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Jack is a 7 year old Havanese. My parents are his 5th home, 3 of which were "garage" breeders, I'm assuming that's somewhere in between BYB and millers. So it's pretty obvious the little guy would have a few issues when he came to us - we just never thought separation anxiety would be this bad.
I thought we could crate him, make his world as small as possible until he felt he could handle more. But after today, there's no way. He'd hurt himself so badly if he were in a crate.
So the scenario is this. My dad is retired, and spends most of his time at home. My mom works full time, and comes home at lunch. This has worked since they got Jack on November 17th, but this week is different - this week my dad is out of town, so Jack is alone from 08:30 to 12:30, and from 1:30 to 4:30. They keep him gated in the bathroom when they're gone because of his marking when they're not around (he doesn't mark when they're around). They leave an item of clothing in there that smells like them (a shirt), the radio is on, they leave a full water dish (that's empty when they return) and a couple things for him to chew on (he ignores them).
Today when mom came home at lunch, she came home to sheer destruction in the bathroom. Every surface had been marked (he has a bellyband but he wasn't wearing it today. It doesn't matter if he wears it or not, he still marks). He had pooped, too - a lot. He pooped right in front of the baby gate - and that's where he spent most of his time on his hind legs, scrabbling/pawing at the gate. He was just covered in poop when mom got home, and she had to use a paint scraper to get dried poop off the floor.
The worst part is she found little drops of blood on the floor, from his paws working at the baby gate.
The same thing happened when she returned from work for the day at 4:30.
He gets himself worked into a frenzy... he pants like crazy, he drools like crazy, he continually paws at the gate... he's going to make himself sick if he continues like this. He's completely exhausted when she comes home. And so hot - all he wants to do when she takes him outside is lay in the snow and eat snowballs.
How the heck do we deal with this?
Person 2:
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The Patricia McConnel book "I'll be home soon" is
probably the best book on how to treat SA out there.
With a dog this severe leaving the room at all is moving much too fast -- even for just a second. The protocol for working with SA is too complicated to describe here -- you'd be much better off buying the booklet. You can buy it through
http://www.dogwise.com
Also, as extreme as this dog is you might want to put him on anti-anxiety medication. This will be short-term until you can get through enough of the behavior modification treatment plan that he's comfortable with short departures.
Person 1:
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In the meantime you medicate him. If you can't do that, then you create two places to keep him -- one that is safe where he can't do any damage. This is the place where he'll go when you actually leave the home. The other is the place that you work on conditioning him to feel comfortable in. This is the place where you will practice desensitization sessions, where you work your way through the leaving routine, and where you don't actually leave until he is 100% fine with it. This is where he will eventually be left when you leave once he's feeling good about you leaving.
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