If you’ve been home more often than not because of Covid Safe at Home, this is a good time to ensure that your dog doesn’t end up with Separation Anxiety (SA) when you go back to work. I’m concerned, as are many of my colleagues, that there is going to be a surge in separation anxiety cases once people aren’t home as often. I suspect that this is especially true of all the dogs that have been adopted from shelters during the Covid crisis, and have yet to experience being home alone.
Here are three tips that can help:
1. Keep calm and come home: Teach your dog that your arrivals and departures are nothing to get excited (or anxious) about. I’ll admit that it’s hard to not get excited when you get home and there’s a wriggly, puddle of love waiting for you, but calm is key. Keep your greetings quiet and low key–this doesn’t mean you can’t love up your dog as much as you’d like. Just do it without lots of highly arousing expressions of joy; quiet and calm is the key here.
That’s goes for departures too. As a friend once said when I told her I felt guilty leaving my dogs home, she noted that they were going to spend the morning lying on the couch while I worked my ass off in my office to bring home the dog food. Now I say quietly, with true warmth and affection,”Love you, be good” when I go, and leave it at that.
Please don’t be this person, says the dog while trying to get away.
2. Begin a desensitizing and counter conditioning plan. The good news is that it’s not hard to condition a dog to being comfortable when you leave the house. The bad news is that, depending the dog, it can take focus and energy, qualities in short supply for most of us right now.
Here’s the simple version: Leave your dog with something that makes her happy while you leave the house. Here’s the oh-so-important detail: Start by leaving for just seconds or minutes at a time. Where you start depends on what your life is like right now, and how dependent or independent your dog is. If your dog is often alone in the house while you and the family are out in the garden, then just add in a quick drive around the neighborhood while your dog chews on a stuffed Kong or bullystick.
If you think about it and realize your dog has simply never been alone in the house lately, then start by having everyone walk to the mailbox while your dog snarfs up kibble tossed onto the floor. What’s important is to start small: Really, really small. If your dog already has SA, then “small” means “walk to the door and put your hand on the doorknob” five times in a row while your dog eats some treats. Or pick up your keys, or put on your coat, ten times in a row to desensitize your dog to that action.
This is the tricky part to explain, because it depends on so many factors, most importantly, your dog’s behavior when you leave the house. If you have a new dog that you got while you stayed Safe at Home, start by noticing how often you leave the dog alone in the house and what you can guess about your dog’s behavior behaves if/when you’re gone. (Taping your dog is a great thing to do and can actually be entertaining.)
I wrote a booklet titled I’ll Be Home Soon: How to Prevent and Treat Separation Anxiety that goes over this in great detail. It’s concise, only 38 pages, and might be worthwhile if you need some more advice about how to proceed. Dogwise and I agreed to put it on sale, basically at cost, in order to help out anyone who could use it.
(Cautionary note: I wrote the booklet in 2000, twenty long years ago, and used the phrase “leader of the pack”. Sigh. It had nothing to do with the meaning now associated with that phrase; it advised teaching your dog to be patient and polite. Needless to say, next time it’s printed I’ll change the wording.) (Cautionary note #2: The scariest thing about publishing something is that the words you wrote will live on. And on and on . . .)
If you’d like to read more on this topic, you might enjoy reading a post I wrote in 2011 about research that claimed counter conditioning wasn’t helpful in SA cases. The research is so flawed my head almost exploded, but it makes for amusing if not slightly frustrating reading.
3. Never correct or punish your dog after the fact. This actually goes for ALL dog behavior, but is highly relevant to dogs who are anxious when left alone. Your dog may look guilty when you come home to ripped up pillows or a pile on the carpet, but Brandy’s appeasing posture is designed to avoid your wrath, not because “she knows she shouldn’t do it”. (Read more about the “guilty dog fallacy” here). Scolding her when you get home will likely do nothing but make it worse the next time you leave.
I’d love to hear what’s going on with you. Dogs fine home alone? Have a new dog who you’re not sure about? Had a dog with SA and now it’s fine? Let’s us know, we’d love to hear about it.
