·       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?