Porter Nips Our Friend's Pants so We Bring in a Trainer
Updated: Sep 16
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Once Porter had some basic obedience and a lot of exercise we could get down to the last and biggest issues: his dog reactivity and his nipping of the pants and fingers of people that he did not know or did not know well.
The pants nipping....I don't know when that started. I can't remember when we noticed that but we finally realized that Porter was ALSO reactive to humans, though less-so than dogs. Sigh. Sigh. Sigh. Sigh. There was lots of crying and then finally a lot of getting down to business.
Porter is ALL the reactives... Dog Reactive... People reactive...
If, like me, your last five dogs were labs or golden retrievers, it might come as a shock to realize your 1-year-old brindle rescue is NOT a lab and will NOT behave like one. In fact, your little rescue may come with a myriad of issues you have never seen before and did not even know existed. Enter The Trainer.
I had read many books, but, alas, Porter had nipped the pants of yet another one of our family friends, and we had no idea what to do with that. We didn't know if this was the tip of the iceberg and there was a lot more aggression behind that nip. I remember being really, really upset that I had this damn dog and I couldn't take him out and in public without him snapping at someone and I couldn't have people over without him nipping at someone, but over time we learned his triggers and they became non-issues. At that time, though, I still did not have a lot of experience with rescue dogs and this behavior was a BIG DEAL to me. I never would have believed my future self if they told me that this was all going to work out...eventually...in time.
Porter's other issues were air snapping at people he didn't want petting him, air snapping at dogs who got too close to him, and nipping fingers of visitors who dared to walk faster than a zombie. Any trainer was going to have their work cut out for them.
Finding a Trainer
I got to work scouring the local dog trainers and their websites and filled out the lengthy information forms. A few trainers wouldn't work with me since Porter was human aggressive. I understood but I remember get really frustrated that I couldn't find someone to help me deal with him before any of his issues got bigger. Finally, after getting some denials and a lot of ghosting, I talked to a board-and-train trainer that I liked, but I couldn't imagine Porter being very productive in a board and train situation. He's an anxious guy, and I felt like all that anxiety would have overpowered any training that the trainer was trying to do, so I finally settled on getting an in-home trainer.
More forms, etc. More ghosting. By the time the trainer we hired called me back and said he work with me, I was like "you're immediately hired." Looking back, I should have spent more time asking him about his training techniques and his training plans, but at the time he was the only person willing to work with me in the home and willing to work with Porter. So, even though I didn't love his entire training method, we still did learn a lot from him and he was one of the few trainers willing to help us in the beginning.
Trainer Doug (as we will call him for this post-not his real name) came over the first night, asked questions, gave advice, and took a lot of notes for TWO HOURS. By the time he left we were wrung out.
We started the conversation as you would expect: He wanted to get to understand what Porter's issues were, and I later realized, what exactly his triggers were. Basically, we would tell Trainer Doug something Porter had done that was bad, and then Trainer Doug would follow up with a lot of questions about who, what, where, and when.
Porter's Triggers
We narrowed Porter's triggers down to these specific scenarios:
People stepping over him
People stepping over him while he was sleeping (like, for example, hypothetically, asking for a friend--when we took Porter to a brewery after a long hike in New Mexico and Porter then decided to take a nap in the middle of an aisle, which made it so a waiter had to step over him, which made it so Porter lunged and tried to eat his pants...which made some bros in the corner go "brrooooo000000-Did you see that? That dog is meannnn" (while chuckling). We paid and ran out of there with our tail between our legs. Hypothetically.)
Strange men who moved quickly and used their hands a lot ( ie: My entire New York family)
Strangers (male or female) who got too close to me or tried to give me a hug.
Kids hugging him
Any stranger or dog trying to say "hi" to him after his parents have dragged him through a long day of hiking (which he likes) and breweries (which he hates).
We then got into strategy. Now that we had a good sense of his triggers, what were we going to do about it? Below are the problems paired with the solutions that we agreed to try:
Problem: People stepping over him.
Solution: Start a PSA campaign to warn friends and family.
Problem: People stepping over him while sleeping
Solution: Don't let him fall asleep in a place where people will step over him. Especially don't let his dum dum parents let him fall asleep in the middle of a public place after a long day of hiking in an unfamiliar state.
Problem: Strange men moving their hands quickly
Solution: Porter either needed to be on his leash with a handler who was far away from the person or in his crate. Ideally, in his crate, because this would allow him to get used to the Strange Men Moving Their Hands, but would not give him a chance to nip at said hands. (Porter has gotten a lot better with this over time and can handle a lot men Men Moving Hands, but now we know his body language and can tell a mile away if someone walks in for a bbq and Porter decides That Man Is Moving Too Fast and Must Be Nipped. Porter will start sending off all of his signals (crazy eyes, tailing the person) so we just grab him, put him on his leash, and give him to someone not greeting the guest. We move him to the bedroom depending on how many more people are coming over.)
Problem: Strangers getting near me
Solution: Same as a above. Put Porter in a crate or leashed for away where he could monitor the situation but not take action.
Problem: Kids hugging him. Porter does not nip children but he will snap at the annoying ones. This is scary for any parent, so we try to avoid getting Porter and the children into situations where Porter has to give his warning snap.
