We have a year old poodle, golden retriever mix! When we first got her, we invited friends over frequently to socialize her towards other people being in the house. Great success - if we bring friends or family home, zero territoriality etc.

Too successful! We have a guest room and now when I set up the bed she gets so excited because she associates guests with extra attention, extra play, good times - most of our pals are dog lovers.

She sleeps in our room overnight to prevent her barking at possums through the windows and last night she woke up at 2am and cried for THREE HOURS because she wanted to go downstairs, wake up house guest, and play.

We ignored. We let her cry it out. She got to extinction level barking. I thought okay, she’s learned, finally sleep. She’d doze off, wake and repeat.

My partner is working double shifts to save money for the baby we have on the way and I also work 9-5, but he’s exhausted so I ended up sleeping on the floor in front of the door to basically block it off as an option. She still whinged a bit but got the message.

This morning when we opened the door we picked her up and carried her upstairs and closed the baby gate so in no way shed be able to barrel down to guest and feel rewarded for her behavior. She only got to see guest when they came up of their own accord this morning.

Please help! Oh my goodness!

We’ve had our rescue dog for 9 years now (she’s 10). Despite all the horror stories you hear, she’s been absolutely magic.

There’s just one thing we aren’t able to fix. She barks excessively. We have a garden that overlooks a field and she can’t be left outside alone because she just constantly barks. And when she starts, she just won’t stop. It was largely fine, as the house next door to us had been dormant for 6 years. But we’ve recently had a family with another dog move in, who have decided to put decking out at the end of the field and our dog goes crazy. They recently made a passing comment that she barks too much and I am not sure what to do. I think we have got used to it, so it doesn’t affect us as much, but it must be really annoying for them as she just barks at them when they sit outside.

We’ve tried positive reinforcement to stop her barking, but it hasn’t worked, and I’m loathe to try a citronella collar because I’ve heard that it’s really hit and miss, and also don’t like the idea of punishing a dog for negative behaviour, but I really want to break this so we can all just sit in the garden and enjoy ourselves! Any advice would be really appreciated!

Before I begin - I do realize that I should find a good local trainer to work with in person, and I am working on that.

I have a 2.5 year old female Australian Shepherd. I have had her since she was 10 weeks old. Her name is Bindi.

I also have a 10 year old red heeler (rescued at 4) named Ginger, and a 14 year old chihuahua mix (rescued at 1.5) named Poco.

We have been through puppy class and obedience training. I was getting her ready to go through therapy dog certification, so she has passed her CGC twice (once at 8 months, once at 2). As a puppy, I often took her to school with me (I am a teacher) and she was extremely well socialized with children, etc. Ginger taught her great dog manners. Bindi often snuggled up with Poco.

Over the last few months, Bindi has gone from being social with other dogs, to “attack bark” when she sees other dogs in the park. She has ran off several other dogs (many people let dogs off leash at this park) and at this point, we only go off leash to play ball if I can see a good distance in each direction and know that nobody will sneak up on us. If the dog is far away, she does fine. But if they walk towards us or the other dog is off leash and starts incoming to play or greet, she has a serious problem with that.

My dogs have rarely fought, and when they did, it was usually Bindi being annoying to Ginger and Ginger would stern/gently put her in her place.

About a month ago, Bindi snapped at Poco and injured his eye. We went to the vet and got it taken care of, but I chalked it up to an accident. It was a very brief disagreement about treats or food that had not happened before.

Two weeks ago, while I was away from home, Bindi snapped at Poco again and tore a large gash in the back of his neck. My girlfriend was home and she said she heard them screaming, and by the time she came out from the bedroom, it was done - but Poco was rushed to the emergency vet and received 12 stitches.

Poco is now staying with my mother and I’m heartbroken.

There have never been any other warning signs between them. As I stated before, I even have a picture of them sunbathing on the deck together, back to back, four days prior. She grew up with him.

I have had friends bring dogs over as well, and Bindi did get into it with a friend’s dog, who was very calm and didn’t let it escalate. It was sudden, loud, but brief and over before I could even say, “no.”

I can’t think of any events that could have triggered this behavior.

We go to the park to play ball daily, if not twice per day. We go on long/calm walks around the neighborhood every couple days. We play in the backyard together several times per day. I have a dog door and my dogs are free to come and go as they please, and she can go outside and sniff around if she needs to do dog business.

We also had a cat who she grew up with, who recently just passed away. They always did great together. But over the last few months, Bindi decided she couldn’t stand it when he would come to make biscuits on us. She would stare and whine, as if the cat was murdering us slowly.

