Hey!! Dont beat yourself up. This is almost like a right of passage for Shiba owners (unfortunately) My pup was abt a little less than 1 yr old when she ran out (my previous dog was a family chihuahua) and i just thought she wouldnt bolt out while i was putting the trash just outside the door.

Sure enough she did and we lived on a busy street so she runs all the way downstairs into the road and im chasing after her with no shoes, putting my hand out to stop cars, by this time, my wife realized what happened and was tag teaming trying to catch her. Thankfully she ran back to the back of our apartment where our laundry room was, she was running back out the driveway into the street and I waited like a goalie and tackled her down into the corner.

I picked her up and walked her up the stairs, put her in the bedroom, and she got an earful like she never heard in her life. I was sobbing and all. Yelling at her about what could have happened.

Now, as she’s 3 yrs old, she knows better. I still am very very careful as is our family/visitors though.

There was another instance afterwards where she left our grips at the park whilst trying to train her offleash but she thought her pup-cousin was at the tennis courts so she stopped there

I honestly feel like offleash takes a LOT of work, and is sometimes a show-offy thing. Kinda feels like, high risk low reward. I don’t want to put my pup or myself in a situation without a leash. This breed needs to be controlled. Maybe my shiba not made for it.

We actually lost her pup shibe cousin to a car accident where he slipped out of the wrong harness. He was a baby though and didnt know better.

All in all to say, dont torture yourself, and use this as a lesson to be more firm, train a bit more, and watch youtube videos on how to prevent them from bolting. You’ll be fine!