A Hard Truth: Why Not Leaving Your Dog Is Ridiculously Tough, But Absolutely Necessary

If you've been working to get your dog over separation anxiety or you've given any thought to it

Chances are along the way somebody might have said to you

You know, you can't leave your dog alone if they have separation anxiety if you're trying to get them over a separation anxiety

Now I know that statement is one that can stir up a whirlwind of emotions

It makes people angry it frustrates people it leads to disbelief and I totally get that

You might think that

Anybody who says that to you myself included?

We're all just being unsympathetic and that we just don't get the realities of your life and how difficult that would be

But believe me we absolutely do

And whenever I say that whenever I say the thing is you have to find a way not to leave your dog

I'm not saying it to make your life harder

It's quite the opposite. In fact

Making your life harder is the last thing I want to do. I

only say it because I want to help you and because I want you to get your dog over separation anxiety as quickly and

effectively as possible

That's why in this episode. I want to dive into

Why I say this crazy thing why on earth I put you through all of this and make you think about not leaving your dog

And I want to explain

Why it makes such a difference and why it's not forever

So let's dive in

Hello and welcome to the be right back separation anxiety podcast

Hi, I'm Julie Naismith dog trainer author and full-on separation anxiety

Keep I felt thousands of dogs overcome separation anxiety with my books my online programs 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 to I

Can't tell you how many times people have reacted really badly when they

Realize and maybe you've been through this realization as well that what I'm saying to them is yes

So when you do the separation anxiety training you get your dog gradually being used to being on its own, but at the same time

You have to work out how not to leave your dog and I totally get it. It's a

Ridiculous thing to say it absolutely is. I mean who can possibly

It seems anyway

We think to ourselves who can possibly who has a life that they can

Schedule and arrange around a dog and make sure that they don't leave their dog

And when you first realize when somebody's first telling you this or you work it out for yourself that you can't leave your dog

it comes as a massive shock and

So no wonder we rail against it

And I do understand if you're in my community and you spend time in my free free groups

You might think that

We're a bunch of

Unempathetic uncaring people who just don't understand and I'm in fact this episode today was prompted by a thread in one of my groups

Where somebody had posted?

well, you know is this is this group just not a safe space for anybody who is

currently still leaving their dog and

And I was really horrified by that because the last thing I want is for anybody to feel in any of my communities

That they aren't in a safe space

But I understand why people might feel that way

Because it's it's really challenging if you're not in a position or you feel like you're not in a position to stop leaving your dog

Then hearing other people going on about that or getting other people diving into the comments and saying you need to stop leaving your dog

Well, that feels threatening and it feels like you're under attack and it feels like people just aren't getting you

But even if some people are diving into the comments and saying that and by the way if that's happening in my free groups

Then I'm always

Counseling and chatting with my moderators about the fact that nobody should be jumping on people like that

So if that happens to you in one of my free groups you let me know

but if that's happened to you or if you just generally feel angry or

Frustrated because you've heard me say it or you've read about me

You've read something that I said about not leaving your dog

And maybe you listen to a previous podcast episode if that's you then I don't blame you

I honestly don't I'm not saying that you're wrong to feel angry or frustrated or upset

At the prospect of not leaving your dog. I think it's a perfectly valid way to feel and

I felt that way when I first found out that I couldn't leave Percy. I

Mean, I just remember thinking well, nobody can do that. That's just ridiculous. I

Also remember thinking well, hey

So if I can find a way not to leave him if I can find a way and not leaving him doesn't just mean

You have to be with your dog all the time

I mean, it means that somebody has to be with your dog all the time

So I remember thinking well if I can find a way for Percy to be with me or with somebody else

24-7 then separation anxiety isn't a problem. It's only a problem of maybe organization or scheduling

It's no different to

Parenting it's no different to having a two-year-old child who you can't leave

You just have to think about when you want to go out and do stuff and you can't take your kid with you

You have to think about

Someone being with them

Right, but you get on and do it now when you get a dog

You're not signing up for that kind of parenting and I totally understand that. I know that when you signed up

when you

Adopted your dog when you rescued your dog when you brought your puppy home. Nobody thinks I'm going to end up with a dog

I can't leave

Nobody. I mean that's not true. There are some amazing people and if this is you oh my goodness hats off to you

