You love your dog and your dog loves you. Love conquers all, right? Because it conquers all, that love allows you to do everything you want and need to your dog and your dog will be okay with it. Right? Actually, that’s not always the case.
You may have the best relationship possible with your dog. This doesn’t mean that your dog is going to automatically be comfortable with you coming close to him while he’s eating. Or with you touching his feet. It doesn’t work that way unfortunately.
The good news is that dogs are great at building associations. And if it’s your dog, you likely already have the first box checked. (Your dog having a positive association with you in general.) The next box that needs to be worked on is helping your dog build a positive association with (fill in the blank.) If your dog guards their food bowl, we need to build a positive association with showing up while they’re eating. If your dog has body handling sensitivity, we need to show them that being touched near and then on the sensitive spot is a predictor of $100 bills.
We can make it happen if we follow a plan. The initial step of the plan is figuring out what your dog can do (or is comfortable with) at the moment and the last step is what the end goal is. Between the first and last step are all the steps needed to get to the last step. When done correctly, your dog is happy and comfortable each step of the way.
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