[Gina_1978]

Hello everyone
I´m not a first time dog owner at all,infact,over the years I have owned a few dogs of my favorite breed (yorkshire terrier).After my last yorkie girl died last year at the age of 9,we (my husband and I) didnt think we´d have any more,but here we are,a year later with two 14 week old yorkie pups named Milo & Bella They´re sibblings from the same litter and we´re head over heels in love.
There have been many bumps in the road over the years,and we considered ourselfs very educated on all that could happen,but we now have an issue that we have never had to deal with before and I have no idea how to fix it.

Milo & Bella have been brought up in the exact same way,infact,they lived up to their "twin" reputation by being extremely alike in everything they did,right up until we got the OK to take them outside after their shots were completed 2 weeks ago.
Milo LOVES being outside,he has a ball! He rns,he jumps,he says "hello" to everyone we pass...But we cant get Bella to walk AT ALL.She acts stressed,upset (she cries the whole time) she lays down like a carpet (pushing her whole body to the floor) and refuses to move etc.
We have no idea what to do or how to address her fear of being outside.She wants NOTHING to do with it,infact,even when we pick her up just to allow Milo to walk,she´ll turn her head to our body and refuse to even look outwards :doh:
We´ve tried treats,calling her etc etc,nothing is working and it´s making us worry,because she´s losing out on fresh air,walking,runnig etc-everything any dog should love!
Sorry this was so long..but can anyone help? :wave:

 

[Avie]

Just throwing something out there -- in no way am I an expert in this! -- but maybe if you attached Milo to Bella with a leash, Milo could show Bella just how great it is to be outside.

And your pups look adorable Just a thought though; consider reducing your signature's size dramatically please. My browser's freaking out and I'm pretty sure there's a size limit in place.

 

[Gina_1978]

Just throwing something out there -- in no way am I an expert in this! -- but maybe if you attached Milo to Bella with a leash, Milo could show Bella just how great it is to be outside.

We actually tried that,and Milo end up getting frustrated because he wants to walk and she doesnt budge :/ He tugs and pulls and she seems to sink deeper into the ground lol.She LOATHES being outside

 

[itsjustmebre]

Alright, so, does she loves treats? Could you possibly lure her outside with them? Or maybe stand just outside the doorway and start feeding Milo some super yummy treats and see if she comes out

Best of luck!

~IJMB

 

[Fuzzy Pants]

What treats are you using. I remember my pup being nervous at first when I'd take her on walks but bits of freeze dried beef liver treats used as a lure and fed to her every so often worked like a charm. Find out what your pup likes best and feed that on walks. If it's peanutbutter she likes then you could smear some on the end of a target stick to lure her along.

 

[sassafras]

If she is THAT afraid, then I think expecting her to go from where she is now to enjoying a walk in one giant step is probably expecting a bit much of her. For now I would take Milo on his walks alone so he can get his exercise.

If dogs aren't taking treats in a situation, the treats may not be tempting enough, and/or they are just overwhelmed and "shut down". In that shut down state, she's not going to learn anything, anyway, so you probably need to back off a little bit. For example, if I have a phobia of spiders that I want to work on getting rid of, the FIRST step isn't for someone to run in the room and put a tarantula on my shoulder. The first step might be for someone to show me pictures of spiders on the internet. If someone gave me $100 for every picture of a spider I looked at, I would start to feel pretty good about those pictures after a while. Then maybe to get that $100 I have to be in the same room as a spider confined in a little box or something... and so on, the intensity of my exposure would gradually be increased after I got comfortable with whatever level I was at.

So personally how I would start with Bella would be to just sit on my front step with her, watching the world go by while feeding her really, really yummy treats. You might have to experiment a little bit to find what she really loves. Just sit there feeding treats. If all goes well, eventually she should start to relax to being out there, to people/cars/whatever passing by, etc., as she learns that maybe the world isn't quite as scary as she thought it was. Then I would maybe move closer to the road/sidewalk and sit with her in the middle of my yard and do the same thing for a while... and then maybe sit in my neighbor's yard or on their step (with their permission), and gradually work on teaching her to relax to the big scary world.

There is a website www.fearfuldogs.com that can help you, and there are a number of members with shy dogs who can probably chime in as well. Also a lot of training clubs are offering shy dog or "wallflower" classes to help you with some of this stuff. I think it's unlikely she'll ever be as outgoing as he is, but that's ok. I think a reasonable goal should be for her to be relaxed and not shut down away from home, and if she does come out of her shell enough to be more outgoing, then that's gravy. Good luck!

 

[Gina_1978]

If she is THAT afraid, then I think expecting her to go from where she is now to enjoying a walk in one giant step is probably expecting a bit much of her. For now I would take Milo on his walks alone so he can get his exercise.

