I have really been disheartened with Tashy’s lack of progress recently   but I am now thinking the problem could actually be with me 

When we first adopted Tashy her SA was really bad and she would pee if ever she was left alone (even if we were still in the house but in a different room) now when I am doing her SA training she barks continuously when I leave the house   All the guidance/literature, I have been given/read says you should wait until there is a break in the barking before entering the house again……herein lies the problem. Tash starts barking & I enter a few seconds/minute later, so really all I am teaching her is if she barks Mum comes through the door pretty much instantly  

It wasn’t until a few days ago when I was starting to loose the will with her persistent barking, that I really needed to take a couple of minutes extra to collect myself before I went back in the house. Whilst I was outside calming down   Tashy stopped barking   I waited 10 seconds because I was convinced she was going to start woofing again but she didn’t   I left it a minute or two before I came back in only to find her happily licking at her kong  

Tonight was a prime example, the first few times she started barking the minute I left her but instead of coming back in almost immediately, I instead, waited a good few minutes & right enough the barking stopped & she was found to be tucking into her kong  

It just might be the case that by me not allowing her to choose between barking her head off or her devouring her kong, I have actually been hindering her progress 

Tash has now been with us for 2 years so she knows stability, routine, care, love & ultimately that we always come back so it just might be that this wee madam is being playing me for a dafty  

Apologies that I have not updated Tash’s progress for a wee while, work has been manic and although I have trying to keep up with Tashy’s training it’s been erratic to say the least.

Just after week 7, Tashy’s progess was going so well that I actually built enough time up to jump in my car, look round the shops for 20 mins and get back home whilst she was still licking the living day lights out of her kong :0) This was until I repeated the above only to come back and find Tash barking her head off and her kong hardly touched :0(

Unfortunately, this seemed to be the case for all our subsequent attempts thereafter. It would now appear that Tash won’t touch her kong if I compress the fresh chicken to tightly …..she much prefers that little effort on her part is need to extract the meat from her rubber toy <rolls eyes>

Regardless of her little barking outbursts I am trying my very best to get Tashy’s use to being left for 1minute/30 minutes every day.

Weather depended, I was hoping to spend one day this weekend doing nothing but Tashy’s training in the hope that I can break her anxiety circle. I’ll keep you all posted about how we get on…………………

Week Seven:

Training seems to be going well .

Over the past week I have been presenting the kong to Tash & going outside for various lengths of time (upto 10 minutes) & she has been absolutely fine with me departing.
I read that once your dog is comfortable with you leaving for five minutes it’s not that hard to work up to much longer durations.

To………

When I got in Tash was waiting for me at the back door as her kong was empty but she wasn’t barking, whining or girning.

The wee minx had totally emptied the red kong whilst Bubby was only half way through the black one.

I think next week, I am going to keep adding time onto Tashy’s alone time but I might video record her as I am interested to see exactly how she reacts once I gone.

Unfortunately this week I have not had the same time to dedicate to Tash but I have been carrying on with her training as much as possible.

So we are now in a routine of shoes on……jacket on…….pick up keys……pick up bag…….present Kong to Tash……….go out the back door…..come back in……take away Kong…..put bag away……..put keys away……take jacket off…….& take shoes off. Which has been working well.

When outside I try to vary the time before I come back in. At first I was literally just going out & coming straight back in, then I started to build up the seconds & then minutes. When leaving Tash for minutes I am always careful to get back inside before she has emptied her Kong as I still want to catch her in the ‘Stop coming back so early’ stage.

I also want to vary the times I am outside so she never know’s when I am coming back.

As I mentioned in last weeks post, the food you choose to put in the Kong is vital. Tonight I emptied half a tin of Butchers Tripe Meat into the Kong and Tash literally could not wait for me to put it down.

I have only started to work on building up the minutes but tonight we got from:

to 5pm without a girn, bark, whine or any sense of anxiety

When I came in after the five minutes, both Tash & Bubbs were to engrossed in their Kong’s to notice my entry!!!

Do you think they missed me?

This week, I am going to continue trying to build up Tashy’s time left alone.

If I have learnt anything this week it’s you gotta be serious about the type of food you put in the kong.

At the beginning of the week I thought we were regressing when Tashy started to refuse the kong but it turned out she just wasn’t to fussed about the food I had put in it. To get round this problem, I decided to cut up strips of chicken & compactly stuff it into the kong – this makes sure that she really has to work at licking it out.

Once Tash was happy to take to her kong whilst I performed the triggers (took a few days), I changed the routine slightly so I would perform the triggers first then put down the kong to her. Each time moving closer & closer to the door that I usually leave by……on returning I pick up the kong first & then take of my jacket etc. The whole idea behind this is for Tash to start to think ‘Yeah you have come to soon….I’m not finished getting all the goodies out’

Presenting the Kong to Tash

This was the first time I made my way to the back door

A few more times later

In this picture I had actually gone outside, closed the door& then walked straight back in to find……….

I’m comfortable now that Tashy is getting better with all my departure triggers however I have a concern that all the training I do is at night (at work during the day) or after my tea so she will start to patternise my routine but I can’t help this so will just have to bash on with it.