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 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 too.
In this episode, I'm talking about choice in separation anxiety training.
I'm really passionate that dogs just don't get that much choice in their life.
Now, I don't mean you to think that I'm suggesting for one minute that we should let dogs do
everything that they want to.
I mean, if that were the case, then my dog Percy would get run over chasing rabbits.
My dog Tex would probably eat himself to death because he would eat and eat and eat
until he couldn't eat anymore.
So, part of being a good pet parent, part of caring for our dogs is making decisions
for them, making decisions that they may not otherwise choose.
But we have to remember that dogs are our prisoners.
Dogs don't get to decide very much in their lives at all, and I know prisoner probably
sounds really harsh, but think about it.
We decide absolutely everything for them.
We decide which home they come to live in.
We bring them home.
We choose them.
They don't choose us.
We choose pretty much what they eat, although with picky eaters, maybe we let them get away
with not eating what we think they should eat.
We decide when they go for walks.
They might nag us a little bit.
They might get on us because they're bored and they need to go outside and play, but
it's pretty much fitting in around our schedule.
And we decide when we want to cuddle them.
Okay, so you've got the ones that nudge you, that come up to you and kind of pester you
until you cuddle them, but we're still making that choice to cuddle them in that moment.
With dogs, lives don't revolve around choice.
It's just not how they are structured.
We keep them in comfortable captivity.
And that's why I think it's so important that whenever we can, we look at the world from
our dog's perspective and see whether it's at all possible that we can add more choice
to their lives.
But what about separation anxiety and in particular separation anxiety training?
Is it possible that we can incorporate choice into that?
What do dogs with separation anxiety think about being left anyway?
Well, it seems quite obvious to us, doesn't it, that dogs who have an anxiety about their
human leaving, they hate it.
They hate it.
We get quite a good read on how they feel about being left.
But what about dogs without separation anxiety?
Well, they aren't voting for their humans to leave.
It's not the number one thing on their list.
So normal dogs don't want to be left alone.
Dogs with separation anxiety hate being left alone, panic at being left.
So when we get dogs over separation anxiety, are we trying to get them to be okay with
something that they actually don't want to do?
Are we trying to get them to accept something that they wouldn't naturally ask for?
Because no dog wants to be left.
The non-anxious dog, if we were to go inside their head, we might hear them say,
Oh, well, you're going out again, I get it, I don't want you to go out, but since you
are going out, I'll just go over here and hang out until you get back.
A dog with separation anxiety, a scared dog who's petrified of being left, they would
say, please don't go, don't go out, I cannot cope when you leave me alone.
But for either category of dog, being alone is not a natural state.
However, us going out and leaving dogs is part and parcel of not necessarily what it
means to be a pet parent, but it is how we relate to dogs.
It's part of the deal, as far as we're concerned, that goes along with having a dog.
But as much as we want to do everything we can for our dogs, we want them to be comfortable,
we want them to be okay, part of the deal is we are going to leave them at times.
And as long as dogs live with us, as long as we think it's ethical to have dogs living
in our homes, as long as we have jobs and medical appointments and social lives, then
we owe it to dogs.
We owe it to dogs to help them cope with this truly unnatural state.
Given that they wouldn't choose it, given that they are not lining up to say, yeah,
go out, please go out, just get out, I don't want you around anymore, I'm so done, I need
some time on my own, I need alone time, now since they are not saying that, given that
they're not choosing to be left, how can we at least incorporate more choice into how
we approach home alone training?
Well, here are seven things that I think we can do that will give our dogs more choice.
And if you're not doing these already, and actually I know that many of the people that
I work with are doing this already, but if you're not doing these seven things already,
do reflect on how you can incorporate them into your separation anxiety training.
The first one, let your dog choose when he wants to train.
Okay, what do I mean by that?
He's not going to be pestering you to do home alone training, because that's not how it
works.
He's going to pester you to throw the ball, or to get a belly scratch, or to open the
treat tin, but he's not going to bundle up to you and say, hey, you know that separation
anxiety training thing?
Could we do that now?
Letting them choose, letting him choose when to train, means being fully aware of whether
he's okay, he's in a state where he's going to be fine and comfortable with the training.
