Achilles' story
Four years ago, I worked as a receptionist in my local vet's office (shout out to Rancocas Vet in NJ for taking care of all my critters!) We received a call for help about an aggressive dog. He suffered from considerable human aggression. It was difficult for the family to care for him due to his threatening behavior. They were more and more worried about an accident. It could occur at any time during something as simple as letting him outside to the bathroom. They were desperately in need of help of some kind. It was their last resort. We discussed all of their options and pushed for training. At the time, I had limited training experience but did not consider myself a for-hire trainer. Despite our best efforts, the family decided their best option for him would be a behavioral euthanasia. It’s a very difficult decision and for some dogs, its the kindest thing that can be done. The resources needed to rehab a truly aggressive dog just are not available to everyone. What’s more, many vets will not perform this procedure since fear and reactivity is often considered aggression, but is much easier to overcome. Achille’s had a lot of struggles, but with some patience, it becomes apparent that most of it is due to fear and no other way that he knew to express that fear. I offered to take him home. And so the journey began....
I left work for a lunch break to go home and meet the family and their dog, Achilles. In unconfined spaces away from his home, he was comfortable, but not interested in me. When they left, I took him on his leash and walked him around the property a bit, practicing a small bit of leash walking to establish some leadership with him. So far so good, he seems ok, right? His crate training manners were impeccable....until I had to get him out, or feed him, or walk past the crate, or be in the same room. I wondered if I'd gotten in over my head. My husband, Frank came home from work later and Achilles couldn't handle this "stranger" in the house. Screaming, snarling, biting at the crate at the sight of him was the norm for a while. A long while.
We started to implement some techniques that rewarded the slightest efforts to be calm from him. He began to start to think about the situations before reacting, finally allowing me and Frank to handle him on most occasions. It still did not take much to instigate his explosive behavior at this point but he'd had six years of this mindset to unpack. I'd hit a wall in my skills. He now knew a considerable amount of obedience commands and let us handle him most of the time. I didn't know how to keep working on building the relationship with a dog like this. A fellow trainer, and very good friend of mine, offered to help us and we began working with some new skills to get past the hump. We were finally on our way to building a functioning relationship based on trust that would allow me to continue growing his confidence in people. The fact of the matter is his behavior really was based on fear. Not because anything bad had necessary happened to him. Dogs can grow up fearful for reasons like leaving their litter too soon or being over protected from life as a pup. And he learned to use aggression as a coping mechanism. We now have a language that we share that allows me to guide him through fearful situations and encourage him to find confidence in better choices.
It's been several years and he has been and still is one of my greatest teachers as a trainer. The dog always knows better, always. It's the dogs who teach us. I've learned better socialization methods, awareness of what's going on in his head based on his body language, and how to communicate with him in his language to grow his confidence and our relationship.
He might be 10 years old now but we still have goals! I haven't taken him camping yet, and 2020 was going to be our year....but that got derailed. Along with everything else! Let's see it happen in 2021!
Achilles advocates for teaching people and their dogs how to enjoy each other’s company safely, even dogs that may have once been called aggressive or reactive.
