 Hey, what's going on guys? Tom Davis here, America's K9 educator. Thank you so much for joining me today on my YouTube channel. If you guys haven't yet, do not forget to smash that subscribe button, like this video. And in today's episode, we're gonna be talking about and working with a client coming from out of state working on anxiety. So it's gonna be separation anxiety, it's going to be anxiety on the leash, as well as some behavioral things that come from anxiety. And so I'm simply just gonna walk you through the whole process guys and go over some very, very common things that people do with their dogs to create that stress and create that relationship. So I'm gonna stop talking, we're gonna get right into the video. No. So now what I wanna do is the other thing that you're, you meet like, you know, what I try to do, like as an artist or whatever is just like, just start peeling off flavors. I'm like, all right, let's just get some of this, you know, it's kind of like renovating the house. You're like, all right, all this has gotta go. Let's get down to the bones. So one thing is the separation anxiety. So you can tell, like as soon as I take him, he's like, nope, mom, mom, mom, mom. And it creates anxiety. So I wanna help him feel more comfortable away from you. And you, so how do you do that? It's not like, just go in here and just knock it off. Like you can't. You have to work on exercises in order for him to be like, I'm okay, I'm okay, I'm okay. I'm not okay. You know, you have to work on that and really get him better. It's much like any yoga running, holding your breath, you have to incrementally get better at it. It's nothing that you can go in and just, right? So I wanna start that process and how do you start decreasing that separation anxiety? And of course, when we talk about separation anxiety, it's going to be, I gotta be next to you. If I'm next to you, I'm not happy. And that's not good for any, it doesn't matter if it's a giraffe or a rhino or a dog. You don't want that. You don't want the thing that you're in charge of to be dependent or codependent on you in order to be happy. So we're gonna work on that. First thing we're gonna do is we're just gonna work on a basic sit and a stay. Have you done stay with him? Okay. So here's what people do is what you don't wanna do is you don't wanna go sit, stay, drop the leash and walk away. That's what you don't wanna do. What you wanna do is you wanna make sure that when you ask him to sit, he's like, okay, I got it, good sit. Turn to him, right? Stay. One, two. He's like, all right, got this. Once you've completed this task and the first step of the first increment, break, do that like four or five times. He's done that. You do the same process and then your distance, your duration and your distraction. So the three Ds that I typically work on with any obedience, distance, duration and distraction. The duration is how long you're standing here. Distance is how far you are away and the distractions are realistic. How many things are we gonna throw into the mix to desensitize him for reality? Right, yeah, and I, but he's like, I can see him anticipating anything. Exactly. He's like, okay, huh, when it's over. Like he's like, wait. Yup. And here's, exactly. And one of the things that everyone does and you may or may not do it, here's the reason why dogs are so anticipatory is they do this. They go, sit, stay, stay, stay, stay, right. Is that what you do? Yeah, so that's why. So that's what you're, exactly. So what you wanna do, neutral. You don't wanna be like a horror movie and suspense and like brah, brah, brah, brah. And then boom, you're just waiting for that door to open and that monster to pop out. You don't wanna build that anticipation with your body language and with your behavior of yourself. So if I say to you, it's just like with human behavior, right? If you walk into the door, I'm like, wait, wait one second, wait one second. Hold on, wait one second. You're waiting for me to come back and then I'm gonna go, okay, what would you like? Right, with my voice? Wait, hold on, right? Okay, and, right? But if I'm like, I'll be right back. You're just like, all right, got it. It's like, it's like an end. Yeah, it's cut right off. So same thing with dogs. We're gonna go, sit, stay. Neutral. So they're not queuing off of our stay, stay, stay, stay. And they're also not queuing off of our this too. I had a client last week that did this. It was like, because what she did is she would do this, like this. And every single time that she did this, the dog would come. And I said, so it's exactly. So the dog's reading your verbal pressure. The dog's also reading your body language. So you're going, click, click, click, click, stay, stay, stay, stay, stay. Dog gets up every time. So you're like a timer. Stay, hold it. Now when we're working on recall, we're not gonna like necessarily do this, sit, stay and things, that's not realistic. What we're doing is we're just working on, I'm gonna go away from you and everything's gonna be okay. And you're gonna practice this until your distance duration and