There are some people who do adopt dogs who can't be left. My heart is just so full of gratitude for those of you who do

But I wasn't one of those people. I did not for a minute 12 years ago

13 years ago now expect to have a dog. I couldn't leave

And that's the reality with most people now, you know

Most people having kids understand that part of the deal is

You don't just walk out the door on a Friday night and leave your 18 month old just toddling around the house

But with a dog we expect to be able to do that

So no wonder it's such a shocker

That when we discover our dogs have this pathological fear

Pathological reaction to being left that part of the deal of getting them over that fear is not no longer leaving them

No wonder we have such an extreme response

So I've been where you are and I remember kind of a curve almost

I think it's called there is there is a content or concept called a change curve and

It reflects how we go through and how we respond to

Really difficult things that happen to us and

The first thing one of the first things that happen that happens when we get

News that's as bad and life-changing as you can't leave your dog is we do feel anger and frustration

And then we start to feel depressed

We start to feel really flat. We start to feel hopeless and

then

Hopefully if we're lucky and we're doing the right things and we're talking to the right people and we're getting the right support

Then we start to see a glimmer of optimism

Creeping but it's not immediate. So for a long time we can stay in that state of anger

confusion and depression and you might still be there and

The big part of that initial reaction is grief

That might sound really weird. I'm just talking about

Finding out that you can't leave your dog. And so why am I talking about grief?

Well grief is feeling sadness at the loss of something

you might never have been able to leave your dog and

So you're not losing something you had you've never been able to walk out the door freely

So you've not gone from a situation where one day you could leave Pepe in the next day

You couldn't although that definitely happens with some dogs

So what you're grieving is the life with your dog that you could have had

The life with your dog that maybe you've had with other dogs in the past the ones who didn't have separation anxiety

maybe you're also grieving for the life that other people seem to have with their dogs and the life that you hoped to have with

your dog and

that grief and that anger and that frustration at

Having a life turned upside down by your dog is not incompatible

With loving them to the nth degree. I mean you can love your dog more than anything on this planet and

Still be sad about the situation you find yourself in those two thoughts are not incompatible and feeling depressed about

The fact that you're trapped or that you don't know how to get your dog over separation anxiety

Doesn't mean to say you love your dog any less. In fact, sometimes the more we love our dogs the more we

place their emotions

Central in our decisions sometimes the harder it gets and then by the way

I think we should be considering dogs emotions

And I and I get that and I get how hard that makes things for us if we didn't care about our dogs

This would all be a lot easier. It really would but you're here. You're listening to this because you really care about your dog

So I don't say find a way not to leave your dog just to be difficult I

Really am looking for a way to make your life easier as quickly as possible

But let me help you I hope

understand why I say this to you and

hopefully explaining to you why

Might might just help it feel a little less

frustrating

so first off as a refresher when we get dogs over separation anxiety

we're using a

technique called gradual exposure

Now that technique is used for any fear. So separation anxiety is a fear of being left

But we use gradual exposure

whenever we try to get any dog over any fear and

It comes from

human phobia treatment

so it's the same approach we use for people who are frightened of heights or

Worried about going to the dentist and I'll come on to my phobia of dentists in a second because I've got a story to tell

you about that that directly relates into what we're talking about in this episode today and

gradual exposure is we actually do

Expose the subject the dog or the human to the thing that they're scared of

We don't allow them to avoid that thing. We don't allow them to run away from that thing

We do expose them, but it's so non scary and non-threatening the intensity of whatever they're frightened of is turned

Right down. So if somebody's frightened of heights we start them with maybe, you know

five foot off the ground or not even we don't get them scaling the Eiffel Tower in the first session and

Hand in hand with that we have to change

Reduce and eliminate the amount of scary time that's going on

because

In your dog's brain or in a human brain with a phobia

You've got an old association

So the person with a fear of heights thinks that ladders are petrifying thinks that open stairwells are

Terrifying so that's what they associate with anything that to do with height. It's scary. It's petrifying

I can't do it

We're trying to create a new association in the person with a fear of height that says Oh open stairwells

