My Dog Treats Me Like A Sibling Or Toy

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Welcome to Off Leash and Unfiltered. Trigger warning. I'm Kati Peppe, delivering the truth in dog training.

Hey everybody, this is your host, Kati Peppe. Before we jump in, I just wanted to take a quick second and remind you to hit the subscribe button because that helps us so, so, so much. We appreciate every subscribe and follow, and we have so much valuable information we wanna share with you. So we don't want you to miss an episode. Without further ado, let's jump in. Hey everybody, thanks for joining me for another episode of Off Leash and Unfiltered. Hope you're having an incredible day, whatever it is you're doing while you listen to this podcast. And if you haven't already, please, please, please hit subscribe, follow, tell your friends about the podcast.

01:00 — Kati gives an update on three trainees, including Ryder, who goes home tomorrow.

Um, every little bit of support helps, and we really appreciate you. Um, busy, busy week around here. We have three trainees right now. Ryder is going home tomorrow. Super exciting. Although I feel like those two weeks just like flew by.

Like they just flew. Uh, he goes home tomorrow. Bear came in a few days ago. I actually just introduced him on social media last night because <laugh> we're a little behind in our social media, so trying to get caught up on that. Get some videos of the dogs posted so you guys can get to know them. Um, but Bear is a big Shiloh Shepherd, beautiful, beautiful guy, uh, dog reactive, and he's doing really well so far. And then we have Zoe, uh, here who <laugh> as it turns out, I mean, the problems that she came in for I think are, are gonna be pretty easily solved.

Um, she's doing wonderful with her obedience training, but we're, we've encountered the issue of, um, peeing and pooping in the crate, which we knew she did on occasion. Her, her owner mentioned that. But it was a thing kind of mentioned in passing at drop-off.

Um, I wasn't anticipating that being our primary obstacle. And let me tell you, it has been <laugh>. So she pees and poops in her crate, guys, like constantly. And so that's kind of our big thing. Um, we're kind of having to pivot and put a lot of focus on that. I mean, we're still doing all the other stuff, but it's like, I'm trying to solve that because that's, ugh, that's no fun. Um, and that can be a really, really tough thing to fix. Maybe we'll do an episode on that in the near future if you have a dog that goes to the bathroom in their kennel.

Um, you know, and, and it kind of depends on how your dog feels about it when it happens. It's like, if they don't like it, um, then presumably it's genuinely an accident. Um, and it's almost kind of self-punishing, right?

'Cause they go to the bathroom in their kennel and then they're in there with it and they don't like it. Um, but some dogs don't really care. Some dogs are, you know, they're laying in it, they're sitting in it, they don't care at all. Some dogs are eating it. I think she's eating it. Um, <laugh>. So that's a lot more difficult, but I'm optimistic yet that we'll make some progress and get some traction there. So we'll see. We'll see how it goes. And then we have another dog coming in today. Um, yeah, so they're pouring in and I'm excited about, about the pup that we have coming in today.

Um, I did do one lesson with the owners with this dog because, um, young dog, you know, maybe five months, I think he's six months now, but when we did the lesson, he was probably more like five.

Um, and they're kind of an older couple, and they were just having a really, really tough time with him. Um, and I think that this board-and-train is going to be, uh, life-changing for them. So really, really excited for that. But anyway, let's dig into it. Today, let's talk about how you get your dog to stop treating you like a sibling or a plaything or toy or any of the above. This is a common thing. Um, and I think Zoe falls into this category for sure. Uh, her owner has bruises all up and down her arm because she just gets treated like a sibling.

04:00 — Kati says Zoe treats people like toys rather than respecting their boundaries.

She gets treated like a toy. That's kind of Zoe's attitude toward others, is everything's just kind of there for her entertainment. <laugh>. Um, I'm not saying she's a bad dog, just, um, definitely hasn't gotten the feedback for her to realize that there's a level of respect required when it comes to humans and other dogs too, right?

But especially with humans, it's like, you can't put your mouth on me. You can't tear up my clothes, you can't chew on me, you can't jump on me. Um, there's a, a level, there's a standard, right? And to her right now, everybody's just there for her entertainment. So, and I think this is super, super common. Uh, we see it all the time. And, and that's when, guys, if you have a dog like that, that jumps on you, um, that puts their mouth on you, kind of chews on you. And people say, well, it's not aggressive.