MEANWHILE, back on the farm: Our life is revolving around Skip’s injured leg, with daily moist heat treatments, laser treatments and 3 sets of physical therapy exercises recommended by kick ass PT Courtney Arnoldy. (Who we managed to get in to see, sort of. I handed Skip off to her in front of the clinic and we worked hard to communicate by phone amidst a major construction project across the street.)
Skip gets one leash walk off the farm a day, which is the best part of his treatment for all of us for sure. We’re up to 35 minutes with no sign of it hurting him, so that’s good news. Prognosis is one to three months more, please please please let it be the former rather than the latter. I am working hard on accepting this reminder of life having “other plans.” I do better some days than others; he and I were just clicking as a working sheepdog team the week it happened, so I alternate between meditative acceptance and being pure and simply pissed off. I give equal thanks to meditation most days, and gin on Friday and Saturday nights to get me through.
I hung back with Maggie to take this shot of Jim and Skip. All of us agree that leash walks are better than nothing, but don’t begin to make up for the joy of off leash walks.
Black Earth Creeks runs alongside one of the trails we have been enjoying lately with the BCs.
Here’s a happy sign of spring: Healthy triplets on the farm of friend Donna H, whose 13 ewes had more triplets (and some quads!) than anything else.
The Prairie Smoke in our garden is smoldering (wait til you see it when it seeds!):
Below is a view from behind the house looking up toward our “DIY safari tent”. The piles you see are from the invasive Bush Honeysuckle that formed an almost solid wall in what used to be an oak/hickory/black cherry woods. I’ve never seen anything as invasive as this plant, it literally takes over entire areas and prevents anything else from growing. A crew from Quercus Land Stewardship spent two days cutting it and treating the stumps. They’ll come back in June to burn the piles, and will seed the area with native woodland flowers and herbs in fall. It’ll take years to get it back to health, and we’ll be dealing with massive amounts of wild raspberries for years, but it will all be worth it, even if it doesn’t come into its own until after Jim and I are gone. (Yes, raspberries are great to eat, but try walking through a patch of solid raspberries sometime.)
Jim and I look forward to staying overnight in the tent sometime soon. We’re waiting for nighttime lows above 50 F, hopefully not too long from now. We have lots more tent clean up to do before staying there though, (we say “your welcome” to all the mice who enjoyed living there last year), so we’re okay with another week of lows in the 40’s.
I loved hearing about what you are looking forward to last week, keep it up!
Anne Johnson says
It’s like Spring skipped Flagstaff this year. But the horses are enjoying the sunshine, the dogs still get their mountain hikes and ball playing at the park. We just all drink a lot more water. I lived in Milwaukee as a child, so I remember the cool Spring and even colder trips to the lakes. Enjoy your beautiful sprouting of flowers and oncoming Spring!
Diana says
HA! I had to laugh at the photo of the repulsed Shiba Inu, struggling to get away from its love bug mom. That photo could be (and is) our Shiba exactly. We sit down next to her on the couch. She leaves. We enter a room. She leaves. We come home after hours away. She barely looks up. We cuddle up to her. “Ewww” she says. Do we love her? You bet, but separation anxiety with her is nothing we have ever had to worry about.
Jackie D says
New dog! We adopted a 3 year old spaniel with known severe separation anxiety about a month before lockdown. At the moment we’re still working on him being able to cope on his own in a room for a few seconds, let alone us leaving the house, so it hasn’t had as much effect as you’d expect! We have now achieved spaniel -free toilet breaks (and sometimes human-free spaniel toilet breaks) so progress has been made.
What is more frustrating is the vets. We were planning on doing some socialisation visits to the vets before he really needed to be treated, but that hasn’t been possible, and in the meantime he has developed mild intermittent lameness that the vet wants to check out once they can reopen the practice. So that’s tricky. I’m doing some force free handling training to try to make it easier for him when he does have to go in to be poked painfully.
Charlotte Kasner says
It seems likely that many dogs may display behavioural changes as a result of the extreme changes caused by lockdown during the COVID-19 pandemic. Anecdotally, I am seeing changes in most of my clients’ dogs as a result of the imposition of different routines and altered home environments including over-arousal due to limited exercise and noisy homes.
