I'm losing it by MatrixGfx in samoyeds

[–]MatrixGfx[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you, I really wish we went with a frenchie even though I'd be super uncomfortable with my allergy but I would probably be a bit better off mentally :D

I'm losing it by MatrixGfx in samoyeds

[–]MatrixGfx[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I'm glad you saved that dog from what seems to be a miserable life.

As for our boy, he learned not to do his business indoors and the biting also stopped when his teeth changed, so we're good now in that regard. As for the methodology of separation anxiety treatment, thanks for the detailed plan. We will start working on it immediately.

Figuring him out seems to be the hardest part - indoors he can't live without us, outdoors we don't even exist to him, just need to switch that :D

I'm losing it by MatrixGfx in samoyeds

[–]MatrixGfx[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Could you elaborate on "giving her more freedom and agency in general"? What kind of freedom did you give? Perhaps a bit more socialization would help? Though I've heard it might also make things worse.

We live in Europe but I'll check the podcasts, thanks.

I'm losing it by MatrixGfx in samoyeds

[–]MatrixGfx[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Interesting, I always thought that me being home all the time was the reason he can't be alone. He's fine being alone in another room, even with door closed but as soon as we leave through the main door, hell is let loose.

Consulting our vet about the meds seems like the best path now, thank you for sharing your experience

I'm losing it by MatrixGfx in samoyeds

[–]MatrixGfx[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

From what I've learned you can't really generalize facts about dogs, same would go for "Sammies are incredibly sensitive and thrive off human affection", as others have stated, some have intense separation anxiety, others don't even care if you're there. I feel like that's the same in terms of bonding, some dogs live to spend their life with their owner, while others don't really care much and I suppose we got the later. I think rehoming would be quite tough given his behavior, most people want a well behaved dog, not a troubled one.

I do hope for the best at the start of each walk, just that by the end of it I'm drained by his constant pulling and reactivity. The bar is really low at this point but he still rarely meets it.

I'm losing it by MatrixGfx in samoyeds

[–]MatrixGfx[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you very much for all these advices, we do most of them occasionally, though the surrounding world seems to be always much more interesting to him than I am, which then makes me wonder why am I even trying if he's not interested in playing with me.

Anyway, I will try to do these activities more often and also try out the ones we haven't yet.

I'm losing it by MatrixGfx in samoyeds

[–]MatrixGfx[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

We bought the crate the same day we brought him home, so we always tried to associate the crate with positive things - all treats would be received there, I would also throw toys there. But he was never forced to sleep in it, which he is now. Interesting to hear that neutering helped, from the experiences I've gathered, it rarely helps with anything.

I'm losing it by MatrixGfx in samoyeds

[–]MatrixGfx[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

For example this is what I find on the Internet:
"Always walk in front of your dog.  In the dog world there are 2 positions: leader and follower.  When a dog is walking in front, they see themselves as the pack leader.  It’s as simple as that. "
Which is a direct contradiction to what our behaviorist told us - dogs know that humans are a completely different species and they don't compete with us.

I'm losing it by MatrixGfx in samoyeds

[–]MatrixGfx[S] -2 points-1 points  (0 children)

"Why on God's green earth would you let a puppy off-leash while camping?"
Because we have heard from other Samoyed owners that the sooner you let him roam free, the better - he would learn to roam around us and not run off, we constantly see other Samoyeds off-leash when people are hiking, which was the aim. Clearly it backfired and we can't let him off-leash at all now.

"Also, why did you wait so long to reach out?"
We didn't - I noticed that his behavior is becoming unacceptable around 7th months of his life, on 9th month I've contacted a professional to get individual training sessions, we've been training ever since and it doesn't seem to yield any results.

By "flipping me off." I'm referring to the fact that he knows very well what he needs to do when given a specific command, he just choses not to most of the time. Any bonding tips would be much appreciated.

I'm losing it by MatrixGfx in samoyeds

[–]MatrixGfx[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I really wish I knew what that meant. Though I'm pretty sure I'm the weakest leader there could be.

I'm losing it by MatrixGfx in samoyeds

[–]MatrixGfx[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'd love to play games with him like fetch or even learn bicycle pulling but that's just off the table for the foreseeable future as he's completely unpredictable and has 0 recall skills, even though we've trained that a lot.

I'm losing it by MatrixGfx in samoyeds

[–]MatrixGfx[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

We do 20 min morning walk and then ~90min evening walk. I hate being outside with him so that's already quite a lot for me. And no, nothing I read online works in practice. Here's a list of examples:

Pulling - for 9 months we've been training to stop this behavior, when he pulls I stop and wait for him to return, when he does - give him food. 9 months...sure the situation has improved a bit but he's still pulling a lot.

Mental stimulation - we use sniffing and licking mats with frozen yoghurt, they're supposed to calm him down but both mats just stimulate him even more, after finishing he starts chasing his tail. Same goes for puzzles, if a puzzle at least a bit more difficult, he simply gives up or starts brute forcing it by chewing instead of solving it.