Solution: Launch 2nd PSA campaign to parents of children. Tell child to leave dog alone. If child is teeny or in their terrible twos, threes, fours, fives, sixes, sevens, eights, nines, tens, elevens, twelves, etc., and won't give Porter space, Porter goes in the spare bedroom until that child goes home. (We found that if we put Porter in his crate THE CHILDREN always find him and continue to harass-I mean, play-with him, so Porter has to be out of sight to get peace.)
Problem: Any stranger or dog trying to say "hi" to him after his parents have dragged him through a long day of hiking (which he likes) and breweries (which he hates).
Solution: Get new dog parents who won't do this to Porter.
All of this came out of Round 1 of training. Rounds 2-4 coming up next.
Our sessions with Trainer Doug continued for a few more weeks, and by the end, I learned some of the most important lessons of reactive dog ownership.
At our initial appointment with Trainer Doug, we had identified these problems and these solutions (below is the short version. Expanded version in previous post.)
Problem: People stepping over him.
Solution: Start a PSA campaign to warn friends and family.
Problem: People stepping over him while sleeping
Solution: PSA Campaign/Don't let him fall asleep in a place where people will step over him.
Problem: Strange men moving their hands quickly
Solutions: Porter either needed to be on his leash with a handler who was far away from the person or in his crate/Desensitizing.
Problem: Strangers getting near me
Solution: Same as a above. Put Porter in a crate or leashed for away where he could monitor the situation but not take action.
Problem: Kids hugging him.
Solution: Launch 2nd PSA campaign to parents of children/ Porter goes in the spare bedroom until that child goes home.
Problem: Any stranger or dog trying to say "hi" to him after his parents have dragged him through a long day of hiking (which he likes) and breweries (which he hates).
Solution: Get new dog parents who won't do this to Porter.
The next few sessions, were just okay. Twice the trainer mixed up the dates and locations where we were supposed to meet and, over I felt the sessions did not really work on the second half of my training request, which was that we start desensitize Porter to his triggers. When I brought it up the trainer said "We don't do that." (grrrrrrrr because that was one of two things I brought up in the initial phone call and that I really wanted to figure out.) We had paid up front so I just resigned myself to finishing up the contracted lessons and finding another trainer to help with the desensitizing.
We did three lessons after the initial consultation, where we completed the following activities:
Lesson 1: I met the trainer at his training location and we ran through some agility. He also brought out his dog for a bit to test Porter's body language (it was not positive), and showed me how to handle Porter (I don't remember what the feedback was.)
Lesson 2: We met in Old Town Alexandria. The waterfront down there is beautiful and very busy and I felt a little worried about someone wanting to pet Porter. As part of my PSA campaign to let the whole world know that Porter is a rescue and needs space, I bought him this bandana to wear in public. He clearly loved it and did not hate me for dressing him up this way:
Honestly, though, I really loved the bandana and wished I had one for myself at work some days.
Our field trip to Old Town was a success. We walked around and practiced commands in the park with lots of distractions around.
In the end, Porter and I survived our lessons and when they were done, I remember feeling underwhelmed. I remember distinctly thinking that "I just paid a lot of money for someone to tell me to respect Porter's boundaries."
Once I got some distance from the initial disappointment, though, I realized I that I did get a bit from the training:
Foremost, I did not want to have to call in another trainer for Porter's behavior. We really cracked down on making sure he was not too overwhelmed and we would put in in his crate or another safe space if we knew that a particular situation would set him off.
The trainer helped Chris and I agree on strategies, so it saved us a lot of bickering.
I learned that I'm my dog's best advocate. I need to stick up for Porter if someone is making him uncomfortable.
It's okay to have clear behavior boundaries for your dog.
Porter's behaviors are not the worst thing the trainer has come across. (Honestly, this in itself was worth a lot. Here I was being like "That's it. Everything is over. He's the worst dog in the whole world. He will never be able to leave the house. I will never be able to socialize ever again ever." The trainer was like: "I've seen it before. It will be fine. Keep working at it." That the trainer wasn't immediately matching my "THIS IS AN EMERGENCY ENERGY" was very helpful. He knew it was going to be fine, and therefore, I could start believing it was going to be fine.
Thankfully, Porter hit 3-years-old and started calming down, in general. There were fewer outbursts and there were long periods of time where he would relax on the couch and snooze. (Thank God).
The most important lesson, though, was that I had to accept Porter for who he was. He does not like strangers. He does not like kids. He does not like crowds. He does not like new situations. He does not like camping. He does not like to run. He does not like warm weather. He does not like road trips. He does not like breweries. Basically, Porter hates everything I was hoping he would like and I just had to get over that. It was okay if I needed him to learn to accept some of these things temporarily as we go through life, but it was not okay for me to expect him to be something that he was not. That's been really hard for me to accept. I seriously thought I could train him to be a therapy dog, and make people happy with the mere presence of my dog, but I can't. He's not interested and therefore, I need to get over it. He is who he is and everything got a lot better when I started to wrap my head around that.
Nevertheless, I wasn't done with his training yet.
I had read too many issues of AKC Family Dog where some grouchy rescue found his zen through nose work and the family lived happily ever after and I wanted in! We were going to try all the sports!
Also, on a more realistic note, I really did want to learn how to desensitize him to his triggers."Desensitizing" had come up in every book I'd read and I wanted to see this in action. Since I've been a teacher for a long time, I knew that most of the time what worked in the books I read did not always work in the real world. I wanted to see how this was done properly.
Armed with these goals, Porter and I set out on the next steps of our training journey.
Products From This Period of Porter's Life
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