mental problems?

[Marley]

hope they can be discussed here too.

 

My bc has become increasing phobic the past 3 months. It began with thunder and fireworks, and has progressed now to any loud sounds, including things like firetrucks or police. He now also is somewhat fearful to go out on his walk, seemingly always thinking there is another storm out to get him (even if its sunny out). I've had dogs

that were scared of thunder before, but it always

ended there.

 

He is also showing an increasing tendency to burrow

into corners and under things. He now likes to

sleep in the linen closet which has louvre doors which he manages to open on his own.

[diane allen]

How old is your dog? My understanding (of limited experience here, so you're getting what you pay for!) is that many dogs, especiall border collies, go through a later 'fear' period at about 1.5 to 2 years of age. Things that had been totally normal, ignored or accepted suddenly become T E R R I B L E!!

 

If that's the case with yours, as with most of these things, don't coddle or you'll encourage it. Just give it a chance to outgrow. My older dog has always been fearful of loud noises, and we have all too many thunderstorms. She'll hide in the laundry room. I walk by, and say, happily, "Oh look! There you are!" and keep going. Nothing consoles her anyway.

 

Hope that's your problem!

 

diane

[Betsy]

Riley (almost 1.5 years) decided two days ago that umbrellas are the scariest thing ever invented. He had never been scared of them before, but ran away from me and into the street :eek: at the sight of me walking out of the house with one.

 

He can tolerate it enough if he's on lead and can even be convinced to walk normally, but off lead, he's gone!

 

I've learned my lesson and will never approach him with said umbrella off-leash again! (Or at least until he's gotten used to it. It was too scary when he ran into the street about 30 minutes after the heaviest rush hour period.)

 

Betsy

[AK dog doc]

Hi, Marley! This will be a bit long, sorry...

I'll preface my remarks by saying that if you have a behaviorist in the area that you can consult, that might be of value, and also that if your vet or trainer is interested in behavior (not just training), that might be another good place to start, since all those people can see your dog, and I can't. Also, if you are uncomfortable with a training method, always seek a second opinion.

 

Dianne is right about some dogs (not just BC's) going through a fear stage at a certain phase of social development. She's also right that if you "coddle" the fear - ie, comfort the dog - you can inadvertantly encourage it - the dog may read your actions as praise or reward for the behavior. Since even the smartest dog doesn't really speak English - it just understands our cue and the action we are asking for with that cue - they will take a huge amount of meaning from the REST of your communication, which would be your tone and your body language as well as overt actions. So if you show concern and try to comfort the dog - which any compassionate person has a powerful urge to do - the dog may think either that YOU (his leader) think this is a big problem, too, so he should be even MORE worried; or that you love it when he acts like that so he should up-regulate that behavior.

 

Complicating your circumstances is the fact that there are only two fears that are considered innate by most behaviorists: one is fear of falling, and the other is loud noises (including thunderstorms, construction, fireworks, gunshots, etc.) But, as you've noted the behavior early, you've got options. And, depending on the dog's age, some of this may ease up with maturity, but right now it sounds as if it's getting worse, so you may need to intervene.

 

I have three dogs, two BC's and a terrier. The terrier is the only dog completely at ease with the loud noises. She was trained in puppy class to ignore a popping balloon (a major food-hound, she was easily distracted with treats and didn't care how many balloons exploded so long as she had her Yummy Chummies). To this day she is the only dog I have who runs from window to window during the fireworks, evidently happily excited by all the noise and light.

 

My puppy, a 17-month BC, didn't get the same training (the instructor was unavailable for his puppy class), so I worked him at home on this. He's not as bomb-proof, but he's not bad, and getting better. I attribute this in part to his age when we did the work, and in part to the fact that my third dog (my recue BC) is a total basket case on fireworks, and the puppy takes some of his cues from the older BC (the terrier is FAR too independant to do so). Also, I won't claim to be anything like as good a trainer as my coach is.

 

So, that said (and sorry for the length, but usually this works better if you know why you're doing what you do), you might start with desensitization first, if the dog is not at risk of hurting himself. To desensitize, you play a recording of the scary noise, but you play it VERY softly at first. You would want to begin by getting the dog in a relaxed frame of mind, and having some really good treats or something really interesting - my one BC will ignore the implosion of the universe if I have his squeaky turtle in my hand. While the dog is getting positive reinforcement, play the tape at a very very quiet level, until he no longer reacts to it. Gradually you can increase the volume; but if he gets to a level where he is reactive, hold at that level (or if need be, back it down a notch on volume) and continue to reward ONLY calm behavior (or behavior that ignores the noise) until he is comfortable. It is important not to move on until he is COMFORTABLE, in my opinion, becaue the goal here is not just to keep him from acting out his fear, it's to keep him from HAVING fear.

 

I try to keep my other cues calm and upbeat. If Finn (the pup) is acting uncertain, I give him a cheerful "No, no, honey, come do this" or something like it and start something fun - treats, a toy, fetch, etc. If he shows ANY inclination to do as I've asked and ignore the noise for the game, he gets a TON of praise. In Finn, at least, this usually builds confidence - he has a job now - and pretty soon he's jaunty and upbeat and uninterested in the disturbance.

