Advice & Adventures 

My first week trying to figure out how to retrain my reactive dog pack ended up turning into an excavation of my soul and a reflection on where I currently am in life. (Follow me for more light and easy dog training tips!!!!) And, currently, in my life, I am in the middle of a scorched-earth, take no prisoners, I-hate-my-job kind of warpath with the school district I teach in.

Part of thwarting reactivity in humans and dogs is to look for the early warning signs that you (or they) are getting riled up.The idea is that it is way easier to shut down reactivity at the very early stages, when there's just low level concern, rather than later once that concern has swelled in to a frothing furor. If you put a few items on your credit card and then pay off that small amount-no big deal.

The Reactive Human (me) was supposed to be working on not being big mad at her bosses, and instead immediately crashed out on an assistant superintendent who took away over 50% of the adult only bathrooms in our school and didn't see what the problem was., AND Reactive Human was NOT EVEN SORRY that she had been reactive.

So here we are. Me and my crazy dogs trying to get our shit together. Trainer Miriam Pollard says that when dogs are unsure what to do in a situation, their genetics take over. When I am unsure of what to do in a situation, I turn to books.