5 Tips to Remedy Separation Anxiety in Dogs
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Consistently exercise your dog to the point that he is calm.
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Keep your departures and arrivals low key.
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Maintain a regular, predictable daily routine 7 days a week for your dog.
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Give lots of praise to your dog when he is calm.
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Ignore your dog when he is anxious.
Here is a helpful video from Animal Planet on Separation Anxiety:
These two articles also makes some good points:
www.paw-rescue.org/DogTip_SepAnxiety.php
I have been researching this problem since my 16 week old Mini Schnauzer suffers from seperation anxiety. I highly recommend the book, "The Dog Who Loved Too Much, Tales, Treatment, and the Psychology of Dogs" by Dr. Nicholas Dodman. Chapter 6 deals with this problem and tells how to resolve it. I have done the recommended steps for the last two days and have seen marked improvement. We have been able to leave the dog twice without a problem. We also moved the dog so his crate is now in the back bedroom so he cannot see us leave or return. We did not medicate the dog. I know he is not "cured" so we will have to continue treating his anxiety but we have definitely taken a step in the right direction.
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Jennifer: Thank you for your feedback. The location of the crate must be key for treating separation anxiety, since I have read that also. I'm glad your Miniature Schnauzer is coming around.
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Found another good book on separation anxiety. Even gives a schedule. "I'll Be Home Soon! How to Prevent and Treat Separation Anxiety" by Patricia B. McConnell, Ph.D.
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Thanks for the info, Jennifer!
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This is a great post. My little Chihuahua Teddy is having separation anxiety issues my wife and I are trying to work through.
I read another great post on dog separation anxiety yesterday on my.arfie.com - take a look http://my.arfie.com/profiles/blogs/the-first-10-minutes-coping
I think working with a dog to train him through the process is key., Leave the house for a bit to test him, try a webcam to keep an eye from the neighbors house.
Somethings got to work - until then I'm gonna keep on trying
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The last 2 days, my boyfriend and I have been using a water spray bottle on our cats whenever they meow "WAY TOO MUCH" because this is a very bad, annoying habit they have gotten into that needs to be stopped. If you disagree then you have no idea how annoying a constant repeat of meows and howls is. It seems to be working quite well and sometimes they just have to see the bottle to stop. But my dog has been acting very unusual... every time my cats start meowing my dog gets up and walks around. He seems to have anxiety or maybe it's not as bad as I think? He understand that meowing = spray bottle and obviously this stresses him out. My dog has been caught in the cross fire with the spray and dislikes it, so maybe he's concerned that HE will be sprayed. But we never spray him with it, and if he's smart enough to understand meow = spray bottle, why doesn't he understand after visually seeing it multiple times, that we are spraying the CATS, not him. Do you think he will get used to it?
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I think your dog will be just fine. You probably won't have to use the spray bottle long term and even if you do, it doesn't sound like your dogs behavior is anything to be concerned about.
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My dog is the same way, he gets nervous when he sees a spray bottle(any bottle). What I did was pick him up and carry him around with me when I had one in my hand and that calmed him down to now he has to be doing something wrong to act concerned when I pick one up. I just made him feel comfortable with one, unless his guilt would get to him.
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