And it's like, well, call it whatever you want. It's not respectful, right? So even if your dog isn't actually being violent, like they're not trying to inflict harm, right?

It's a gateway <laugh>. So you gotta keep that in mind too, right? Because these things tend to escalate, especially as your dog moves through maturity, through the maturation process. If you have a dog that jumps on you, puts their mouth on you, chews on you, pushes you around, makes demands, barks at you, um, even drags you around, like these are all indicators, right, that your dog just doesn't really view you as a relevant source of information, feedback, standards. Like you're, you're just not worthy of any of that stuff right now. You just don't have that relationship.

That's what your dog is telling you. And that may be the extent of it. It may stop there. Even if that's all it is, it's still not great, right? That needs to be fixed, in my opinion. Um, and the thing is, if you don't fix it, then there's the potential for that to escalate into worse things, right?

Because a dog that can jump on you, make demands of you, bark at you, chew on you for fun, tear at your clothes, whatever it is that they're doing, is a dog that as they get a little bit older, why would they have any problem guarding their food from you? Why would they have any problem guarding their toys from you? Why would they have any problem growling or snarling or snapping at you if you try to move them off the couch, right? Because you haven't assumed that role as the leader. I say leader of the pack, that's pretty cliche, but you know what I mean.

07:00 — Kati argues that everyday interactions shape whether a dog sees its owner as a…

The leader of the household, the leader in the relationship.

You haven't assumed that role. You've been assuming a role similar to that of a sibling, or even worse, right? You've been assuming the role of a subordinate or as an entertainment thing. And that is shaped, guys, through every interaction you have with your dog all day. It's not like, and here's the thing. If you take your dog to any purely positive classes, and I don't mean to harp on this, but this is why this doesn't work, right? All you can do in those classes is teach your dog to do things. So they're great for initially teaching your dog obedience, right?

But teaching your dog how to sit, how to come when called, how to lay down, none of that stuff. First of all, none of it's gonna become reliable there because they don't finish the job. And second of all, none of that stuff teaches your dog to respect. In fact, it could be quite the opposite, right? Because most of the time we're doing that, we're just shoving biscuits in the dog's face. It's cookies, cookies, cookies.

And that's it. So things become wildly unbalanced because there are no requirements. Everything's optional. There are no corrections, everything's reward. There are no expectations. Everything is just if you want to, right? And so you get pushed further and further apart, you get pushed further and further down that spectrum of respect. There's just no reason to respect you. You are fun and games, you're a plaything. You're a toy, you're a sibling, you're an equal, you're a subordinate. But one thing you are not is a leader, a parent, an authoritarian, whatever you wanna call it, use whatever language you want, right?

But someone has to be making the decisions, and it's not you.

So every interaction with your dog all day is what shapes this. And that is the thing that is kind of difficult to articulate sometimes for people. I think it takes a while for people to be immersed in the training, to watch our stuff, listen to our stuff, come to the lessons, come to the group classes for 'em to really start to grasp. This isn't a thing. Like, I can't carve out 10 minutes a day or 20 minutes, or even an hour a day. You can't, there's no amount of time every day that you can just carve out to go work with your dog and teach this.

That's not gonna work, guys. We're talking about your relationship. And that is developed and formed and sculpted and built every moment of every day.

So if you think you're gonna carve out a half an hour after dinner to work with your dog and fix that, you're dead wrong. You're dead wrong. You have to be willing to be a person who requires respect all the time. You have to be willing to give your dog that feedback in real time when it's needed. And to be fair, in order to do that, you have to know, well, when is it needed? What are those moments? And so we are gonna talk about some of those moments today. What are the most common ones?

And some of the key moments and some of the most, um, effective opportunities for you to leverage to change your relationship with your dog. So you can kind of shift that dynamic, uh, and be a person who's hopefully a little more relevant and can just get the better, better version of their dog <laugh>, right? So to speak. Um, we always talk about getting dogs to be the best version of themselves. Like that's what we do. And guys, that doesn't happen just by teaching the dog tricks or obedience commands.

12:00 — Kati introduces everyday moments owners can use to establish and maintain standards.

