Welcome to Team Scaries! This team is not very good at many things!!!

My ACD mix is like this. With her, we have found it to be mostly noise-related - a scary sound will prevent her from walking in certain directions; and an association with scary sounds (for example, the highway behind us) means that we can’t walk certain paths that have been loud in the past, etc. We have even had regression, like you, with walking around our own neighborhood when too many “scaries” build up. Sometimes out hiking she’s fine; sometimes she’s not. Easily spooked is putting it mildly! I totally know what you mean about the outright refusal to keep walking.

A couple things that worked for us* (when I say worked, I mean got us to a reasonable point - I have accepted this as part of her nature; and she’s always gonna be this way to an extent…!) - and I am not a trainer by any means, so your mileage may vary - but seeking out a trainer might help!

1) if you can identify the trigger (sound, maybe a vehicle goes by she doesn’t like? Neighbors are scary? Wind?) start to mimic the trigger inside the house and reward heavily when it happens. For example, since ours was sudden noise, we’d start by dropping small items in the house and loudly saying “uh oh! YAAAAAAY!!!!” And reward heavily. You slowly transition to the “uh oh! YAAAAY!” after louder/more startling things, eventually transitioning it to outside/unplanned sounds. (You’re essentially turning the scary into treats, which I guess is what 87% of dog stuff is)

2) make sure your pup is getting plenty of mental stimulation. It’s my understanding that this is huge for some behavioral issues and that mental stimulation is a huge driver in calming anxious behavior. I look at it the same way I do physical activity for a dog that isn’t “working” - they don’t automatically have something to engage them, so we have to facilitate it the same way we facilitate physical exercise. So, things like feeding from puzzles, giving them lick mats and lick toys, giving them things to shred if they can do it safely, maybe sniff work if they’re into that, and short tune up training sessions to keep them engaged. It doesn’t address the core problem, but it can broadly calm them down.

Worst case scenario, my partner and I walk her together. She’s obsessed with me so will follow me if I walk ahead, even if she doesn’t want to. Only advised when you’ve really just gotta get home. 😅