Leave the Dog Alone

Honor your dog's "dogness."

Dogs, like humans, are social creatures. This is one of the reasons they make such great pets and companions. Domestication and breeding have cleaved our species together in ways that benefit us both, for better or worse. Our dogs want to be around us, and we want to be with them. And we are not shy in showing them so with touch, talk, and eye contact—sometimes in overpowering amounts.

Dogs enjoy being part of our family, and being close to us, yes, but they are also individuals who sometimes want time to themselves, despite what we might think. They seek us out for attention, but they also learn, when given the chance, that closeness can exist without affection being given 24/7.

Humans often misinterpret dog behavior in ways that, at best, confuse the dogs we love, and at worst, drive them to send us messages we don’t tend to welcome. Because they are so forgiving and desiring of affiliation with us, our dogs continue to try to communicate with us in the only way they know how.

And often, we can’t see, don’t see, don’t want to see, don’t want to believe. But it doesn’t have to be this way.

I have a simple message that can help you to interact with dogs much more effectively and safely. It costs you nothing, but may save you, or someone else, from being bitten. It will honor the dog's "dogness," too. You won’t like it, necessarily, and you may have a difficult time carrying it out. But it’s something that we humans owe to the dogs in our lives.

Leave the Dog Alone

Why do people seek out dogs as pets? There are lots of reasons, but in my experience I’ve found two reasons that transcend age, gender, class, financial status, and personality: we want a being that will love us unconditionally, and we want to be able to touch and stroke that being pretty much at will.

Luckily for both our species, dogs tend to enjoy touch and other forms of attention from us, but most humans don’t know when to stop—or why they need to! There is definitely such a thing as too much “love” when it comes to dogs.

Passive bonding

When you are hanging out with your dog, touching, stroking, talking silly, kissing him, picking him up, or playing with him, you are bonding actively with him. In and of itself, active bonding is a good thing, and we both benefit. But both dogs and people also need the absence of active bonding, too. Passive bonding is often overlooked in our relationships with our dogs because we don’t realize that they need it. Passive bonding is “the space between the notes,” the closeness without touch, the proximity to each other without any requirements or need. Are you allowing passive bonding in your relationship? Your dog needs it, and so do you.

Leave the dog alone so that he can rest, sleep, settle, and learn that touch should be earned in some way—it’s not freely abundant. Leave the dog alone so that you develop some self-control around your dog. Just because your dog “doesn’t seem to mind” you constantly petting him, or even seems to want it 24/7 does not mean you must comply with his requests. Just because your dog is close enough to touch doesn't mean you have to do it so much.

Show your love to your dog by actually meeting his needs—not just yours. Here’s a blog post on the things your dog really needs, with more on passive bonding.

Leave the Dog Home Alone 

Dogs don’t understand the concept of temporary separation until they’ve been taught, so every time you leave the house, the dog isn’t sure you will be back. There is no way to convince him that you will return except by always returning. So yes, dogs feel stress when we leave them, but we cannot ameliorate this stress by staying with them more or carting them everywhere with us. We must teach them how to deal with the stress of being left alone by actually leaving them a fair amount, and by not allowing our emotions to get the better of us. The best way to inoculate the puppy against separation anxiety is to leave and return, and to mix up departure and arrival times, length of time away, and actions that precede and follow an absence.

The dog needs to be left safely, of course, which may involve the use of a crate or other confinement. Don’t get all emotional about that part of it—dogs don’t generally perceive confinement like we do, and it helps greatly with structure.

Here’s an article I wrote on crating.

You needn’t make a big deal out of your comings and goings, even though you think that’s necessary. Your dog will still love you just as much if you come in calmly, take him out calmly (or send him if he’s trained) to his potty area, and then engage with him calmly. All the high-pitched voices and exclamations are your attempt to meet your own needs, and they can confuse the dog. Keep things simple, and on a schedule as much as possible. The dog will adjust.

Many people tell me that their dog has “separation anxiety,” and usually, they are wrong. They themselves have separation anxiety. Sitting at a restaurant or movie theater and worrying about the healthy dog you left an hour ago is pointless, and likely not reciprocal—he’s probably napping by now.

Most dogs don’t have separation anxiety, but many do fall somewhere on a continuum of separation distress. Mitigate that stress by keeping your emotions in check, making your farewells and arrivals calm and consistent. (And if your dog really does have diagnosed Separation Anxiety, work with a professional, please.)

Make sure your dog is getting the proper amount of exercise, mental stimulation (including training), and having his primary needs met, and then go away. Don’t go away mad, just go away.