And it means being aware of the times when he says, do you know what, just not today.
And that that's okay.
It's okay for your dog to vote with their feet, to vote with their body language, to
say, no, you know, I know you want me to get comfortable with being alone, but I'm not
really digging the training today.
Can we just skip it?
And if your dog is telling you that, and remember, dogs speak volumes through their body language,
and in particular, the micro-tells, if that's what your dog's saying, let them choose.
It's okay.
And in fact, it's way better for you to choose not to train when your dog is telling you
it's not today, than to try and force through the training.
It's not good for you, and it's not good for your dog.
Number two, when you do start training, when you're starting a training exercise, let your
dog choose when they want to stop.
Okay, so they might not want you to train at all, which is the first point, but when
you get started, be so conscious of what they are saying with their body language.
And if you have any suspicions that your dog isn't handling it, then I want you to
stop, because that is letting your dog choose when to stop.
Lots of people say that if we work on fear-based training, we're forcing dogs to be okay with
their fears.
Often what's happening there is people are missing the signs that their dog isn't comfortable.
But if you look for the signs, you will see when your dog is saying, yeah, okay, I can
do this today, or no, it's too much, I need to stop right now.
And that is giving your dog choice.
So number one and two are letting your dog tell you when it's okay to start the training,
and number two is letting your dog tell you when it's time to stop.
Let them choose.
Doesn't matter what you've got in your goals, it doesn't matter what you've written down
that you want to achieve today, let your dog choose.
Number three, let them choose what they do while you're doing the training.
So remember with separation anxiety training, what we do is gradually expose your dog to
increasing amounts of alone time, but at a pace that's okay with your dog.
And the alone time doesn't increase in any big increments.
It's just little increases that your dog can handle.
And if we ever think it's too much, we go back and we make things easier.
And that is it.
That's the training.
The training isn't about getting your dog to do something, the training is about getting
your dog to feel differently about being left.
So if your dog wants to look out the window and it's fine and that doesn't make him anxious,
let him look out the window.
If looking out the window makes your dog anxious and makes things worse, then you want to probably
certainly block the window, stop your dog seeing outside because that stimulus is too
much for them.
But if your dog wants to sit by the door when you're gone, as long as he's not anxious,
remember he's telling you when he's okay with his body language, but if his body language
is fine, he's not stressed, he's not anxious, he's not upset, but he's just hanging out
by the door because any minute now you're going to come back in, then let him do that.
Let him choose.
Don't make him stay on a bed.
Don't make him stay in a crate.
Don't make him stay in a room he doesn't want to be in.
Just let him choose where he stays or what he does while you do separation anxiety training
and that extends to when you've got the longer durations and you're now going out and you're
doing your stuff, let your dog choose.
If your dog's not doing any harm, if your dog's not getting into stuff, just let them
choose what they want to do and where they want to be.
Now, as someone who owns a Labrador cross, letting him have access to the kitchen or
to food on the counter is not going to happen, so I'm not going to give Tex full choice over
what he does when I'm gone.
So obviously we're going to be sensible about this, we're going to make it safe and we're
going to make sure there aren't things that dogs can get into that they shouldn't get
into, but once we've done all of that, just let them decide where they want to be and
what they're going to do.
Don't make them stay on a bed, don't make them stay in a particular room, give them
choice.
Number four, let your dog greet you when you come in.
Don't ignore your dog.
If you're doing this training, your dog is being brilliant at learning to cope with you
coming and going, learning to cope on his own, but he loves you to bits and when you
come back in, he probably needs you to interact with him.
So give him that choice, give him that choice, allow him to greet you however he wants to
greet you.
Know that it's not him being bad or crazy or anything, it's just he loves you and he
wants to greet you, so give him the choice if he wants to greet you, allow him to do
that, don't deny him that.
Despite what you might read, despite all the advice to the contrary, ignoring your dog
is not going to help one bit.
So give him the choice to come and say hi.
Number five, so outside of training, let him be with you when he needs to be with you.
Let him be in your company, if he's going to learn to be okay when you're gone, then
give him access to you when you're around because that's what he wants.
