Me Master, You Dog.

Last fall I came to the conclusion that our dogs were a bit out of control. I came to this conclusion after being dragged from the back yard to the front on my rear end because my precious pumpkins caught sight of another dog happily minding it's own business.

I checked into trainers, since going to class with other dogs would be severely out of the question. A personal obedience trainer for my dogs would have run about $600 a month. I came across one fellow who was very helpful and highly established, his fee was about $1600 and this cost covered both dogs until I was satisfied with their behavior. Perfect, but I couldn't shell out that kind of money all at once. At least not for dog training. OK, so Tony wouldn't let me. Consequently, I checked out every book I could find on obedience training, dog behavior etc....Here is what I learned;

• Tony and I had not established dominance. Since dogs are pack animals this is very important. I thought that we had done our best, but turns out letting Sampson and Delilah demand attention is one form of them being dominate over us. (who knew?!! i thought they just wanted some love.) Feeding them before we eat is also another no-no. Letting them go through doorways ahead of us, etc..was also a problem.
• American Pit Bull Terriers are innately strong willed. Someone with a chihuahua might think barking incessantly at people outside is cute, or baring teeth at any other dog is funny, but chihuahuas are about 58 lbs lighter than Sampson or Delilah.
• Not taking the aggression issues seriously could result in worse behavior that eventually may not be controllable.

It has been a long frustrating struggle. For one, I've had to retrain Tony,myself and anyone who comes in contact with our dogs as well as the dogs themselves. Here is what we tried, and slowly seems to be working. I say slowly because we honestly do not spend as much time "training" as we should. If we could devote 2 hours per day, which was recommended, it may work faster.

• Feeding after we have finished out meals. This includes no tid-bits from the table, which always bothered me...and Tony does it without thinking still to this day.
• Going throught doorways first.
• Instructing the dogs to sit or shake or to perform some command before receiving any attention. (this was the hardest)
• Preventing any urination from Sampson outside of our yard. This was difficult to because Sammy was use to "marking" everything from out yard to the park and back. He is sneaky about it too. He doesn't always raise his leg.
• Letting them bark at people who come to the door, but then saying "enough" and enforcing compliance.( ok, this one we are still working on)

The last one I have had no luck with until yesterday. I finally figured it out! To teach a dog not to strain and pull when on a leash I read that whenever they begin to pull, you say NO and promptly go in the other direction. Well...I have , for several months now, been trying to do this on the sidewalk. It is very dizzying and frustrating and would work after about 15 minutes and I would have to repeat every time we would go outside. Yesterday we were in the field across the street and I was being dragged from on bush to the next. My arms felt like they were going to be pulled out of socked and I was sweating like a monkey and I had enough. I thought to myself "I'm in charge, not you. We don't go where you want, we go where I want. Me master, you dog".

Not really realizing it at first, I applied the "go in opposite direction" strategy. It worked like butter! In a matter of minutes. I didn't get dizzy because I wasn't restricted to going back and forth. I had the entire field to work with. This morning they got a little excited right out of the gate, but one opposite direction turn and they did great.

So, that's it. We accomplished one small step. It feels good. Especially in the shoulder socket area.