Modern Dog Blog

So much is changing. My doggies are getting their very own human baby this fall. They are thrilled at the prospect of many days of cheerios getting gleefully tossed in their direction by tiny hands. To my dogs, babies equal lots of good stuff on the floor. Food, toys, more food. Did I mention the food? Wow, a human baby, yikes! How did this happen? I think I know but now this brings us to changes in the business. The blog will continue to be my space for dog stuff, but will now be including how to live with dogs and babies – and cats and birds and fish. Maybe not so much a how to as a “holy crap, this is nuts” sort of thing. Surely it will be an entertaining ride for the next few years!

For the real dog training though, it is time to say goodbye. This year marks my 20th year of training my own and other people’s dogs. A lifetime really. This is so much of my identity. I was a dog trainer when being a dog trainer wasn’t cool, or even really understood. When people looked at me and said “A dog trainer, huh? What do you do for money?” Now, everyone is a dog trainer after work. Or they’ve quit their “real jobs” to “follow their passion for animals” and opened up a doggie daycare, or high end pet boutique, or gone on to spend their entire savings building a dog spa that most of us would enjoy a day at. And everybody, I mean everybody, is a “trainer.” That’s great, good for them, but there is only so much room. The market is flooded with newbies, and while I admire their fresh enthusiasm, I question the depth of their knowledge. How many of them are really good dog trainers, and how many of them are simply good at marketing?

I started to wind down my business in the summer of ’06, after my dogs and I were involved in a very ugly, very brutal dog fight. My boys came away with some scratches and some lingering dog aggression problems, I spent the rest of the day in the ER with a torn up leg getting sutures – oh boy! I was pretty well toast, off my feet and then on crutches, for six or eight weeks. The emotional toll it took on me took much, much longer to heal. It was then that I stopped taking any clients (or dogs) with aggression problems. The dog that nailed me was totally lovely with humans, and had been nice with dogs, but just lost his crackers and tried to kill another dog. Unfortunately, there were a lot of loose dogs that day, and I happened to be standing in the middle of it when the fight broke out. It was by far the most vicious thing I’ve ever seen dogs do to one another. AND SO, I stopped going to dog parks, tried to avoid off leash dogs, stopped dealing with aggressive dogs – any sort of growl sent me running for cover, shaking. It’s quite embarrassing to be a professional dog trainer and admit that you are suddenly, rather terrified of dogs. Even that tiny yorkie that chase us out of his yard. Hmm, ya, that didn’t go so well. And I was doing better until this past weekend my pugs and I got run down by a rather nasty bulldog that lives in the neighborhood and he did his best to eat my pugs. The only thing that saved us is that dog is really fat and slow, and I was kicking the snot out of him. Fortunately we all only got slobbered on – but the incident sent my mental state back quite a ways. It’s really hard to focus on teaching a dog when in the back of your mind you are wondering when it is going to use those nice, shiny choppers to rip holes in your flesh. Why is this evil dog running loose you ask? I’ve often wondered the same thing, but apparently his owner thinks it’s cute to let him out in the common areas to terrorize everyone. That, and she’s too lazy to actually walk him so she just “turns him out” for his daily constitutionals. I’d like to kick her!

Anyway, back to the story here. I kept working with puppies, and basic manners – Fluffy jumps up, Scooter runs out the door, things like that. I started only taking personal referrals of “nice dogs” and pulled my cards out of vets offices. I still see two or three clients a week, but with the baby coming, have decided that on July 1st, I will officially retire from the grand world of being a dog trainer. It’s a big scary thing for me, as I have been a dog trainer most of my life. It’s who I am, it’s what I do. But the logistics of running a small business, trying to get to appointments all over the county, the constant stress and work of having someone else’s dogs in my house – these things just do not mix well with a baby. Not for me, anyway. One of the main reasons I have had my business was so I could spend my days with my dogs, not leaving them home alone all day. I feel like I have to now dedicate myself to the raising and “training” of my human charge.

So here we go. A whole new era. I will refer all my boarding clients out, and change the message on my phone. And fade off into the sunset. No longer will I spend precious emotional energy trying to fix problems that owners have given their dogs, no longer will I worry about a dog who is in a miserable home, I won’t care if people don’t follow through and then wonder why their dog isn’t getting better, I won’t feel responsible when Fluffy has an accident on the carpet – even though I wasn’t there to stop it. On the other hand, I won’t be helping as a puppy has their first “aha” moment and realizes that putting their butt on the ground really DOES get them cookies. I’ll miss out on making some cool new friends, cause as weird as dog people are, some of them are pretty damn awesome. I’ll be a little sad to let the younger generation of dog trainers take over. But it’s time, I think. I’ll have to figure out who I am without lots of people and their dogs looking to me for advice and help. Really, can I function without a treat bag permanently attached to my waist?

I have a different job that needs my attention now. I have to be a human mom, as well as a dog mom, and somehow figure out how to combine the two. And maybe, just maybe, I’ll finally find the time to train my own dogs…

Posted on March 21st, 2008 by michelle
Filed under: The Naked Part, Training