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Feb. 18, 2023

Ep 179 Where To Start

Ep 179 Where To Start

This week, we'll talk about what you're supposed to do if a dog is worried. If a dog is scared if a dog is being aggressive or acting aggressively, what can we do?  Find the podcast on your favorite podcast host, watch at , or check out the...

This week, we'll talk about what you're supposed to do if a dog is worried. If a dog is scared if a dog is being aggressive or acting aggressively, what can we do? 

Find the podcast on your favorite podcast host, watch at https://www.youtube.com/@creatinggreatgroomingdogs, or check out the website CreatingGreatGroomingDogs.com to listen or watch there. 

Want to learn more about behavior? My Master Groomer Behavior Specialist program consists of 4 eight week courses. They are entirely online and include weekly zoom classroom time. The program is through The Whole Pet Grooming Academy. For more information about this fully online course, go to WholePetNH.com #dogtrainer #dogtrainers #dogtraining #dogpodcast #dogpodcasters #doggroomer #doggroomers #doggrooming #MasterGroomerBehaviorSpecialist #petstylist #petstyling #ccpdt #iaabc #apdt #cbcc #cpdt #fearfree #fearfreecertifiedprofessional #fearfreepets #positivereinforcementtraining #positivetraining #dogsofinstagram #doggroomersofinstagram #dogtrainersofinstagram #akcsafetycertifiedgroomer #dogbusiness #schoolforgroomers #holisticgrooming #wholisticgrooming #WholePetGroomingAcademy

Transcript

Ep179 Where To Start

[00:00:00] Episode 179. This week, we're going to talk about what you're supposed to do if a dog is worried. If a dog is scared, if a dog is being aggressive or acting aggressively, what can we do?

[00:00:13] This is the creating great grooming dog show. I'm Chrissy Neumyer Smith. I'm a certified professional groomer, a certified behavior consultant for canines, a certified professional dog trainer, a master grimmer behavior specialist, an instructor at whole pet grooming academy, and the owner of happy critters in Nashua, New Hampshire.

[00:00:30] And this, my friends and colleagues is the show where grooming and training meet.

[00:00:36] Let's start with, why do dogs find grooming difficult? Why do we have so many behavior problems with grooming? And part of that is because dogs find grooming unpleasant, uncomfortable and or scary. And if you can remember those three things, it'll help us a lot. When we start seeing a behavior that we don't want, maybe it's a dog who's really, really silly who does not want to be still, who finds that unpleasant.

[00:01:00] Cause he'd rather be playing with the other dog and the other side of the room or playing with you. Those things happen and that is part of unpleasant. What if it's simply uncomfortable. That could be physical discomfort because their body just can't bend in the ways we're asking them to bend or can't stand as long as we want them to stand, or maybe they're uncomfortable with a tool or a procedure or a person, or even being uncomfortable being out of their house. So uncomfortable. Another really common reason why we see behavior problems.

[00:01:31] And then scary. Scary can just be anything that the dog finds particularly scary. That's really, really common. So if we think about each of those things, unpleasant, uncomfortable, or scary. Are the reasons why we see behavior problems in grooming. Then I think it becomes a little bit more clear that our solution is to make things more pleasant.

[00:01:55] More comfortable, less scary.

[00:01:59] So how do we do it? Right. Cause last week, last week, I pretty much laid it out there that. I really do not think we should be holding dogs down and getting the job done. Okay. I know that's old school. That's back in the 1900's. We did it that way. And you learn from someone who learned from someone from back in the 1900's, because I did it too. He did it too, but.

[00:02:20] It is not appropriate. It's not okay. It actually creates more of our problems because what happens when we hold a dog down, when they give us a signal that says I'm uncomfortable with this. I'm uncomfortable. I find this unpleasant or scary and we hold them down. We are actually making it more. Unpleasant.