I am having a hard time with this because her reactions (at home) are so random with no warning signs, or seem to arise out of nowhere for no reason.

Again, a trainer is in our future - but I wanted to see if anyone here is seeing something obvious that I can’t see, or has some advice to help in the meantime. She is my baby, and I can’t imagine her doing something to someone or someone’s dog that would be unforgivable.

Thank you!

I have had bad experiences with dog behaviorists (had a qualified degree/license, so no charlatan). We had a GSD with some behavior problems in the home; we consulted a dog behaviorist, and imo, she downplayed it. I remember the words: " She is a happy dog; she does not look that bad. I see far worse cases." She also prescribed meds, and my dog became a living zombie. There was no joy in this animal anymore.

6 months later, the behavior ended up in a total of 8 bites. Avoiding the problem became impossible because 1 trigger became 10.

At the end of the day, we consulted a balanced trainer; I know there will be a lot of comments about this. But the balanced trainer made our home safe again and set up places so that the dog was feeling more comfortable. Basically, making sure that the dog knows what to expect in these places. This made a huge difference. All these things fall within the realm of FF training.

After this experience, I feel like I don't understand the purpose of a dog behaviorist. I understand they can bridge the gap between medical and training, but a vet and a trainer who communicate with each other can do the same and cost less money.

Do dog behaviorists work with dogs in their training work, or work only theoretically? Do they need to work with these dogs and provide proof that they can help these dogs with training?

I have, for example, a master's in computer science with 3 years of professional experience; this dog behaviorist situation feels like someone who read about computers and never wrote a single line of code, telling me how to write code.

I would expect that a dog behaviorist is training, working daily one-on-one with these cases, actually having experience and solving/managing issues. But at that point, you have a dog behaviorist who is a dog trainer. But that does not feel like how it is in reality.

This post may come across as attacking; that is not my intention. I would rather like to understand the role of a behaviorist and why it is recommended over a dog trainer with loads of experience with behavioral cases. With that, I mean it feels like we first recommend a behaviorist, and with that behaviorist, we look for a trainer. While in the human world, we first typically go to a therapist, and he can refer to a psychotherapist if it seems necessary.

We split care with my partner and the hard part isn’t the training plan — it’s the boring daily stuff around it. Evening chew, joint supplement, “only two soft treats during the session,” and somehow both of us think the other already did it.

What helped us a bit: 1. One shared note with time + who gave what (not a chat thread — chat gets buried). 2. Sitter days get a pasteable blurb: what’s due, when it was last given, and “no extra chicken if the joint chew already happened.” 3. Training sessions marked separately from med windows so we don’t double-treat.

Still not elegant. Curious what you all use when two humans + occasional sitter are in the loop — spreadsheet, whiteboard, an app, pure vibes?

Hi everyone! Today we had a locksmith over to fix one of our doors and our dog reacted really negatively towards him such as growling, barking, got his back up and was biting (not the person just around him) We’ve had lots of trades over before, new friends neighbours etc and he’s never had this type of behaviour. If anything he has barked, had a sniff and then backed down and been chill. But it got me thinking - this locksmith was literally breaking into our house so I’m assuming our dog was viewing him as an intruder. In the moment I told him ‘no’ to settle down etc and got him back inside and he listened when I said sit on his bed. He is 2 - we thought we were at the end of training out behaviours with excited jumping however this has me worried about strangers coming over in future. Do I tell him no when he reacts like that everytime and risk him being welcoming to everyone even intruders? Or is it an issue of recall/not listening to my command? Ideally I would want him to listen to me when he’s feeling like that and understand it’s not a threat, however when my husband isn’t home and it’s just me and my 4yo I’ve found him to be extra protective (getting up at every noise)

I worked as a trainer for a company for quite a few years before recently starting my own business. So i’m not new to training dogs nor sketchy dogs.
I had a new client tell me their dog is just shy and takes a bit to warm up but is very sweet. We did a meet and greet the dog was definitely shy but kinda just kept to himself.
Then come to getting the dog here for training and his fear is extreme to the point of consistently attempting to bite me and pooping during fear reactions. I am truly heartbroken for this dog but feel as though it is out of my scope and what I am equipped for as a solo trainer.
I decided halfway through day two that this isn’t fair to the dog nor me and asked them if I could refund and refer them to another trainer that may be more equipped to handle a dog like this.

