Newbie but Hopeful

[Bryan Ramona]

My significant other sent me this link a long time ago. I finally sat down and read it and said, we need to do this for our rescue dog Leia. We can see that she's super smart, but she's developed one specific behavior that is very frustrating. She is completely obsessed with a rubber ball and plays with it from morning to night non stop... as long as BOTH of us are in the room. If one of us leaves, she lays down and goes to sleep. As soon as another person comes to the door or through the door, instead of greeting that person, she grabs the ball and runs to me to have me throw it in the living room again. And manically, she'll continue to do that over and over again until that other person leaves, or until I put the ball away, and then she grabs another toy to do the same thing. Is this unusual and, more importantly, is this fixable? Thank you. We've gone to several trainers and can't seem to figure this out. She is 51% shepherd, 22% pit bull, 17% staffer. Terrier, with little bits of mastiff and pug DNA also. She was found as an emaciated stray in Lancaster, PA and the rescue people got her back to health. We adopted her last October and she's now a healthy and active 55 pounds!

[Adrienne Farricelli]

Hi there and welcome to the forums. My apologies if my reply comes late.

What you are describing is very interesting and thank you for taking the time to provide such a thoughtful description of Leia. this is actually a very helpful history, and I can understand why this has been both puzzling and frustrating.

I don't find Leia's behavior unusual in presentation. Most importantly: yes, this is very fixable, though it typically requires a shift in how the behavior is understood rather than simply adding more training cues.

From a behavioral standpoint, this does not look like  in my opinion as a dog "needing more stimulation” in the traditional sense. Instead, I believe this pattern is most consistent with learned compulsive arousal tied to social context and predictability.

The rubber ball has likely become Leia’s primary coping strategy when arousal increases, particularly when both attachment figures are present or when a transition occurs (someone entering the home). The fact that she sleeps when one person leaves, tells us this is not excess energy, but rather socially driven over-arousal as this behavior is context-specific ( in occurs when both people are present,/visitors arriving).

In cases like this, the ball is primarily not a toy, but a self-soothing object that loses its power once the stimulating stimuli/events are gone. 

The good news is that this does type of behavior can be fixed by implementing a variety of behavior change strategies such as:

Reducing rehearsal of the behavior (management is essential at first).

Lowering baseline arousal/impulse control games. https://www.braintraining4dogs.com/members/archive/10-impulse-control-games-for-dogs/

Teaching alternative behaviors around arrivals that are incompatible with fetch (like laying on a mat) https://www.braintraining4dogs.com/members/video-archive/train-dog-go-to-mat/

Her background as a former stray, combined with her genetic makeup, makes this presentation very understandable. Dogs who have experienced instability often cling tightly to predictable rituals especially in emotionally charged moments.

If you work through the impulse control and arousal-regulation exercises in the course, you should see meaningful improvement. This is a situation where less excitement and more predictability will help her far more than additional outlets.

Please feel free to share follow-up details. 

I hope this helps,

Happy training!

Adrienne