Human-orientated dogs are also finding it difficult to limit interactions with people, especially where it results in having no visitors to their home or distancing while out.
Whether this results in true separation disorders once the situation changes remains to be seen, not least as it does not look like the “old normal” will be established any time soon, if at all.
It will be interesting to see if owner attachment style undergoes any changes or results in more extreme behaviours from already-affected dogs. If dogs have poor attachment capabilities, are they more likely to be distressed by constant owner presence?
I find it difficult when owners who do not provide a safe base or safe haven for their dog are convinced that their dog’s problems are due to the dog’s over-attachment to them. “Sorry, your dog has little regard for you” does not usually engender compliance with the behavioural adjustment programme!
It may be more difficult for dogs in urban environments as they may be used to interacting with many more dogs and people on a daily basis than rural dogs. On the plus side, although the hime environment may be noisier and more hectic, the relative peace and quiet outdoors give us a glimpse of life for the lucky rural dwellers.
Again anecdotally, I am finding that nervous dogs are jumpier as the soundscape has altered, and it may be that usually, potentially scary noises are actually muffled to some extent by the high level of background noise that is now absent.
Andrea says
When you burn the honeysuckle piles, please be sure to relocate them a few feet first to dislodge any bunnies that have taken up residence. Rabbits love brush piles. A burning rabbit or, worse, a burning nest of baby rabbits, in a brush pile is a horrible thing. Happened to a friend. 🙁 Love your posts. Thank you for sharing your knowledge!
Bětka says
Separation anxiety is one of my dog’s many issues. Unfortunately, I have C-PTSD and a 4-year old daughter, so treating this problem feels like a mountain. Other things keep improving, but separation anxiety stays on the list. Maybe next time! 🙂
(“A dog would be so good for you,” my former therapist said. If only she knew, haha… She was right though – he does help in a weird way.)
Beautiful pictures!
Betsy says
I am so glad you asked for odd behaviors going on! Our 16 month old whippet/boxer/Irish wolfhound cross (don’t laugh, she is actually very cute) has developed a routine of barking, jumping up and running every time my husband stands up or walks around the house. It doesn’t stop until he sits down again or leaves the room. She will sometimes bark when I stand up but to a much lesser degree. She gets so wound up the only way I can get her to stop and focus on something else is to put a treat under her nose (she doesn’t get the treat until we go through a series of puppy pushups). Strangely enough, we had the same issue with a rescue puppy several years ago. She eventually grew out of it as she aged. I am a trainer but I am at a loss for the solution to this issue. I suspect insufficient exercise/stimulation is a big factor. Any suggestions will be very much appreciated!
Terri Jambor says
I contacted Dog’s Best Friend Training and received great advice from Chelsie. Dottie, my English Cocker Spaniel, is doing much better.
Ana Schnellmann says
Thank you, as always, for an interesting and applicable post. I have three Goldens, one of which is a pup, and I’m ensuring I give everyone “private time” for an hour or so in a crate as well as “private time” with me on walks.
One big concern is the immense number of new dogs/puppies in my neighborhood. It seems SO many people are saying, “I’m home all day–great time to get a puppy for the kids!” I have to wonder where all those dogs will be in six months . . . how new owners, including one first-time owner I know, will pursue training . . . what’s going to happen to those new dogs when owners make a 180 and go from being home all day to being at work all day.
Rachel Wanzer says
Thanks for the 3 tips Trisha! I”ll be using with my own dogs and passing them along to my clients.
LisaW says
We are all lucky our dogs have had someone home with them for their entire lives with us (worked from home for years, then got a job, and my partner “retired”). When we used to go out for dinner or an event (did we really ever do that?), I would give them each a treat on our way out the door. They got so they were more focused on the treat about to be delivered and less on us leaving.
I am having separation anxiety when I need to leave the house. I’m anxious about leaving and really can’t wait to get back. I’ll be home soon is my mantra to myself!
(The only exception is when I take Olive for a long walk in the silent, deep woods, that is my balm.)
Take good care, everyone.
Trisha says
No kidding Ana, I too am concerned about all the dogs who are going to live very different lives once things are relatively normal again. Paws crossed.
