Bringing anxious animals into your life can sometimes seem confusing and frustrating at first, but the payoff of sticking with them is oftentimes a lifetime worth of love and devotion. There are a few things to consider when you introduce a new animal into your home and find that life is moving a bit too fast for them.
Introducing Too Many New Things at Once
Anxious animals often need some extra time to adapt to new circumstances. Consider that your new pet very likely could’ve come from the streets, or a starter home that didn’t socialize them enough, and has likely passed through the care of a shelter, rescue, foster homes, or maybe even animal control. That kind of journey can be overwhelming for anyone, especially when you don’t really have much say in it. Even if that’s not the case though, anxious animals generally need to be introduced to novel stimuli one thing at a time. If an animal is unsure of their new home, they need to be allowed to acclimate to the home on their own terms for a while. Once that’s accomplished, you can move on to introducing new things that they need to acclimate to. Basically, allow them to get comfortable at home with all of their new housemates before welcoming in the entire neighborhood to meet them.
Securing Their Environment Adequately
Now, we want our new animal friend to explore their surroundings and make themselves feel at home, but anxious animals may be flighty and prone to escaping. There’s no worse feeling than losing a brand new animal that barely knows you. They’re not always exactly invested enough in their new family to come back to you, and chasing after them can sometimes just make things worse. You’ll want to avoid situations like this by preparing your home environment adequately. Make sure your doors and windows are secure to prevent any mishaps, and keep in mind that flighty animals will sometimes try to dart around you to get through a cracked door. If someone shows up at your doorstep, step outside to greet them and keep a keen ear on your animal.
And when it’s time to start exploring outside of the home, make sure that you’re securing the environment—wherever you are. This may mean taking initial trips to the backyard while leashed up. Many dogs can scale a fence, even if they don’t look like it; and a simple stroke of bad timing—such as a car backfiring on a nearby street—can send your animal fleeing in panic. Make sure that you’ve purchased a secure harness for them and have adjusted it appropriately. Play it safe, and remember that a panicked animal can sometimes fight their way out of a seemingly escape-proof harness. Which leads to our next considerations.
Pushing Too Quickly
One of the best parts of having a new animal—a dog, at least—is taking them out to explore the world with you. It can be frustrating when your new buddy doesn’t want to conquer that 14er with you at the first available opportunity, but all socialization and desensitization work must proceed at your animal’s pace. If you notice that your animal is tensing up, shutting down, or trying to exit a situation, allow them to exit and assist them, if necessary. If you force your animal into an uncomfortable situation, you run the risk of them escaping from you, or even possibly biting someone.
It’s always preferable to abandon your long weekend walk through the crowded park to spare your animal a potentially terrifying experience. Ideally, they saw enough of the park in a non-aversive way to start desensitizing a little. You recalibrate your plans and come back some other time to chip away a little more progress.
Providing a Sense of Security
Providing a sense of security is related to securing the environment, but there are subtle differences as well. Securing the physical environment provides you and your animal a space to work within, thus giving you opportunities to develop their sense of security. Nobody makes their best decisions when they’re feeling insecure or overwhelmed, and your animal is no different.
When you help your animal maintain a comfortable perimeter they are calmer, more attentive towards you, and more cooperative. If you lead them into an uncomfortable situation and force them to regulate their own boundaries, you may find that the mood quickly declines for everyone involved. Setting comfortable boundaries is almost always mutually beneficial for everybody.
It’s up to you to help secure their personal bubble. Speak up for them—and hopefully as you progress, those boundaries become less and less invasive.
Giving Up
So, all these worst case scenarios may sound pretty daunting, but, fear not, they are generally pretty avoidable with a little foresight and preparation. The main thing to remember is to always let your animal set the pace of progress. Be attentive to their needs and adjust accordingly. There will likely be snafus and setbacks throughout the journey, but most of them can be remedied if you’ve approached all your new situations (training opportunities!) with consideration. Take things one step at a time.
Remember, there’s nothing wrong with taking some time to yourself to recover your energy. If you still want to do that long walk through the busy park, secure your animal at home and take the walk for yourself. It’ll help the whole socialization process more if you return home happy and ready to get back to work again, rather than being upset that you missed out on your activity. You may also find that the alone time will yield new insights into the training.
It may take a little extra effort, but take the time to get to know your new animal on their terms and they, in turn, will feel more secure with you, be more cooperative, and everyone will generally be more satisfied with the relationship!
Still want some extra guidance regarding your beloved anxious animals? Feel free to contact me!
