I'm having issues with my 7 month old puppy. I posted about her growling at the vet when she was 4 months, and it's not really getting better.
Backstory, I adopted her from a rescue at 12(?) weeks, she was dumped at the shelter at 6 weeks (the people said 8 weeks, but nobody believes that), rescued, then fostered alone with an old lady, who I doubt socialized her at all. I took her to my friends right away, took her to puppy classes as soon as she got her vaccines(she had a hard time being away from other puppies)... took her to puppy play classes where she started getting aggressive towards the other dogs if she was restrained in any way (we had to take turns letting the puppies play, and she would not sit still on my lap when it wasn't her turn), but totally fine once she was off leash with the other puppies.
I've been taking her out for walks since her 3rd series of vaccines, and she was already fearful of people getting close... even though all the interactions she had with them were fine really... now she randomly barks at people, and we took her to school this morning when we dropped our kids off and she actually did awesome until we were walking back and she snapped at a kid out of nowhere (didn't actually touch him, but still). Needless to say... we won't be taking her again anytime soon. I usually change sidewalks if we're walking past people and/or dogs (she goes crazy at dogs) but thankfully my neighborhood is pretty quiet so it's not really a big issue and easy enough to do.
At home we often have guests, and she barked like crazy at one of them last week even though he had treats (like she'd bark every time he talked), but she was fine with him yesterday when we had a party. She LOVES our close friends and their kids who she's seen every week since we adopted her, but yesterday one of them tried to take one of her special chews and she growled at her (I traded for a regular treat very easily after that). She also growled at a little girl who kept petting her, so I ended up crating her for a while. She hates being away from me so she was not happy about it, but if it's what we have to do, it's what we'll do. The worry for me though is that it seems that getting separated from people makes her more anxious and makes the situation worse (I still wonder if it's why she started getting leash reactive too).
She's also very attached to me and, I'm sure, protective of me.
She's a husky/American Eskimo/Lab mix (with some other random stuff). I initially wanted a puppy to go hiking with, and obviously that's probably never going to happen now. I do understand that some breeds are less friendly towards strangers than others, but I can't help feeling guilty and that I did something wrong. One of my friends rescued a puppy at the same time too, didn't take him to puppy classes, didn't take him for walks or socialize him at all, and he's a well adjusted dog... I'm just starting to wonder if I'm just a terrible dog owner or something (we had a dog with severe resource guarding issues too, and our other dog now is also leash reactive towards other dogs, and actually bit one once).
Thoughts? Tips to make things better? Finances are tight right now and we really can't afford a trainer.
Backstory, I adopted her from a rescue at 12(?) weeks, she was dumped at the shelter at 6 weeks (the people said 8 weeks, but nobody believes that), rescued, then fostered alone with an old lady, who I doubt socialized her at all. I took her to my friends right away, took her to puppy classes as soon as she got her vaccines(she had a hard time being away from other puppies)... took her to puppy play classes where she started getting aggressive towards the other dogs if she was restrained in any way (we had to take turns letting the puppies play, and she would not sit still on my lap when it wasn't her turn), but totally fine once she was off leash with the other puppies.
I've been taking her out for walks since her 3rd series of vaccines, and she was already fearful of people getting close... even though all the interactions she had with them were fine really... now she randomly barks at people, and we took her to school this morning when we dropped our kids off and she actually did awesome until we were walking back and she snapped at a kid out of nowhere (didn't actually touch him, but still). Needless to say... we won't be taking her again anytime soon. I usually change sidewalks if we're walking past people and/or dogs (she goes crazy at dogs) but thankfully my neighborhood is pretty quiet so it's not really a big issue and easy enough to do.
At home we often have guests, and she barked like crazy at one of them last week even though he had treats (like she'd bark every time he talked), but she was fine with him yesterday when we had a party. She LOVES our close friends and their kids who she's seen every week since we adopted her, but yesterday one of them tried to take one of her special chews and she growled at her (I traded for a regular treat very easily after that). She also growled at a little girl who kept petting her, so I ended up crating her for a while. She hates being away from me so she was not happy about it, but if it's what we have to do, it's what we'll do. The worry for me though is that it seems that getting separated from people makes her more anxious and makes the situation worse (I still wonder if it's why she started getting leash reactive too).
She's also very attached to me and, I'm sure, protective of me.
She's a husky/American Eskimo/Lab mix (with some other random stuff). I initially wanted a puppy to go hiking with, and obviously that's probably never going to happen now. I do understand that some breeds are less friendly towards strangers than others, but I can't help feeling guilty and that I did something wrong. One of my friends rescued a puppy at the same time too, didn't take him to puppy classes, didn't take him for walks or socialize him at all, and he's a well adjusted dog... I'm just starting to wonder if I'm just a terrible dog owner or something (we had a dog with severe resource guarding issues too, and our other dog now is also leash reactive towards other dogs, and actually bit one once).
Thoughts? Tips to make things better? Finances are tight right now and we really can't afford a trainer.