Positively | Victoria Stilwell | Forum

I haven't been on this forum in so long, wow. Things haven't gotten any better as I had hoped. If anything, they're just getting worse. He jumps and bites anyone who gets too close to me. He's a little better with my mom when she comes towards me slowly but he especially bites my sisters husband any...

Hi Deb, This is my first dog so I haven't had much experience with training dogs until now. When we first got him, he would cry even if I was in the othertheir room. He was only attached to me. I mean, when I wanted to shower, I had to wait until someone was home to stay with him (even though I was ...

Sorry for the late reply! Yeah I don't feel comfortable with him being on his own in a strange place. I am trying to see if my mom will be okay with him going to the daycare to play for the morning/afternoon so at least when he's at home, he's super tired (hopefully). My mom says we will be out all ...

Sorry for the late reply guys! Been busy with volunteering & family. Nettle, I think I've finally got my point across. It's frustrating because many times when my family wants to pet, or pick up Mickey, he growls. Today my sister said "whatever we want to do, he growls. That's what dogs do....

Today we went to the same people's house (my mom had to force me out) but before going, mom sent them a text saying I'm really upset with them because in my opinion, they know Mickey doesn't like it but they are just doing it because they know I'm strict when it comes to how people handle him. So th...

Nettle, for example right now we have some family over. Mickey went to greet one of them and she started holding him in the air. He kept growling and she would just say "no don't go". I waited. When I saw she wouldn't stop, I told her "he doesn't like that" and then she made him ...

Nettle, here are a few examples: 1) we take him to families house, they pick him up, he would keep growling. He hasn't bitten because of this so far but his growling got worst after this. At first, I used to not say anything, but I've gotten firm. Since he was from a pet store (I might get a few rud...

Yeah sometimes I'll see him just throwing his food around so once in a while when we see he's not eating, we throw it around as a game & then he'll chase the food and eat it. That's about it. I can't get him more food puzzles since he won't even look at it. His kibbles are pretty small but I've ...

Yeah, I'm using a dog toothpaste. Mint flavoured. Maybe since he probably doesn't like the mint, I should also change the flavour to chicken or something.
I'll try these suggestions, thanks!

I'll try, thanks! There's just one main thing that is really stressing me out right now. My sisters wedding is in June and we will most likely be out the entire day. Like from 3pm till 1am.. It's so hard finding a daycare we actually trust. I found one and even took him for an evaluation (he passed)...

Do you know why he might be making those weird hacking/coughing/choking sounds? The vet didn't seem too concerned but I'm still not sure. The only way I've been able to have SOME success with it is if I go super super slow and give lots and lots of breaks in between. Which will take at least 25/30 m...

Oh and to answer your question Nettle, he does not look underweight to me. The vet did not say anything either. He has lost a pound or so but that's about it. Right now, he weighs at around 6.5lb. I do think that that's underweight for a Maltese at 1 year old but I'm not so sure. Ever since having h...

Mickey had a visit with the vet 2 days ago for his ear & as soon as the vet saw his teeth, he said he needs to have them cleaned professionally. So they did that the same day. This was the first time bringing him to this vet. The last vet was a pretty busy vet and he had no time to let Mickey ge...

I'm going to try these suggestions. I just hate how as soon as friends & family find out the way we are training him, they go on and give their negative opinions making me feel guilty. We were not free feeding him for quite a while. Then the comments started rolling. "You're going to make h...

I will definitely try the hand signals. My mistake was, I'd ask him to lie down without a treat in my hand. Once I saw that he wasn't doing it, I showed him the treat and lured him down with the treat. I've never thought about rewarding from the other hand but I'm going to try, thanks! It's super sa...