It happens by teaching the dog how to live by a set of standards and then passing that over to the owner so they can go home and implement these things and build a new relationship. So let's talk about what some of these moments are. Okay? Well, let's just get the most obvious one out of the way first. Um, and this is something everybody is missing when we meet them. This is something everyone's lacking when we meet them. But if you have a dog that kind of treats you like a sibling or a plaything, the most obvious thing that's missing, most likely, from your relationship is just a good old-fashioned correction for treating you that way.

If your dog jumps on you, if your dog puts their mouth on you, if your dog does any of these things, that's a no followed by a meaningful correction, okay? Not a tap at a level the dog can just feel, an uncomfortable correction.

Why? Because we want that to go away, one, and because two, we wanna make sure we send the message that we do have standards, we do require a level of respect. And we will stand up for ourselves and we will issue negative consequences if you do something like that to us. And not just to us, but to any human. But it starts with you. And almost everyone, guys, is missing that. And it's like, with an e-collar, it just couldn't be any easier to do. It's so—now, there are other ways to do it. This is the way to do it.

It's the most effective, it's the most efficient, it's the most practical in most situations. Not all, but super practical, super easy for most folks to implement. There's no excuse to be having your dog do these things to you and have you not fix it. And you don't need to be an expert to do this.

Anybody can do this. It's not hard. It's not fancy, it's not overcomplicated. And I tell you how to do it right. I, I give this information away freely all the time. Now, if you wanna use your e-collar to teach your dog how to do stuff, come back when called, go to place, that takes a little more effort. If you just wanna stop your dog from being an asshole, much, much easier. I recommend anybody with a dog over five, six months of age, put an e-collar on them. So when they pull out the stuff you don't like, you have a tool to say you can't do that.

15:00 — She emphasizes saying “no” before correcting an unwanted behavior.

Right? And it's important, you know the process, but the process is simple. You say no when the behavior occurs or is about to occur. And then after—that's important—after you say no, you follow up with a correction that your dog actually cares about. Now, I emphasize that because people don't, right? They, ooh, tap it at five, right? On a, on an e-collar with a hundred levels, I can't even feel a five. Can't feel it till it's on 12.

If you're that afraid to make your dog uncomfortable for a second, get a goldfish instead. Get a goldfish instead. Guys, it's not a joke. Your dog's not made of glass. You better be getting a really small, really soft dog if making your dog uncomfortable for a second makes you that uncomfortable. Not trying to be a bitch, <laugh>, just saying there's no reason for your dog to respect you guys. Don't jump on me, don't bite me. Don't tear at my clothes. And humans are very verbal. Dogs are very physical, right? We wanna just reprimand the dog verbally.

Well, guess what? That doesn't do anything. Even if it stops in the moment, doesn't do anything. It actually teaches the dog that you getting upset results in nothing. Because yes, they know you're displeased. Yes, they know you're upset. Yes, they know you're frustrated. But who gives a shit? It doesn't lead to any kind of consequence. Some dogs love that. They love that little bit of conflict, that little escalation. Sometimes that feeds the fire and it amps them up more.

You shouldn't tolerate that kind of treatment from your dog, because what kind of foundation are you laying for your relationship? Who are you in your dog's eyes? Why listen to you at all? So a hundred percent, that's the first thing. That's the most obvious thing, guys. Your dog's jumping on you, your dog's putting their mouth on you, your dog's tearing at your clothes, your dog's barking at you because they want something. That's a hard no, that's a correction. Okay? Pulling you around on the leash too. Same thing. You can't drag me around, right? So even if you don't have a perfect heel, your dog's not walking like right next to your knee, checking in with you all the time.

18:00 — Kati identifies leash pulling as another behavior owners should not accept.

It's like, okay, but you can't drag me down the road. Like, isn't that the big thing? Like, isn't that you put your dog on a leash and off they go, right? Put you on some roller skates.

No, you cannot drag me around. Now sometimes that's really easy to fix just by having a prong collar on the dog and knowing how to deliver a good leash pop when your dog pulls you. And that's usually fixable in just a few minutes. We've had some really extreme pullers that are very physically insensitive and tuned out and confident and all these things, and they don't even hardly notice the leash pop. And sometimes we have to combine that with an e-collar correction, not usually, right? But it's not super uncommon either. So if you have a dog like that, tuned out, insensitive, pulls like a truck, um, it may be that you find it very difficult to stop the pulling with a leash pop, right?