If dogs aren't taking treats in a situation, the treats may not be tempting enough, and/or they are just overwhelmed and "shut down". In that shut down state, she's not going to learn anything, anyway, so you probably need to back off a little bit. For example, if I have a phobia of spiders that I want to work on getting rid of, the FIRST step isn't for someone to run in the room and put a tarantula on my shoulder. The first step might be for someone to show me pictures of spiders on the internet. If someone gave me $100 for every picture of a spider I looked at, I would start to feel pretty good about those pictures after a while. Then maybe to get that $100 I have to be in the same room as a spider confined in a little box or something... and so on, the intensity of my exposure would gradually be increased after I got comfortable with whatever level I was at.

So personally how I would start with Bella would be to just sit on my front step with her, watching the world go by while feeding her really, really yummy treats. You might have to experiment a little bit to find what she really loves. Just sit there feeding treats. If all goes well, eventually she should start to relax to being out there, to people/cars/whatever passing by, etc., as she learns that maybe the world isn't quite as scary as she thought it was. Then I would maybe move closer to the road/sidewalk and sit with her in the middle of my yard and do the same thing for a while... and then maybe sit in my neighbor's yard or on their step (with their permission), and gradually work on teaching her to relax to the big scary world.

There is a website www.fearfuldogs.com that can help you, and there are a number of members with shy dogs who can probably chime in as well. Also a lot of training clubs are offering shy dog or "wallflower" classes to help you with some of this stuff. I think it's unlikely she'll ever be as outgoing as he is, but that's ok. I think a reasonable goal should be for her to be relaxed and not shut down away from home, and if she does come out of her shell enough to be more outgoing, then that's gravy. Good luck!

Thank you very much for your reply,I apreciate it greatly
As treats we use her absolute favorite-sweet ham peices.They usually drive her crazy! But the moment we´re outside the house,she "shuts down" (as you said).It´s as if she simply cant control herself and her body goes completly rigid.We have no idea what could have caused this or why she´s so fearful - we´ve tried both a collar and a harness with no luck.She came from a wonderful breeder (both her & Milo),and we have treated both her and Milo with lots of love and patience,so we´re lost as to where this is coming from.
The other problem is,we live in the middle of nowhere,on the outskirts of the island where there is absolutely nothing.No cars,no neighbours etc.All we have are lots of other animals (cats,birds,dogs,donkeys,ducks,chickens etc).She´s fine with all of that,but we werent able to socialize either of them with other people,cars,roads etc until right after all their shots (at 12 weeks),because it wasnt possible due to where we live.So of course,they had never seen or heard any of that until just 2 weeks ago.Milo adapted instantly,Bella is hates it I´m going to look into reading about fearful dogs and how to help her..thank you so much!

 

[Hambonez]

My pup Hamilton is 5.5 months old now. When he first finished his shots he loved going on walks. A week later, having had nothing upsetting happen that we can figure out, he decided he didn't want to go on walks anymore. Not around the neighborhood, not at the park, no way. He doesn't pull or cower, he just sits, and doesn't move. Very frustrating! After mulitple unsuccessful park trips, I realized that what I wanted was to go on a walk at the park with my puppy. What he wanted was to lay in the grass, so we started doing it his way. We would go to the park, and sit on a bench (or he'd sit under it, or behind it in the grass). We'd people and dog watch. When another dog or an interesting person would walk by, he would perk up and wag his tail and get all happy, then sulk again when they were gone. Gradually though, he would decide he wanted to check something out, or walk to another bench. Now he'll walk for a bit, on his own terms, but his tail is up and he's happy and we're out of the house. We call it taking the dog for a "meander" instead of a "walk." He's made friends at the park too, including a group of small dogs who meet up on the weekends. Last time he didn't want to go home! Over the weekend we took him to my college reunion, and to visit my family, and he had to walk allll over campus and we took him to the beach and he walked like a champ! I thought I was going to be stuck carrying him everywhere but he walking all over like he owned the place!

Ergo, my long winded suggestion is, try doing what she wants. If it's just sitting outside and not walking and just taking it all in, start there. As she becomes more comfortable, maybe she too will be willing to walk more. Save the walks for special time with Milo.

 

[Cyreen]

So personally how I would start with Bella would be to just sit on my front step with her, watching the world go by while feeding her really, really yummy treats. You might have to experiment a little bit to find what she really loves. Just sit there feeding treats. If all goes well, eventually she should start to relax to being out there, to people/cars/whatever passing by, etc.,

I agree, while someone walks Milo, find Bella a park bench and park. Let her get used to the noise and movement while being with someone she trusts for shelter. If she can see Milo being brave without having to venture out herself, even better.

Also, they're adorable!