The Start of Porter's Long Road to Being a Good Boy. Fundamentals First, As Usual.

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Porter does not look excited for skool to start. (Look how shiny my floors used to be!)

Have you ever had your arm covered in little bitey teeth marks? I now have. As soon as we got Porter, our first rescue, home he proceeded to tenderize my arm while I had to pretend to be happy about it since I had thrown a fit at the adoption fair about getting him. ("ISN'T HE PRECIOUS!?!?!??! I asked my husband later through clenched teeth while my arms shined beet red.)

This was one the first night of the first day we had him him and one of the first signs that we were in over our heads. As any good nerd does in these situations, I proceeded to read every book in our public library about dog training. Fortunately, I came across Lucky Dog Lessons, which helped me get started with some concrete tips and routines.

Lucky Dog Lessons

Porter had the prerequisites doe training: a stable home, safety, no health issues, food and water.

Now, I had to get this whirling dervish of fur and teeth under control.

First, we needed the goddamn basics.

1. A Predictable, Structured Routine

Porter is a highly anxious dog. He does not like change. He does not like surprises. He does not like adventures. In order for him to be grounded, he needs a predictable, structured routine so that he knows what's coming, day-in and day-out. I was made the mistake of trying to keep everything Very Exciting and Different because I had read that dogs are destructive when they are bored so --Different walks!! Different toys!! Different snacks!! Different road trips!! Doggy Daycare!! Although this might work for some really outgoing and curious dogs, it was not for Porter. The constant surprises stressed him out and amped him up.

We set up a daily routine that worked for Porter and stuck to it.

5:30- 2 Mile Walk

6:30-Kibble

7:00-10 minutes in yard for fetch and sprints

7:00-11:00 Crate

11:00- 11:30 Yard time

11:30-3:30 Crate

4:00-Walk

5:00-Training

6:00-Dinner Kong

6:30-Literal sprints in yard. I would run; he would run with me.

6:45 & Onward: TIME TO REST & Chew on the many, many chew things we bought him.

2. Exercise

Since Porter was highly anxious AND high energy, his routine needed to include a lot of exercise. Cesar Milan, and most trainers, really harped on this.

We would wake up at 5:30 am and do two miles of long, slow sniffing walks, some sprints in the yard, before work. Porter hates running because he likes to sniff, so here we were.

After work we did another 2+ mile walk. Porter did not often tire out and sometimes this afternoon walk would go for many miles. One day we tallied the miles and realized that he required around 7 miles a day of walking until he was calm, non-destructive, ready to exist in a house, and willing to do some training. This was the momemt we understood why Porter had been returned to the shelter twice. It was hard to give him what he needed: a TON of time outside, sniffing and walking the same ol; route. EVERY DAY.

Luckily, we are psychos and were able to provide this for him, but we understood how this could have quickly become a problem for previous owners. I can specifically remember crying in the middle of a Saturday morning walk because we had already walked Porter three miles and he was nowhere near tired. He was spinning 100 miles per hour in every direction while also somehow eating his leash and my glove. I was tired from the week and just wanted to spend my Saturday morning in a blanket drinking coffee. I started crying because he wasn't even close to being tired and I was exhausted. My husband took over that day and sprinted Porter in the yard for a while. Soon after this, he started to regulate and did not need as much exercise, but goddamn he was exhausting.

Porter finally sitting still not destroying things. one morning where I remember being especially relieved that I had finally tired him out and could drink my coffee

3. Down Time/Night Night Routine

Hand in hand with the exercise is the down time. Even though Porter was high energy and needed A LOT of exercise, he did not know how to turn off when he was tired. We would have finished the whole routine I listed above, and he would STILL be destroying things and running around the house. Before I understood that over tired looked veryyy similar to understimulated, I would be jogging him at 10:00 at night because he had just destroyed another indestructibile dog bed and I couldn't figure out what was wrong with him. I thought he needed more exercise (at least that's what the dog books were telling me!).

Finally it hit me that he was acting like an over-tired, cranky toddler and I realized he WAS an over-tired, cranky toddler, just furry. This was when we instituted the massive night-night bone chewing extravaganza ON LEASH. It signaled the end of the day and we would feed him as many bones as he needed until he fell asleep. Porter liked to chew the shit out of every decorative item in the house, so I gave him a lot of things he was allowed to chew on: one rawhide, one Whimzee and one third thing that varied depending on what I had picked up at the store lately. All of this would keep him busy, calm him down, and ultimately tire him out.

Porter's favorite bones when he was little were the small Dentley's rawhide rolls.

I had to put him on the leash for him to understand that he was not supposed to be wandering all over the house destroying things and barking out the window. For dogs that like their crate, you could probably just pop them in there.

Porter liked chewing on these.

(Side note on choosing your Night Night bones: Porter was really picky about food and snacks so it was a lot of trial and error to figure out what he liked, what he did not like, what gave him diarrhea, and what would last more than 10 minutes. Some bones he would gobble down in 30 seconds, which was not helping my cause. Some bones, like the really heavy duty ones for heavy chewers, he wouldn't touch (Shin bones, things like that...). He liked certain textures but not others.

Whenever I bought him a new chew item, I would literally give it to him and start a timer. Anything that made it past 10 minutes and did not give him the shits got bought again. What works for one dog does not work for all, so just be prepared for your own trial and error period. Order a bunch of stuff and see what works until you find your Magic Night Night Bone Routine.

