Is it willful disobedience and noncompliance.... or is it an undiagnosed health issue? Part One
For so long, so much of dog training was about "making" the dog do things by force. Make them obey, make them comply. Very little thought was given as to WHY a dog might choose NOT to do something that was asked of them, it was just agreed that some dogs were "stubborn" or "dumb" and needed a heavier hand when training.
As society moved more and more towards positive reinforcement based training systems, we got better about not FORCING a dog to do something, but we still chalked "disobedience" or noncompliance up to lack of motivation, lack of proofing, and other training 'issues'. This was a huge step forward for our dogs, but still not a complete picture!
It wasn't really until recently, the last few decades, that we started to look at our dogs and their training holistically; this development probably closely aligns with when we started to see our dogs as core family members, instead of just "pets". We now understand that how our dogs feel one day, is not going to be the same as how they feel the next day. We all have good days and bad days, and our dogs are the same. We also understand now that our dog's physical health is a key puzzle piece to resolving certain behavior problems.
In fact, one of the most important things that any dog owner needs to do before embarking on a training and behavior modification journey is get a truly clean bill of health from their vet. This can often be easier said than done; many animals won't present with the same issues in clinic as they do at home (things like gait issues, limping) because their system pumps them full with adrenaline and cortisol, which can mask physical pain. Additionally, every vet (just like every trainer) will have a different level of knowledge depending on what's going on!
And let it be known that not all dog trainers and behavior professionals take this into account. There are certainly still more trainers than not who do not look at a dog's physical health and simply regard all behavior through a simple obedience/training lens. "MAKE" the dog do what we think they should do, no excuses.
In this series of posts I want to talk about three separate occasions where a problem behavior or what looked like "disobedience" actually ended up being more related to a dog's physical health than any gaps in training.
The first case I'll be discussing is our younger dog, Phoebe. I've had Phoebe since she was 8 weeks old, and Phoebe is SMART and very into training. She always has been; even as a young puppy she would do loooong training sessions and wouldn't tire out mentally or get bored, she'd always be game to keep going.
When I asked Phoebe to do something, if we had trained it, she was pretty much always up for it. EXCEPT: if I asked her to sit on slick flooring, or if I asked her to jump up into our SUV. No amount of training or luring could convince Phoebe to do these two things; she would sit when asked, but she'd always find soft flooring to do it. And she would get into the car, but she would only put her front two paws up, and I always had to lift her butt up. I always thought these were just quirks, or maybe that she just had a sensitive tushy and preferred sitting on soft flooring ("what a princess", I'd joke).
Well, when she was three she suffered from a bad injury and had x-rays taken. Turns out she's had bilateral hip dysplasia (meaning her hip sockets are too shallow to properly fit the ball of the upper thigh bone) for her entire life, and she was likely avoiding these two activites because her joints are awful and she already had advanced arthritis in both hips at 3 years old. This is my sporty, active girl who would hike 5 miles with me, return home to play fetch for 30 minutes, train for 20 minutes, and STILL have gas left in the tank. There was NEVER a thought in my mind that maybe her "quirks" were actually signs of undiagnosed pain. But the x-rays provided us with concrete evidence that, yes, many of Phoebe's training "preferences" were actually likely symptoms of the physical pain she experienced from her bad hips.
Common advice given to "fix" these behavior issues (not sitting immediately when asked, and not jumping into the car when told to) by old schools trainers is to push on the dog's rear end when they don't sit, and to use physical force using a leash or grabbing the collar to PULL the dog into the car. If I had done either of these things I cannot imagine the conflict I would have been building into our relationship. Every time I pushed on Phoebe's rear end I would have been causing her physical discomfort or pain (a great way to have a dog become shy with hands and avoid touch!), and if I had dragged her into the car I'm sure she would have started to avoid car rides entirely!
So instead of looking at these things as something to "fix" and make happen, I changed my expectations. I no longer ask Phoebe to sit much, if at all, and if I do ask her to sit I make sure she has solid traction underneath her. We've covered almost all of our laminate and hardwood flooring with rugs to prevent slipping and potential injury. We bring a yoga mat to the vet's office so that she doesn't have to do anything on slick tile. When people who meet her ask her to sit I ask them not to, and instead will recommend they ask for a "touch" or another standing behavior. She has orthopedic beds throughout the house, and stairs to climb up onto furniture as needed. I continue to lift her rear end up into the car, but she's trained to use a ramp should we need to do that in the future.
In a perfect world I would be able to pay for hip surgery for both joints; right now, we're making do with hip and joint supplements, pain medication as needed, and lots of low impact exercise to keep her moving. Other than the "quirks" she's always had, and some grumpiness when resting and stepped on by a cat, she's doing well so far.
I am so grateful to my training education that I never tried to "force" Phoebe to do these things and that I tried to dig deep to find out WHY she wasn't wanting to perform these behaviors. I don't NEED a sit on hardwood floor, but I do NEED a happy and comfortable dog!
Follow our blog the next few weeks as I discuss the remaining two cases and continue to explore the ways that physical health can impact our dog's behavior!
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