There are plenty of articles online about separation anxiety. Most recirculate the same advice that’s been around for many years; some of these recommendations are sound and stand the test of time, while others are sadly out of date or just plain wrong. Completely withdrawing your attention from your dog, for example, is more likely to create stress, frustration, and other problems than it is to cure a separation issue. Then there are the sites that make it sound as though separation anxiety is something that can be cured in “5 Easy Steps.” Naturally, that involves purchasing the handy-dandy, fix-em-quick manual that’s instantly downloadable. If only it were that easy.

The truth is that separation anxiety is a challenging problem, and one that gives even experienced trainers pause. I can only imagine the confusion and frustration of the average dog owner who gets conflicting advice from trainers, television, and the internet. Although I’ve been successfully treating dogs with separation issues for the last twenty years or so, I never truly understood what owners go through until we adopted Sierra. Not only that, but Sierra was such a non-typical case that pretty much all of the standard protocols and advice…well, let’s just say she hadn’t read those books. So I had to come up with creative alternatives.

The first few weeks were extremely tough, and one day when I was standing in the kitchen venting my frustrations to my husband, he turned to me and said, “You know what this is—it’s your next book.” I won’t repeat my response to him at the time, but as it turns out, he was right. Don’t Leave Me: Step-by-Step Help for Your Dog’s Separation Anxiety was the result of the combination of my personal and professional experience. The reason it’s in a workbook format is because I know how unwieldy separation anxiety can feel, and I also know that just being able to hold a workable plan in your hands helps to vanquish that feeling of helplessness, and instills hope and confidence. The book reviews and emails from owners whose dogs have been helped by the book warm my heart and make me grateful for the opportunity to combat some of the more questionable information that continues to circulate.

Although I still love presenting my seminar on Helping Fearful Dogs (another topic that’s very close to my heart) and others, this year I’ll be rolling out a new presentation called Two Timely Topics: Separation Anxiety and Dog-Dog Play. The morning is all about new and creative ways to help dogs with separation issues. Although it’s based on my book, it goes farther with even more tricks, tips, and new approaches. The dog-dog play half is extremely video-intensive, and I was amazed when sorting through the endless hours of video at just how much the human eye misses when watching interactions in real time; the slow motion playback segments of the seminar are truly eye-opening. I’m hoping to see a lot of you trainers, owners, and other dog folks at these seminars, and to get the word out that separation anxiety can be treated effectively in a humane and compassionate way.

Bodhi, who we adopted from a shelter at the estimated age of a year-and-a-half—prime time for PDS to manifest—came to us with a severe case. No, the treatment wasn’t antibiotics or bed rest; it was training, and a mega-dose of patience. The shelter had told us Bodhi had been turned in by a college kid who could no longer afford his upkeep. Judging from Bodhi’s behavior, it was easy to believe he’d been raised in a frat house. Hell, he probably hogged the remote and used beer kegs as Kongs. That first week, I couldn’t walk across a room without him blocking my path, jumping on me frantically, and repeatedly clamping his jaws around an arm or nipping at my legs. This wasn’t soft mouthing, either; it left bruises.

Another way Bodhi’s PDS manifested was that whenever I’d go to pet Sierra, he’d thrust himself bodily between us in an attempt to keep all the attention for himself. Yep, he had it bad. So what’s a dog-Mom to do? First, instead of allowing him to block me, I body blocked him. I certainly never kicked him (no, not even the “Cesar kick”), but instead shuffled forward as though my feet were glued to the floor. Bodhi quickly learned that trying to impede my progress just wasn’t going to work. As I claimed the space, he surrendered it by moving away. As for the charming jumping/mouthing combo, I leaned slightly forward while giving him a hard stare and uttering a low, guttural, “Eh-eh!” That might sound harsh to some, but something had to be done. It certainly didn’t traumatize him, but it was an effective punishment, as it quickly decreased the occurrence of the behavior.

As for his pushiness when I would pet Sierra, I decided on an acceptable alternative way for him to solicit my attention; to lie down. Of course, I didn’t expect Bodhi, in a flash of doggy genius, to come up with the idea on his own, so I showed him what I wanted. I taught him a down. Then, any time he approached while I was petting Sierra, I immediately cued him to down. He was then rewarded him with a most spectacular tummy rub. The result is that now, many times when I’m on the floor petting Sierra, I’ll hear a thud behind me. It’s Bodhi, flinging himself to the floor and rolling onto his back, waiting for attention. It’s pretty funny, but it’s also a beautiful thing.