I ended up buying a lot of Dentleys and Whimzees. He also loved bully sticks but we REALLY had to watch him or he would gobble them down and get the squirts.

Here are some other chews we would rotate in:

Porter and the gang eat these every night. I'm pretty sure we put them out of business by buying and eating every Pork Chomp in the world.

These did not last long but Porter enjoyed them.

The dogs love these and they meet the 10 minute minimum.

Porter loved these.

We would throw these in every once in a while.

Porter would actually eat these and they lasted a really long time. I would only let him eat 1/2 a bone at a time.

4. Potty Training and Crate Training: 

   PORTER WAS NOT POTTY TRAINED. The rescue told us he was, but he sure wasn't. I vividly remember coming home one evening after Porter and I had finished our very, very long afternoon walk. I made him dinner, gave him a bone, and my husband and I then sat down together thinking we could chill and watch a movie together. Porter then took a huge shit behind the couch.

   
   

   Potty training a 1-year-old dog is not that different from a puppy. Porter was not allowed to be unsupervised around the house until he was potty trained. I literally kept his leash on and attached to me all the time. (He chewed through a lot of leashes, but I would just grab another one and pop it on.)

I bought a lot of these leashes on Amazon because they were cheap so I wouldn't feel AS BAD if Porter chewed through one. If he didn't, it was a good leash, in general.

1. 
   

   To potty train him, I used Brandon McMillan's crate training pyramid, which made it so that I was crate training and potty training at the same time. He has a great YouTube video of his method here: crate training pyramid that he talks about.

   
   

   Basically the pyramid involves playing with the puppy for a few minutes, putting the puppy in the crate for a few minutes, then taking the puppy out to pee for a few minutes. Then you would repeat this while slowly extending the play time, crate time, pee time- over time. This method worked really well for all of our dogs.

For us, this method served a dual purpose. Porter hate, hate, hate, hate, HATED his crate, but crate training him was non-negotiable. If he wasn't in his crate, he destroyed whatever he could and shit and peed on the floor. and barked out the window at all hours.

Using the crate went a really long way in his supporting his potty training and his curbing his destructiveness.

It was really hard to get him in the crate, though, and I hated every minute of getting him in it. He would go in because we asked him to, but man-oh-man-it was a battle; I could feel him murdering me with his eyes. With Porter (and now with Mabel), you could see when they switched to their evil side--their eyes dilated and they LOOKED mad. It always reminds me of this scene from Finding Nemo where Bruce the friendly shark gets a sniff of blood and then wants to eat his fish friends:

Porter when I put him in his crate

This is the face Porter would have on every time I put him into a crate. Sometimes, after putting him in the crate, I would stick my finger through the bars to try and give him a reassuring scratch-BAD IDEA. He did not like that and woud let me know it by snapping at me. YIKES! I learned it was best to get him in there, turn around, and walk out without making a fuss.

As soon as we knew Porter was potty trained and would not destroy the house if left him out of his crate, we let him roam the house, but it probably took half a year-maybe a bit more to get to this point. Porter sometimes still has to go in his crate as an adult, and he stills hates it, so we only crate him when absolutely necessary.

The crate came up again in his later training when we were working on his reactivity: In short, I wish I did not stop crating him after we finally started, as it was another key tool in his reactivity training. Since I had stopped putting him in his crate once he was potty and house training, I had to go back and crate train him AGAIN as part of his reactivity training.

Porter Good Boy Most Likely Figuring Out How to Drag My Down the Street

5. Basic Obedience

I signed Porter up for his first obedience class and I made a blackboard with what he was working on so that everyone who was in the house would know. (Clearly, my husband and his friends got ahold of my training board.) By the time I was done, I figured Porter was basically going to be a Golden Retriever in a brindle boy's body. (He is. not.)

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   Porter's Training Board

   
   

We took our class at Kissable Canine. The trainer, Lisa, led an organized class and was excellent about making sure the reactive dogs did not set each other off. She has since moved her business out to Lewes, Delaware, and I recommend checking her out if you live that way.

Obedience school in this setting was a win for Porter because the training room was a considerable size and the dogs were able to be spaced far apart.

Obedience is the lynchpin for reactive dogs because it allows you and your dog to communicate in stressful situations. I am still working on it. The first few steps were easy, but learning to advance and proof the obedience is hard. That being said, any bit of training helps.

Porter Graduates Obedience 101

Porter was a focused little guy so even though I would set the training timer for 15 minutes, he would willingly do 30 or 45 minutes before tiring out. He reminded me of the "working German Shepherd" in this reel:

We worked our way through the basics and and even some fancier tricks that I got from the book 101 Dog Tricks.

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   101 Dog Tricks

   
   

   Here is a video of Baby Porter's training in progress: 

   
   

He actually still loves doing "skool" today and gets all fluffy and excited about it. It's one of the things we do together to make him happy.

Creating a predictable routine, getting exercise and rest, crate training, attending obedience classes-there were the first few steps we took to reign in Porter and his chaos. Looking back, I am not sure how we managed to get through this stage and still want more dogs afterwards, but I guess we are wired to remember the good stuff.

If you are struggling with your rescue dog, I've been there. I am there right now, just with a different dog (Mabel). Porter is my Good Boy and I enjoy hanging out with him.

Once we put the fundamentals first, Porter and I made some a lot of progress before I had to call in The Trainer to get him to stop nipping fingers and pants.

We are not done with his work, but he has come a long way and your dog will, too!