Each Dog Tells A Story
Every dog makes an impact on you. I started my career with dog training in 2006. I had just realized that what I thought was my dream of becoming a veterinarian was not what I wanted. I wanted to make a difference in the lives of animals. Years later, I realized that I wanted to help people communicate better with their dogs.
We had dogs all my life. The love of helping them and communicating with them started early. But I thought, like most people, that dogs needed to be commanded. That you had to tell them what to do. You had to make them do things.
Then we got Akribos and it all changed. Akri is our corgi. He changed what I thought a dog should be. He was defiant as a puppy. Back talking. Drama. And I realized, this was the breed. He learned different than the labs and rottweilers that I was used to. He gave me attitude and I had to learn that his consent with doing something was so important. Or he just wasn’t going to do it. Akri taught me patience. That as long as I was patient and gave him directions and showed him that he would like what happened that he would do as I asked of him.
Then we adopted Amarant. He is a border collie mix from the shelter. He had spent time outside. He ate EVERYTHING. Puppy proofing all cabinets was necessary. We worked, and honestly are still working, on leaving food things alone. We spent time on resource guarding. On Leave it. On Drop it. On consent work. Amarant has noise aversion and anxiety issues. Amarant taught me that trust, confidence, and consent take time. Amarant taught me to go at his pace and that even baby steps are steps in the right direction.
Throughout the years, every dog that I have worked with has taught me something. But the biggest thing that they have all taught me is that we need to do a better job of communicating with them. That we need to take a step back from the constant ‘command’ focus on our dogs and instead focus on the things that we think are necessary. We need to focus on the bond between owners and dogs.