It's been (as usual!) a bit of an up and down week.
We had quite an explosive reaction when bumping into the neighbours earlier in the week. On reflection, perhaps this hit me so hard as we haven't experienced one that bad in a while. On the plus side, that means we are doing pretty well at managing the environment overall.
Predictably, we had a few more reactions that evening and the following day. The average duration of reactions increased by 50% this week.
On a very positive note, George went on his first forest adventure, designed for small dogs, run by his daycare. I'd been umming and ahhing about this for a little while. Whilst I thought he would enjoy it, I was a bit worried about him getting there in the van (he can still be quite reactive in the car if he can see triggers), and whether the area is fully fenced etc.
I sent through a list of questions and was put at ease. It takes place on private land so there is no risk of him coming into contact with other people and dogs but they would use a longline if needed. The group of dogs is small (there were only 2 others).
I was quite nervous on the day though! The daycare staff very kindly messaged me to let me know how well he had done. Apparently he was very good and didn't need the lead at all.
From the photos and videos, it looked like he was having a blast. I couldn't see any signs of nervousness or anxiety. He does tend to be more confident with his doggy friends.
I am so pleased. I think this will be a good way for George to get exercise in a safe space, and will hopefully help to build his confidence.
Other observations this week - George has been a little more unsettled in the evenings than he has been. Although I'm not sure whether that is necessarily a bad thing.
George has tended to pass out in the evenings but I think that may have been because he was exhausted from being triggered/on high alert throughout the day. What I am seeing now may be a more 'normal' evening following a less stressful day.
He does still rest and he doesn't pace and bark like he used to. He is just more awake.
He has been a bit more clingy though. In the mornings, if I step out of the room for a second, he will cry, which he hasn't done for a long time. Leaving the room (briefly) at other times of the day, doesn’t seem to cause an issue. I don't want to go backwards with our work on independence in the home so he'll just have to come with me in the mornings while we work on it again.
He's still not too interested in eating from a bowl. Scatter feeding is still working well, as well as snuffle mats and treat balls. He likes to work for his food!
I've watched a few seminars on dog anxiety this week and have learned a lot. I'll write some posts about those in future.
On the whole, a little setback this week but a massive win with the forest adventure!