But at the end of the day, it's the same as all those other behaviors, guys. Someone has to disagree with it. Someone has to provide a negative. And someone is, you <laugh> a negative consequence for pulling me, for trying to drag me down the road, for trying to drag me off into the grass, whatever it is. No, I will let you know where we're going. <laugh>.

You can't pull me to the grass, to the dog, to the person you wanna say hi to. No. And I promise you, that won't stop until you correct it. And it's funny because you're gonna see, as we go through this list, we, every little thing we're doing with our dogs all day is culminating in this, um, just this mess of a relationship where we're literally teaching the dog to ignore us, to treat us with disrespect, to treat us like a sibling, to nevermind what we're asking for, to pull us, drag us, jump on us, bite us.

Like we're literally teaching them, yes, it's fine. Let's do more of this, right? And then you become more and more and more entrenched in that lifestyle and that relationship.

Now, you can't do those things to me, and you can't pull me around. And stopping pulling is easy. I did do an episode specifically on fixing your walk. It's a great listen. I'll link to that in the show notes. All right, let's talk about some of the ones that might be a little less obvious. Number one, we'll work our way toward the most important one. Okay? So let's start with things like react, reactivity. If you have a dog that's reacting to things, barking at things, that's a no. Right? So that's a good opportunity for you.

21:00 — Kati urges owners to choose household standards and enforce them, rather than rely on…

You have to find places in your life, guys, where you have standards, and then enforce them. If you just live your whole life, like all day from sunup to sundown, not enforcing any kind of standards with anything. Now, let me be very clear. Enforcing standards doesn't mean verbally reprimanding your dog. It doesn't mean putting them on a leash. It doesn't mean putting them in a kennel. Those things are fine. They're management.

Those things are management. They are not standards, right? Those things are management for a dog that you can't get to live up to the standard. And what I'm talking about is you force the dog to comply with a standard. If you don't have those moments in your day, then there is no fucking reason for your dog to care about anything that you say. There just isn't. And so barking at things is a really good opportunity. It's a, it's a moment, right? Like, okay, I'm gonna have some boundaries and this is going to be one of them.

I'm not going to allow my dog to bark out the window at people, to bark when he hears someone in the driveway. That's not gonna be allowed anymore. Can you guess how we fix it? We say no, we follow up with an actual correction that matters to the dog, right? So now we're telling the dog, hey, that thing, we don't allow that anymore. And then people worry that they're gonna confuse the dog, right? Because it's been okay. No, you're not gonna confuse the dog, right? It's just things are different. Now, this is the rule, right?

So if you're consistent, the dog will comply. And you shouldn't have to be consistent forever, 'cause if you do it properly, the behavior should go away, right? So if you're still working on this in a month, you are doing something wrong.

We have dogs come in for board-and-train, right? Oftentimes it's two weeks when they go home, they're not doing this stuff anymore, not with me. So no barking, that's gonna be a rule now, right? And maybe in certain contexts, barking is okay. Like if you're playing with the dog and they're barking out of excitement, maybe that's fine, right? But we don't bark at dogs when we, when we're on a walk, we don't bark out the window when someone goes by the house. We're not gonna do that anymore. It's a standard, right? So this is an opportunity for you to become someone with standards by having an actual rule and enforcing it.

24:00 — Before correcting a broken command, Kati says owners must ensure the dog understands it.

Barking is an easy one.

Breaking commands. So the one caveat, the one condition here, right, is your dog has to really truly know the command. So if you haven't done formal training with your dog, where they understand the instruction, they understand the verbal command, they understand what behavior they're supposed to do when they get the command, then you can't go around punishing noncompliance. That has to be done first, right? I know I say that every time because it's important, right? If someone takes this one episode or this one piece outta context, they're gonna think that they can just tell their dog to do something and correct them for not doing it.

Um, but it's really important that your dog does know what's expected first, because we're asking them to do something, to come when called, to go to place, to walk in a heel, right? But if there is a command that your dog knows and knows very well, and knows the behavior, and knows exactly what's expected, there should be an actual consequence for not doing it. There should be an actual consequence for breaking that command.

