ZOFIA WISNIEWSKA

Like this morning, we had an actually decent walk, with some lie downs and staring but no barking or lunging so that was nice. And I was quite happy about it until we got back to the apartment building and as soon as he walked in he lunged at the door because he saw his reflection in the glass…

Hi! New here but figured I’d post right away since I’m desperate for help 😅 Walking my dog is currently so bad it makes me want to cry. The moment I allow him to step out the door, he goes tail up, head up, tense, like he’s instantly overstimulated. I always calm him down before I move from the door, get him to heel, look at me, and so on, but he just can’t seem to switch off for more than a moment. He pulls, he lunges at random things he spots, he barks at nothing or at the sky. I think generally dogs are the biggest issue as he lies down and refuses to move as soon as he spots a dog and then lunges if the dog gets closer. Sometimes I can get him to change direction and walk away if I’m quick with a “Turn” command before he lies down but often there’s another dog there since I live in the city and in a dog-dense area. Full disclosure, I haven’t done the courses yet but I did have a look at the case studies and specifically at Homer. Now I have learned about counter-conditioning before, but the problem I have is that as long as there is a dog anywhere in sight, he’s just completely uninterested in food. And yes, I tried store-bought, self-made, raw, human food, all kinds - nothing interests him. If a dog is far enough sometimes he will absent-mindedly take the treat while staring at the dog but I think he does it more as a “I’ll take it if you want me to” rather than a reward. Odd thing is, this has only been happening for maybe a month. I don’t believe anything particular happened to trigger this. Previously he’d do the lie down and sometimes pull on the leash a little but there was no tension and barking and lunging. I also spent all of last week at my boyfriend’s place with my dog and he was completely different on the walks there - yes, he’d stare and lie down when he saw dogs but he was able to listen to me otherwise, didn’t bark at nothing, didn’t seem tense. As soon as we got back to my place and stepped out of the car he went tail up and started barking on the corridor. So it seems like it’s also location-specific? I am really frustrated with this, it seems whatever I try either doesn’t work at all or works for a moment and then stops working. For example, I tried just marking focus and attention, so if he’d look at me or be close by I’d say “yes!” and give him a treat if he came up. And as soon as I started doing that, he would focus heel half the walk, unprompted, I’d tell him to go sniff or go potty and he would do that and come back. And that made me so happy and suddenly one day he just stopped doing that. Like if he looks and I say ‘yes’ he will just continue on. It’s come to the point where I just genuinely dread going on walks, they are so stressful and embarrassing for me. We come back from the walk and I’m on the verge of tears. He’s a 1.5yo BC, unfixed.