After all, how can he learn that you will always return if you never go away?

Leave the family dog alone, kids

Dog bite statistics can be alarming when you first hear them: 4.7 million dog bites occur yearly according to the CDC, with over half of those occurring to children. Actual fatalities are rare (fewer than 100 per year), and many other things kill us with more regularity. But when dogs kill, it hits us right in the gut, doesn't it?

Everyone has heard news stories of children being mauled and even killed by dogs, often by dogs that are well-known to them. Most bites to children come from their own family dogs. Why is this? Often, it’s because the adults assume too much from both the dog and the child. The family dog should not have to endure children bothering him endlessly—even when they are "being kind" to him.

We know it’s wrong to hit, grab, tease and badger dogs--and responsible parents drum this into kids' heads constantly. But even when kids are taught to refrain from these actions, their attentions to the dog may still cross the line. It’s also wrong to allow your child, or any child, to ride your dog, lie on top of him, climb on him, move into his space quickly, grab toys or food from him, wake him from sleep, pet him endlessly, or pick him up when it’s not absolutely necessary. You might think it’s cute, and you might presume that the dog is OK with these behaviors because he hasn’t growled or bitten, or walked away.

But you’d likely be wrong. It’s to dogs’ credit that they tolerate a lot of crap from us, but not all dogs have the same amount of fuse. If pestered, badgered, climbed upon, picked up, laid upon, or grabbed enough, any dog can bite—even your beloved family pet. And when it happens, you don’t get to blame the dog. He was, in all likelihood, sending signal after signal and was thoroughly ignored.

In short, do not allow anyone—child or adult—to treat your dog in a manner you’d not allow towards another human. Know your dog, and protect him.

Leave the public dog alone

Everyone knows dogs who “love the world,” and pert near everything in it. These canines seem to have a permanent grin on their faces, constantly wagging tails, and the perfect acceptance of any touch we seem inclined to bestow upon them. If you don’t own one of these dogs, you have friends or acquaintances who do, and you see people at the park, on the street, in every city who do. I like to call these guys Ambassadors, because they embody so many of the qualities we seek in our pets: friendliness, joy, laid-back acceptance regardless of our faults and flaws, a desire to avoid unnecessary conflict, and a joie de vivre that we covet but cannot ever seem to clear our thoughts enough to reach.

Luckily for us, most of the millions of dogs living in homes, riding in cars, and going for walks in the community are Ambassadors in full or in part. We trust them, and they trust us. We relax with them because we value what they embody, especially the desire to avoid conflict. People call them angels, heroes, furkids. They claim, "I didn't rescue my dog--he rescued me."

Just as people differ in our personalities, dogs come sometimes with personalities that aren’t as easy to accept. Not all dogs are ambassadors, and that’s actually perfectly fine. Dogs were bred to perform tasks, and sometimes the ambassador qualities don’t fit with those tasks (guarding, for instance). Some dogs do not want to interact with people they do not know, and this is their right. Whether it's because of genetics, personal temperament, a lack of socialization as a pup, or some other factor, the dog is simply how he is, and while training and proper socialization can help pretty much every dog on the planet fit more within our parameters as constituting a good pet, training cannot erase genetics. With dogs, it’s nature AND nurture, always.

The thing is, many humans assume that every dog they encounter is naturally an Ambassador, and this can be a big problem. Assumptions about dogs and their behavior gets us into trouble sometimes. You are not entitled to interact with every dog you meet in public, regardless of your desires. In public spaces, in friends’ homes, in situations where a dog or dogs happen to be, leave the dog alone by default.

Yes, of course there are situations where it is OK to pet or interact with dogs that do not belong to you. Always ask permission from both the owner, and the dog—and listen to the answers they both provide before touching. No matter what the owner says, if the dog says "no," do not touch.

How do dogs say "no"? Some people assume that if the dog isn't snarling or trying to bite them, he likes it. But dogs are appeasers, and may try lots of things before they get to this point. These include hiding behind the owner, blatantly avoiding you; ducking the head, pulling away from you, averting their eyes and licking their lips, tucking tail, or taking a submissive, low posture. If you stop, crouch down, and wait for the dog to enter your space, and he does not come into it, leave him alone.

NOTE to the owners/caretakers of Dogs Who Prefer to Be Ignored By Strangers: You have a responsibility to your dog to keep him safe. This includes not just actual, physical safety, but also his perception of safety. This means that even though *you* don't perceive the "nice" man who is trying to pet him as a threat, the dog might--and it's HIS perception of the situation, not yours, not the stranger's--that matters. I know you don't want to appear unkind to people, but your dog depends on you. If you allow, or worse, encourage touch from people when your dog is sending clear signals that he is not comfortable, you are throwing your dog under the proverbial bus. How can he trust you? And at what point does he proceed from hiding behind you to biting? This can be prevented. Listen to your dog.