As for Bodhi’s PDS, we still have a ways to go, and he may always have a trace of it. But we’re working on it. So take heart, friends, if your dog has PDS, patience and training is just what the dawgter ordered.

The “stimulation” as it is sometimes called, began at a very low level, and moved up through level 8, at which point the shock became too painful to proceed any further. The sensation was described at various levels as akin to a mosquito bite, static electricity, a bee sting, a painful slap, and…well, one that elicited an exclamation I can’t reprint here.

At a certain level of shock, although the prongs were against her wrist, one of Frances’ fingers began to twitch. This makes sense, given the nerve pathways’ ability to conduct electricity—we are electrical beings, as are dogs. It does make me wonder, though, in what other parts of a dog’s body the shock is felt, and whether the pain is localized to the neck or if it travels. She also mentioned that it hurt more each time. Do dogs become more and more sensitized when shocked multiple times?

Perhaps most interesting was the comment that was made after a few of the tests that the pain lingered on for a few seconds afterward, then gradually faded. Even if you were a proponent of shock collars, you’d have to admit that if this is the case with dogs as well (and there’s no reason to think it wouldn’t be), pain lingering on after a correction is pretty sloppy training, not to mention cruel. (For the record, I don’t recommend citronella collars for the same reason.)

I’m sure some people will watch the video and thinkm Oh, but you wouldn’t just put a shock collar on a dog at that high of a level. Why then, I would love to know, do shock collars even go up to such insanely strong levels? Naturally, some dogs are more sensitive than others, just as people are, but at some point it becomes obvious that a particular sensation is going to cause serious pain to the majority of recipients.

Another important point to consider is that during this video, the trainer controlled the remote; she knew when she was going to receive a shock. Dogs don’t know. Pain combined with lack of control and the element of surprise is much worse than pain that is self-administered.

I commend Frances Dauster for doing what I certainly would not have done. Perhaps watching this video and hearing the description of the pain at various levels of “stimulation” will stimulate some to throw their shock collars away and “train with your brain—not pain.” You can check out the video for yourself here. 

While most conversations are pleasant enough, some are difficult at best. I recently got a call from a woman who had a five-month-old Labradoodle and two young kids. Predictably, the dog was jumping and nipping at the kids. The family wanted the behavior stopped, yesterday. Pretty typical stuff. Then the woman went on to tell me what she had tried so far: a spray bottle; “clamping the dog’s nose;” and, finally, “hitting him as hard as I could.” I was silent for a beat, processing that last one. She continued on to explain that when she hit him, the dog thought she was playing, and just got more amped up. I was silently grateful that the dog hadn’t been traumatized. I maintained a calm, friendly tone as I told the woman I could hear that she was very frustrated; that I was sure it’s difficult to deal with two young kids and a rambunctious dog; and that I knew she didn’t want to have to resort to hitting the dog that way. She agreed completely. We chatted a bit longer and, thankfully, she ended up setting up an appointment.

After I hung up, I suddenly burst into tears. It’s not a reaction I’ve ever had before—in this business, I hear about disturbing things on a regular basis, and I deal with it. Maybe I was just having a rough day. The thought of someone hitting a dog “as hard as they can” is pretty awful in itself, but that hadn’t been the only troubling dog-related behavior I’d heard about that day. That same morning, a trainer friend had told me about two young men—big, burly guys, from her description—who had a young Aussie mix puppy with them at a basketball court. The pup was behaving very well, lying calmly at the edge of the court as they played. My friend was walking her two dogs in the surrounding park area, being careful to maintain enough of a distance so as not to be distracting. At some point one of her dogs barked, and the puppy stood up and trotted off a few feet to investigate. One of the men immediately yelled at the puppy to get back there and lie down. The pup skulked warily back toward him, but apparently it wasn’t fast enough. The man grabbed the pup by the collar and dragged it across the asphalt, yelling close to its face all the while. My friend didn’t feel she could safely intervene, but she felt terrible, as did I, just hearing about it.