He loves you more than anything else in the whole wide world, so allow him to be with
you when he needs to be with you.
So if he needs a snuggle, let him do it, it's not going to make his separation anxiety worse.
If he needs a belly rub, give him a belly rub, let him be with you when he needs you.
That's a massive choice that we can allow dogs to make.
Number six, be really mindful that the goals, the hours, the milestones, all those things
that we use to measure separation anxiety progress, they're about us and not them.
Dogs don't care about that, I guarantee you, if you're working on separation anxiety training,
your dog is not saying to himself, I can't wait till I get comfortable with two hours
so that mum can go out for two hours, he's not saying that.
Remember, he'd rather you didn't go, we're helping him cope, we're giving him coping
skills, but he is not looking at the chart, waiting to check off the next big number
and the next big number, that's no dog anywhere.
So when we reframe it and remind ourselves that goals and hours and milestones are about
our agenda, then I think it helps us go at our dog's pace, because when we try to push,
when we try to go too quickly, it's because we need that for us, and I know, I know you
need to be able to do stuff, remember I've been there, I've been there with a dog who
I felt as imprisoned as he did, basically, that's how you feel, right, which is actually
quite interesting because they feel that all the time.
We feel like we have no choice when we've got a dog with separation anxiety, they feel
like that all the time, but I've been there and I've wanted to get to two hours, I've
been desperate to get to three hours, I've been so needy of getting more time that I
could do stuff with, so I really understand, and it's important to keep ourselves motivated
and think about the freedom and the things we'll be able to do when we get that bit more
time, when our dogs can handle more alone time, but that is about us, that is about
our needs and not theirs.
And I think it helps take the pressure off if we remind ourselves that the best place
to go at is the one that our dog is choosing, and if that means he's going to go for a few
weeks without making any progress, that's okay because that's his choice and if he chooses
his path through this, he will be more confident, he will have a better foundation, and that's
going to be good for you too.
Number seven, my final point, and probably the biggest one, is keep the training 100% fear-free.
Dogs don't vote for training that makes them scared, no dog would, and what that means
in separation anxiety training is we don't test out dogs to see, hmm, how long could
they go for this time, we don't need to do that because that goes back to point six,
those goals, the hours, the big glamorous milestones, those are about us, they're about
our agenda.
A dog does not want us to test them out in that way.
They don't need us to watch them and start our stopwatch and wait until we see them getting
a little bit anxious, that's not what they want.
They want to feel, if they had any vote in this process of separation anxiety training,
they would just say, okay, alright, I get it, I need to be able to cope on my own, I
can do it, but as long as I don't get scared while I'm training, yeah, that's fine.
And remember, mild fear is fear, it's fear, it's not, it's fear, so let's not try and
downplay it by saying, oh, yeah, well, you know, he did exhibit some mild fear, he was
at his anxiety threshold, he did just tip over, fear is fear.
So just because we think the training is going too slowly, I guarantee you that that
doesn't mean the dog does, in fact, more likely than not, that's exactly the right pace for
that dog.
It's slow for us, but it's right for them.
It's all about slowly, steadily, and at your dog's pace.
And if your dog is ever finding things too difficult, we make things easy again.
But always think about, what can my dog handle, what's the pace that's right for them?
So those are my seven things that will give dogs more choice over a process that he really
doesn't have that much choice about, but that we think is an important process because we
need to do things, we need to live our lives, and we want a dog who can cope with that reality.
Your dog is never going to choose to be alone.
This training is not going to turn him into a convert to, I want to be alone, that is
not a dog's natural state.
But if he were to sign up to this, he would probably sign up to a deal that said, okay,
I know you need to do these things, mom, I know you need to go out, get it, so if you
can help me be okay with that, help me cope with it and not feel scared, then I think
I'd like to give that a try.
And so what you're doing now, the separation anxiety training that you're doing, is helping
him deal with his biggest fear.
For a dog with separation anxiety, being alone is as scary as it gets.
And I promise you, he would absolutely thank you for doing that, as I do.
Alright, good luck with that training and I look forward to catching you soon.
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 julienaysmith.com.
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Thanks so much.
Good luck with that training and bye for now.