Trisha says
Chelse rocks!
Trisha says
Amazing Betsy, how often something simple becomes an unexplained cue for a dog’s behavior! More exercise, yes for sure, but I’d focus on lots of mental exercise (tricks are great) as well as physical. If it was my dog I’d decide what I did want her to do, and then use the
standing up as a cue for that. First teach it however you can all by itself (get a toy? lie down on a mat?), then begin to use your husband rising up a few inches from the chair as the cue to go do it. This requires, first and foremost, a very patient husband. I’d first figure out how to reinforce him!
Trisha says
Ah, Betka, hang in there (sorry about the ‘e’…)! I can easily see how SA feels mountainous. As long as your managing it, I’d say put it on the list for later. Much much later. Enough is enough!
Trisha says
You are lovely Andrea, to think about the bunnies. And yes, indeed, rabbits and lots of other small mammals love to next under brush. However, we have about 30 seven foot-high piles of new brush, and the same number of old ones, so I’m afraid that moving the brush, pile by pile, is impossible. We’ll do our best to try to give the creatures a warning and time to leave, but I’m afraid that it will help only in some cases. I will say that our twelve acres has pretty much been heaven for small mammals, and the rabbit population is, uh, healthy. That doesn’t help individuals, of course, so we’ll do what we can.
Trisha says
Charlotte, interesting observation about nervous dogs being even jumpier. I assume this is in the city or the suburbs where there is a good deal of background noise from traffic, etc. Makes me think of white noise machines….
Trisha says
Jackie D: My vets will meet with us in the parking lot if we are well masked and hand washed. You might want to see if that is possible for you. Also, I wrote a blog a few weeks ago about, socialization puppies during Covid lock downs, you might want to check it out, even though your dog is older. Glad you got him before lockdown!
Bruce says
Our dogs seem to enjoy having their humans home all the time. Less commuting time = more walking time is a big plus in their eyes, for example. And more home-cooked meals = greater chance of food falling on the floor.
But sometimes I get the impression that the dogs’ need to keep an eye on what we are doing is cramping their style, and interfering with their beauty rest.
“Fer cryin’ out loud humans, settle down so I can take a nap!”
Mary says
Trisha, you’re so right! Chelse DOES ROCK! She’s been helping us via Zoom with our new Westie puppy. (This is the 2nd one she’s helped us with, and she is amazing!) I’m so thankful to the whole Dog’s Best Friend organization! I cannot wait until face-to-face classes open up again!
Margaret says
I have been thinking about this a lot. I got my first-ever dog, Cobie, from Keeshond Rescue an 1996, and took 3 weeks of vacation when I brought him home. We bonded like glue at his foster home and on the drive home from Illinois. When I had to go back to work he lost his s**t, and barked his brains out. I was living in an apartment, and I worked nights, so you can imagine the neighbors’ delight. Have often wondered if he would have done better if I had started my normal routine from the beginning.
To be fair, my Flat-Coat, Nina, also has severe SA, which has required visits to the veterinary behaviorist at Purdue, and medication, and none of the same issues applied. She was not a rescue, but comes from a wonderful breeder, I got her at 9 weeks, she was not an only child, and I resumed my regular work schedule right away.
If anyone is wondering if it’s me (I certainly have) I have had 3 other dogs with no anxiety issues, and their backgrounds were all different: I finished raising Elly from 8 months as a guide dog puppy after she was removed from her nightmare first raiser home, Lia came from her breeder at 8 weeks, and Kate is a retired show dog who had lived primarily in a kennel.
Candice says
NEVER leave your dog alone with a stuffed Kong!! They are NOT indestructible! Trust us, we know! Part of a Kong toy that was stuck in our dog for almost a year!! You’ve got to be vigilant and watch your dog with these toys!!
I have photos and medical reports for proof!
Darlene says
Your photos are lovely as always! I so enjoy seeing the nature on and around your part of the world.
LOVE and completely relate to the line “so I alternate between meditative acceptance and being pure and simply pissed off” re: Skip’s injury.
I compete in agility with my own wonderful bc. We too seemed to be clicking together when he came up lame as well. We lost most of his 4 y/o year of competition…and well, now this stay at home order :(.