These are certainly not the worst examples of the abuse dogs suffer at human hands—believe me, I’ve heard a lot worse. But this type of thing happens so often. These are just two more examples of the kind of low-level abuse that goes on daily, in millions of homes, in the name of training. And the truth is, most of these owners are not terrible people; they’re frustrated with their dogs’ behavior, and don’t know how to get compliance any other way. It’s ironic, because just like the dogs, they just don’t know any better. Just as we train dogs gently and kindly, we trainers have to keep our cool with owners regardless of the awful things we might hear, in the hopes of changing the person’s behavior.

In any helping profession, it’s easy to get burned out. All we can do is to keep on having respectful conversations, and keep on putting the education out there. And so, that one emotional outburst past, I go back to keeping my balance on the fine line of hope that at some point the tide will turn and positive, gentle training methods based on cooperation and communication will become the norm.

I had been trying to get Bodhi to chase a ball. He’d begin to run after it, but would stop halfway. I tried again, with the same result. This wasn’t like him. Soon enough, it became apparent that he had other business on his mind, and he soon contributed to the dog park souvenir collection (which, of course, I promptly cleaned up—who wants bad karma?). It got me thinking about a friend, a trainer who has been working long and hard on teaching her dog a solid retrieve. She trains gently and very well, and she and her dog have both been enjoying the process. But I wondered: If it had been me teaching Bodhi the retrieve, and it had been very important to me that he brought the ball back this morning, would I have become frustrated? Would I have insisted that he do it, or would I have given him the benefit of the doubt, thinking that maybe he had a good reason for not complying?

We soon left the dog park and took our usual on-leash stroll along the winding pathways of the larger park. I like to allow my dogs to sniff and explore, but as I also like to remain upright, teaching Bodhi to walk nicely on leash has been a necessity. I don’t mind if he walks out ahead (we have a separate cue for him to walk by my side), so long as he doesn’t pull. Teaching this adopted, previously untrained, wild and crazy adolescent malamute mix not to pull has been quite the adventure, but things have been going well. Then there came a point toward the end of our walk where Bodhi suddenly almost yanked me off my feet. Following his gaze, I realized that there in the distance was his nemesis, the black Lab who is Bodhi’s personal Darth Vader. I gently redirected Bodhi to walk away with me, and although he was reluctant, we continued on. But what if I had taken the attitude that my dog was defying me? It’s easy to see how that line of thought could lead to a correction. And would that have been fair? Sure, it’d be nice if we were at the point where I could expect Bodhi to give me 100% attention and behave perfectly regardless of what’s going on in the environment, but the reality is, we’re not. That we’ve gotten as far as we have, where he can still focus on me and comply with minor distractions around is a beautiful thing. I don’t expect him to go from 0 to 10 with no steps in between. Once again, it was a matter of giving him the benefit of the doubt, allowing that there might have been something outside of the norm happening that was causing his behavior. Assessing the possibilities before jumping to conclusions—giving our dogs the benefit of the doubt—can avoid needless frustrations and corrections. And, hey, it’s good karma.

Shelter:

1. Volunteer at your local shelter. If you don’t feel comfortable spending time in a shelter environment, participate in community adoption days.
2. Volunteer to take photos of shelter dogs to be put online.
3. Donate blankets, food, or crates to your local shelter or rescue group. Check the organization’s website to see what they need. Spearhead a blanket drive in your community.
4. Take it a step further: Ask if you can post a rescue organization’s wish list to your website, and/or make signs for local pet supply stores. Collect the goods and deliver them.
5. Offer a skill to rescue/shelter dogs: training, massage, energy healing, etc.
6. Donate a Kuranda bed. These beds are made of PVC and cloth, and keep dogs off cold, wet shelter floors. Through the program, you can purchase a bed from the website and have it shipped to your local shelter. I donated one of these to the shelter where I adopted my dog Sierra—why not send one to the shelter where you got your dog, as a thank-you for saving a life?

Foster:

7. Foster a dog for a rescue organization. Some will even pay for food and medical care while the dog is in your home.
8. Many dogs are in need of temporary shelter. Check into places such as centers for victims of domestic violence where family dogs may need temporary fostering.
9. If you are unable or would prefer not to foster a dog yourself, offer to donate funds to pay for a dog’s care while in a foster home.

When People Need Help, Too:

10. Banfield Trust’s Pet Peace of Mind program provides care to pets of those in hospice. To learn more and find out whether there is a hospice in your area, visit the website.
11. Help people and dogs in need at the same time. Organizations such as PAWS/LA help AIDS patients by delivering dog food and generally assisting with the care of their dogs. Use online search engines to find local organizations.
12. Volunteer to drive dogs of the elderly and disabled to appointments for medical care, etcetera, or become a volunteer dog walker for them—you’ll get the exercise benefits too.

