Abbie is a timid dog. She’s fine around other dogs, but shy and fearful of people.

For years we had trouble leaving her alone. She became anxious and chewed lots of stuff. So, we crated her. That worked. She really liked her crate, and would hang out inside it even when we were home and the crate was open.

But, then, earlier this year she started chewing on her crate, and generally acting intensely anxious when we would leave. We were afraid that she might hurt herself.

So, what to do? We couldn’t leave her out because she chewed stuff. We couldn’t crate her because she had reached a point where she might injure herself trying to get out. We searched through books and watched a lot of Dog Whisperer, and learned something.

It’s easier to train aggressive dogs than timid dogs. Watch Cesar Milan with this in mind some time. The few episodes in which he does deal with timid dogs don’t really show the same sort of clearly positive turn-around you see with aggressive dogs.

Eventually we turned to Bark Busters, a world-wide dog-training organization, that provides a support network, and a strategy, to local franchises. Our local dog trainers are Jeff and Cathy Drier.

The improvement is sensational.

As anybody who has looked into this sort of thing quickly learns it’s more about training the owner than training the dog. The Driers explained that Abbie is constantly checking to see who’s in charge of the pack. Because if someone else isn’t in charge, the responsibility falls to her. We weren’t showing proper leadership. After a few house visits there has been a wonderful transformation over Abbie. She’s still a little timid, but constantly improving, and there’s never any worry about leaving her alone anymore.

It was a little pricey, but getting all your furniture chewed up is pricier. It’s also a much happier household nowadays, with neither dog nor owner anxious about the other’s behavior.

If you need some dog-training help I’m happy to recommend Jeff and Cathy Drier at Bark Busters.

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