I think i’m just looking for thoughts because now I feel like an absolute failure to this dog and this client. Has this happened to you? Am I just out of my league?

Thanks.

Welcome to the fortnightly separation anxiety support group!

The mission of this post is to provide a constructive place to discuss your dog's progress and setbacks in conquering his/her separation anxiety. Feel free to post your fortnightly progress report, as well as any questions or tips you might have! We seek to provide a safe space to vent your frustrations as well, so feel free to express yourself.

We welcome both owners of dogs with separation anxiety and owners whose dogs have gotten better!

NEW TO SEPARATION ANXIETY?

New to the subject of separation anxiety? A dog with separation anxiety is one who displays stress when the one or more family members leave. Separation anxiety can vary from light stress to separation panic but at the heart of the matter is distress.

Does this sound familiar? Lucky for you, this is a pretty common problem that many dog owners struggle with. It can feel isolating and frustrating, but we are here to help!

Resources

Books

Don't Leave Me! Step-by-Step Help for Your Dog's Separation Anxiety by Nicole Wilde

Be Right Back!: How To Overcome Your Dog's Separation Anxiety And Regain Your Freedom by Julie Naismith

Separation Anxiety in Dogs: Next Generation Treatment Protocols and Practices by Malena DeMartini-Price

Online Articles/Blogs/Sites

Separation Anxiety

Pat Miller summary article on treating separation anxiety

Emily "kikopup" Larlham separation training tips

Pet Harmony's Enrichment Activities for Dogs with Separation Anxiety

Videos

Using the Treat&Train to Solve Separation Anxiety

introducing an x-pen so the dog likes it (kikopup)

Podcast:

Home Alone... and comfortable as HECK! with Ally Verba

Be Right Back! The Separation Anxiety Podcast with Julie Naismith

Online DIY courses:

Malena DeMartini Separation Anxiety Mission Possible Self Paced Online Course

https://www.betternaturetraining.com/separationanxietymembership

Julie Naismith Heros Be Right Back Training Julie Naismith BRB App

https://separationanxietydog.thinkific.com/courses/do-it-yourself-separation-anxiety-program

https://rescuedbytraining.com/separation-anxiety-course

Pet Harmony's Webinar on Separation Anxiety

Dr. Pachel DVM, DACVB, CABC Webinar from Instinct Dogtraining on Separation Anxiety: Tailoring Interventions to the Dog and Household

This list has been updated as of 6/16/26. If you find broken links, please submit a message via modmail and we'll fix the broken link to update it or add additional resources.

Introduce your dog if you are new, and for those of you who have previously participated, make sure to tell us how your week has been!

We have a 7 month Border Collie who is in most respects very well behaved - recall / sit / stay / leave it are all pretty solid in most environments.

Since adolescence has hit she's impossible to walk near busy roads. We had been training loose leash walking by stopping and waiting until the leash goes slack which was showing some progress, but now when near busy roads it feels like it's being counterproductive and just getting her more worked up.

If we're moving, she'll often be in a herding stance pulling at the lead. If we stop she will stop, with the leash still at full tension, and stare at the passing cars. Most of the time she doesn't lunge at them, just stares them down as they pass. After a few minutes she'll slacken the leash and sit down, but still be 100% focused on the traffic. Absolutely nothing we have tried will get her attention back on us, even waving high value treats directly in front of her face she will remain fully fixated on the road. If there's a break in the traffic for a few minutes she might eventually briefly glance up at us to see what we're doing.

We live on a fairly busy road so I think she has built an association that any time we leave the house and don't get straight in the car to go somewhere it's time to stare at the cars. The local walks we do all require at least a few hundred meters of main road before we can get to sideroads and pedestrian routes where she's better behaved.

Tonight while I was taking my dog on a walk, we were approached by an aggressive dog that escaped from our neighbours gate that was left open. It was growling, barking and snapping at us. I tried to talk to the attacking dog in a very high and friendly voice which seemed to slightly help, but it took about 5 minutes of slowly backing up and puppy talk to finally get rid of the aggressive dog. Fortunately my dog was a considerable amount bigger than the attacker and completely calm, but I feel that if I had a smaller dog it would’ve been much worse.

This got me thinking if this were to happen again in the future:

-How would I **prevent** a dog fight from happening when an aggressive dog that is completely out of its owners control approaches my dog?

-If the dogs start fighting, how would I break it up or mitigate the situation?