I do like your gin and weekend idea tho !
Healing thoughts to Skip. Hang in there, this too shall pass.
Kat says
Jackie D’s comment reminded me of my Finna. She had terrible separation anxiety and when I’d go to the bathroom she’d try to tear the door down to get to me. When I’d come out she’d try to climb inside my skin with me she was so relieved I was “back.” I told her over and over and over again how she was extremely lucky she’d come to me because she’d have been put down for ‘attacking’ in any other hands. Her frenzied greetings really did resemble an attack. I’d assume the classic “be a tree” pose and ignore her until she calmed down and sometimes even had to drop to the ground and “be a rock.” When she’d calm down some I’d calmly invite her outside to play or into the kitchen for a treat. Gradually, she stopped being so frantic when I wasn’t in sight . And eventually me leaving was no big deal.
It’s been interesting with my husband working from home. D’Artagnan knows when I’m working on something to leave me alone but my husband is a lot less clear about his expectations. I’m ending up taking D’Artagnan out a lot more often during the day because he’s figured out that if he bugs my husband for attention enough eventually ‘Dad’ will tell ‘Mom’ the dog needs to go out. Lots of yard work being accomplished but less of the stuff I’d normally be working on. We’ll find our new balance but it’s a work in progress. If D’Artagnan hadn’t come to us with a reputation as an escape artist we’d give him more time to hang out by himself outside but I’m still not ready to trust him so the rule is someone has to be outside with him. So far he’s shown no inclination to actually challenge the fence but the very first thing he did when he came to live with us was carefully examine every potential weak spot so it’s going to take awhile before I really trust him alone outside.
On the upside all the extra outdoor time means I’m actually beginning to really see my food forest outlines. I grazed the yard for lunch yesterday. It was a very tasty salad in small bites, celery, parsely, kale, and sweet cicely.
Chris from Boise says
Nothing to add re: separation anxiety, but thank you so much for providing access to the Come, Sit, Stay podcasts. They are so thought-filled, it gives me much to ponder for several days. Special thanks to Lynn Ungar for the poems!
We continue to enjoy a couple-of-times-a-week off-leash hikes, plus neighborhood walks. Great horned owlets almost ready to leave their nest, tons of wildflowers, and a prairie rattler on Rowan’s and my last hike (fortunately she’s highly sensitized to snakes, so her sideways leap as she rounded a rock caused an identical one from me; by the time I had landed a safe distance away the rattler was coiled and rattling). I apologized for the scare we had given it, shot a quick photo from afar, and we continued on. Nature is my balm.
Melanie Hawkes says
Is it separation anxiety or reactivity if your dog barks because he hears something when you’re not home? I am working on his reactivity when I am home, and he’s getting better with my neighbour’s dog barking, but not much I can do about it when I’m out…
lin says
Our first dog, Pupper, had SA. Back in 2002, and I didn’t find out about your booklet for over a year. By then she was on Clomicalm and we were practicing behavior modification. I still remember how I absolutely relieved I felt returning from a Thanksgiving dinner to find her sleeping on the couch (as opposed to endlessly pacing and crying).
When we return from shopping or visiting, our present dog, Mr. B, shrieks like he’s being murdered. But it’s definitely not SA, just his way of asking, “You’re back! What did you bring me?” My husband has always worked from home, so Mr. B is used to having someone in the house. I think he’ll miss me when I go back to work, but he has a favorite routine with my husband as well.
Lisa says
Great tips, thank you, Trisha. You’d think that home isolation would provide endless opportunities to train our pups and habituate them to future absences. Yet the structureless, zoom-addled days sap my energy (guilt, guilt). I can only imagine what parents of at-home young children must struggle with! Anyway, thx for the ‘nudge’ to think ahead to help our dogs transition when (we hope) we’re all able to go to work.
M says
Thank you for the timely post, which I’m reading with interest to prevent SA in a new puppy.