[00:02:40] Uncomfortable or scary. Okay. More of the same problem is not going to solve that problem. I know, and we've all done. It we've all thought, but he'll just have to figure out that it's going to be okay. So for anybody who is kind of new to this idea that, okay, we're not going to hold dogs down and force them anymore.

[00:03:00] I know I'll take a deep breath. It's not that we're mean people, those of us who have done it that way. I speak for myself also for those of us who haven't have done it that way, time and time again. It's not because we did it cause we're mean. It's because the idea was that we needed to help this dog get this procedure done.

[00:03:19] But this isn't veterinary medicine. This is a haircut. And so we thought we were helping by getting it done. And figuring that if it doesn't hurt, the dog will eventually figure out that everything is fine. Yet. And here's the thing, guys. Dogs don't seem to care as much about whether or not it hurt if it was scary.

[00:03:39] They're going to remember. It was scary. Have we all got a story in our head for a time when something scared, one of us. You know, did it, did you get hurt? Maybe it was a near miss with a car accident that really scared you. Even though you didn't get hurt, maybe you're still scared. Maybe it's still scared. You.

[00:03:57] So we have to let go of the idea that it's strictly about avoiding pain, because fear is involved too. So how do we then work on dogs and get the job done? If a dog is afraid. Now I want us to think about. Assuming that every single dog we meet has some sort of fears about grooming. Because it's weird.

[00:04:21] Right. 'cause it's weird. It's so weird to be in dropped off someplace weird, or they have somebody weird show up at their house with a van or unpacking all of their grooming equipment in the house. Cause I'm a house call groomer. There are lots of formats, but all of that can be really strange. Okay.

[00:04:37] And we have to kind of assume that any dog that we meet. Until we know that they are comfortable with it. We should assume that they're not comfortable with it, that they're going to find it on pleasant, uncomfortable and or scary. So we need to first off have this in our head so that we can help our owners understand that the, your dog's emotional wellbeing.

[00:05:01] Is really important to me. Now I know someone out there just want emotional wellbeing. Like there's the hard R roll the, oh my God. Did she really just say that? But let me put it this way. When dogs are not good for grooming. When they misbehave for grooming, when they show us the behaviors that we do not want, right? That's when dogs get hurt, people get hurt. Equipment gets broken and customers become upset. Businesses get destroyed.

[00:05:28] It is not good business. Uh, dog's going to get hurt. That dog is going to get hurt. And that vet bell is going to cost you much more than that dog's grooming ever would have. If you look at it the day after an accident, you're going to think, why did I push it? Why did I push it? So first off is to think about setting realistic expectations with our owners.

[00:05:52] No in the past, I've talked about a safety policy. And a safety policy. If you go back even, even episode number one, or if you go to creating great grooming dogs.com, I have it written up there too, but the safety policy is all about explaining to owners that I'm going to help your dog be good for grooming.

[00:06:10] That's really important. Now, if you are not used to this training aspect of grooming, you might be thinking, but that's not my job. I'm not here to be the trainer. But if we can break free of this idea that holding him down is part of our job. It's not, it makes it worse. It makes it worse. We make our own problems.

[00:06:32] I know, and it was such a hard pill to swallow. When I first realized I was making my own problems. Ah, But as, but I was by holding dogs down, we're creating that new problem. So if, instead we are already telling owners, I'm going to try to keep your dog calm, comfortable, and cooperative. If your dog becomes overly silly, if your dog becomes frightened, if your dog is scared of anything, I'm going to back up and try to help them be calm for it. Your grooming may not be completed today. I'm going to do my best, but I will charge you for my time.

[00:07:06] My time is always going to be worth something guys. You have to like, let that sink in. You're going to charge them for your time. You're not selling haircuts. You are selling haircutting services and their dog is not well-prepared for your services. Now you are going to help them solve that problem.

[00:07:23] By patiently and lovingly and gently. Backing off. When their dog is scared and helping their dog become more comfortable. Because that's the long game. So, if you are new to that idea, I want you to think about, um, If you have a plan in place, maybe that's, I'm going to have you talk to a trainer or I'm going to have you talk to a vet because this seems like a medical problem to me.

