I was very relieved to get hold of Sonny because the way things were going I had a feeling he wouldn't have stayed alive for much longer if he had stayed with that owner.
The first few days of Sonny moving in with us were great. The kids were made up to have another dog in the house but we soon found out it was not going to be plain sailing. The first thing we had to cure was the howling at night, because lover boy had been so doted on he had been given pride of place on his owners bed.
Now I may be daft about dogs but the thought of dog breath in the morning was not attractive and so we soon let him know that we were not going to allow him the same privileges. After two nights, he stopped howling as he found he didn't particularly like it when I banged on the door when he did it. Aversion therapy seemed to work, I thought. However, that was a relatively simple problem to deal with compared to the next one to beset us.
Coming home from work one day we found the sofa cover ripped up the back. I was devastated. that was when I found my first dog trainer. A nice lady who talked to me about how to build his confidence. How he needed to have things that smelled of me and how that fact that he followed me everywhere (to which I thought 'AAAh bless him', was not a good thing. Unfortunately he was to chew many other things after that, the most inconvenient of which was my only pair of verifocals (£375 later thank you very much) which meant I had to go to an interview with a big crack in my glasses and also do an exam. Somehow I managed..... and even got the job!
The problems with aggression towards other dogs were getting worse. I became curious as to why he would sometimes dash across the park with great abandon, only to return (looking very pleased with himself) with a lot of long hair in his mouth. Later, I discovered he had begun to take exception to a very nice couple of bearded collies. Perhaps he just has an aversion to fluff I thought?
But when he growled at the sight of a mum walking her toddler, some way across the park, Iwas really worried. Perhaps it's time to get his bits done, I thought, after all, we don't want any unwanted puppies. It's my moral duty etc etc
WRONG! WRONG! WRONG!
Guess what, after a swift recovery from his operation his dog aggression appeared to get worse. Oh dear, this was not supposed to happen. Nobody told me that a dog who lacks confidence probably needs that little bit of testosterone just to cope and that the last thing you should do is to take it away from him. But because I didn't know this and because I had never owned a dog before (apart from Holly who was fine) how would I know? I really don't remember the vet evening talking the operation through, it was like booking a car in for an MOT.
So where are we now, Oh Yes. So far we've got separation anxiety (improving or managed) plus aggression with other dogs. We found that if we kept him distracted ie with a ball game, he would largely manage his bullish behaviour but not always. And, as you do, I started to get more nervous of taking him out. It didn't seem to matter how far away the other dog was, he would soon start to turn into a whirling dirvish and exhibit a high pitched whine which made him sound like I was stabbing him with a hot poker. Boy was this embarrassing! I began to emphasise with those mothers you see in the supermarket, the one everyone looks at whilst their child is kicking off. You feel people are saying to you 'haven't you trained your dog yet. That really is bad behaviour dear, don't you think you should take him to a socialisation class?' What socialisation class will take a dog that attacks other dogs... sorry, what was that?...Oh dear, deathly silence......
And then, halleluja I discovered Jan Fennell and her idea of a dog being like a wolf that needs to live in a pack. Now, this makes sense. I remember a fateful Easter bank holiday weekend when partner and I sat down with our book and tried to get the dogs to lie down and give a 'deep sigh'. I can't quite recall the number of hours we spent on this but I can tell you that every time we so much as flinched, both dogs would spring up like hot potatoes. It was very frustrating and by the end of the weekend we felt a real couple of failures. But, I went to a talk by Jan Fennell and she gave me her contact details. All is well folks, Tony Fennell is coming down to see us, Sonny you've met your match. Tony Fennell was lovely, but had travelled for hours through a traffic jam. It was a boiling hot day and he was very good at setting out what we had to do. But somehow it was very hard to be clear about what to do in every situation and I became very anxious about 'bothering ' the Fennells with, what I thought might be, too many phone calls. In the meantime Holly was busy letting us know that any if we had any ideas about taking over the pack she was having none of it. She began drinking profusely and weeing all over the kitchen floor on a regular basis (and yes this was definitely behavioural) a regular doggy sulk!
Then we move, it's even harder to walk him now, we are not near a park and if I can I try to avoid any dogs, I can't risk meeting one off the lead. The day comes when we unexpectedly meet a large (and fluffy) german shepherd dog, quite old, not bothering anyone and on a lead. Sonny the whirling dirvish is right on form, he's wearing a head collar now and writhes about at such a pitch that he manages to get out of it and attacks the other dog. I am mortified and have to ask the owner (who thank god is totally nonplussed) to kick him off. Sonny and I go home, I am shaking and now literally terrified to go anywhere with him. I don't take him out for 3 weeks and confine him to ball games in the garden whilst we try to decide what to do.... What is left, walking him at 2am??
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