Donate/Fundraise:

13. Got a talent or product? Donate it for fundraiser raffles.
14. Many homeless people with pets go to food banks for help. Donate dog food to your local food bank.
15. Prefer to donate to a national organization? Check them out on Charity Navigator.
16. Assist your favorite animal charity by having a virtual fundraiser. Use social networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook to spread the word. Websites such as FirstGiving will allow you collect funds online.
17. Do you run a business? Donate a percentage of sales to the dog-related charity of your choice.
18. Have a garage sale—better yet, get your whole community to participate—and donate all or a percentage of the profits.
19. Have a recycling drive. Place bins for cans and bottles in your office, local pet supply shops, etc. and donate the proceeds.
20. Organize a silent auction. Solicit donations from companies and from your community.
21. Spearhead a dog food drive, then donate the collection to your local shelter or food pantry. Get local pet supply businesses involved, too!
22. Create a product (like these great Puppy Mills Bite T’s that I love) and donate a portion of sales to dogs in need.
23. Set up a large box outside pet supply stores and ask for donations of gently used pet items such as bedding, dog toys, etc. Donate to your favorite group.

Education:

24. Set up a booth in your community to educate the public about spay/neuter. Refer to low cost spay/neuter clinics in your area. You might also hand out info on how to support the shutting down of puppy mills.
25. Get the word out about puppy mills. Check out Prisoners of Greed, and the Companion Animal Protection Society, which investigates pet shops and puppy mills (both provide education and accept donations).
26. Got an area of expertise? Set up a website and share your knowledge. Or write a blog on training, care, and other positive aspects of the human-dog bond. It’s easy to get set up on WordPress.
27. Write articles for local magazines and newspapers.
28. Do presentations for school kids on the importance of being kind to animals. Bring your own well-trained dog and dazzle ‘em with some cool tricks.

Internet and Social Media:

29. If you’re a web designer, donate your talents to local rescue groups. Help get those dogs online so people can see them!
30. Add a banner link from your webpage to Petfinder to help encourage adoptions.
31. Create a webpage for lost and found animals in your community, and post flyers announcing it at vet’s offices, dog parks, and other places dogs congregate.
32. Post educational material online via Twitter, Facebook, and other social media sites. Spread the word on worthwhile causes and campaigns.
33. If you are a trainer, donate your time to write articles or answer questions on dog-related websites.

Big Ideas:

34. Start a non-profit Pet Taxi service to help shuttle dogs to the vet, etc. for people who are ill or otherwise unable to transport.
35. Start a small rescue group; perhaps a specific breed, small dogs only, senior dogs, etc. If you are a trainer, train the dogs to make them more adoptable. (Now there’s a marketing idea: “Adopt a dog who comes already trained!”
36. Start a non-profit food pantry for dogs of the homeless and others in need.
37. Coordinate with your local cable station to set up a weekly show highlighting dogs in need of homes.

Miscellaneous:

38. Donate canine oxygen masks to your local fire department.
39. Take CPR training for dogs. Extra credit: become certified to teach it.
40. Many rescues need transport, especially when dogs have to be transported from state to state. Do a bit of Googling around to see how you can help.

Naturally, this story made me think about dogs. We often stress the importance of exercise, but I seldom come across conversations about how much mental stimulation is required for a dog’s well being. I can’t help but think about all of those border collies and other highly mentally focused breeds that are in the care of owners who don’t understand this aspect of their needs. Perhaps, just like Santiago, those dogs require a higher level of mental stimulation than others in order to remain well-adjusted emotionally. We do know that many highly intelligent dogs who don’t get enough mental stimulation invent activities for themselves, channeling that intense focus into projects their humans just don’t seem to appreciate.

Highly intellectual dogs need more than simply excavating a Kong or running through basic obedience routines. So how can we challenge them? One thing that comes to mind immediately is clicker training. What could be better for a super-smart dog than having to figure things out? Once a dog is clicker-savvy (click equals treat), the game is on! It’s all about figuring out how to make that human click, and it’s great fun for both parties. Although Mojo (my soul dog who has passed on) wasn’t what I would call mentally advanced, he loved learning new tricks with the clicker. Two of his favorites were “Say your prayers” and “Turn out the light.”