And there seldom is, right? When, when we meet people, they're not doing that. And granted, a lot of them, their dogs are not fluent with the command, so they can't do it. Um, but even when they are, it's not happening, right? All the dog gets is a no or uh, uh, um, but there's no actual consequence. So you add a physical layer to your words, guys. No is just a noise. It doesn't mean anything unless you make it mean something by actually delivering a consequence. So if your dog only knows one command, fine. Enforce that one, right?

I said, sit. I didn't say totally ignore me. Strain on the leash, air scent, look around the floor for biscuits. I said, sit. If you don't sit, there's a correction. Simple stuff. And the correction might just be a leash pop, right? Leash and prong on the dog. Pop. I said, sit. e-collar, even more practical. So easy,

Right? But most people, they teach their dog over and over and over and over again, day in and day out, day in and day out. I give you a command. And if you don't do it, nothing happens. So what is the dog learning, right? They're just learning that what you say is meaningless. You don't enforce anything. They don't have to listen to you, right? You're <laugh>, you are a sibling. Like you are an equal at best, at best, right? No fault of the dog, just to be clear, right? Because that's the relationship we are building with that.

That's our fault. That's fixable though, right? So just completely ignoring a command that you know is a known command, there should be a physical layer of correction for that.

How your dog goes through doors. We don't fly out of the kennel, we don't fly through the front door. We don't fly out of the car when the door opens. This one's huge, guys. It's huge. I've done hundreds of videos on door behavior. And it's not just about going through the door, it's not just about the dog bolting through the door. It's not just about, it's actually, it's not at all about you going through the door first. I send my dogs through the door without me all the time. But the key piece there is I send them, they don't just choose to go.

28:00 — Kati says crowding a doorway or waiting there in an overexcited state also needs…

And even if they didn't go, if they're crowding the door, if they're spring-loaded, if they're tense and overexcited, they just can't wait to get through the door, we're gonna have a conversation about that. Because why? Huh? Because I have standards, right?

I have standards around the door. So this is another huge moment that you can leverage to become somebody who actually has standards, right? But too many people don't. They just wanna live with their dog without thinking about any of this stuff. And the beautiful thing of it is, once you teach your dog the standards, you don't have to think about it a ton. You'll know when they make a mistake and you can tell them, but it's not gonna be a huge deal forever if you do this properly, right? But people don't want to, they just want to.

They just want magic, right? Not everybody, not you, not mad at you. I'm just saying it's really, really common for people to just want their dog to just, just be good. Just be respectful. But it's just a fantasy because dogs are dogs and they're gonna do what comes naturally. And what comes naturally is being motivated for things that they want, right? Being overexcited, being impulsive, charging through doors, being reactive. These are things that come naturally to dogs, and they're going to do them unless someone steps in and tells 'em not to. And if you'll, if you're willing to do that, then you can create something so much better and so much different, and it gets easy.

But you have to put in the time and be willing to say, we don't go through doors like that anymore. We don't. We have a level of respect at the door. And this is what the level of respect is that I require. No crowding the door, no being spring-loaded, tense and overexcited at the door, and no going through the door, right? And by the way, the no going through the door gets super easy once you don't allow the crowding and overexcitement at the door, right? Because now you walk up to a door and your dog just looks at you like, what are we doing?

They're not gonna run through the door. No fucking way, man, because they just found out you have rules about the door. Oh, I had no idea.

Why didn't you just tell me? <laugh> Right? We get that look from the dogs all the time. Bear is a great example. I can't wait to post Bear videos. Um, but he is, was kind of getting a little outta control, and he's very dog reactive. And um, and he's a big boy. And it's just so funny because we put him, you know, he's on his leash and his prong, and he starts walking ahead of us and we give him a good leash pop. And he just looks up at us like, oh my God, I'm so sorry.

I just had no idea. Nobody's ever told me <laugh>. And I love that, right? And so he is a pretty respectful dog, right? But he had to know there was an expectation. And once they know that, you don't generally have to tell them very often, right? They're not gonna be robots. You'll probably have to remind them now and again, but you shouldn't have to go through this big fancy routine at the door. Every time you go to a door, guys, you just go up to the door and then you go through the door, right? And all you gotta do is just watch your dog.

