Yansa
Background
Yansa was rescued by the sweetest people. He was given lots of love and affection in his new home, but no rules, boundaries, or structure were in place. Yansa had no obedience training and no leadership to follow. Couple those with his traumatic past and his owner’s misjudgment of his body language in certain situations and you had a dog with a horrifying bite history.
I was tasked with training Yansa after he had bitten people on more than one occasion, the last one being the most severe. It was evident to me when I met him that he had underlying issues that needed to be addressed first. What was perceived by his owners as pure aggression was actually the result of those underlying root problems, eventually culminating in horrific bites.
Impulse Control
Impulse control is one of the most important things for a pet dog to have and Yansa had none of it:
On walks, he would urine-mark every pole, tree, or object that he felt like marking. I’m sure everyone agrees that having your dog stop you abruptly every couple of meters does not make for a pleasant walk. He used to urine-mark every new place he went to (yes, including homes and indoor venues). Can you imagine how embarrassing that must be for his owners?
Other situations in which Yansa failed to control his impulses is when he saw men on the street that he did not feel comfortable around. His fear would cause him to bark and lunge at that person to get them away and he could not be calmed down easily. Yansa was also reactive towards guests at home and dogs on walks.
During Yansa’s first week in training with me, I was the victim of his redirected aggression when he bit me in the leg while lashing out at a nearby stranger who was approaching. The redirected aggression happened because he was at a high stimulation state and I happened to be the one nearest to him and restraining him with the leash. He was not able to control his impulses on this occasion as in previous times with his owners.
Obedience and Leadership
As pack animals, dogs need structure in their social groups. When a pet dog is not given clear structure or rules, it does not know who the leader is in the hierarchy and will assume that role for itself. Unfortunately, that was the case with Yansa, who saw the need to be the leader and protect the family. He always walked ahead of his owners and zigzagged from side to side while pulling hard on his leash.
Training and Result
When I started working with Yansa, I gave him lots of rules and boundaries that he needed to adhere to. I taught him basic obedience that helped him understand what I was expecting of him at any time. He felt comfortable knowing that he no longer needed to stay alert and act for every noise outside, every passer-by on walks, or every new guest in the house.
It was important to desensitize him to all types of stimuli– dogs on walks, strangers on walks (men), new guests at home. That was coupled with counterconditioning to reassociate the stimuli with positive things such as chewy bones, treats, and scratches. Those techniques were effective as he learned that his bed was a safe zone that he can stay in when new guests are around, and he could chew on a bone (which also helps to relieve stress). He is only allowed to greet guests after they are seated, and he is calm.
Obedience was also applied to walks as Yansa learned to walk in a “heel” position without pulling on the leash or moving from left to right mindlessly. He also learned not to go after cats or dogs and to always follow the handler.
To help teach Yansa to be a follower, we played “follow the leader” with lots of practice on different terrains and difficult areas that he was previously afraid of and never accepted to go to.
Teaching Yansa to control his barking and lunging impulses went hand in hand with teaching him to control his urine-marking impulses (the goal is to teach him global impulse control). Stopping urine marking needed a lot of patience, observation, split-second timing, and of course not leaving him unattended.
Yansa’s family was taught how to effectively communicate with Yansa, how to continue his training and learning, and how to manage him(management is very important with a dog with a bite history because it can never be guaranteed that this dog will not attempt to bite anyone else, even after years of being bite-free). If all the conditions for a bite realign one day, Yansa may resort to biting again to cope with his stress.
