When It All Goes Wrong

It was one of those days when it came to training today. I'm sure you know what I mean. Those days when you ask "Do I know anything about training? Haven't I taught my dog anything?" It came on the heels of a great agility training session, and then we decided to do some obedience. It all went down hill from there.

I took Lyric to D&B to work on socialization and focus with distractions. She fell apart. In truth, I think I fell apart worse. So, on the way home, I bought us a deal of french fries to share (Junk food I know! Bad owner....) gave her a kiss, and thought about our time together in the positive light of trying to figure out a lesson from our experience.

Turns out, I really do have a lesson to learn from it. In fact, it's a great lesson to learn and so I see our outing as a wonderful success. All of these things that I know came together, and now it's time to see where I didn't apply them so that next time I can!

I heard Susan Garrett say that one of the biggest mistakes we make as positive trainers is that we don't allow our dogs to fail enough. And I do think she hit it on the nail on that one. I'd like to add that as trainers, we don't like to let our dogs fail because WE don't want to fail. As heartfelt as it would be if we simply didn't like to see our dogs fail, I don't think that's our only motive for not letting them fail. What they do is a reflection of us, or so we seem to think. When in reality, our dogs failures aren't always ours to claim. This drive to keep Lyric from failing caused me to stumble big time today, and poor dog she wouldn't have been failing if I hadn't been failing first!

My plan going to D&B was to have a wonderful success of socializing and training, but what I failed to realize was that I shoved Lyric into attempting a huge success without understanding that she had some little things to work out. By having these huge goals, I lost sight of the fact that dog training is made up of small victories, not big ones.

The moment we walked towards the doors I had a hesitation that I should have acted on. Going towards the doors I felt a discomfort, like neither of us were quite ready. I excused the notion because I did have focus I reasoned. She was looking at me some as we went to the door. But what I settled for wasn't my criteria. When I go into a place like that, I want total focus. Even if that means working the front doors for 75% of our time there. I did not have the 100% focus that I needed outside before facing the numerous distractions inside.

Lesson - Fix the problem of Focus when it starts rather than playing 'patch it up' all through the session.

All the other problems built themselves upon this shaky foundation to our outing. Without that total focus, I started feeling stressed. and where does that stress go? Right down the leash to my dog. The look in her eyes told me she wasn't comfortable. We weren't in our optimal working zone - we'd already gone beyond that. So what did I do? Get frustrated that she wasn't trying as hard as I was to patch up the focus. Instead of going back outside to fix the problem, or finding space away from as many of the distractions as possible, I kept trying unsuccessfully.

Lesson - When you and the dog are stressed, don't try to keep regaining that focus without changing the amount of stimulation. First find a way for both of you to calm down into work mode, then regain the focus before attempting those distractions again.

I kept thinking I was gaining some attention, only to loose it just as quickly.  I would achieve getting her eyes on me but then she'd go back to sniffing. I ignored the displacement behaviors which caused her even more stress. She also was not tugging well, which is one of her favorite games. That's a red flag if there ever were one. Whether it was from the stress, or a sore mouth from playing with Rusty earlier, if she wasn't tugging she was distressed.

Lesson - If you can't achieve your criteria (like focus and tug drive) and your dog is distracting themselves on purpose, then they are too stressed and you are no longer working together - you are surviving apart because there is no connection.

 So, rather than pushing ourselves to achieve focus and awesome behavior even during that stress, I should have reduced the amount of stimulation in order to regain focus and infuse us with confidence. It was a battle that we could not win, and even if we did we would have been sacrificing Lyric's love of working and focus and drive. That's just not worth loosing for one session.

I'm honestly glad we failed because it brought everything back into focus for me. Sometimes we trainers need to have failures, just like our dogs, because when it all goes wrong, the lessons we learn might just make it all go right.

Ball Patrol - Lyric's choice!

My topic for today has to do with 'choices'. This concept is the idea that by allowing the dog to make choices, but controlling the access to the reward, we can teach our dogs to understand what behaviors are acceptable, and which ones aren't.

Lyric has an obsession with balls. This is not a behavior that I like. Previously, I've tried to control the dog - telling her to leave it, calling her away - or by managing the behavior - putting all the balls away. These options have not been working, and there are definite reasons why. I hope that this new approach of getting Lyric to choose will help relieve these problems.

The main complaint with controlling the dog is that it is exhausting. I do not want to continually have to tell Lyric no. It also creates a dog who must be told, rather than thinking for themselves. Long term, controlling Lyric just isn't an option. The issue with managing the behavior is that balls will get left out be someone. There will constantly be error. It also does not teach her self control, and I do not want her obsession to grow.

Now to control the access to the reward. Controlling the balls is not about putting them away but controlling her access to them. So, I have decided to create an "off limits" place for balls, that way neither of us are confused on when balls are okay to play with and when they aren't. I have a basket of toys that are out, but not open for playtime. The requirement for Lyric is that when the balls are in that basket, she is not allowed any access to them. In order for her to learn this, I've been setting firm boundaries, and giving no second chances.

It is a reward for them to be down on her level. So long as she doesn't mess with them, they are left down low.

But what if she starts sniffing the basket and touching the toys? I do not want any gray area about what is expected. She is allowed NO access. The basket is put up if she sits and stares at them or touches them. The last thing I want is a dog who sits by the basket day in and day out. It may seem harmless at first until that obsession grows. It all depends on her focus. Is she really paying attention to them, or did she just walk on by with one sniff because it's an object on the floor?

If she grabs the ball, I simply do not allow her to play with it. Instead of commanding her otherwise (remember the goal is to not have to control the dog) I simply grab her collar, preventing any play to take place. She gets board and drops the ball, and I calmly go put it away.

The big thing with this is that it's her choice. She gets to decide what she's going to do. I'm not going to get after her, or tell her 'uh uh' when she starts towards the basket. Even if I could stop her from going to it, I don't want to. It's her job to make the right choice. I simply control the outcome. By not trying to make her decisions right, she's going to learn a lot faster what the rules of the basket are.

The next step is earning a ball. I only want to give her a ball when she has accepted ignoring them. If she engages me in something else, totally ignoring the ball, then I might tell her to "take it!" as a reward. But that is only when she has completely forgotten about the ball.

Day 1 of ball patrol has started...so far so good. I had to take away the ball only twice after setting the basket down the first time. It has been put up a few more times than that. And for the first time in quite a while, she's laying down taking a nap.