Another neat mental activity is to let dogs figure out how to get treats out of a complex treat dispenser. For dogs who haven’t done it before, the Aikiou (pronounced “IQ”) is a good product to start with: it’s a large plastic paw with four sliders that can each be pushed to reveal a treat, and a round disk in the center that must be nudged or pawed to reveal pockets of treats all around the circle. For more experienced or highly intelligent dogs, the Nina Ottoson toys are an excellent choice. They’re more advanced, and require dogs to figure out, for example, how to spin multiple levels of disks to line up the openings to reveal a treat. There’s one where a dog has to figure out to remove a large wooden peg in order to allow a slider to move, which in turn reveals the treat. There are varying degrees of difficulty, and plenty of puzzle toys to choose from. Of course, there are many other activities that also stimulate dogs mentally, including sports such as agility, K9 Nosework, and herding. We just need to match the sport to the dog’s abilities and discover what he enjoys.

According to the Santiago article, because intellectually advanced children are often ostracized, they try to act like everyone else by burying or switching off that highly advanced part of themselves. Researchers worry that “intellectual motivation, after prolonged decimation…becomes irrecoverable.” I hate to think that a dog with intellectual drive, who is motivated by learning, could end up languishing without proper mental stimulation, possibly even becoming depressed, or having his lack of needs being met manifest as behavioral issues. Santiago’s story is a good reminder to all of us to take the time to challenge our dogs not only physically, but mentally. There’s an old saying that a tired dog is a good dog, but I’d venture to say a dog who has been mentally stimulated is a great dog, and a happy, better behaved one at that.

I was commenting online the other day about how far Bodhi has come in the year-plus that we’ve had him. My friend Angela Wong in Malaysia responded, “Another testimony that patience, perseverance and consistency are some of they key factors in rewards-based training. Fear issues don’t just disappear overnight, just as how it didn’t develop overnight in the first place!” And you know, she’s right. It can be so difficult to see significant changes when you live with a dog every day, especially since big changes are normally made of a string of small, subtle changes that connect and build upon themselves. It’s easy to feel that nothing you’re doing is having an effect, especially when we live in a culture of instant gratification. But taking the long view, things do change.

It’s easy to forget that when Sierra first came to live with us after having been in the shelter four times, although she was sweet and friendly, she was also shut down in certain ways. If I gave the hand signal for stay, she’d cringe and look as though I was going to strike her. She was afraid or somehow unwilling to try to excavate a Kong, and I kept making things easier and easier for her (peanut butter smeared on a bully stick, for example), until she felt it was okay to try. She’s still a sensitive dog, but nowadays she knows a bunch of tricks, is a willing and enthusiastic participant in training sessions, and can get anything you can put into a Kong—frozen or not—out in no time flat.

My husband and I both suspect that Bodhi was abused. I’m the first to say that people jump to that conclusion all too easily when adopting a dog, but the way he’d flinch whenever my husband would move his foot just a bit spoke volumes. Bodhi was afraid of my husband for the first couple of months, but slowly warmed up to the point that now, he and Sierra good-naturedly battle it out for my husband’s attention each night when he gets home from work.

While on leash, Bodhi used to lunge and bark at other dogs. It seemed as though behavior modification took forever, and I changed tactics a bunch of times along the way, always striving to match the technique to what was needed at the time. The worst was when we’d walk both dogs together, as not only was Bodhi reactive, but Sierra would actually resource guard dogs who were at a distance, and would begin snapping and snarling at Bodhi. So whenever we see a dog coming, we create some distance between ourselves so as not to pass the dog at the same time. Over time, we’ve been able to close this gap a bit, although the behavior is still not to where I’d like it to be. I have to say, though, that Bodhi has come a long way in being able to pass by other dogs, and thanks to a few different men we see on our regular morning park visits who give him treats, Bodhi has now taken to going up to strange men to solicit food and attention. And many times these men have dogs—who Bodhi totally ignores! Okay, so the mugging for treats is not the best manners (and I do ask that they tell him to sit first), but coming from a dog who was deathly afraid of men, I’ll take it. And Bodhi can usually walk past smaller dogs fairly calmly now, although large dogs are still a bit of a challenge and take more wrangling.