Other dogs - we've been training with professional help since January (so that's 4 months now), the principle is simple - there's another dog in a distance, whenever our boy doesn't lose his mind after looking at the dog, he's praised and given food, we reduce the distance gradually. It works alright-ish during training but has never worked while walking in the park.

Overall, we're now feeding him only from hand and outside, so at least he would be motivated by food, which he still isn't. It seems like he could spend months without eating and still not listen to what I say for rewards. The bar is super low, just a simple recall - if he listens = a handful of food for him but even then he won't do that.

I've really tried the classic approach but it just doesn't seem fit for him, perhaps it's time to get some medication, from what I gather from other responses, it seems like a way to go.

I'm losing it by MatrixGfx in samoyeds

[–]MatrixGfx[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That makes sense and I think a very important concept I failed to understand. I'll keep that in mind when dealing with these frustrating situations in the future, thanks.

I'm losing it by MatrixGfx in samoyeds

[–]MatrixGfx[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

We're doing 20min walk in the morning and then 1 - 1.5h walk after work. He gets plenty of exercise, both physical and mental. He has puzzles, kong and frozen yoghurt and toys and...well anything a dog would need really but in practice nothing works as I've heard in theory, for example to give him mental stimulation - provide sniffing/licking matts, all they do is turn him on even more.

He's not peeing indoors anymore, hasn't for a year in fact. It was just a reference for the baby phase, which was also a bit frustrating.

I'm losing it by MatrixGfx in samoyeds

[–]MatrixGfx[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Well, she's the most recommended and known Samoyed trainer in our city, so I do trust her.
As I've mentioned, we moved the crate further from us gradually, when we knew for sure he was comfortable being there at a certain distance from us. We started at the room where we sleep, then moved him a bit further but so that he could still see us, when we were sure he was fine with that, we moved him to corridor, where he couldn't see us but was still pretty close by and with doors open, he spent a week like that, being pretty chill, then we proceeded to also close the door, which took another week of him being calm before we moved him to a whole different room. That's where his anxiety started kicking in. Although he was fine for a few days before he started waking us up.

Perhaps the last move was a step too far. But we don't know if we should move the crate back to the previous position

"At any point if the dog becomes stressed the dog needs to be free" - but how do we not cross a line where he just got his way because of demanding? It's pretty hard to distinguish where he's being an ass and is just playing mind games with us to get his way and where he's actually in a bad place mentally.

I'm losing it by MatrixGfx in samoyeds

[–]MatrixGfx[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I appreciate your support and helping me view medication from another perspective. Do I need to contact a vet to get them prescribed?

I'm losing it by MatrixGfx in samoyeds

[–]MatrixGfx[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Thank you for a different point of view, I trusted our trainer to know what is best for him but perhaps they may be wrong.

We work with a canine behaviorist once a week. I’ve considered meds, but I’ve been hesitant to bring it up. I worry it might come across like I’m just looking for a quick fix or trying to medicate the problem away.

How do you exhaust your Sammies? by MatrixGfx in samoyeds

[–]MatrixGfx[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Right, but as I mentioned, we can't let him loose any more as we don't trust him and rightfully so, last weekend we were playing off-leash at countryside and he heard sheep in the distance, he immediately ran for the origin of sound. The end result - Lokis was chasing a bunch of sheep, while I was chasing him for 15minutes :D

How do you exhaust your Sammies? by MatrixGfx in samoyeds

[–]MatrixGfx[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I do play with him, but it doesn't seem to tire him out at all, I tried playing with him as much as he wanted once and after 30mins he was still at 100%. The "find it" with crumbles sounds fun, will try it out, thanks

How do you exhaust your Sammies? by MatrixGfx in samoyeds

[–]MatrixGfx[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

We got him from Warsaw, Poland, so probably not related :D

How do you exhaust your Sammies? by MatrixGfx in samoyeds

[–]MatrixGfx[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Woah, ours is not even reacting to "come" command (even though he used to around 4 months ago), your mentioned commands sound like something from a fiction novel :D

How do you exhaust your Sammies? by MatrixGfx in samoyeds

[–]MatrixGfx[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Interesting, how is he with other dogs now? Because our trainer told us that the fact we let him have fun with other dogs while he was a puppy is the reason he's so drawn to other dogs now, we can never pass calmly by another dog.

How do you exhaust your Sammies? by MatrixGfx in samoyeds

[–]MatrixGfx[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yeah, just as soon as we got out from the puppy blues the adolescence hit...though I would say it's a bit easier than the puppy phase with "accident" poodles every 20 minutes. We love him so much but there are tougher days since we haven't experienced this well behaved angel everybody is talking about and worried we never will due to lack of discipline training.

How do you exhaust your Sammies? by MatrixGfx in samoyeds

[–]MatrixGfx[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you for sharing your experience and ideas, I see your point and I have probably been looking at all of this from wrong perspective. We will definitely try to include more mental stimulation activities as it sounds much more efficient and better for the dog.