks so much. Good luck with that training and bye for now.