Although I don’t walk around thinking about how far the dogs have come, maybe I should sometimes. If you’ve been working on a long-term behavior issue with your own dogs, maybe you should do. It’s true that patience, perseverance, and consistency are key. And taking the long view now and then helps to keep you motivated, and grateful for the progress you’ve made.

But what about reading dogs? Sure, we understand basic canine body language, and we know for the most part what a dog’s expressions and behaviors indicate. But it’s possible for everyone from the greenest dog owner to the most experienced trainer or behavior expert to make mistakes. Dogs are, after all, living creatures; it’s not like reading a temperature gauge or taking a pulse, where the answer is measurable and finite.

I remember once being at the computer when Bodhi came over, sat down, and gave me a meaningful look—you know, the one that can bore holes into your skull. Busy with my work, and assuming he was just bored and pestering me for attention, I told him repeatedly, “Not now.” Imagine how badly I felt when I finally left my office to find that his water dish was empty and probably had been for some time, especially after the bully stick I’d given him 30 minutes before had made him oh so thirsty.

Things can get dicier when we misread our dogs in situations that involve other dogs or people, especially if our dogs aren’t comfortable in those situations. Missing a subtle stress signal or a split-second flash of a mannerism can mean we don’t remove the dog from a situation quickly enough and, as a result, a more serious interaction occurs. This point was driven home recently, as I’ve been preparing a new seminar that includes half a day on dog-dog play. It’s extremely video-intensive, and the process of assessing all that video has been very educational. There is no way our eyes and brains can process all the nuances of play and communication between dogs; it just happens too fast. It really did blow my mind to see, during the slow motion playback, just how much I had missed. I bet that slow motion playback will open a lot of attendees’ eyes during the seminar as well.

Fortunately, completely misreading our own dogs doesn’t happen very often if we are tuned in to them. What I see more often is strangers misreading my dogs. “Oh, look, your dog wants to play.” No, my dog is stalking your dog, who apparently looks like lunch. Or the infamous, “All dogs love me” as the person approaches, even as you step in front of your dog to block any further interaction. It’s obvious to most that your dog does not love everybody, but some folks just seem to waft along in a cloud of blissful ignorance.

When others misread our dogs, we can step up and be our dogs’ advocates, their protectors. When we misread them…well, we can always do better the next time, and that means staying open to the possibility that our dogs’ intentions or behaviors may not always be what we perceive them to be. It means we continue our own ongoing education by being in the moment and practicing close observation of the amazing, nuanced signals and communication that is the language of dogs.

In mice that were genetically engineered to have a duplicate copy or two of GTF21 squeaked out ultrasonic distress calls to their mothers nearly twice as much as those with normal amounts of GTF21. And mice who had been engineered to be missing a copy of the gene were less vocal. As the article states, “This is the first study to show that some forms of anxiety may be linked to added or subtracted genes.”

When I was writing Don’t Leave Me: Step by Step Help for Your Dog’s Separation Anxiety, I thought about the possible genetic link quite a bit. I did list genetics as a possible cause, although finding research studies on the topic was nearly impossible. Author James Serpell states that “selectively breeding increasingly affectionate, socially dependent, and infantilized dogs may concomitantly select for excessive attachment to owners and intolerance to being alone.” This makes sense. And perhaps it’s even possible that in selecting for those traits, those GTF21 areas are being duplicated. We see the results of genetic selection in the temperament of the puppies we produce, but the truth is that we don’t know enough about the actual mechanism.

Of course separation anxiety can have many causes. Some are attributable to humans, such as bringing a dog home, spending tons of time with him, then leaving to go back to a regular work schedule. But what if separation anxiety is also found to have a definite genetic link? Is there a way to selectively turn off those extra areas of GTF21 so that separation issues could be lessened? Could we eliminate the excess GTF21 from breeding lines? Or will there be some sort of medication that could help by targeting that specific gene? Or, as Hilary Lane, who was kind enough to alert me to this article, says, “What if it backfires? If these dogs have the known genetics, will some euthanize them, thinking there is no way to solve the issue?” I certainly hope that wouldn’t be the case. After all, there are genetic components to fear issues, and to aggression issues as well. But even when we encounter dogs whose blueprint includes them, we can still make progress behaviorally. At this point there is no way of determining with certainty what caused a dog’s separation issues. But just as with other possibly genetic-based problems, we can still offer help and make life for that dog and owner a lot less stressful.