# Three month gotcha-versary



## banzai555 (Sep 2, 2019)

I know 3 months probably isn't a thing but it feels like a win. 

Willow is doing very well overall. She is sooooo much less leash reactive than she was, she "leaves it" when I tell her to (including with a white-tailed deer that walked out of the bushes literally 10 feet in front of her this morning), she even walked up to a stranger at the dog park the other day and let her pet her. She tolerated a super annoying little fox terrier that kept barking in her face and jumping up to nip at her ears, merely sidestepping with a look of amusement and then running off. Her leash reactivity is definitely a "BUT I WANNA PLAY WITH IT, MOM!" 

She's even doing better in the truck and car....still whiny, but not quite as bad now. And we had our last day at the check station yesterday, and she did so well---still uncertain and a bit skittish, but she's come a long way since I got her. 

Willow is super vocal with her little groans and whines, I love her little bronco-bounce when she's excited, she plays tug with me now which she didn't do before, and her face/ears have sooooooo much personality. 

Granted, she's started shedding like mad again, my house has a vague corn chip smell lately, so I vacuum a lot more now...but that's ok. We still need to work on patience (both of us), I still don't trust her loose in the house since the garbage incident, and she's developed a really bad habit of running into my legs from behind at a dead run or body-checking me while we're out on walks/playing....I'm wondering if she has vision problems, honestly. But overall I feel like things are good, and hopefully will just keep getting better! Here is a pic of both of us a couple of weeks ago at the check station, when a professional Brazilian photographer randomly stopped by for the day (he was doing a piece on hunting in America).


----------



## MineAreWorkingline (May 2, 2015)

Glad to see that time and patience is paying off!


----------



## Kazel (Nov 29, 2016)

Congrats! Sounds like you've made a ton of progress! That's really good and if I were you I'd celebrate 3 months as things are getting better! 

As far as body checking goes she might just not be respecting your space. I teach all of my dogs not to run into me while playing as it can really hurt and lead to a bad crash. Just a quick ah-ah too close whenever they run full speed at me while playing and they start respecting my space and go around me or slowi down and trot up to me if they want to say hi. I've noticed pretty quick turnover on better manners on that. 

Also to the corn chip smell, if it's coming from her it could signal some sort of yeast/fungal infection. Could be from an allergy of some sorts probably food. I'd sniff her paws and ears maybe to find out especially if they've been bothering her at all.


----------



## Aly (May 26, 2011)

Great photo of the two of you. Every day is a 'win' in my book, so three months calls for cake and ice cream. Congratulations, you're clearly doing a good job.


----------



## banzai555 (Sep 2, 2019)

Kazel said:


> Congrats! Sounds like you've made a ton of progress! That's really good and if I were you I'd celebrate 3 months as things are getting better!
> 
> As far as body checking goes she might just not be respecting your space. I teach all of my dogs not to run into me while playing as it can really hurt and lead to a bad crash. Just a quick ah-ah too close whenever they run full speed at me while playing and they start respecting my space and go around me or slowi down and trot up to me if they want to say hi. I've noticed pretty quick turnover on better manners on that.
> 
> Also to the corn chip smell, if it's coming from her it could signal some sort of yeast/fungal infection. Could be from an allergy of some sorts probably food. I'd sniff her paws and ears maybe to find out especially if they've been bothering her at all.


Thanks...yeah the body-checking doesn't happen super often, and most of the time she'll run past me with no problem...so it's hard to predict when she'll do it. I do give her a very sharp "NO!" when she runs into me and she definitely reacts to it. If I hear her coming behind me I'll move over and try to give her more space to pass. 

The corn chip thing....I had read it was somewhat normal for their paws to smell like corn chips, and yeah we've had snow on the ground for the last week or so so I figure it might be worse because of the extra moisture everywhere. But I'll keep an eye on it. She doesn't otherwise act like she has any allergies---doesn't excessively lick her paws, but she does shake her head pretty often so I'm trying to keep an eye on her ears. I felt a small lump on the outside of her left ear close to where it meets her skull, about a month ago, but it's covered in hair and I can't really see it so...don't know what it is but will keep an eye on it. But she doesn't scratch excessively or worry it, just shakes her head like she's being tickled.


----------



## GSDchoice (Jul 26, 2016)

Love the picture of you two!

Dogs often play with eachother via body slamming/jumping on eachother, so it could be that she thinks she's "playing" affectionately with you? But I think the NO as a marker will work! 

I think I've gone nose-blind...I can't smell my dog at all. I am pretty sure he is not odorless though.  

And whining less in truck/car...maybe it's just turning into "old news", not so exciting/scary/disorienting anymore...?

Sounds like she is settling in nicely!


----------



## Aly (May 26, 2011)

GSDchoice said:


> ...
> 
> Dogs often play with eachother via body slamming/jumping on eachother, so it could be that she thinks she's "playing" affectionately with you? But I think the NO as a marker will work!


Don't bank on the effectiveness of 'No." I had one female that thought body slamming me was a Fine Game. She _only _did it in the snow, but she _was _wicked enough to be unpredictable about _when _the body slams would happen (e.g., not today, maybe tomorrow, maybe next week). No didn't work, even choice curse words didn't work and I know a bunch. Worse, she even had the nerve to come up and give me kisses as I lay sprawled in the snow...:frown2:


----------



## Kazel (Nov 29, 2016)

banzai555 said:


> Thanks...yeah the body-checking doesn't happen super often, and most of the time she'll run past me with no problem...so it's hard to predict when she'll do it. I do give her a very sharp "NO!" when she runs into me and she definitely reacts to it. If I hear her coming behind me I'll move over and try to give her more space to pass.
> 
> The corn chip thing....I had read it was somewhat normal for their paws to smell like corn chips, and yeah we've had snow on the ground for the last week or so so I figure it might be worse because of the extra moisture everywhere. But I'll keep an eye on it. She doesn't otherwise act like she has any allergies---doesn't excessively lick her paws, but she does shake her head pretty often so I'm trying to keep an eye on her ears. I felt a small lump on the outside of her left ear close to where it meets her skull, about a month ago, but it's covered in hair and I can't really see it so...don't know what it is but will keep an eye on it. But she doesn't scratch excessively or worry it, just shakes her head like she's being tickled.


I wouldn't move out of her way personally. I'd teach her to respect your space. It can be a really useful skill as you can really get hurt by them knocking into you, they happen to be right at knee height. My dad has bad knees and my pup slammed into him hard right into the knee he's gotten replaced, before I got him good at respecting space. Basically whenever she comes too close when going 80 miles an hour let her know it's not okay. You want to get after her before she runs into you not after she does it. Teach her to stop it before it happens basically. 

As far as the corn chip smell I've only ever had it with dogs with some sort of issue. But it does seem like it can be a normal thing reading up into it. Some dogs just shake a lot but shaking her head could be an indication she has an ear infection or other issue. My boy doesn't scratch at his ears but he shakes his head a lot when they're bad. 

Hopefully though it's all normal and she's just acting and smelling like an every day dog does


----------