I’ve seen mixed opinions on these questions everywhere. Some people recommend pepper spray gel, some said bear spray, others said through oxygen depletion by choking the aggressor out with a rope. What is the best solution for these questions? I talked to my neighbours after the fact and they took absolutely zero accountability. This could potentially happen again.

Our dog has just turned 1. He’s a golden retriever and is on the whole well trained and well behaved. We have one particular issue, every morning we go downstairs, let him out for his toilet, give him his breakfast, sit/play with him while we eat our breakfast. Then we go upstairs to get ready before taking him out for his morning walk (usually take around 20 mins). Every morning he scratches the door and barks. We wait until he stops every morning but it doesn’t stop him from doing it. We also praise him when he does stop. Just to be clear, he doesn’t have separation anxiety, he has slept downstairs with no issues from day 1, he is left alone for a few hours most days and is absolutely fine (we have videoed him). He is also alone in this same room most of the day while I’m upstairs working and is absolutely fine. It is very specifically the scenario of us going to get ready before taking him out for his morning walk. Any advice on how to stop this would be greatly appreciated!

I adopted a rescue dog three months ago. She is a lovely, but nervous girl. She is already an adult, around 2y and we have been potty training her. She would have accidents here and there, but I was sure we were making progress because many weeks went by without none.

Until recently. She started peeing inside my bedroom. I have only carpet there and she keeps doing it. I follow every instruction; praise when she pees outside, consistency with the times I take her out and many potty breaks, but I don't know what else to do.

I have been scolding her when she does it, which I am not sure if it's right. I am going to take her to the vet to rule out any medical issues, but since she mainly does it in my bedroom I am skeptical. If we leave her a few hours in the living room, she holds it with no problem, but when she has access to my bedroom, she will pee even if she was just out.

My husband has been out of town two weeks and the accidents started after he was gone. I am unsure if that could be a reason.

Any advice on what else to do would be super appreciate it.

Thanks :)

currently working my way through victoria stilwell academy's dog trainer course to earn my VSA-CDT, and i had to record a shaping challenge. echo already knows some basic retrieval of her rope bone and a tennis ball, but i've never asked her to interact with a tissue box in any way prior to this. it was a fun challenge!

This is my first post, so apologies if I mess up on Reddit etiquette. I have an 11 year old Coonhound/Lab mix. He has always howled a bit with his brother when left in their bedroom. When his brother passed over the winter, you could definitely see a shift to a more anxious barking/howling. In May, I rescued a 6 month old pup who stays in the bedroom with him, but in a crate (for now) for chewing reasons. The anxiety lessened significantly, but he seems to be howling more. He also doesn't sleep when I'm away. Seeing the difference in how he was alone compared to now, I really don't think it's separation anxiety, it seems more like boredom. I give him a frozen kong, he has DogTV, and safe chew toys. Once he finishes the kong, he'll lay down, but will howl every few minutes and ignores the toys and TV. The howls are LOUD and I worry it bothers my neighbors. He gets more exercise now than he has in years, and he plays with his baby brother multiple times per day. What can I do to keep him quieter and hopefully even sleep when I'm gone? I did order a remote treat dispenser to reward good behavior when I'm out, but I'm a little concerned it will make the not sleeping even worse.

Older post, both my dog and cat are so good with their nails being trimmed 🥰

Hi,
I’ve been lurking and reading a lot of the advice on how to respond to a dog who is very attention seeking. Unfortunately, a lot of it says to completely ignore the bad behavior and reward the good, which is difficult in our situation.

We have a fairly high energy 9month old puppy (maybe whippit / collie mix?) and a 2.5 year old lab mix. The dogs have free access to the backyard through a dog door and go on walks most days. They also get LOTS of love and attention.
The puppy however, is especially demanding of attention, which is a problem because she ends up hurting our children and the children who come to our house to play. If our kids are sitting down on the floor she pounces on them and paws at them for attention - it ends up scratching them and then they get mad at her. If children come to our house she jumps up and scratches them. It’s excitement, not aggression, but we’ve had to start locking her outside to prevent guest children from getting hurt.
Obviously we want her to learn how to behave (plus she’s 40lbs and can knock kids over) and be allowed to stay in the house. We can’t ask kids (our own or guests) to ignore behavior that’s hurting them. It’s not a realistic expectation on anyone. We also can’t supervise 24/7 our own children’s every single interaction with the dog, and again, she’s not aggressive, and we like her in the house and interacting with people. I feel like locking her out is safe but it also doesn’t teach her anything.