[00:07:49] Um, medical problems that can cause behavior problems. Think about itchy skin. Itchy skin can be a behavior problem on the grooming table because we are we're messing with that itchy skin. Have you guys ever had an itch? Uh, just drive you crazy, right. Dogs. Don't have kind of impulse control to say, oh, but I need a haircut.

[00:08:07] So we may be sending them to the vet. We may be sending them to a trainer. We may be sending the owner home with homework and we may refuse a groom. Now sometimes grimmer start going, oh God, this sounds like a lot of work. And it can be, but I want you to think about if we refuse a groom. What happens is, is I'm not refusing a dog. I'm refusing an owner.

[00:08:29] Who does not line up with my business. So use the same. Logic that you would use if a dog comes in Madden and the owner says, I do not want to pay for extra brushing. I do not want him shaved. I want you to trim all of that hair. And I know best because I know he's brushed out. We brush them every day.

[00:08:49] Near the grimmer saying this dog is mad at. Um, what do we tell them? If we cannot resolve it? If an owner just does not want to hear us, what do we tell them? We tell them, I'm sorry. I cannot help you with that. I'm not going to just do a trim over mats. And I'm not going to give you what you want today. That's not in your dog's best interest.

[00:09:10] We need the same verbiage when we are talking about behavior stuff. Your dog is really afraid of what we're trying to do. Forcing him through things that he's afraid of makes the problem worse. Time and time again, it makes the problem worse. It will never ever resolve the problem. And that's a bold statement. Let me tell you, it's not going to make the problem go away by holding him down and doing his nails every six months. It's not going to make the problem go away.

[00:09:37] So if we think about it, as we set our business policies, we set our structure. And our structure is to teach dogs to be good for grooming. And to not make things worse by forcing them through grooming that they are literally telling us they cannot handle. Literally telling us in variety of behavior, ways that they can't handle it. So this is part of why we need to rethink our business model and how we talk to our customers about behavior problems, because forcing dogs through when they're afraid.

[00:10:14] Should only be happening during an emergency medical situation. That is not a haircut. Okay. We have other options and we're going to talk more about that in the next part.

[00:10:25] If you're enjoying the show, please subscribe, follow, and leave a review.

[00:10:29] So when do we start working on a behavior problem? Now, this is a tricky little piece. I think that we start working on a behavior problem before we even meet the dog, simply by changing our mindset about where behavior problems are. And what we think is worth our time to work on. The problem I run into is that we as groomers and non-gamers might not understand this. We as groomers have been trained that.

[00:10:58] You try to get that job done. And it's not until we have trouble as the human doing the grooming. When we start having trouble getting the job done is when there's a behavior problem. Now that's a logic chain that we're going to have to change. If we want to make the real change for ourselves and for these dogs, it's not when we are having problems, getting the job done. It's when the dog is having problems with us, getting the job done.

[00:11:27] So, what that means is, is if you're holding a dog's paw and they're wiggling a little bit and you hold on tighter and they're wiggling more and you hold on tighter, but you're still getting those nails done. Okay. That's forcing dogs through trimming. I know someone out there is like, no, it's not, but it is.

[00:11:45] Let me backtrack a little bit and say, when you are holding a dog's foot and they start to wiggle. This is when you look at what's happening and say, okay, you're uncomfortable with this. Do you need to reposition? Um, sometimes we're just holding the leg too high. Sometimes we're holding a toe too tight. Oftentimes groomers are holding too tight because we're still in our mindset that we have to hold onto that leg.

[00:12:10] You know, and, and as long as we can hold that leg still and get the job done, then the behavior problem, isn't a big deal because we were able to get the nails done, or we were able to get that tail trimmed or whatever it was. Despite the dog flailing around and fighting, we were able to get it done. So the behavior problem, isn't a problem yet.

