One of the things I encounter the most that I don’t think I have ever covered very much is the topic of Dogs, Moms, and kids. About 85% of my clients are women and the majority have kids and grandkids. The 800-pound gorilla in the room that nobody talks about until it is too late is the dog biting one of the kids. This thought is in back of the mind of every Mom when her kid is introduced to a dog outside of their family dog. What do women and dogs have in common? They both have better intuition than men, but unfortunately are often slower to act on it. All too often in fear of being seen as overreacting. When it comes to the safety of you and your child, it’s not overreacting, and here is why.
If a child is going to get bit, it will most likely be by the family dog and not some random stray or a dog at someone else’s house. The reason is that when you come upon a dog in an environment that you don’t control you are more aware of the dog and how your child approaches the dog, if you allow them to at all. In some cases, you are just not as aware of your own dogs at home, or more often totally aware and on edge with your dog around your kids or other people’s kids with your dog. After being married for almost 30 years, I can tell you that ignoring my wife’s Momma Sense has saved me lots of heartache.
When I first started MCS, I wrote an article called “Daddy’s dog is Mommy’s problem”. If Dad gets to pick the dog, it is usually something big, strong, powerful, and cool. Like anyone who wants a dog, the fantasy and reality of having a dog are two very different things. The biggest being that just like a parent with a child you have to take care of them day in and day out regardless of how you feel about the chore or the dog. As with my family and for many others, when the kids are young, they need/want Momma more. That works out because Dad goes to work and gets a break, Mom is there 24/7.
It’s worth noting that in my research of Native Americans and their relationships with dogs was that in those cultures the women besides doing all the child rearing did most of the dog training as well. Just like with the children as they were trained and prepared, they would venture outside the village, not before. As with Mom’s since the beginning of time, these women had a lot to get done and did not have time to fool around, so they all have a very specific way of doing everything so that everything got done.
Fast forward to today and what has not changed is that most Dads go out to support the family, and again at least when the kids are young, Mom is the primary caregiver at home. A dog’s behavior is going to be molded by whoever spends the most time with them, by what they do, and what they fail to do. The children are the priority, and the dog is often an afterthought until something happens.
Like humans, dogs cannot be calm around what they have not been exposed to. Dogs have to have a leader or the only thing they can do is respond instinctually to people, places, and things. Again, just like kids, they have to be shown how to act. After receiving instruction, if they act inappropriately, they are immediately and consistently disciplined until they submit which just means being brought under control. Continued correction without being shown how to avoid the correction is abuse. I use the “dog in the field” example. You encounter a dog in an open space and lunge at it. The dog will have one of three reactions. The first and most common will be for the dog to run away since they have the space to do so. The second is to come at you to either play or nip at you to back up. The third is laying down, rolling over, and or peeing as a sign of submission. If you put a dog on a lead and have someone lunge at it without having formed a relationship based one eye contact, movement, and touch (Focused Based Canine Training) and do the same thing the dog will still either run away, come forward, or submit. The problem will come when they go to the end of the lead backwards or moving forward. At that point, they are essentially tied to a tree. Restricted movement incites panic. The dog is unable to run away or effectively fight. This is what we call lead reactivity. Remember that is just not a physical thing, it is a state of mind.
Now we take a dog after less than an hour of Focused Based Canine Training and have the dog in the heel next to the handler on a loose lead. We perform two pressure tests at the conclusion of every session. First, with the dog and handler in this position, I come up and walk extremely close to the handler, so close that we rub shoulders. To pass, the dog must not bark, put any tension on the lead, or move anything other than their head (no turning around). This lets me know that the dog has been shown that they do not own any space, not even the space under their four paws. All space belongs to the handler. The next one is most telling, the lunge test. With the dog in same position, I lunge at the dog. I have already created contrast by first walking slowly. I have had dogs that had done well during the whole session only to show their true colors during the lunge test, and that is the point. You never know what you or your dog would do in a situation you have never been in. The best predictor of future behavior is previous behavior.
The Immediate Correction Lead that comes with every appointment is used for safety (prevent the dog from injuring themselves or a dog/person) and communication. It is not used for restraint or control. If you have to use physical strength to control a dog, you don’t have any control. Most dog bites take place in the home where the dog is not on a leash.
Dogs are pack animals and as such have no self confidence in themselves, only the pack. What they do to bond and establish hierarchy is move together in search of resources while avoiding danger. One person has to take responsibility as the dog’s primary handler. In most homes this is going to be Mom, either because she wants to do it or nobody else will.
Through Focused Based Canine Training, the dog is conditioned to never make their own decisions but to instead focus on the handler. If the handler stands their ground and does not react, the dog does not react. If the handler is calm, the dog is calm.
