May 2024, by JudyShevelev & Vero Chávez Rojo
Last month we wrote about why our dogs act the way they do during adolescence. This month, we offer some strategies to make your life a little easier. These are tips we offer our clients regularly and they have found them helpful. Hope you do too!
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Strategies to Help You Get Through This Trying Time
Professional Support: Seeking the support of a positive reinforcement trainer or behaviorist is one important step to take. Such a professional can help you understand the particulars of your situation and your dog to create a program to meet your needs. (Note: Positive reinforcement training is always a good idea but is especially important at this stage because our dogs tend to be less stable emotionally, and it is not uncommon for new fears to develop during this time. Using aversive training methods can only exacerbate this situation.)
Patience and Realistic Expectations: It’s important to set our dogs up for success by not asking for more than what they’re able to do and for us to be patient. Otherwise, we risk causing a great deal of frustration in our dogs, which can lead to other behavioral issues.
Routine and Structure: Maintaining a solid routine for your dog during this period, especially, is extremely important because it provides structure so that your dog knows what to expect when, which in turn provides stability during an unstable time.
Continued Socialization: Continue to provide opportunities for socializing with other dogs during this period. All dogs are hardwired to communicate with other dogs, but if they don’t practice, this skill gets rusty and can lead to reactivity.
Reward-Based Motivation: Keep the rewards coming! As mentioned above, they have a key role in motivating your adolescent dog and in strengthening your dog’s memory. Rewards include food treats, games and walks, toys, special time with you, and affection—basically anything that motivates your dog.
Opportunities to Sniff and Explore: Give your dog plenty of opportunities to sniff and explore, and limit heavy cardiovascular exercise that might overstimulate your dog’s nervous system. Forty-percent of a dog’s brain is dedicated to processing olfactory stimulation. We can take advantage of this fact by creating opportunities for our dogs to explore and use their sense of smell, which they thoroughly enjoy and it relaxes them.
Clear and Respectful Communication: Communicating clearly and respectfully to your dog goes a long way towards building a solid bond. Our dogs spend much of their lives observing and studying us. It is also our responsibility to learn about canine language so that we can communicate effectively.
Support and Autonomy: Just as with human adolescents, our canine adolescents need to know that we are there to support them and, at the same time, it is possible to teach them to make good decisions on their own, thus allowing them to have more autonomy.
Managing Your Emotions: Controlling your own emotions and having a place to process them that doesn’t affect your dog is important. Sometimes we forget that our emotions and behavior also influence our dog’s behavior and emotions. How you communicate with your dog at any time, but especially during adolescence, will make a huge difference in your dog’s confidence level, their desire to look to you as a guide, and their maturation process in general.
Our primary job, as pet guardians, is to provide a safe and comfortable environment for our dogs during this tumultuous time. It gives our pups some stable ground on which to stand and builds a sense of security and self-confidence, in addition to fortifying our bond with them.
When the going gets rough and we humans get frustrated, it is helpful to remind ourselves that this is a developmental phase that will not last forever. To this end, it can be useful to practice mindfulness exercises with our dog.These exercises help us to get in touch with our essence and recall the loving, faithful, and intelligent essence in our dog.
Dealing effectively with our own emotions and gathering the information we need to properly support, communicate with, and understand our dogs as they go through adolescence is the greatest gift we can give them.
(For more information about mindfulness exercises and emotional support for you, contact us regarding our Personal Development Coaching Program: https://www.holisticdogtrainers.com/services.)