[00:12:26] But the behavior problem is a problem for the Doug. It's a problem for the dog. So at the first signs that this dog is a little uncomfortable. This is when we should step back and say, how can I help you be more comfortable?

[00:12:42] Right there. That's your decision point? Okay. If I turn on the dryer and the dog jumps. And tries to get away. That's my decision point. Not five minutes into that drying with a dog who's been flailing around for five minutes. Know at the very first sign. That's my decision point. Okay, let me turn off this dryer for a second. Was it the noise? Was it where I was? What was going on and try to figure out how to help that dog be more comfortable.

[00:13:12] There in that moment. If I'm holding an ear, if I lift up an ear and a dog Yelps, What is my first thought. Do you have an ear infection? Is your ears sore? Is there something scary going on that maybe I didn't see in the room. But it's not after I try to hold that dog for another 10 minutes and now it's become way too difficult for me to safely do my job. It's not about us.

[00:13:39] It's not about us as the groomer or the trainer or the vet or anybody else who's working with that dog. It's not about our experience with this dog's behavior. It's why is the dog behaving like this? So that I can teach them to be comfortable for it. Okay. Those are decision points. And our first thing that we should think about is comfort. Is this dog uncomfortable? Is there some physical or medical reason for the dog to behave this way?

[00:14:07] That's really important because in many cases there is. Uh, in many cases, we've, we've held on to a toe and maybe we didn't know that there's arthritis in those toes or, you know, we, we lifted up a leg and now they're balancing on their bad hip. All right. And sometimes we forget that. All right, I'm going to throw that out there to everybody out there. Who's a dog owner and a dog professional.

[00:14:32] The pod that hurts. If we're lifting that pop, I think we're like, oh, well I know he has a sore, right, POB, but why is he being like this for the other one? Because the left, Paul. When you lift the left, Paul you're making him stand on the sore one, right? We have to think about what's physically going on in their body.

[00:14:50] And try to help them be comfortable. Now the other thing that keeps us from, from really absorbing this. Is I think that if you've never tried to help a dog be comfortable with it, Or maybe you've tried and you're failed because you were like, well, and I'll tell you I've done this too. Like, okay, well, we worked a lot on the training part, but now we really need to get them done.

[00:15:12] I mean, he can't go home looking like that. And in that last couple of minutes of a groom, You totally, totally. I just shred all of that hard work. You did just destroyed it by saying like, Nope. And now I'm going to hold you down and it's only got two committed. Snip. See it's okay. It's okay. It's okay. It's okay.

[00:15:28] And in that moment. That dog is like, I still got forced through grooming. We totally erode any hard work that we've done in those last couple of minutes. This is actually what drove me to start my own business because I was so tired of grooming that way. With the expectation that the grooming always has to be perfect. And the, oh, we can't send them home, looking like that.

[00:15:49] Yes, you can. If owners want perfect trims, they need to bring in a dog. Who's prepared to be trimmed. I know we're dumping some of that back in the owners lap. But orders can't do that. Owners can do a lot. They might not have our equipment, but there are a lot of things that owners can do. We can send our owners home with homework.

[00:16:11] And let me say the first couple of things that I have owners do. Is just start touching their dog all over with stuffing things. I call it the coffee table game and I'll have the owners. I don't care if that dog's snuggled up on the sofa next to them while they're watching a movie. They don't have to be standing there going to start off with just items on their coffee table. They're going to pick up the remote, rub it down their dog's back, touch their dog's feet with it.

[00:16:34] The lid of a jar candle, maybe the jar candle, the tissue box, a pen. Just start touching them with stuff. Okay. Spend a week just touching them with random objects all over. All over. And that's when owners say, oh, but I don't want them to think those things are toys. Yeah. Uh, no. And that's why I'm having you do it with a bunch of things that aren't toys, because our grooming equipment aren't toys either.

