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Schedule Anxiety

Separation anxiety is a well-known condition in the dog world, but the term is often used to explain away any anxiety. In reality, dogs can have anxiety over many different scenarios – just like humans. A dog with separation anxiety often cries or barks, displays destructive behavior, and will not eat specifically when left alone. Some dogs only have anxiety when being left, but a dog with a tendency toward being anxious requires specific training and understanding. We want to teach the dog that there is nothing to be anxious over. If they are afraid of a vacuum, we can use counter-conditioning to help reduce that fear. If they are afraid of visiting the vet, we can use desensitization to make the vet less scary. An easy mistake to make with an anxious dog is to put them on a strict schedule. "Don't use a schedule?" you ask, "but everyone knows schedules and structure are good for dogs!" This is true! Sort of… Structure is extremely important when training your dog. It falls under the category of consistency. You should have consistent rules for your dog, such as when or if they are allowed on the furniture, what behavior is expected when a visitor enters the home, how to handle seeing a squirrel, etc. Your dog should understand exactly what is expected of them in any scenario they may encounter. The tricky part comes when humans follow a time-based schedule.

If you always do things at the same time every day, your dog will get used to it. They will know when it is time for breakfast, dinner, walks, bed, or anything else you always do at the same time. This can be nice on a day-to-day basis, but the problem comes when something changes. Maybe you have to get up early for an appointment and feed your dog early before you leave. Maybe you want to sleep in because you've been working hard all week. Maybe you want to go on vacation to a place where your dog cannot come – or even a place where they can. In each of these scenarios, your routine will change. If your dog has a tendency toward anxiety, even the slightest change can have a huge effect on their behavior. Changes in routine can add up and make things worse. Say you need to have surgery. You will still be home with your dog during your recovery, so you don't have to worry about separation anxiety! Yay! Everything should be fine, right? Maybe not. Your dog will know if you are in pain, or acting differently because of medication. They will notice your change in physical abilities and need for extra rest. They may become anxious because of those things, alone. There is not much we can do to help with them noticing these things and coping with that anxiety. But if we also have kept them on a strict time-based schedule that is now broken, we have set them up for an extra layer of stress. This is called trigger-stacking.

We can all become trigger-stacked at times. This occurs when multiple stressors that are minor all add up. An easy way to understand is to think of a day when you woke up late, stubbed your toe getting out of bed, spilled your coffee, ran out of gas, had to deal with difficult customers at work, forgot to pick up that one thing you needed from the store, and you get home. You walk in the door and your partner says, "Hi honey. What's for dinner?" You explode. You let out an aggravated sound and yell that you just need 10 minutes to yourself! Your partner didn't do anything wrong. Nothing truly terrible happened. You just had a bad day because everything added up. And you took it out on your partner. This is what it's like to be trigger-stacked. A very simple way for us to try to help our dogs not experience trigger-stacking when something in our lives changes, is to make sure they are used to things changing in the first place. If breakfast always happens in the morning, but never at the exact same minute, and walks always happen before bed, but not at exactly 7:30, our dogs will learn to be flexible. They will not experience an extra layer of anxiety simply because daylight savings time ended, or you happen to have a day off. They still have structure. Their needs are still met. They learn to trust that these things will happen without getting caught up on when.

If we teach our dogs that we will always meet their needs, but in our own time, they will be able to relax. You absolutely should give your dog structure! You should be as consistent with them as humanly possible. You should teach them to trust you. But you also need to teach them to handle change. After all, the only thing we know for sure in life is that things will always change, eventually.