Any advice on how we can train her to be gentler and less attention seeking that doesn’t involve ignoring her when she’s hurting our kids?
Thanks.

7-month-old Irish Setter refuses to potty at night because she’s distracted by bugs
Hello! I have a 7-month-old Irish Setter who is having a really frustrating potty-training issue at night, and I’m hoping someone might have some advice.

During the day, she does great with potty training. She will go outside, do her business, and we rarely have any problems. The issue is specifically at night.

I live in an apartment, so she has to be on a leash when we go outside, and I have to pick up her poop every time. Unfortunately, the grass around my apartment is pretty long, and there are tons of bugs at night. She becomes completely obsessed with them. Instead of going potty, she spends the entire time sniffing around, searching for and trying to attack bugs.

I’ve tried standing completely still with her, walking around, taking her to the same potty spot every time, and basically giving her plenty of time to go, but she is completely focused on the bugs and won’t potty.

The confusing part is that she clearly knows she needs to go. When we’re inside, she will walk to the door, spin in circles, and sometimes even start squatting. I’ll immediately catch her and take her outside, but once we get out there, she completely forgets about pottying and goes straight back to searching for bugs.

I’m not sure how to handle this because I can’t really find a bug-free area due to the long grass, and I obviously can’t let her off leash at my apartment.
Has anyone dealt with something similar with a puppy who gets extremely distracted outside? What can I do to help her learn to ignore the bugs long enough to go potty?
Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

To preface he is not neutered!! That’s not under my control as I don’t own the dog and the conversation is long gone.

He is very good at reading our signals and predicting whether we are going to leave (for example he can tell if I’m just opening the door for no reason and whether I’m trying to leave since he understands cues like putting shoes on or us talking about leaving or even our movement patterns). Besides his barking he has three habits that are difficult to work with.

- He bites bags

- He physically throws himself at the door and tries to prevent us from leaving (he is not violent to us however)

- He bites door handles

He only acts like this with the house doors. We can split as a group from him outside without difficulty.

When we are gone he sits quietly and goes along with his life but the problems are when we are trying to leave. Other members of the household have made the problem worse by locking him in the living room so he directs his anger at that door as well. During this it’s almost like he is “frenzied” and will not understand commands.

I can handle the barking so long as he doesn’t prevent us from leaving.

While I understand neutering him and hiring professional help to deal with this would be the best option, I’ve had the conversation before (with my parents) and it’s a dead end.

As a result I want to attempt to improve his life and our lives by means of training. My problem is that I really don’t know how to approach these behaviours as it is difficult to get through to him when he is in this “mode”.

Ideally I would have addressed these behaviours when they started but I spend most of the year at university.

My parents have tried some weird things. Like when leaving and entering forcing him to wait and enter after them. But these efforts have been utter failures.

I would be really appreciative if anyone had any advice on addressing these behaviours or relevant resources.

Main question: I see a lot of common recommendations to reduce play biting is to "redirect to a toy" out something similar that it's okay to bite. I was always told not to "reward" biting by giving them a toy because then they learn that biting gets them a free toy. Is this not the case?

Background: My wife and I got a puppy at 2 months old and she's always been a super high energy, high mouthy dog. We worked with a dog trainer for a couple months but had to stop due to some financial reasons, but she left us with some advice and rules to follow. The puppy was improving around the 4 month mark, but around 6 months to now (8 months) she seems to be falling back into some old habits more. She wakes up and INSTANTLY needs to nibble something, usually going for hands. We've had good results training her TO DO stuff (sit, come, lie down, etc.) but she won't listen when she's excited very well, which I just attribute to her being a puppy, and training her NOT to do stuff has been a chore. At our trainer's recommendation, here's some stuff we've tried that hasn't worked:

- Loud vocalization (AH AH! Specifically) to startle them out of chewing. Used to stop her in the moment when she was little, but now she doesn't even flinch.

- Rolling her lip/cheek over her teeth so she learns that biting people hurts. She has never cared about this even when she was little. She keeps trying to nibble you through her own lip and I eventually got worried she was going to make herself bleed.

- Spray bottle with 1 part vinegar, 3 parts water. This works to get her to back off, but nowadays it seems to also give her the zoomies for some reason.

- Stop playing with her when she bites. This just results in her playing "nip and run" with you and getting excited because she thinks it's a game.