Building your dog's confidence is essential, and part of your job. Allowing or encouraging unwanted touch does not build confidence--it erodes it. Contact a trainer who works with dogs like this and uses an inclusive approach (lots of tools in the toolbox, several ways to tackle the problem) to help you.

And stop worrying more about what strangers will think of you or your dog, and focus on helping your dog. No one is entitled to touch your dog. It's OK, and often better, to Just Say No, smile, and walk away.

Here's a blog post I wrote about interacting with other people's dogs.

Children Are the Most at Risk When Things Go South

Read the above section again and apply it to your kids. Most dog and child interactions are perfectly safe as long as a watchful adult is present. Teach your kids to Leave the Dog Alone when:

• The dog is unfamiliar to them
• The dog is loose or itself unsupervised
• The dog is sending signals that it wants to be left alone
• By default

If you teach children that their default behavior when they encounter a dog that meets the above criteria is to Leave the Dog Alone, they will be safer.

Yes, there are situations where children are allowed, maybe even encouraged, to interact with dogs that do not live with them. But these interactions should never be assumed, and must always be permitted by an adult who knows the dog. Never assume, even if the dog is displaying “friendliness,” because most people who are not canine professionals misinterpret signals of stress or excitement for friendliness.

Look, we love dogs, and they love us. Dogs are pretty adept at showing affection for us, and we think we are adept at showing them we love them--but often, we are wrong. We give them too much affection and not enough structure, in general. We want to meet their needs, but we often only meet our own needs and confuse ours with theirs. We can do better, and we must.

"Do you love your dog? Or do you love loving your dog? If it's the former, you will make sure to provide your dog with what he truly needs. If it is the latter, you will do what you want and then complain about him." ~Sarah Wilson

Leaving the Dog Alone, like obedience/manners training, helps dogs deal with our often confusing world. It isn't mean, or cruel, except sometimes to our own sensibilities. It's safer for us, and ultimately for them. It honors them. Make it your default behavior until you are invited to interact, either by the owners of the dog, or the dog himself.

Enjoy the dogs in your world, definitely, but do it consciously and while meeting their needs, not just yours. They will pay you back a hundred-fold.

One-Trial Learning

Remember, if you can, learning how to ride a bike, or use roller skates, ride a skateboard, throw or hit a ball, or dance a routine as a young child.

If you grew up in the age before video, you were shown what to do by someone who had already mastered the skill. Patiently or not, that person gave you the steps to follow, and then allowed you to try. Maybe they moved your arms and legs, or maybe they just talked you through it.

You failed at first, didn’t you? You fell. The ball wobbled and landed nowhere near where you were trying to throw it. You struck out—a lot. You got the dance steps wrong, and out of sequence.

Your teacher showed you again. And you failed again. This process repeated itself, for hours, days, or weeks, leaving you frustrated and feeling as if you’d never “get it.”

Then one day as you were practicing, after a number of repetitions over the days or weeks, the activity fell into place as if you’d always known how. Once you knew it, you could never again not know it. A feeling of euphoria washed over you. Your teacher celebrated with you. Maybe you even skipped off to teach someone else.

The next time you went to learn a new skill, you knew it might take some time. You instinctively knew that you would need to practice to get better, and this knowledge boosted your self-confidence. Because what you wanted, now, more than anything, was that euphoria of getting it right. 

Now think about, at around that same age, how you learned not to touch a hot stove.

Was there any practice involved in learning this important lesson? Not only did no one demonstrate how to avoid the stove, you were actively warned against practice for this task.

How quickly did the learning occur? If you are like most people, you only needed one repetition—just one—for this lesson to sink in.

That is what is known as “one-trial learning.” It’s behavior change that takes place extremely quickly, typically because the consequences are painful, scary, harmful, dire—or all of these.

What does this have to do with dogs?

Dogs, like most social beings, learn in many of the same ways we do: by practice, and repetition, and by consequence (reward or punishment). Every behavior has a consequence, and how the animal perceives that consequence determines whether the animal will repeat (practice) the behavior. If the consequence pleases the dog, he will practice more, and gradually improve to mastery. If the consequence is displeasing, he might attempt the behavior a few more times, then give up. If the consequence is scary, painful, or dire, he will cease the behavior—usually after one trial.