No problem. I can stand on the 10th floor look right down and I'm fine

So it's a brand new association. It's different to the old one and

The challenge that we're faced with is that the old one doesn't go away

That old association of I don't like climbing open stairs

remains there

But what we do when we work with gradual exposure treatment is we increase the weight of a new association

So the new association starts to take over

But because that old association has been there for a long time

It's very susceptible to kind of barging in to the brain again and saying whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa forget the new association

That's ridiculous. You really are afraid of heights. I need to remind you and

It's often triggered

by a scary experience

right

so that person who has a fear of heights is maybe have maybe worked up to walking up an

Open stairwell and got to the first floor and can look down from say the second floor

But for whatever reason they decide to march right up to the sixth floor and look down and it's way too triggering for them

So that old association comes back in and says yeah, I see I told you

Open stairwell height anything to do with scaling up

Anything to do with going higher that is scary. I was right all along

So we have to remove that scary stimulus and if you think about what happens with a human phobia

people with a phobia

Humans with a phobia naturally avoid what they're scared of. In fact dogs naturally avoid what they're scared of too

You know dogs who are scared of vet visits will not walk themselves into the vet

They will not say to you one morning not that they could say to us

But you know if they could talk they wouldn't say hey, do you know I'd really like to do

I'd love to go to the vets today. Yeah, I know I'm petrified of the vets

But hey, let's just do it right said no dog ever and

The same is true with humans

Humans avoid the things that scare them. So the person with the fear of heights isn't

Scaling the Eiffel Tower. The person who doesn't like insects isn't walking into a room full of them

The person who hates flying

Will do everything they can to avoid flying. People with extreme phobias of flying never get on planes

so people with a fear of something naturally avoid it and

The problem with dogs is that we don't give them as much opportunity to avoid the things that scare them as a human would

because humans have

Kind of unlimited discretion here to avoid their phobia for the most part and some people are forced to fly

Maybe because of work some people who hate public speaking occasionally have to do public speaking

But for the most part people with phobias are opting out of exposure to that phobia

I mean too much actually one of the problems with phobias is that

People get so good at avoiding and escaping that the fear

Gets more and more and more and more and more entrenched

That's why we always say with dogs that if you're not training for a while

It's always good to keep them slightly in the game with some really simple training exercises separation anxiety training

Because too much avoidance

Isn't helpful either

So humans are really good at avoiding the things that scare them they do it naturally

but dogs don't get that choice and

That's why gradual exposure therapy for a patient with a fear of flying or a fear the fear of height

Goes hand in hand with them not exposing full-blown intensity of the thing that scares them because they're not exposing themselves to it and

we need to step up and

Make the decisions for our dogs that a human would make so if a human had a fear of being left alone

They wouldn't they do anything they could not to be left alone right if we had that fear of isolation

We would do anything we could not to if we had a fear of going out if we had agoraphobia

We would do anything we could not to

So we have to step up because dogs can't make that decision

We need to gradually expose them to being alone the thing that they're scared of while

Avoiding them having full-blown exposure

because that's the way we're going to get them over this as quickly and as effectively as we can and

We need to have lots and lots and lots of positive

Associations so going back to that concept of there's an old association in your dog's brain, and there's a new one

to get the new one

To be the one that the dog uses all the time the new association you need lots of repetition

So you need lots of repetition of the safe exposure to being alone

You have to expose your dog over and over and over to safe alone time whilst at the same time

stopping the scary exposure and

To a degree we're also fighting history. There's a long history with lots of dogs of

Negative association with being left. I mean lots of dogs with separation anxiety

Often they develop it before we know or sometimes stuff happened to them before they came into our homes

and so there's a long history of a

negative association of being left and dogs just like humans have a tendency to negativity bias and

So now we've got not only this negative history

That there's more

repetitions of there are more your dog has more experience of negative exposures if your dog had separation anxiety before you realize it and

One negative experience

Doesn't equal one positive experience. I don't know what the there is no exact ratio, but I can tell you that you need

more positive associations to outweigh the negative ones and

So if you think about it as a scale, we've got positive associations on one side negative on the other

We're trying to add more and more positive associations of being left

But if we add any negative ones again

Especially given the weight of negative associations. There's a big risk

Everything just topples over to the negative side again

Now one thing that can happen when we expose dogs to a full-blown

exposure a full intensity exposure of the thing that they're scared of is a process called flooding and