 

This may take several weeks or longer, and working daily is preferred by most trainers, even if only for 5 minutes. The one problem I see here is that it is usually important that during re-training, the bad thing not happen to the dog - in this case, the bad noise. Since you have no control over the weather (or if you do, please let me in on it!) your dog may have to deal with thunder during the re-training phase (ditto the loud traffic). Is there somehwere the dog can go during re-training where he's comfortable and/or the noise isn't present? Some of my clients report that a pet with a problem like this is fine at their mother's house, or in the car at work (weather and break-time at work permitting), etc.

 

I think the "Environments" tapes have a thunderstorm you can use; you can probably make a fireworks tape using a friend and some popping balloons. One last caveat... if this doesn't make sense the way I've said it, get a behavior consult with a trainer, vet or specialist, and ditto if the dog seems not to respond. I personally veer away from using drugs to retrain, and I would not use them as a substitute for retrainng, but there are some cases in which this is helpful. (Since I have yet to put a dog on drugs as an adjunct to retraining, though, my experience with that is limited to my academic knowledge). We have a behavoirist we work with long-distance, though he requires a competent trainer to work with the team and go to the house for some of the sessions. To be honest, I have no idea how much that costs since he bills his stuff independantly and so does the trainer.

 

Good luck with this... it IS important, since some dogs put their own lives at risk by freaking out at the wrong moment. Let me know if I need to clarify... this was a ton of info to dump on you, hope it's not TMI in that sense.

[Marley]

Hi all,

 

thanks for the comments. The dog is 18 months old, so still fairly young. I do have one of those thunderstorm CD's so I will try playing that while playing with his tennis ball.

 

warning: long story :eek:

 

I'm still a bit concerned about this need to hide/curl up in corners. At home its a minor annoyance as I have to leave his favorite closet door open. But he now wants to do this in the car/truck as well. It seemed to start while he was in my pickup one rainy day a month ago. It was really pouring when I stopped to run into the store. I left the back sliding window open for a litle air (it was cool out), and apparently the wind direction changed while I was inside and started blowing rain inside the cab. Came back and found him sleeping in the passenger footwell. Now when he is riding in the truck, after a while he just jumps down there. I suppose I could live with that, but it was a near disaster in my new car. He is to ride in teh back seat, and the 2nd day he decided to jump down.. except there wasnt room between back and front seat, at least not for a border collie! When I caught sight of his butt in the air from rear view mirror I pulled over and first tried to just move the passenger seat forward. Wrong! Got out and went thru backdoor only to find he had his head and shoulders under the front seat now. I first tried to pull him back gently. This is when I realized.. he was stuck. And not just stuck. The small metal loop his rabies tag is on had somehow hooked itself on to something metal under the seat and he was very close to choking himself. I tried to get his collar off, but its the old fashion type and I was unable to get enough leverage to get the pin out of the hole. I eventually was able to pull apart the stuck loop enough to get it unhooked (and sliced my hands up nicely doing so!) and pull him out. I now have put a shoe box under each back seat to keep this from happening again. I also went back to the snap on/off collar. I trainer had convinced me to use the old fashion type as 'the others break', but I never had one break and this was too scarey an experience where the snap on would have been off in a flash.

[nancy]

Simple solution for travelling is to use a crate or a seat-belt harness. Safer for both you and the dog, too.

[jvw]

Almost exactly at two years old my BCxACD became EXTREMELY sound sensative. She would scurry for her crate at various sounds. Including a piece of paper being dropped on a table! It got to the point she didn't want to go out on walks. I had a phone consult with a behaviorist. Tried Melatonin. No better. I decided just to ignore it. I made her keep going on walks (sometimes not easy) but I did switch our walks to a different location. In time the sensativity diminished. She still startles at loud bangs. But instead of freaking out she first looks at me. I of course act as if nothing has happened. On Saturday we were working sheep (well trying to!) and gunshots on the farm right next door merely caused her to pause for a second.

 

My experience may be atypical. But I found that the less concerned I became with this "problem" the less aparent it became. Hope it gets better for you.

Jennifer

[Marley]

hi.. back again..

 

Its really become a problem now with going on walks. He literally runs from the leash, unless its time to go to the park (5pm) to run with his friends.

 

Once I manage to get him out the door, he is difficult for the first 1/10 mile or so, walking a few strides, then stopping, then walking again. Eventually he does get going fairly normally, but is always eager to turn around for home.

 

I'm really frustrated with this. This was a dog who until this summer would *always* want to go out, even if you didn't. Just saying 'do you want to go for a walk' would get him jumping around.

 

Could there be any medical issues here? This change in behavior was just so sudden and strong it really does seem abnormal. I think the eyes are ok - he seems to always catch the thrown ball (though sometimes outside he will have problems finding it on the ground). An older employee at the local pet supply even suggested he might have a mineral imbalance.

 

Ideas?