So what does that mean for us, as dog owners and teachers?

Why, when teaching their dogs new behaviors, do so many owners assume that the dog should know what to do after only one, three, or five successful repetitions? They weren’t riding a bike as well as Lance Armstrong after one attempt, but they feel like Fluffy should “get it” immediately. Or, even worse, they assume Fluffy “knows” it and is just disobeying to spite them! (This is definitely incorrect. Owners often assume knowledge on the dog's part where it does not exist. Do not fall into this trap.)

Maybe this expectation stems from our “want it now, get it now” culture.  We are an impatient species these days, and we suffer for it.

Wherever it comes from, it’s not helpful.

It took the owners of these recent Intermediate Class graduates months to get them to a place where they could "stay" this close to other dogs and be calm. It doesn't happen by accident--it takes practice.

No good training uses dire (scary, harmful, painful) consequences to teach new behaviors like sitting, coming when called, or lying down. When we want a behavior to continue, we use pleasant consequences after it occurs (or we help it to occur). Since we are not using dire consequences, we will need multiple repetitions to get the dog to a place of mastery. These multiple repetitions should happen over a period of days, weeks, even months. There is no humane way to get “one-trial learning” of a positive behavior like “come.” It takes the time it takes, with multiple reps in “easy” locations, then in different locations under different conditions, so that the dog understands.

Also: your dog enjoys those euphoria moments, too! When he gets it right and you rejoice in his success, your bond grows.

This is textbook learning theory, and there aren’t any shortcuts that work. Dog training takes patience, just like learning to throw a ball. Practice daily, reward small successes, and give it time to work, just like your parents, teachers, coaches and friends did with you.

The relationship that blossoms with your dog may surprise you.

Do You Mind? Part II

Mindfulness: paying attention in a particular way, on purpose, in the present moment, without judgment. This is the definition I like the best (I'm pretty sure I got it from Sarah Wilson). The “without judgment” part can get a little hairy, as we humans are masters at narrating our lives as we go, and focusing more on the negative than the positive.

It’s a very satisfying concept at its core. And I’ve been studying it for years in some form or another, through lots of reading, through my successful 15-year dog (and people) training business, through my work at the Atlanta Humane Society, and through my consistent need for alone time and silence.

In 1986, at the know-it-all age of 20, I went to a 2-day Transcendental Meditation (TM) seminar with my girlfriend. I don’t recall whose idea it was (probably hers). What did I know about TM? Not much; at the time I don’t even think I knew it was a fad popularized by the Beatles. I was sort of in a spiritual “woo” phase at the time, having thrown off the shackles of a Catholic school educational upbringing but not quite ready to dismiss the idea that “there might be something out there.” (The more people I meet, the more I’m convinced that the best way to turn people agnostic/atheist is to send children to Catholic school.)

So, we went to this seminar, and they taught us how to do TM, not as a group, but individually. I actually practiced it, albeit spottily, for a few years before giving up on it. But I still remember my mantra to this day (I can never tell you; it’s a secret for me only and it is not to be shared--I take that spiritual shit SERIOUSLY). I never gave it enough of a shot to get good at it, so I can’t really say how well it would have worked for me if I’d worked it. It has mostly fallen out of favor, from what I can tell, probably because of a lack of science showing it was the miracle many expected it to be.

So when I signed up for the MBSR course, I wasn’t a complete stranger to meditation. I was happy to learn, however, that there really isn’t a “woo” aspect to MBSR. I specifically wanted a secular experience, and that’s exactly what I got. I also got reacquainted with yoga practice, if only the basics, because 10-15 minutes of basic yoga moves is a really good way to prime yourself for 45 minutes of sitting and meditating. It makes one a lot less fidgety.

I hadn’t done a lot of research into MBSR before deciding to take the course, partly on purpose. I made sure my teachers were qualified to teach it, but that was about it. Of course, it’s like buying a car: after you own the one you buy, you see the same make and model everywhere (the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon). After I started taking the class, I started seeing news reports of the efficacy of mindfulness all over the place.

Luckily for me, the venue shifted the second week of class to a more open space with properly-working heat. (See my problems with hot, small spaces in Part 1.) By week 3, we were doing mostly sitting meditations, which was pretty helpful in keeping me awake (but not foolproof).

To be honest, I didn’t really feel stressed by life. I didn’t take the course to reduce stress, specifically, but to learn more about being mindful and living in the moment. It’s something we can all learn to access, but we rarely do—probably because it’s not simple. We are so used to living in a “want it now, get it now” world that many of us have forgotten what it’s like to wait for things, to become proficient at a skill, to enjoy the journey.

