Tilly and Me: Learning together

Although I've had other timid foster dogs before, none have been so extremely submissive and terrified of people as Tilly is. So as Tilly is having to learn to relax around people, I am learning how to foster a puppymill breeder dog. It is proving to be a challenging road for both of us, but there are little baby successes along the way that keep us going.

Awhile back on the Ratbone Rescue online chat group I remember that someone had asked for some suggestions on how to deal with an extremely submissive dog. Several of the expert foster parents said that when the dog does something submissive, like rolling on their back, don't try to make them relax, instead just ignore them. At the time I thought they were being so harsh. I mean, this is a poor, abused dog! It needs some love! Boy, were they ever right.

The first day I couldn't look across the room at Tilly without her rolling onto her back. Rubbing her belly wasn't helping so the next day I decided to try the tough love approach suggested in chat. I sat on the stairs of the deck outside and Tilly would cautiously approach me (luckily she really wants the love, but it just scares her). I would slowly reach down to pet her back and over she would roll, so I would stop petting her and look the other direction. When I could see that she had righted herself, I would start to pet her again. It only took about two sessions of this and she wasn't rolling over, just creeping along on her belly. I let her do the belly thing for awhile and then today the goal was for her to sit rather than scooch along on her belly when she wanted some love. Today's success is that not only will she sit up while being pet, she will come to me and put her paws up on my knees to let me know she's there.

Like many longtime puppymill breeders, Tilly isn't exactly house trained. Interestingly she lifts her leg to pee and does some marking (although it looks like we have that under control now.) Right now she's finishing up her season, so she has to wear a diaper and three times she pooped in the diaper. To help manage this and to help with the submissive urination we've been taking frequent trips to the backyard. However, today Tilly has started to feel so comfortable and safe in her cushy crate that she refused to leave it. She was using her crate to hide from the world. I figured I'd try to entice her out and when I stuck my hand in she went nuts, snapping and growling. I closed the crate and took a breather to think things over. Then I decided it was time for some more tough love.

Ever so slowly, I tilted the open crate until she was forced to crawl out before she fell out. We went outside for about 30 minutes so both of us could relax and get ready for the next test: for her a test of courage, and for me a test of patience. When we returned to the living room I removed the cushy blankets and dog bed from the crate, locked it and set the bed next to the wall, but in an area were she was forced to see what was going on in the house. After scrambling at the door of the crate awhile she gave up and crawled into her bed, tucking her head under the blanket so she can pretend that I'm not there. That's all I'm going to ask of her today. She's doing her best and needs a breather between each forced step towards courage.

So today's wins: petting without slinking AND she pooped outside AND it wasn't on the deck or patio

Today's issues: growling, snapping and hiding in her crate; our solution - let her have the soft dog bed, but take it out of the crate and place it at the edge of the room.

The photo above was taken last night when Tilly was still getting daytime access to her crate.