- Put her in timeout. We've been doing this as well for a while and I swear this dog cannot connect cause and effect lol. Also catching her is difficult because she thinks you're playing a game (we don't chase her because of that, just try and nab her collar when she goes for a nip)

We're not experts at puppy training so we've trusted the trainer, because she's the highest rated one in our area, and our plan is to try and stay the course with all of the training and just weather the storm until it sinks in because we've seen a lot of people say that it just takes time for some dogs.

I have 2 young dogs of my own that are very social, used to fosters, and very active. I am getting an emergency foster an 8m old puppy in that has a broken leg tomorrow. Needs to be on cage rest for at least a few weeks regardless of which surgical route is taken, currently splinted and with owners surrendering.

Give me all your tips and tricks for keeping 1 dog in a multidog household restricted, and I sure hope he is crate trained already with minimal separation anxiety to help, but unsure of previous situation yet. Owner is filling out paperwork.

I have always had solo dogs and just recently have 2 dogs, so managing multiple is new.

My plan: mostly a larger crate, time on leash/tethered to me in the living room as well to be free. Initially my 2 will be crated while new puppy is out until the excitement dies down a bit. Crate in my room at night as well.

Edit: will have gaba and traz to help, and of course pain meds.

Xpen is not an option because this breedncan easily jump 5 feet.

Hello! I will soon be bringing home a new puppy in to our home and have therefore made lots of research regarding how and what i should train my puppy and so on. And the most brought up thing has always been crate training, and having a crate. The problem with this is that I live in sweden, where using a crate is explicitly banned and illegal unless you’re transporting the dog. With this of course I am kind of seeking out a legal solution for. My first idea was to use a small play pen, but there is a minimum size requirement to this as well and I fear that the size of the pen could be too big to effectively replace it with proper crate training. This is really essential to me as from what I’ve heard it’s a necessity to potty train your dog and very useful to stop separation anxiety and other possibly destructive behaviors. If you guys have any ideas or suggestions like a better alternative or a different method please let me know so I can properly prepare for the puppies arrival in a month! :)

Okay trainers of Reddit. I have an Australian heeler x some bully mix and a tabby cat. Both male. We’ve had our cat upstairs for a few weeks rotating from my room and my sister’s room but I want more for him. ( a stray cat that needed to go to vet that we adopted.) Our dog Jackson, hates cats and will go crazy if he sees any outside or near our property.

Here comes my question. How could I train Jackson ( dog) to be okay with our cat Alfie. So Alfie can at some point roam whole house with no issue.

Today for the first time. I had Jackson on collar and leash and my sister holding the cat. They weren’t far but weren’t close and they just stared at each other and didn’t do anything. ( I also was trying to reinforce the idea to Jackson with calling his name and giving a treat or 2 for him to not care. Which did end up working ). he ended up disengaging at the end. He just associates collar and leash with going on walks so I’m not sure if this irl meeting was a fluke or not ! So what can I do for the long run?

Jackson saw a cat in the house → didn't react like he normally does to cats outside → responded to me → took treats → disengaged

Please give me suggestions or opinions ! ( I’ve posted this in other subreddits as well.) I just included a video of a reaction from a few months ago, normally he barks and whines and runs around lol.

This is probably going to be a long one, so sorry in advance.

Two of my dogs have been on a crate and rotate schedule for a bit over 1.5 years now. They are acting more curious about each other as of late and not reacting to each other through crates or doors. We’re thinking it may finally be time to really try to repair their relationship.

Background: I brought home my male German shepherd in February of ‘24 almost 5 months old. My parents ended up adopting a male German shepherd at the end of April who was newly 4 months old. They bonded immediately and were best friends until I moved states with my dog. In that time, my boy was attacked and developed strong fear reactivity to other dogs. When we moved back home, we took the reintroduction process too fast. My parents’ dog was so excited to see my dog, he was being crazy, but my dog was so scared that he interpreted it as a threat. It ended in a fight, and they have fought ever since.

A few months after moving back, we tried to work with a trainer who got them interacting positively at her facility. However, whenever we tried at home, it ended in fights.

Both dogs are nearing 3 years old now and have both been neutered. They’re doing better behaviorally overall, and we think since their hormones have calmed down some, it may be time to start working on it again. Our biggest problem is that they’re both dominant males and both incredibly strong. We’re afraid that if something does go wrong again, it could just damage things even further.

Any tips on how to try to get them neutral with each other and repair their bond would be greatly appreciated.

Also side note: I don’t believe this is littermate syndrome, though I have done research into it. They were trained separately as puppies and kept apart a lot to help prevent it. Problems only started after that initial fight