Ken’s Comments:
A wise person once said that you can tell a lot about a person by the way they treat others. I firmly believe you can tell all you want about a person by the way they treat a dog. I get to meet so many people in this line of work, and for the most part, dog lovers are good people. No more is that true than in the case of Catherine and Sampson. Catherine is GOOD PEOPLE.
I remember walking into her house with warnings that he is aggressive. Sampson met me at the door, sniffed, checked me out and was interested. Ten minutes later he was cuddling on the couch with me while I conducted the one on one. Why was he not aggressive? I did not give him a reason to be.
See, Samps was nervous. He reacted when people overwhelmed him. Overwhelming him was easy to do. He needed to learn to enjoy. So we set up a plan to maximize those opportunities and slowly convince Sampson to trust.
Catherine is the type of owner a trainer loves to see. She followed through everything, working her way through the one on one, enroling him in group obedience, and joining the walks. She did this despite having a work schedule with rough long hours. There are times on the walk, Catherine had 2 hours sleep and still showed up. She is also all over anything good Sampson does. Sampson looks at somebody, she rewards, Sampson sniffs at somebody, she rewards, Sampson allows another dog to sniff, she rewards. It is great to see.
As a result, Sampson has come leaps and bounds in such a short time.
Is he perfect yet? Nope, he can still get overwhelmed. But, he has so much love to give that even if he does react now, it is very brief, not serious and he gets over it quickly.
He loves his cuddles and will go nuts if I am around to get at me and into my lap.
Hard work, persistance and dedication is so key to behavior modification. Catherine and Sampson are excellent examples this. They are a work that is still in process and I am LOVING witnessing it.
Here is their story from Catherine
I’ve always had a dog ever since I can remember.
My family got a puppy when I was three years old and we had him until he passed away sixteen years later. By that time I was living away from home but I knew that when I had a place of my own I would absolutely have another dog. Seven years later in Spring of 2015 I was dead set on adding a dog to my home. I decided on rescuing a pup from the SPCA and started monitoring all of the websites pretty closely.
In June I saw “Charley” on the Gander SPCA Facebook page. He was a medium sized mixed breed, 9 months old, and he loved fetch and cuddles. That was all I needed to hear. I had absolutely no idea where he came from and I actually didn’t even care (it turns out he had two previous owners, and two stays at the SPCA).
I drove out to Gander to meet him to bring him home.
We played a bit of fetch in their play area, I popped his new leash on him and we headed for the door. In the doorway the staff said to me “Oh, did anybody mention his aggression issues to you? No? He’s not great with kids under 10 and his previous owner brought him back because he nipped at her when she disciplined him.”
Perfect. Too late, I was in love so off we went.
I renamed him “Sampson” the moment we got in the car. He was the sweetest with me, licking, looking for cuddles, playing nice.
A couple days later I brought him to meet my parents. My sister and my aunt were also there visiting and things were not so perfect. Samps turned into a savage before my very eyes. Every time my aunt’s boyfriend spoke, moved, or blinked an eye, Samps would go absolutely off his head and start trying to bite at him. Eventually I actually had to leave their house and drive back to town. I had tried to put him away in a bedroom for some quiet time but it turned out that he knew how to open doors…
Sampson had so much energy, which was fine because I’m not short on energy myself, but taking him for walks was a trying time. He needed it to burn some energy but he pulled so much that by the end of each walk I was at my wits end. He would bark and jump at each person we passed and heaven forbid we run into another dog. Every time I left the house he would try to bolt out the door and there was no calling him back, he would stay about one home away and come back when he lost interest in whatever he was doing.
After a couple of months of trying to work it out myself I had a one on one with Ken and I could not believe that Samps let him into the house and then jumped into his lap for kisses and cuddles. I thought he was about to make a liar out of me. We implemented some new house rules, tethered for a few weeks, and a couple months later I enrolled him in Level 1.
The first day off class it was back to the old Sampson, barking, growling, and hiding between my legs. Ken took the opportunity to show the class how to properly greet an uneasy dog and after a few minutes Samps came around, at least with Ken.
By the end of the first level Samps had really come around and was friendlier with most of the trainers.
We’ve now completed level 2 as well and the difference is unreal. It’s been a massive summer for Sampson.
We attended Neveah’s Lemonade Stand and he voluntarily approached adults and children for pats on his head. I would never have brought him to a public event by myself but the support of the group and the trainers gave me the confidence to give it a chance.
After the experience with the kids, Samps became a little more open to the little girls next door being around him. He curled up between their father’s legs for a rub and allowed the little ones to pet his head without too much fuss. It doesn’t sound like a lot, but being near kids is terrifying for Samps and letting them near him without growling or barking is huge.
He’s still nervous around strange kids and I’m not ready to let them near him either but I’m hoping that after My Dog Is Awesome and Level 3 he will be ready to meet my 5 year old nephew.
We recently participated in the Bark for Life in Bowring Park and again, Samps was letting strangers pet him and playing with the other dogs. He greets the other dogs and people at the group walks like they are old friends and he has the best time sniffing and getting pats from whoever is willing to entertain him.
He absolutely dies for a cuddle with Ken before the walks and I can actually have people in my house without worrying about Sampson going crazy. I know (for the most part) what he is comfortable with and what is going to spook him and he knows that I’m his safe person.
I can’t say enough about all the help and support we’ve received from Ken and his trainers. Samps isn’t perfect and neither am I but he has come so far and I can’t wait to see what more he is capable of!
