Sharing a silly victory - Page 1

Those of you who have followed the board for a while will remember the difficulty we had last fall with my pup Ansgar. She had an intestinal intersucception which required surgical intervention. All through the winter she has progressed, & healed, & turned into a really affectionate little darling, although she is very petite, & thin, (she has become a very picky eater) her coat is shiney & full, eyes bright, but she is very clingey, & will tip toe around the yard & by my side. She would never extend herself or stray too far away from me. I think being left at the  veterinary surgeons while she was in her fear stage, & all the stuff they had to do to her to save her life (& they were wonderful, very caring) left her less confident than she might have been otherwise.  Last evening I had her out, just playing & throwing her toy for her, when my husband came home from work. Now all of these dogs love Carl....they go crazy when he comes home. Ansgar, went to greet him, & as he walked toward the house, she started to run, at first just her usual dainty little lope, but then, as Carl got closer to the house, she put on a sudden burst of speed.......OMG, it was so funny, I watched the expression on her face just open up! Her eyes got really wide, she opened her mouth & let her tongue loll, & she tore around the yard for the next 15 minutes, with Carl & I just in stitches; she crashed into him, & careened away , into me, & finally stopped to lean up against my legs, panting with her head thrown up, all happy, tongue hanging out! That was the first time I've seen that dog let go & run & be just happy since her surgery. She's been like a little worried child for so long, what a relief! I hope maybe now she will actually be able to start training, it's been hard to get her to do anything that didn't involve leaning on my legs! Even throwing her toys for her to bring, she would trot out to them , snatch them up, & hurry back to me, looking like 'whew, I made it'. Any more confidence building suggestions?

Obstacle work does wonders for confidence, but some obedience is ideal to really do it well so they don't fall on their little heads.  Glad to hear your pup is doing so much better!

so glad to hear she has made such amazing progress :)

just have fun with her and encourage her to be outgoing we had a JRT who was terrified of water and just about everything and she was the most clingy dog ever,  we had a pool party the whole family in a tiny paddling pool eventually she decided that being with us was far more important than her fear of water and jumped in !!!

well that was it water was the best thing ever from that point on and her confidence grew and grew to the point where she wasn't bothered if i was close by.

find something she really loves and encourage her to play  on her own and be less reliant upon you.

all the very best of luck. and kisses to your special girl xx

tracie

We have found swimming to be GREAT for fearful/non-confident dogs. It seems that overcoming that basic fear of the "unknown" translates into all areas of thier lives.

Thanks everyone, just had another minor disaster-main water line into house burst! Going out to get plumbing supplies! Back later! jh 

LOL perfect opportunity for her first swimming lesson ;)

hope theres not too much damage :(

You might want to get her into agility to boost her confidence.  We used that on our old GSD and it did wonders for her.  The act of conquering the obstacles really seems to do the trick.  Good luck with her, sounds like she is finally coming out of her shell.  And good luck with the water works.  Hate to hear you are having plumbing problems.

Deb

my used to be afraid of the water, now she goes for a swim at least 4 times every day........good exersise..

Hey, thanks for the advise & the empathy! I just thank goodness other half is talented in that way. When we bought this old house in '02, he changed all the plumbing over to copper, at quite an expense, only to find the water was so alkali that it began to eat away all the copper! Now we've bought a lot of some sort of silcone piping that you fasten with something called a 'snake bite'??? Supposedly it can withstand our mega hard water......but unfortunately we think it may have killed all the appliances in the crawl space....hot water heater, baseboards, etc....we'll know for sure when it all dries out! Fans & sump pumps are on wide open! I wouldn't want Ansgar to go swimming down there....she doesn't need a perm, & I don't think a zapp would do her confidence much good either......LOL! Not only will we not have anything but bottled water today, but after my hubby gets changed into work  overalls, the power's going out as well. Don't need him getting fried! I've seen too many folks standing in water, with electrical stuff plugged in, power on, floating around their ankles! Yikes! Oh well, I'll probably have to give another paycheck to Home Depot! *sigh*....it's always something! And the weather's turned crappy again, don't want to take the pups out to play or train today, it's sleeting right now, yesterday it was in the 70's. Ah, well! That's life! jackie harris

You may need to run your water through a pre-filter. There are several communities around here that have to do that with their well water. Might save you $$ on appliances and plumbing.