Gordo's real birthday

It's been seven years this week since I adopted Gordo, and I'm amazed at the dog he's become! The dog who used to be a bundle of nerves and fear is now calm and confident most of the time, and when he's not, I appreciate it for reminding me of how far we've come.

Issues we've overcome: Fear of the car - he would pace and whine every time we went somewhere Fear of some noises like the blender or the coffee grinder Fear of new people approaching - he would bark Fear of dogs approaching - he would lunge at them Fear of children - he would bark and sometimes growl

How did we do it? Clicker training was a huge help - it gave me ways to distract him and redirect his attention when he was acting fearful. We always used positive methods - he was so fearful it didn't make sense to punish him and compound his fears.

I also learned a lot about body language so that I could read him and understand his more subtle cues. Lucky for me he gives really excellent cues so he was easy to read if I was willing to take the time and make the effort.

The fearful behavior towards children was probably the scariest issue we had to deal with, because not a lot of people want to volunteer their children to work on this issue (and I can't say I blame them!) I was lucky enough to have a neighbor with a calm 9 year old daughter who was a willing participant in Gordo's transformation. Initially I would just ask her to be present while I worked with Gordo on his tricks, then gradually I asked her to be the one to give him the commands and/or reward him. It took some time, but eventually the dog who would growl and bark when he saw her started to wag his tail and act happy to see her! He became more relaxed with other children after making friends with her, and now he's a different dog when he's around kids. I'll always monitor him closely when children are around, but I don't worry the way I used to.

Last year at Thanksgiving my 3 year old nephew was over for Thanksgiving. The house was chaos with about 30 people bobbing in and out of the kitchen and Gordo was just wandering around making friends, when little Joey tripped and fell on top of Gordo. It was one of those slow motion falls where you see it and can't get there fast enough, and I think it took 5 years off my life, but the beauty of it was that nothing happened. Joey fell, landed on Gordo, Gordo looked at him like "What did ya do that for?" and walked away. Nothing happened. THIS was the moment we'd trained for, and it proved that all of our hard work had paid off.

He's still terrified when the smoke detector chirps because the battery needs to be changed. He's still not overly fond of random people approaching and petting him, so he wears an Ed Hardy style collar that says "Trust No One" and I tell people that's his motto, and I'd rather they didn't pet him. He doesn't need to accept every new person, and it's okay if he's nervous on occasion. Sometimes I'm fearful and I just want some space so that I can compose myself. That's life.

It's been an amazing journey with this guy and I'm grateful for everything he's taught me. Through him I've learned that I have patience I wasn't aware that I had.

The Toy Graveyard

How do you stop a puppy from chewing? You don't. Puppies chew like it's their full time job, so it's in your best interest to make sure that puppy always has appropriate chew toys. If you don't provide chew toys and you find that he's eaten your favorite pair of Jimmy Choos, you should roll up a newspaper and hit yourself in the head with it. You should have given Fido an appropriate outlet.

There's a rowdy little bugger named Miles who's living with me at the moment, and little Miles is about 8 months. His job duties include tearing up toys, running with his brothers, and snuggling with my socks and earmuffs. (Don't ask me to explain this behavior, it's beyond me). His mom and I make sure that he always has access to plenty of appropriate chew toys so that he's not tempted to chew on inappropriate chew toys, like shoes and laptop cords (two items that have fallen prey to Miles the bandit).

He has access to a huge basket of toys when we're home, and he's crated with a frozen peanut butter filled Kong toy when we're gone. This is how you handle puppy chewing - you give the pup an appropriate outlet, and you manage the situation so that he doesn't get a chance to sneak off and destroy things when you're not watching. Training is almost always a combination of rewarding the behavior you like while managing the environment so that the dog doesn't get a chance to practice behaviors that you don't like.

At the moment, the toys in the basket have seen better days and most of them need to be thrown away and replaced, as you can see from the toy graveyard show in this pic. Sigh.

That's okay, I'll never be upset with him tearing up a toy. That's what they're for!

Now I have to run. I have some toys to order.