Flooding has been used in

Psychotherapy has been used on people and it's basically where a patient is exposed to the maximum absolute maximum

fear inducing intensity of the thing that they're scared of

They come through it. They go out the other side and in conjunction with a therapist

They discuss and they rationalize that despite how horrific that was they survived

they're still here and it's okay and

When when because it doesn't always and it often backfires when flooding does work

It's the therapist patient

conversation that's helping

Understand why that exposure wasn't as threatening as somebody initially thought

However

Lots of people many people and many therapists will never use it because it's a pretty horrid

Experience and it's risky because it doesn't always work far from it. And sometimes it can make things worse and

It has to be done with patient consent

And if you ask most people like most people with a fear of flying would not say to you

Yep, I want to go on a flight and I want to go through the most turbulent

Turbulent hour that you could imagine

I want that plane to drop from the sky and I want it to

To go nose up again and then drop and go no no nobody

Rarely with a fear of flying is going to say that

So human patients have a choice about flooding and even when they do opt to do it

It can make things worse and it might not always work and that's why most

Therapists these days tend to back off from using flooding the problem with using flooding on a dog is they're not a consenting

Participant we can't ask dogs if they want to be exposed

To a full intensity of the thing that they're petrified with of and even if we could ask them

There's still a really big chance that it wouldn't work. It's really not a consistent approach for helping dogs overcome anything

It's a massive welfare issue and it's just not an approach. We should ever ever think about using now

Everything I've said so far. I am NOT saying it to make you feel guilty

So if you've got this far and you're feeling guilty

Then I feel bad because my intention is never to make you feel guilty about

Anything that you're trying to do with your dog and your dog separation anxiety

You're dealing with enough guilt. I mean if you have a dog with separation anxiety, you know that you get so much

guilt-tripping from others and I know absolutely

Firsthand how much guilt there is and how much guilt accompanies having a dog with separation anxiety

So the last thing you need is more guilt and that's why I say believe it believe it not

Everything I'm saying in this episode is because I want to make your life easier

Not harder because I want you to feel better. I don't want you to feel worse and I don't want you to feel guilty

So gradual exposure is not a quick solution. So even though I want to make your life easier

I know that it won't be easy in the short run

And my goal is to get your dog over separation anxiety as efficiently and effectively as is possible for your dog

That's efficiency

making the progress making training go as well as it possibly can for your dog and

One of the things one of the big things that slows it down slows progress down or even halts it is a

Dog getting exposed to a full-blown exposure of what they fear

Now I talked about the dentist early on now luckily for most dogs

They go completely under when they're having dental treatment these days and you can see why

Now if you're like me and you've got a phobia of a dentist then

General anesthetic probably seems quite appealing when it comes to dental treatment, but it's not an option. It's a

if you're extreme and off the charts and you just cannot go near a

Dental surgery then it might be but nowadays there are things like oral sedation

So conscious sedation that mean that you're not as wiped out and you can have smaller procedures done

Comfortably and calmly now a while back many years ago. I started to have

Sedation well, maybe not full-blown sedation

But certainly some kind of anxiolytic help when I was going through dental treatment

And I found that by doing that by going to a different dentist

By having more checkups because checkups don't mean drilling by having more

Hygienist visits visits because I really like going to the hygienist now

I was gradually getting better and better with going to the dentist and I had a really long run where I didn't need to

have anything done

until I

Had a mounted by accident and I managed to kill the root in one and kill the nerve in one of my teeth

So I had to have a root canal treatment done on the tooth and I was petrified. I was absolutely petrified

because it was

It wasn't something that I'd worked up to it was way more than

Despite everything I've been doing to get more comfortable with being the dentist. It was way more than I could tolerate

So it was an intensity that was more than I had become gradually exposed to

And I freaked I completely freaked I had a terrible time now. Luckily I

Found a dentist who took a slightly different approach that the dentist that I went to where I freaked

I just stopped we didn't do anything. I just can't do it

but I had to get this done. So I found a dentist who was well known for treating nervous patients and

We got through it. And in fact, she said to me you'll feel like you're having a spa day

It was a really positive experience and then another long run of nothing happening

Until I had to have something else done

That also went not great I couldn't get numb I was anxious the more anxious I got the more numb

I got and it just got worse and worse and worse

It turns out that even though I'm getting better and better. I still needed a little bit of sedation

Taking some, you know a tablet half an hour before that kind of sedation not knock me out general anesthetic

And I didn't have that

So mind the intensity was too much if you've ever dived into thinking about whether you should give your dog's medication for

Home alone anxiety

One of the things that medication does is it changes the intensity of the scary thing, right?