So if they start to screw up, you can let 'em know it's too much excitement. You're too forward, you're crowding the door. It's not allowed, right? But just like I said, you, you correct your dog, that stuff goes away. They stop doing it.

And then it's a once in a while thing if your dog starts to go off the rails a little bit. But that is huge because doors are such a big part of our life. They happen all the time. And so it's a really key moment. This highlight, this one, doors. It's a key moment. If I go up to get you out of your kennel and you're going ape shit, I am going to correct you for that. Yes, you can be glad you're coming out. And for most dogs, unless they have a real issue, like I don't mind if they stand up.

I don't mind if their tail's wagging, but if they're popping around like popcorn, if they start doing spins, if they're whining, uh-uh, nope.

Which leads me to my next one. But I guess before we do that, let me just pause for a second and say, you need to make sure when you open a door, and I don't care what door we're talking about, the kennel, front door, car door, the gate in the yard, whatever it is, you open that door. What choice does your dog make? Because just asking them to sit, guys, does not make a respectful dog. Stop telling your dog to sit at the fucking door. Open the door. Let your dog make a choice. Now, if it's dangerous, right?

33:00 — For doorway practice, she recommends a leash or long line when an untrained dog…

If your dog's gonna be loose and they don't have a recall. If you're on a busy road, any of those things, put your dog on a long line.

But what I want is for you to open that door. Same thing with the crate. Put, put a leash or a long line on your dog before you open it up, before you fully open the gate, right, the door, open it up, the gate, the front door, the crate, the car, whatever it is, let your dog make a decision. Do not hold them back with the leash. Let them make a choice. If you don't do that, you will never get there. Do not tell your dog to sit. Do not give them instruction. Do not hold them back.

Make a choice. And then you can say, good. If they don't bolt through the door, <laugh>, or if they do, it's no meaningful correction. And then we're gonna do it over again so that you can do it correctly. And I can say good, right? But most people, even once we tell them how to correct the door, they go up to the door and they say, sit. They go up to the door and they've got their arm way behind them trying to hold the dog back with the leash.

Guys, neither of those things are gonna result in the dog that just has respect at the door. Neither one of those things will get you there. You have to teach your dog. Look, this is a requirement, and I'm just gonna expect you to know this. When we go to a door, I want you to know what the standard is, because you are a person with standards, remember? But you're not a person with standards if you are willing to go up to the door every single day, multiple times a day, and ask your dog to perform a trick or just hold them back with the leash. You are not a person with standards. That is, does not describe a person with standards.

Doesn't describe a rule, a boundary, okay? But anyways, it was a good segue into the most important one, which is just disagreeing with overexcitement.

This isn't something most people even realize they can do. And it's less tangible, right? It's really easy if your dog breaks a command to know they broke a command, and you have to correct them. It's a lot harder when we're like, no, you just have to disagree with that state of mind, right? So if my dog sees somebody coming home, if my dog knows they're coming outta the kennel, if my dog sees another dog, right? It doesn't, I don't care what you see. You can't just choose to fly into a level of excitement that makes you intolerable and uncontrollable.

That is not allowed. So no, I don't want my dog to be a robot. I don't need my dog to be completely flat, but I'm always the priority. And until I say, go crazy, you better not go crazy, right? And we'll have time for that.

We'll have time for fetch or tug or swimming or running or hiking or just off-leash playing with your dog friends. We'll have time for that. But right now, someone's just coming to the house. You're not allowed to go crazy right now. I'm coming to get you outta your kennel. You're not allowed to go crazy right now. I have you on a leash, and there's other dogs that you can see. You are not allowed to go crazy. And people like to make excuses, right? Well, it's because this is be, no, it doesn't matter. It's because you don't have standards.

That's what it's because of. Your dog can control themselves in those contexts. You just don't require it. So let's be honest about why our dogs behave this way, but it's easily missed, like I said, because it's not generally considered a bad behavior. So people don't even know they should be addressing, right? Because your dog's not being quote unquote naughty, right? Except they kind of are, right? Because they're in a state of mind where they couldn't listen to you, and they start pulling on the leash, they start wanting to dart through doors, they start wanting to bark, all those things we just talked about.

38:00 — She applies the same “no” and correction approach to overexcitement around routine events.