your distractions are all really good. So let's start that and see how we do. Good. And just hold it. Nope, so put him back. So one thing I would do is you're doing another pressure, which would be that. Yes, yes. Does that make sense? You don't want the dog to ever, you just want him to go off of break or heal or come or whatever. So what I would do in this situation for you guys is stay, you can use this as like a wall. And then do this. Just don't give him anything because he's already anticipating that. So don't give him another cue to anticipate on. Pressure, nope, just pressure on. Like this, there you go. Sit, stay. Now stop right there, good. Fold your leash in half, yep. So whenever we're doing obedience training with any dog for any reason, doesn't matter if it's behavior modification or teaching a puppy basics. So give him a break. What you don't want to do is this, okay? Let me show you how this works. So again, when we're talking about duration, distance, and distractions, like the final test would be stay, right? But we're not, we're not there yet. So you have four feet of leash right there. So we already did the first sit stay and he kind of was like a little rocky on it. So then you take it here and you hold it and you say, okay, we're gonna go this close. We're gonna work on distance and duration. So we come back, we're holding, okay, break, right? And then once you're like, all right, we've passed that test, then you're gonna go out to your full thing. So do it again and just fold your leash in half. You guys, we're doing a giveaway. As usual, all you guys have to do is like this video and in the comments below, leave your dog's name, letter, enter, letter, enter in the comments below to automatically get entered when a free online session with me, anywhere in the world, it's a half an hour session. I wish I could give it back more, but that's all I can do right now and you guys can enter right now in the comments below. Stay. Now just hold this for a little bit longer. Good. Now just put it down your hand. Good. Good, stay. Right, break, perfect. Like I said, I think it's just, it's really about just taking these little, little things and making, you know, soliding and everything up because you wanna do the best you can as a dog owner to make sure that you're doing everything you possibly can to counteract or counter condition the inherited anxiety that the dog may have been born with or the breed or whatever. So let's do this again and I wanna walk through the process to make sure that we're in a good spot that way when you go home in the future, you can practice this. Good. Okay, so now that, nope. So now the next phase of like this is you're gonna come out, you're gonna hang onto the leash and you're just gonna go to the end of it. Stay. Stay. And then you're gonna hold that and don't call him. Just put your arm down, good. Good. And you just sidestep this way to the left and then you get, nope, catch him. So try to catch him before he gets off. So this is what I'm talking about is like the sit, stay in his case has a lot to do with his separation anxiety. He's like, where do you think you're going? You're not leaving without me. So this is something to practice that. So this isn't, so micro-macro, right? I always talk about that. It's like your micro is working on your obedience with the sit, stay. The bigger picture is he's working on his anxiety of being away from you and you moving around and him not being clingy to you. So this is a perfect exercise for you to use with him to help with all of that anxiety. So now what you can do is you're just gonna walk to him and tell him good stay, but don't break him. So good. Now tell him to stay. Good, just back up. Good. Just letting him know that he's not moving until you break him. So sidestep a little bit, watch his behavior. If he gets up, you're gonna cruise right to him and catch him. Good. See that, hear that deep breath he just took? It's good. Go back that way. Good, now just drop the leash. Good. Now go up and tell him good stay and give him a little bit of, good. Good. Stop, good. Good. And now give him a break. Break? Good job. So if you practice this enough, the next step is dropping the leash coming out to here. Then dropping the leash and turning around. Then dropping the leash, going out the door and then so on and so forth. So he's gonna be, you're basically taking an exercise to teach him and to prepare him and desensitize him and really just push him through these uncomfortable situations through obedience to mentally prepare him for all of this. And that's what you're gonna do. So that was really good. All right you guys, that's a wrap. Thank you so much for watching. If you haven't yet, do not forget, like this video, smash that subscribe button. I hope this brought you value. I hope you learned something from it. It was a lot of fun. Thank you everybody so much from the bottom of my heart for watching, listening, commenting, engaging. I appreciate you guys. I will see you next time. 🎵 Move forward, switch up. I hit E that's a sticker. She picture perfect so I told him I'm...