mydogjourney: A big lesson learnt…

I learnt a big lesson yesterday and I need to share it with you guys…

I took Cooper to go and visit my Aunty and Uncle’s dog, Ollie the Groodle. Ollie is only 1 so between he and Cooper, their energy is pretty crazy and hyper.

Anyway, when I got to my Aunty and Uncle’s house I made, in retrospect, a very dumb decision. I let Cooper off the lead before entering the house. At this time, Cooper’s energy was at extreme excitement. The second my Aunty opened the front door, Cooper went full pelt to what he thought was outside – but actually it was straight into the glass window, head first!!!

Thank goodness he didn’t actually break through the glass and he was ok. It was a loud scary bang and I think it shocked everyone besides Cooper. He is a tough dog. Straight after he was ready and rearing to go and see Ollie. They played and played for the next hour and had an absolute ball together!

Come to think of it, Cooper behaves like that quite often. He enters my parents house in this excited state. We let him off the lead in the park in this excited state. When we go to my other Aunty and Uncle’s house, he get’s just as excited to see Diesel – but thankfully there is a back way to get straight into the garden so he can’t destroy their house! It’s also situations like people entering our house. Realistically, whilst Coop is young and in training, we should make people wait outside until Coop is calm. Then they should enter the house with no touch, talk or eye contact with the dog. And once Coop is quiet, then they can greet him.

The big lesson I have learnt is that Cooper shouldn’t get his way when his energy levels are so heightened. It just creates havoc. Jase and I are going to need to spend the time making him sit, drop and calm down before entering other peoples homes, before going to the park or the beach and the list of places goes on. We will need to be very patient and wait for his body language to tell us that he is in a calm relaxed state before we do any of these things.

I have watched many Dog Whisperer episodes by Cesar Millan and he is all about the energy of the person and the dog. If I am calm, the dog should read my energy. It will take time and patience but after this incident, it will definitely be worthwhile. Coop could have seriously hurt himself!