Back to kids and dogs. Naturally Mom’s biggest fear is her child being bit by the family dog. Back to intuition or just plain common sense. If you see your dog fixating on, staring at, squaring off to, growling, showing teeth, getting between you and your child, immediately seek professional help. The dog is communicating in canine, they are warning your child that they are in their space and are making them feel uncomfortable. They see it as your child challenging them. They are answering that challenge and a quick movement by your child may be seen as an escalation of force and the dog may bite. It will not get better. They will not grow out of it regardless of the age of the dog.
The way the dog sees it. Dogs have five things, the Canine Commodities: food, water, space, toys, and attention. Your dog can only see you one of two ways, a provider of these things or a provider of access to these things. Most dog owners are providers. Providers just give the dog food, water, space, toys, and attention. When you provide access, you require the dog to focus on you and behave a certain way so that you know that they know that everything is yours. You only share it with them when they do exactly what you want to unlock the commodity. Here is just one example. –
All dogs value going outside. If a dog stands in front of the door and you see him doing so and walk over and just let him out, you are a provider. If you are able to walk up and open the door and the dog does not go out the door and instead looks at you for permission instead of looking at what is outside, you are providing access.
All handlers are on a sliding scale from all access- access provider. The less access provider you are the more the dog will believe you and everyone else in the house is beneath them. If someone is beneath you naturally you subjugate them, again on a sliding scale. So, any dog or human that does not control access the dog will begin to control access over them and that is where the kids in the house fit in. By them not controlling access, the dog may begin to “bully” them, and it usually starts small like this. One day the dog is eating and a kid walks in the room. The dog stops eating and stares at the kids. If the kid is aware and stops, the dog has now won that challenge. It’s not over food. It’s over the space around the food. If the kid pays no attention and just walks by, they are showing themselves as higher ranking and at least in the beginning most dogs will go right back to eating. The next time the dog might let out a little growl as they look up. If the child stops, the space is being controlled by the dog. If they stand still or back up, it’s all good. But if they step forward after stopping, the dog will likely see it as a counter challenge and nip/bite. This is so unbelievably common. No amount of talk n treat sit, down, stay training will fix this.
Last year I had a client with a two-year-old Lab that was a great dog. One day the baby walked by him while he was eating and he growled. So then they put the food in his crate and when the baby would walk by, he would attack through the crate. So then they gave him his own room and nobody could go into it while he was eating. This is why you don’t negotiate with terrorists. He now understands that nothing is his and that the baby is higher ranking than him because Mom and Dad say she is.
Most of the above relates to a puppy (birth to 9 months) and adolescence (9 months to 3 years). Just like teenagers, dogs during this time will test boundaries.
The other issue is with older rescues that were never around kids or when older people have dogs that are not around kids.
Every dog I work with is on a sliding scale of wellness to recovery. The earlier I work with them the more we can work on wellness to avoid issues in the first place. Unfortunately, most are more recovery. Recovery meaning that there has been an incident or history of behavior that has put their living situation and life at risk if their behavior cannot be changed.
One of the biggest mistakes is sitting back and watching the dog waiting to see how they react to something. Without focusing on you, there is a likelihood of them not doing what you want. Before a dog can be socialized, which just means exposed, two things must be in place. First a person who takes responsibility for them, and secondly effective communication between them and the dog. These are the non-variables. The variables are the environment and distractions in the environment.
Back to kids with dogs. Dogs, like us, are used to predictable patterns of movement and noise. If you rescue a dog that has not really been around small kids, then they are going to overreact to them. They are likely to see them as a threat and focus on them. If they come too close to them, the dog will likely try to avoid them by moving away. The problem is that inside a home they can only go so far before they feel trapped. I said “feel”. Just like the dog on the lead, their perception is reality. Feeling as though they are cornered, they are likely to nip, not bite. When you get too close to a person and make them feel uncomfortable, they will try to push you away to create distance. This is what a dog does when they nip. It’s quick escalation from the look and growl referenced when walking passed the dogs while they are eating. This is the same thing that happens when the kids go to the grandparents house.
It is just like any other controlled exposure. Once the dog has identified their handler (higher ranking dog) and they have a way to communicative based on eye contact, movement, and touch, they are introduced to the trigger. Through consistent corrections and praise, the dog’s response to the trigger is reconditioned. This works for any trigger.
Thank you for reading and I hope you have enjoyed this article. If you or someone you know has a dog that “you just can’t trust,” contact us today to avoid anyone getting hurt. Feel free to give us a call at 717-693-2085