bad walk.

well, we had our first bad walk in a long time. Alki was doing her weird thing where she acts like she thinks Im going to hit her. I could tell she was on edge from the start, and I wondered if she does better on walk days that she's played fetch on (we cant play fetch then immediately walk, but a few hrs later we often do), and I think maybe she'd have done better if we played fetch instead then walked this eve.

I probably should have taken the clue right from the start and headed back and just played "find it" in the front lawn or drive way. That way we are close to home, there's no risks of seeing/hearing dogs or other stimuli that might freak her out, and if something does we can just run inside. AND she still gets the benefit of being outdoors, smelling/hearing things at a low level, while that being paired with food. This is what we did a lot of in the beginning, but she's been doing so well the last couple months that we've been doing longer walks also.

I know set backs are to be expected, its just frustrating. And the amount of defeat and utter heart break I feel when she goes into this state of mind where she is literally terrified of me....its hard to handle. I want to just drop down and sob, yet Im stuck having to try and be happy and chipper and try my hardest to keep her as stable as possible while we race back home.

We heard all the normal dogs, but she was much more on edge than she's been. But we did play our "hurry past" game where I say "ready???" she looks at me and then I toss a piece of cheese up ahead. This focuses her off the barking, and it gets us moving quickly past the barking. Usually this works like a charm and she hardly notices the dogs, but today she was having trouble and would react to the barking between each toss.

She also seemed a little more tense than usual when we passed a group of people. Usually she doesnt noticeably care, but we play "look at that" and/or I click/treat as we pass or when they talk or if she glances at them, etc just to keep building the positive association. Today we did the same but she was a lot more alert and focused on them. And she was a little startled when a man with a deep voice started talking about 1 1/2 house lengths in front of us.

She was also not heeling well, and was very sniffy/distracted, I am pretty sure because she was afraid of me. She wasnt pulling hard to move away from me like shes done in past really over threshold moments, but usually after a couple mins of walking/sniffing she is heeling/watching me with no prompting constantly, and today I had to ask for it continuously and as soon as she got a piece of bait she moved out of position. She also did the thing where she, very subtly at first but more dramatically as the walk went on, would take a treat from my hand then pull her head back like she thought I would hit her. She hit rock bottom right before we got home when I wasnt even looking at her or talking to her and she just lifted her head up from a sniff, looked at me, and cowered back into the ground. Ugh. Usually this only happens when she hears dogs barking nearby, or sees a dog (we did not see any dogs and thankfully usually dont), and we didnt hear any barking that she hasnt been able to handle for the last 2 mos, but she just couldnt handle it today for whatever reason, and the minimal stimuli we did encounter added up to be way too much in the end.

Sigh. Its heartbreaking. I know I created this problem by not being more cautious with my boarding dogs and essentially put her in the position to be attacked by that dog. And I know I could have worked harder with her sooner. But, it is what it is I guess.. Its just really heartbreaking when these shitty days happen.. I guess I can be thankful that we havent had a day this bad in months, and I can use this as a lesson to remember not to push things too far, and to listen to the messages she gives me, and that its always better to be safe than sorry.

Tonight we will play fetch and then Ill feed her part of her dinner out on the drive way. And tomorrow will play fetch in the morning or afternoon then try a very short walk in the evening.