My previous dog had SA, which was gradually reduced to mere clinginess. He was also a working breed already predisposed to acting like Velcro, so I considered it a success! We used the counter conditioning techniques in your booklet, a small dose of fluoxetine, and many, many frozen peanut butter Kongs. All of these reduced his anxiety but his behavior – barking constantly as long as I was gone – continued. He engaged in no other behaviors. I was also on my 3rd year of trying to fix his SA.
Possibly this will be controversial, but I was curious if blocking his behavior (barking) would be possible. I had noticed he went into an ‘anxiety spiral’ – he started barking, which continued to increase his anxiety, leading to more barking, etc. He seemed unable to stop himself once he started.
In a last attempt before returning him to his breeder, I bought a fabric muzzle one size larger than his correct size. I made it a touch smaller (sewing). I made sure he could eat, drink, pant, sleep, and could wear it completely comfortably. It was actually pretty loose, but not so loose that he could bark. I introduced it slowly, only when I was at home, in a positive way, for very short sessions. He was never stressed out about wearing it. After I felt he was fine with it, I left him to go run an errand. I put it on, gave him a frozen Kong, settled him on his dog bed, and walked out the door.
When I came home, he was asleep – lying flat on his side, completely relaxed, not at all stressed or anxious. He had slept the whole time, I think. It was the first time he was not panting, drooling and miserable. I watched for re-directed anxiety but never happened.
From then on, his muzzle was our routine – in fact, I would hold it out and he would put it on himself. Then he’d get a Kong. Many years later, I faded out the muzzle and he was fine. Of course, he still got a peanut butter Kong every time I left the house.
I always had bad associations with muzzles as punishment or just to prevent biting. With my dog, it was a fantastic tool that allowed him (and me!) to live a much happier life.
NewsView says
I have come to appreciate, belatedly, that separation anxiety is one of the leading reasons dogs end up at animal shelters and humane societies. Other manifestations can include nuisance barking when the owner is away from home, persistent attempts by a dog that has been spayed/neutered to escape the yard (dog’s effort to bust out and locate the missing member’s of the pack), as well as tearing a warpath through the house when left unattended (alone). Separation anxiety, in short, has many more manifestations than typically appreciated. As such, I have a suggestion: As an investment in the successful integration of rescued pets into their new households, shelters ought to make a practice of sending adoptees home with resource materials by which to train and troubleshoot common new pet problems. It need not consist of a book but it should, at minimum, include a handout. As my own experience attests, even experienced dog owners can benefit from such materials.
My spouse and I lost an elderly dog just as the COVID-19 situation was ramping up. After 15 years with the same dog, I was forced to relearn the art of introducing a new dog into our household. After reading several guides online I hit upon an idea: Divide the new environment (your home) into bight-size chunks (zones): First, your new furbaby gets to know the outside (neighborhood and yard). Then they get to know the inside — with the caveat that they don’t get full run of the house until they have been observed, and trained if need be, to behave appropriately in each zone. (At this introductory stage, it is useful to have baby gates, close doors and if necessary keep your dog on a leash indoors.) In this way, one can establish that it is not appropriate to try to beg or swipe food off a dining room table (kitchen/dining area becomes a designated zone). In this way one can train a new dog to use the same spot in the yard to do their business (another zone). And in this way one can be sure that the dog is not going to help themselves to the sofa or the beds without permission, if at all (living room/den area is another zone, with bedrooms and home offices being another).
I was unprepared, despite a gradual-introduction strategy, for the fact that #StayAtHome would come to represent in our newly-adopted dog’s mind: “Must be at home at all times”. Consequently, the more challenging training task is to undo an emerging problem with separation anxiety (a mutually-stressful away-time experience resulted in our dog figuring out how to open pocket doors that were intended to keep her confined to a smaller portion of the house, chewing up window blinds in an attempt to watch for our arrival home and pulling molding off a door frame that she observed us exit).
It will be a challenge to deal with what goes on when we are not home but one that must be undertaken to keep her from being returned to a shelter. (We want her second home to be her forever home!) All of which is to say — if some version of the “zoned introduction”, on-leash training tips and the separation anxiety advice contained in this article could be made into a two-page flier for new pet owners, it might serve to break the new pet assimilation process down into manageable chunks, and thereby prevent shelter dogs from becoming shelter dogs yet again.