[00:16:59] So they can take a mild interest, but no, they can't play with it. Because if it's a brush or a comb or a clipper or sheers, there wouldn't be able to play with it. So this is about having owners working on stuff at home. And then of course, keeping their dog calm, comfortable, and cooperative while they're just touching them all over with stuff and things from their coffee table.

[00:17:20] Then I have owners move on to standing having their dogs stand while they touch them all over with stuff and things. Right make this normal. And then when they get into the grooming shop, what happens? We have a different variety of stuff in things. Okay. And then we can refine it more, but at least this dog is learning. That being touched all over.

[00:17:42] And handled this way. And maybe standing up, um, is important and it's not necessarily a cookie game. It's just hanging out with your dog and touching them with stuff while you watch a movie. So there are things that we can send owners home with. But if you are working toward helping a dog, be good for grooming.

[00:18:01] And you make the pledge to yourself that you're not going to just force this dog through. What happens is, is usually in about three grooming sessions. I can see dramatic change. I know somebody out there just went. What? How many growing sessions, three. Three. And usually it's about three. That doesn't mean this dog is totally trained.

[00:18:26] What that means is, is that we have made progress by doing grooming stuff and things and touching them all over with stuff and things. In a way that is not, um, pushing them through grooming, pushing them past what they can handle. If we can spend the time. And working on it. In three groomings. So sometimes I have owners as an example for us as grimmer. Sometimes I'll have owners say, I don't know if I have the time. And I'm like, I think that.

[00:18:56] If we started right now. In three months time. Right. Like they that's three regular groomings or six weeks. Maybe we're going to bring this dog in every two weeks. Let's say it's six weeks. I'll have them write on the calendar six weeks from now. And when that date comes and goes, say your dog could be totally be doing so much better by now, but you didn't start.

[00:19:19] And you know what that calendar date goes by a couple of times and their leg. If I had started, maybe I wouldn't be dealing with this problem anymore. Okay. I do it a lot with my dog owners when I'm doing lessons, things like barking and stuff. I'm like, man. In two weeks, you could have had a very different dog. So write it on your calendar because you'd thought you didn't have enough time, but here you are with the same problem over and over and over again.

[00:19:43] Groomers are you sick of the same problem over and over and over again? It's because we've accidentally let that happen. Don't let owners force you into doing beautiful trims on dogs that aren't prepared for it. Well, I know, tell them the same and know you're going to say when they want you to trim over mats.

[00:20:05] No, that's not in your dog's best interest. So if we can help this dog feel comfortable with it, maybe send the dog home with homework. I'm gonna play the coffee table game. You just spend some time calm, comfortable, cooperative, just goof off, touching your dog all over with stuff. Right. Send them home with some work.

[00:20:24] It'll help a little bit, and then we're not going to force them through trimming anymore. We're going to actively pay attention and try to keep them calm, comfortable, and cooperative so that we can see real progress so that when we grim this dog, Every four to six weeks for 15 years. 15 years. Most of that time will be a dog who's comfortable with it.

[00:20:48] Okay. If we can spend a couple of groomings that maybe we don't get things done perfectly in the beginning. That's okay. Think about it, the beginning. When you're first learning something. Right. It doesn't look like the finished product. Okay. We're not saying to not groom these dogs. We're not saying to not trim their nails.

[00:21:07] We're saying to back off now so that we can trim their nails for their entire lifetime so that we can do beautiful grooms for their entire lifetime. If we back off on those. The real strictness of making them beautiful and perfect. Now. And work on their behavior and work on what they need from us.

[00:21:27] Then we can work toward perfect later when they're comfortable with it. Because that will happen.

[00:21:34] If you want more information. You can contact me through creating great grooming dogs.com. I teach at the Whole Pet Grooming Academy, that's wholepetnh.com where I teach the Master Groomer Behavior Specialist diploma program. And the first class of that is "Behavior And How It Relates To Safety."  I start a new one about every eight weeks. That's an online course. Anyone around the world could take.