FEAR, ANXIETY, STRESS - EMOTIONS AND FEELINGS -

I was born with a lot of sensitivities and for most of my life I've had various difficulties with my health. For most of my life, I've been learning first-hand about the effects of Chronic and Acute Fear, Anxiety, Stress on my Physical, Mental, and Emotional Health.

Since I can remember, for various reasons I've struggled with communicating and connecting with other humans. I found that it can be a helpless and horrible feeling to be struggling internally and externally, all while the well-intentioned people around me are unaware and mean well, but may unintentionally and unknowingly make things worse. Also, it can be a horrible feeling when I am doing my best but struggling, and have the people around me make interpretations that suggest that I am basically “being bad” or “doing it on purpose”.

As a human who can experience a lot of fear, anxiety, stress, a lot of sensitivities, difficulties with understanding, difficulties with impulse control, so many different things...I can have a soft spot for dogs who may have similar difficulties.

Until about 2016, I was unaware that dog emotions and feelings officially existed, and I also did not have much awareness or understanding about my own emotions and feelings. Working with dogs has been an easier, lower pressure way for me to begin exploring the world of emotions, feelings, and their connection to behavior – for dogs, and for myself.

For most of my life, I had been focusing on task and accomplishments, with little or no regard for my emotions, feelings, health concerns, sensitivities, fears, anxieties, stresses, and after over 30 years I was unable to keep pushing and saying “im fine”.  I had basically continued telling myself and others that “im fine”, until I began experiencing more obvious physical, mental, and emotional health difficulties that I was unable to ignore! Over 30 years of being tough and pushing through took a tremendous toll on my mental and emotional health, which caused me to have a lot of ongoing physical health problems.

I continue doing my best to understand: "I did then what I knew how to do. Now that I know better, I do better.” ~ Maya Angelou (Thank you Colleen Pelar!)

For many humans and their beloved Canine Family Members, it can be an eye-opening and freeing experience to shift from being focused on the expectations of performing tasks and commands, to a world of emotions, feelings, meeting needs (safety and comfort are basic needs), asking for cooperation with cues (instead of commands), seeing the information and communication happening through the emotions and feelings being conveyed through behavior (...or the lack of behavior!), and troubleshooting to find ways to make it possible for the individual learner to find their own version of individual success, and to coexist peacefully with their internal and external environments.

Fortunately, dogs are not machines, and unless one wants a stuffed animal, a machine, maybe a robot dog, it can be amazing how shifting from the focus on task, to focusing on meeting basic needs, especially the need to feel safe. Instead of mostly focusing on performing very specific tasks, we mostly focus on changing the Conditioned Emotional Responses (CERs) of the learner to their environment and basically every piece of their life - it can have a profound effect on the learners, both canine and human!

Change the emotions, change the behaviors!

There can be so many things to work on, and it can be hard to juggle so many things at once. As an example, here is the Mister Amore: https://behaviorincontext.com/the-mister-amore-bio and we basically did as much as possible of these things, everyday: https://behaviorincontext.com/what-will-your-dog-do%3F and https://behaviorincontext.com/build-a-solid-foundation

Basically, we made a list, identified our priorities, and worked one step at a time, going at Mister Amore's pace, doing our best, everyday. (Cue “One Step At a Time” by Jordin Sparks?)

This can be a lot easier in a home environment, where there is a lot more control, and it is a lower distraction environment, then progressing to more difficult environments at the canine learner's pace. Even while working in the shelter environment with its unpredictability and so many moving parts, I've been able to make significant behavior change happen for countless dogs, including several bite cases involving long term shelter residents, simply by focusing on the emotions associated to basically every element of their lives - it can be a totally life changing experience and then the dog’s behavior can totally change to "a lot more adoptable". It can make life better, for everybody!

After adequately meeting basic needs (especially the need to feel safe!), working on the Conditional Emotional Responses (CERs) to the various stimuli that may cause fear, anxiety, stress, can be so incredibly helpful for the overall Physical, Mental, and Emotional Health of our canine learners. Also teaching functional life skills to create good habits and a super solid foundation often results in a super good dog who people might get jealous about!

And until those habits and foundations are SUPER solid, it can be incredibly helpful to a catch the canine learner when they’re doing good, early and often, to help effectively build the good life skills + use management strategies (like baby gates, the crate if comfortable with the confinement, etc) to prevent unwanted behaviors from getting stronger by being practiced!

Dogs are constantly communicating their emotions and feelings through their body language and behavior (and/or lack of behavior!) Here are some resources to help humans better understand what dogs are saying:

https://www.silentconversations.com/

https://www.silentconversations.com/resources/

http://www.ispeakdog.org/

http://www.ispeakdog.org/books-blogs--more.html

Some Videos about Dog Body Language and Communication 

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLZkES6JEXCTQ5lFN_pwRmGCWyVpYm1rvW