Our meditation practice started out with instructions. The very first meditation we did was a “body scan,” where the instructor guides you through focusing on every part of your body for what seems an almost agonizing period of time. Our instructions were to make note of how each part was feeling, nonjudgmentally, and then move on.

Doing it this way made it easier for us newbies to block out the “chatter” that courses through our brains constantly. Every time we started thinking of anything other than the body part the instructor was talking about, we were to direct our thoughts back to the assignment. That generally occurred about, oh, I’d say once a second. It was exhausting.

But it was also liberating in a way. When you don’t really try to control your thoughts consciously, it seems to you as if you cannot—it is impossible. But it isn’t. And once you start doing it, you get better at it. The brain is a muscle, after all.

Dog trainers have long known that mental stimulation for dogs is a powerful tool for keeping them out of trouble and out of shelters. It tires dogs out in positive ways, and makes them think. Unlike physical exercise, it has no fitness plateau, either, so it can be used daily (as long as it remains interesting and requires the dog to work at a solution).

Practicing mindfulness is mental stimulation for humans. But it doesn’t tire you out when you do it correctly—it sharpens you, awakens you, pokes you in the solar plexus and changes your brain. It also enables you to confront things about yourself that may have been buried a bit beneath the surface.

And that is where the journey starts to get interesting.

Do You Mind?

I recently attended an 8-week course on Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction, or MBSR, which I have noticed since the course began is becoming pretty popular around the country.

Several compelling studies are arriving that show that focused meditation improves our minds in a myriad of ways. (Don’tcha love that word, “myriad”?) Once thought to be the sole bastion of “woo-woo” New-Age practitioners, meditation is now “hip,” and even buttoned-up workplaces are adopting it as a way to reduce stress and improve functionality and creativity. Doctors are prescribing it to treat ADD and ADHD in children and adults.  They are also prescribing it for chronic pain, high blood pressure, IBS, and other ailments. What about therapists? More and more, therapists and psychiatrists are recommending mindfulness as a treatment for depression.

Mindfulness Meditation, as it is also called, could apparently be the Thing That Saves Humanity From All Evil. (Then again, probably not. But does it hurt to try?)

Meditation itself comes in several forms. It can be religious, spiritual, or entirely secular. It can range from simply sitting with oneself in silence, or even contemplative silence, for a few minutes a day to 3-day retreats full of little but eating, sleeping and purposeful meditating. It often conjures up a vision of patchouli-soaked rooms full of hipsters chanting and bending their bodies into various painful poses, but that shouldn’t define it.

MBSR isn’t just any meditation. The key is mindfulness, and if you think it’s a simple thing to turn off your brain for 10, 20, or 45 minutes at a stretch and focus solely on your breath, you will find out soon enough that It. Is. Not . That. Simple.

And that, my friends, is what makes it awesome.

Yes, one of the greatest things about Mindfulness Meditation is that the idea—turning off distractions and focusing on one thing—is simple, but the practice is deliciously difficult.

The first night of class, I fell asleep. And snored. And I wasn’t the only one.

C’mon, give me a break. It was evening, it was winter, and it was very, very cold outside, so the heat was up higher than I’m used to in a room that was slightly too small for the number of students present. Also, the meditation part came at the end of a 2-hour lecture, and we were instructed to lie on the floor.

You’d have sawed some logs, too.

(Thinking back on it, I am reminded of the scene in the movie G.I. Jane—an oddly entertaining/eye-rollingly bad flick mostly due to the acting chops of Anne Bancroft and Viggo Mortensen—wherein our Navy S.E.A.L. trainees have been awake for almost 24 hours and are given a “break” from their nonstop physical travails in the form of a sit-down in a classroom. They are dog-tired, starving, chafing in wet, sandy clothes, and nearly beaten down, and Mortensen tells them to “write an essay, no less than 500 words, on ‘Why I Love the U.S. Navy.’” The heat is turned up, the lights are dimmed, classical music begins playing, and it’s pouring rain outside--and they are ordered not to fall asleep.)

The MBSR presenters are savvy, though, and they knew this would happen, and warned us about it playfully. It takes time to train your brain to do this, they said. You will fail at it constantly, but you will get better over time. And I did. And I still am.

Oh, it’s a journey. I get slack. I don’t make time for it like I should (45 minutes a day, 6 days a week, is the prescription). The trick is not to start judging yourself for skipping it, though. That’s difficult, seeing as we humans spend a great deal of time judging ourselves harshly.

Stay tuned. I need to go meditate now.