I'm back!!!!! And still learning!!!

Hey everyone!!!

Sorry for the long gap in posts but January came around and my parents had to work a lot which meant I got to hang out with my buddies at Pooch!!!  Check out my earlier blog if you want to know more about the Pooch Hotel.

Recently my mom has been working with me in the training department to get me past my nervousness about an object called a Lacrosse stick.  She wants to be able to use it to fling my ball and not wear her shoulder out before its time.

To give you some history about me, my puppyhood was filled with very little.  I wasn't socialized with much outside the home so my reactions to new situations, shall we say, can be different.  For example, when I first met my adopters during a temp foster situation I didn't care at all about meeting them right away.  I just HAD to meet the garden hose on a reel that was next to the house.  I pulled at my leash, digging my pinch collar into my own neck but I didn't care because I NEEDED to check out the weird object.  This was pretty much how I went into most new situations, pulling at my leash, sometimes barking, but very determined to meet anything and everyone new.  Which of course can be somewhat rude to both people and dogs.

So knowing this about me, my parents have worked very hard to keep me calm in new situations, to approach things calmly, in order to introduce me to new things.  So when mom brought out the lacrosse stick she expected my usual reaction which almost always involved some level of excitement.  I pancaked...I laid flat on the ground and tucked my tail.  I ran back into the house and found comfort in my bed.  I think it worried my mom a little.  Of all the reactions she was prepared for, she wasn't expecting this.

So she talked with our trainer who reassured her that this was just another aspect of my under-socialization and not recalling a negative experience with a stick.  She let her know that dogs whom she knew grew up from puppyhood in loving homes still hide from brooms and other sticks.  So they set up a plan to get me past this.

We started by just placing the stick on the ground and letting me check it out on my on time.  Next mom used a technique used by the mom of my former arch nemesis Violet to teach me that the stick with the treat basket was okay and brought good things.  She put salami in it.  But I still wasn't so sure.  So mom had me play the "Find It" game.  I searched high and low but only found the salami in the treat basket.  We have played this game a lot these last few days.  Mom changes it up a bit by holding the stick, sometimes she will swing it around and place a treat in it, then bringing it back down for me to find it.  And once she even flung a treat out of it which I thought was kind of cool.

So we are making progress and the goal is soon I'll learn that this stick can bring me a ball.  Just going to take some time and patience.  But we are on our way.