It's not okay for your dog to choose to get that excited. And so the answer to that is just like an unwanted behavior, guys. It's "no" followed by a correction. Yes, we talk about corrections a lot, not because it's all there is or it's all that matters, but because these are all things that we don't want the dog to do, and that requires a correction. And that is the only way to be a person with boundaries. You will never become a person with boundaries, an owner with boundaries. You will never become a leader in that sense without corrections.

It's what everybody is missing when we meet them. It's what everybody needs. Everyone's already really good at petting their dog, at telling their dog. They're good at giving them treats. Guys, when we meet people, they're doing all that stuff already, and they've been doing it sometimes for years, right?

But they've never corrected their dog once. They, and they might think they have, right? 'Cause they've been, "No, no, no, no." But there has been no correction. There has been no physical, tangible correction. There's been no punishment for anything ever. And again, they're getting entrenched in these relationships where they're just meaningless background noise, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. They're siblings, they're toys, but they're not someone who matters. Their words don't matter. Their commands don't matter. How they feel doesn't matter. It just doesn't matter, right? Because there's no reason for it to matter. Not 'cause there's anything wrong with the dog.

The dog's just doing what comes naturally. If your dog flies into overexcitement, it is your responsibility to say no and just give your dog a correction.

And

Then if and when you are ready to let your dog run around, be a little extra. And there's still rules, by the way, even when you do that, right? They still have to listen to you. If you ask for something, they're still not allowed to jump on you. They're still not allowed to put their teeth on anybody. These things all still apply, right? But your dog can get excited and run around when you say, "Go ahead."

And I think that is the most common key moment, is overexcitement. I think number one, people don't know they're supposed to be addressing it. And number two, they don't know how. But just like anything else, it's "no" followed by a correction. 'Cause state of mind is everything, guys. If you don't have that, you have nothing. If you cannot control arousal, you will never have your dog under control. And that's why that's the most important piece of this. And it's the one that's always missed when I come to get you from your kennel, when someone comes to the house, when you see another dog, when we get in the car, it doesn't matter what it is.

41:00 — Kati lists whining, panting, pacing, jumping, and pulling as signs of overexcitement she would…

You cannot fly into overexcitement. You can be happy, but you can't be nuts. There shouldn't be whining, panting, pacing, jumping, pulling.

No, no, no, no. And none of that is gonna be fixed by you going, "Sit, sit, sit, uh, uh, uh, uh." It's "no" and a real correction. And again, e-collar makes this super easy. There's no reason for anybody not to have this control over their dogs now. And no, it's not mean. Okay? Dogs aren't big on self-help, guys. They're not gonna help themselves figure this out. Somebody has to tell them that there's an expectation, there's a certain level of excitement that is okay, and there's a certain level of excitement that is just too much until I give you the go-ahead.

And then you can let off your steam, go do your zoomies right at the park, out in the yard, whatever.

But you don't have to do it when the guest is walking in, right? You don't have to start doing spins or lunging or barking when we're out on a walk. No, someone's coming through the door. You can't charge the door and go crazy. No, that excitement is not allowed. And learning how to control excitement is the most important skill that you as a dog owner and handler can develop. So if you have one thing on this list that you go after, go after that. Say, "Okay, I'm gonna look at the moments where my dog all on their own chooses to get crazy excited, and I'm gonna fix that."

Doesn't mean they don't get to have fun. It means I'm gonna learn how to control my dog's state of mind so that they're not just at the mercy of over-arousal all the time. 'Cause your dog is right. They're helpless to control it because nobody has taught them how. No one has said they have to. And so every time your dog sees anything, they go off a cliff because they haven't learned how not to. And it is a gift to teach them how to control that because then they're going to be able to do more, go more, be more.

Your relationship gets better. You become someone who deserves respect. You become someone relevant. They listen to you. You can take them places. You can trust them more. It's easier. It's less management, right? The management starts to go away and you start implementing actual training. Hey guys, thanks for joining us today. I really hope you enjoyed the show. If there's a specific topic you'd like to hear discussed, you can send that to me directly via email or fan mail. Just jump down into the show notes. That information will be there for you. I really look forward to hearing from you.

Thanks for supporting the show, and I look forward to next time.