Newly rehomed dog with separation anxiety

[Allelbowsandtoes]

Hi.
Just wondering if anyone has experienced similar and desperately hoping it will get better.
We rehomed a 3 year old whippet just under a fortnight ago. DP had the easter holidays off and I've had this week off. We thought she'd be able to be left alone for short periods of time by now but.....no.

DP is away on holiday this week and I've been with her.....at all times. She whines if I go out of the front door for more than 30 seconds and is unable to settle. I've tried doing the door is a bore training throughout the week, very little impact thus far and I've been as structured with I as I can.

Just spoke to DP on the phone, he's due home tomorrow. He seems to think I'm over worrying and she'll just "have to get used to being left alone". I've told him in no uncertain terms that all behavioural advice is to do the training slowly and never force them to be alone and cry it out as that makes it worse....

We've sorted dog sitters for the next two weeks while we're at work but beyond that DP thinks she'll be fine. I'm starting to suspect which got a long road ahead of us and I'm almost in tears and overwhelmed.

The dog came from a family home where they had to move house and couldn't keep her.....apparently she had no separation anxiety there so this has obviously been triggered by the awful upheaval for her.

I'm not even sure what I'm asking for here.....reassurance that training helps?

She cuddles me, she's very clingy 😄 I'll sit on the sofa near her and then she'll come and drape herself over me and get as close to me as possible and be so huffy if I have to move her haha. I try to be respectful of her personal space but she doesn't do the same back 😄

I had considered this but from what I can tell so far I actually don't think she'd prefer it. She gets a bit overwhelmed by being around people, other dogs, in public etc for too long - whereas she's super chill and happy at home. That's why we've organised a rota of friends and dog sitters to be here with her during the day, so she's in her own environment

I don't think it's that they don't believe me, it's that they've convinced themselves that it only happens because the dogs can hear me coming and going.

I do know some dogs will bark a couple of times when their owners leave, or because they hear their car pulling in the drive, but I've driven or walked past these homes at other times and heard the dogs howling too. It's really sad.

But I think for a lot of people it's not necessarily malicious - they don't come home to any mess, their dog is happy to see them and they have to work so they just convince themselves it's okay or not a big deal.

That's good. As long as it is all on her terms for the moment. 👍

People lie unfortunately.

The good news is it is absolutely treatable but you’ll need to get help whilst you are training. If it’s ingrained then it will take months but if you go slowly, at the dogs pace you’ll get there.

Julie Naismith is a great resource. Sun threshold training is the only way to do it reliably but it can take a lot of time. I know many ex sufferers though of virtually all breeds.

Let her be clingy. Let her follow you everywhere. She’ll then gain confidence herself. Just be there for her for the moment. Think puppy. Mine didn’t start gaining independence until she was 8 months old. It happened naturally. We let her follow and seek reassurance as much as she needed. Now she’s an independent little madam who cares not where we are.

I have since spoken again to the previous owner who said she was absolutely fine on her own before with the news on in the background

Something like only 50% of owners of dogs with some degree of SA can recognise the signs. They may not have know they were lying - they may have never bothered to record their dog to see how they behave when left or may have done so but been unable to recognise the more subtle signs of distress.

Thanks for all the responses everyone. We had to leave her with a friend for the first time yesterday as I had to pop to work for a few hours. Apparently she whined for 10 mins or so and then was beautifully settled....she didn't want our friend to leave when he went home 🤣

We've been doing the door is a bore training and making slow progress. Yesterday after her morning walk I managed to stand outside for 5 minutes before she came to the door. We'll get there.

Brilliant. Literally every little absence where she stays relaxed or even just a tiny bit unsure will help her learn it's totally fine to be alone, nothing bad will happen and you'll be back. I know loads of rehabbed SA dogs you just need to take things slowly and go at their pace and be prepared to go back and forwards.

Thanks 💙 I'm doing my best to be positive and try not to be anxious myself. I just need to keep reminding myself that things objectively are getting better and it's all moving in the right direction!

we rehomed a rescue who could not be left alone, he was very destructive.

We found two things helped really quickly.
one was exercise. Once he had had a really good walk, he was basically tired and ready to settle and sleep (he was massively underwalked in previous home)
the other thing was entertainment. We used to leave lots of things round for him to interact with.

• cardboard boxes with treats inside
• toys with treats stuffed in the seams
• kong with peanut butter smeared inside.

He used to get excited when we left as he got all these things scattered round the house to play with. He spent the first half an hour ripping boxes and shredding toys, and then fell asleep.

Now he can be left for ages and he doesn't care. Our only entertainment these days in the peanut kong which he loves.

But having had 2 rescues, I would say he is in really early days in terms of being settled and knowing that this is home and this is a safe place, that takes several months. Once that happens he will be more relaxed altogether.

Popping back for a brief update. Its been nearly four weeks now since we bought her home and she's sooo much more settled, there's been a massive change over the last week, been able to leave her for chunks of time with no issues. Yesterday I popped out to the garden (not attached to our house so she wouldn't know where I was) to do some quick jobs, watching her on a dog cam so I could come back if she was distressed. I was out there for 30 mins and she didn't even lift her head from the bed.....in the end I got cold and came back in 🤣 she's not following us around the house much either.

I suspect the old owner was telling the truth and it was more that she was unsettled rather than true SA. We're going to keep being cautious about increasing time left alone but overall its looking good.

She's become a bit of a cheeky food thief now she's settled though so we'll have to address that next 🤣

I've just read this thread and you sound like a wonderful owner OP! I worked in rescue for a few years and you never know truly how honest the surrendering owner is. I used to put them into 3 categories

1. honest/distraught
2. slight embellishers - bored of dog/puppy; felt guilty at giving dog up so made out that there was behaviour that wasn't as bad as they'd said
3. downright liars You get a hunch for the truth after a while and at the end of the day it doesn't really matter so long as the dog gets rehomed with someone who cares enough to work with it. Good luck, SA can be resolved and your hubby needs to listen to you 😜

I think your dog is still uncertain and will hopefully start to feel secure in their new home.

My dog would follow me to the toilet if I got up at night, but after a week he stayed in the nice warm bed because he knew I was coming back. He was learning to trust me
I hope you have a similar experience.

Thankyou, that's very kind 😊 don't worry, DP is fully on board now and actually it's a couple of his mates that have been really helping us out with dog sitting duties.

One of my best mates also worked at a rescue for a while and she had a similar experience. Also, their rescue centre had a waiting list so to bypass it you'd get people turning up with a dog which they claimed they'd found straying in the street and wanted to hand in....meanwhile the dog is obviously theirs as its very attached to them and cries and howls as soon as they dump it and leave. Awful.

What a great update! I had a pup who was so anxious she chewed through a wall to get to me when I popped next door to go for a wee. Couldn’t leave her alone for long enough to have a shower. It was awful.
We followed the advice on FB group dog training advice and support. It took months. But now we can leave her and she doesn’t wake up when we come home. If we do wake her she sighs at us! So it does work!!

That sounds so stressful, severe separation anxiety like that is so distressing for dog and human. Amazing that you turned it around so well and so quickly!

We had a whippet as a family pet when I was a teenager and he had horrendous SA, would chew through wooden window frames and get gum splinters trying to get out 😭 at that time there was less freely available training info online and it never got resolved, we just had to take him everywhere with us.

It’s just awful isn’t it? I literally had months and months of never being able to leave her alone. But because I didn’t leave her she gradually stopped worrying about me leaving her! I’m just so lucky that I don’t work and had supportive family and friends to help out.