Because it changes your dog's the intensity of your dog's response. So it turns out that I still wasn't ready to go

Completely without sedation. So I still needed a little bit but I had a treatment without it and I again

I absolutely freaked and

So

Then I didn't know what to do because now I am petrified. I feel like everything

Everything that I've gone through all that, you know over the years of getting better and better and better

at being at the dentist was completely undone and

That's an example of what happens when

You are getting over a phobia, but you experience an intensity that's way too high

it just takes you back that old association kicks in the

Negativity bias is there and your little brain is going yet. See I told you in my case

They dentists are scary dental treatment is bad

And it was so loud so much louder than the calm voice that would have been saying to me in the last few years

Yeah, it's not so bad. Is it?

So I just wanted to share that example with you and you might if you've got a phobia you might have had something like that

Where you have an experience that is so triggering

That anything you were doing to gradually get over your fear

Seems lost now. I'm going to give you some hope because if you're thinking yeah

But if my dog has one bad experience, is that it I am now as it were back in the saddle

The good news is that very often that once the learning is there

So I still have this learning that actually being in the dental chair isn't so bad

It's just that I had a one bad experience again, and it kind of buried that new learning, but the new learning is coming back

I'm having more positive experiences again, and I'm getting back to where I was before I had that full-blown exposure

So I don't want you to panic and go oh no

So one bad experience and my dog's gonna know as I always say to people when they do

When their dog seems to regress that new learning is always there, but what we don't want is to keep having those

overexposure

Moments because look what happens

Okay back to dogs and enough of dentists

Can you see why I'm saying this now? I'm not saying it to be difficult. I'm not saying it because it's stupid

I'm saying it to help you and

If you want to rail about it if you want to say it's stupid if you want to throw something at the podcast

Throw something at the podcast well, you know I mean, then I totally understand

But I do once you've done that once you've been angry with me or whoever whoever's telling you

I do need you to dig deep and I need you to see how you can do this

There are lots of people who were in your situation if you're in there

I can't possibly do this situation right now

Just know that there are so many people who thought the same too. I thought the same too

I thought I could never find a way to manage absences lots of people say the same, but they do

They dig deep and they do what they can all we're asking all I ever ask you of you is just do what you can and

That could mean next week

Just find one hour just find somebody to have your dog for one hour next week because that will be one hour less of

exposure than your dog's currently getting I

Know that some people go cold turkey on this and they'll say right, okay

I get it and they turn their lives upside down and they miraculously find ways not to leave their dog

but for lots of other people

it's more of a process and

If that's you and you're not a cold turkey kind then it's okay to say, okay next week

I'll try for an hour and then maybe the following week

I'll see if I can find someone to have them for half a day and then maybe it's a day

And if you can't afford daycare or a pet sitter or if you live somewhere where there aren't those options

then

Make sure that you're making the most of local Facebook groups of next door

Make sure you're making the most of my free group where you can look for people in a similar situation to you

Trade time if you know somebody who's got kids, maybe you could babysit. Maybe they could dogs it in return

Call in all those favors. It doesn't have to be one streamlined solution. In fact for lots of people. It's often a real patchwork of

Such and such so and so we'll have them on Tuesday afternoon and then on Monday morning and so on

So it doesn't have to be a dog, you know daycare five days a week often

We're patching together a solution and that's okay, too

So if you've made it to the end of this podcast episode without getting ridiculously angry with me, then I'm so grateful

I'm really I'm rooting for you and your dog. I just want this to go as

Well as it possibly can and do know that it's okay to feel like this is ridiculous

But it's also okay just to dig in and see what you can do

So thanks for listening. I do know you've got lots of options when it comes to podcast. So I appreciate you taking the time

I'll catch you on the next one. Bye for now

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 Julie Naismith calm

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

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