Plus, who ever heard of a Lab that leaves food unattended?  If you think this situation sounds strange, you’re right.  Unless Max’s magical treatment mix for severe separation anxiety is out of whack, this situation makes no sense.

Upon further investigation I noticed that we forgot to change Max’s DAP collar last month.  A few days later, and with the new collar firmly in place, Max is back to normal.  This oops really affirms that the phernomes in the DAP collar work to help control Max’s separation anxiety.

Now, I’m happy to report that once again, Max cannot wait for me to leave him home alone.  No, I don’t think it’s that he’s basking in the peace and quiet of ‘alone time’ as I would.  He’s just relaxed enough to enjoy his Kong full of food.  And when Max is relaxed, I feel better too.  We’ve come a long, long way.

Oh, what a big mistake that was!  I didn’t think about all the sloppy slush that was melting off my cars.  The garage floor was quite messy.  Unfortunately my highly trained, service dog, decided to lay down in the slop and get busy with his food.  Did my intelligent dog lay on the bed I’d left for him?  Apparently not!  He was covered in dirt upon my return.  Unfortunately, I hadn’t really planned a dog bath in my day.  But, if I was to let Max into the house, a bath was mandatory. 

It was not pleasant but Max emerged a much cleaner dog.  And now, I’m going to watch what I wish for or I’ll be washing more mush off my mutt.

·       Behavior modification

·       DAP collar

·       Medications

·       DAP infuser

·       Activity toys

·       Stopped feeding him with a dog dish

Without the behavior modification, understanding of separation anxiety and medication directed by Dr. Theresa DePorter, I don’t think Max would have been successful.  In fact, I’m sure there are a lot of misunderstood dogs that end up in shelters because of their misunderstood separation anxiety.

The goal was to have Max be excited about his family’s departure.  We wanted him to connect being home alone to having something really yummy to eat.  To make this work, table scraps, dinning a la dog dish, etc. cannot occur. 

Max is really excited to see me leave these days because he knows he’s getting food and likely it’s something more than dry dog food.  When he’s with his family, he gets nothing but dry dog food and not much of it.  If we’re planning a departure, some food is held back so he’s good and hungry when we are gone.

You might think he also gets crumbs off the floor but that’s another project.  Max, as a leader dog, was taught to ignore food on the floor.  With 3 kids, we’re really good at giving him plenty of opportunities to eat food off the floor but it hasn’t come easy to him.  Breaking old habits is tough.  But, that’s a service dog issue and maybe that’s not an issue for your dog. 

If you have a retired service dog, I’d love to hear about it.  Did you have to teach your dog to play fetch like we did?

Kong Dog activity toy, photo showing red Kong granade

What’s an activity toy?  Basically, it’s something that the dog has to work on.  When successful at “working” the toy, a treat comes out.  It’s a great concept; the dog works at the toy and gets rewarded with food for his or her hard work.  It’s a great way to engage the dog, reduce boredom or anxiety and keep the dog busy so they have less time to get into trouble.

You might think I’m evil, but Max never gets food in a dog dish.  He has to work to get all of his food out of something.  Ok, maybe “never” is too strong of a word.  When I’m out of town, I have no control over how Max is fed.  However, 98% of the time, he works for every meal. 

Have you seen a Kong like the one in the picture?  Imagine it stuffed with frozen food (I often use our leftovers mixed with dog food).  Max works very hard on the Kong to get his food out.  I also use Squirrel Dudes.  These toys are great for dispensing dry dog food.  You can also make activity toys.  A milk jug punctured with holes makes a great dispenser for small treats.  Since the jug is big, it’s best if the dog has a good amount of room in which to work. 

I’d love to hear more ideas on how to make feeding time play time.