my boyfriends dog is a burden

Just because a dog acts remorseful after they are disciplined does not mean they have any fucking clue why they are being disciplined. That remorse is remorse for being disciplined - in other words Fear and anxiety that this other animal, that stands on two legs, is larger than me and has opposing digits, who provides me with food and shelter is angry at said, remorseful dog.

You can literally punch a dog in the face as it is shitting on your carpet and it might not have the faintest idea why you just punched it in the face, because all it's mind contains in that moment are "I really have to shit" and then "OH MAH GOD I'M BEING ATTACKED BY THE ANGRY BIPED WHILE I'M VULNERABLE AND SHITTING!" In other words, imagine you're in the toilet, taking a dump (the whole world is a dog's toilet by default) and a creature twice your size comes crashing through the door and screams at you in a language you cannot comprehend. Would you be scared? Would the expression on your face resemble remorse? Would you feel more guilty? Or would you feel sheer horror and fear for your life? Now imagine the giant creature wanted you to perform some different behavior before you sat on the toilet and took a dump, but the creature had no way of communicating that behavior to you in an intelligible way, so you had to constantly worry about taking a shit, because you just don't know if or what the hell the giant ogre wants you to do before you evacuate your bowels?

You have to stop attributing human-like thought and reason to these dogs. Dogs do not think the way humans do, they experience emotions, but not with the same level of complexity, or for the same reasons. They are at the mercy of their own instincts. So if one dog shits or pisses on the floor, it's pretty hard for a dog to resist to want to cover that scent up with his own shit and piss. Dogs thrive on routine - if they're in an environment of chaos and uncertainty, they will resort to instinct, and instinctual behavior can be a problem when it comes to pets in the home.

 

U got bad dogs u live with but they arent yours?

Move out.

Get a nice clean apartment- no dog shit or piss or hair or slobber

Then you can look forward to coming home! And thats worth a lot.

Or open the front door and call in a anonymous complaint to the animal control ppl about two viscious dogs on the loose?

 

If a dog is five years old and getting worse.... You need to look at what you're doing, not the dog. You need to learn about dog training.

Now, I'm pretty sure it's wrong to hit a dog..... but isn't it sort of stupid to hit a pit? You don't want to teach them to think in terms of violence, of course it messes with the other dog -- you're trying to train a dog bred to be an unpredictable fighter, by hitting it.

 

so what did you end up doing?

 

Ever heard of POSITIVE reinforcement? If you beat the shit out of me I would be the worse damn dog I knew how to be.

 

Ma'am, it is with honest respect that I would suggest that, given the patience that you have for this dog, you wait before having children. If you are loosing your patience with this dog, you have no idea how crazy a kid can drive you.

 

Seriously! If you can't handle an unruly dog, how will you cope with a toddler? Are you going to beat your kid too?

 

....and before anyone without a kid says that kids don't do that, YES, they will attack and hurt your pets (even without meaning to), they will DESTROY your house and make a mess of anything they can if you so much as take a piss, they will do much worse than growl at your neighbors and humiliate you in public (they have no sense of shame, but on some level, understand that you do, and if you let them, they'll use it against you) and much much much more.

And just like dogs, if you "discipline" them aggressively, they will act remorseful, but not even REALLY have a concept of what they did, and will act out even more and learn to feed off of negative attention, and it will cause emotional problems that will be MUCH more problematic than your dogs emotional problems.

 

About the dog, it sounds like the three of you could benefit from taking a dog training class together. Your vet should know where some are. Or contact your local free school or look up dog training in the Yellow Pages.

 

First of all, I dont compare kids to dogs. Dogs are jUst animals to me, I can get rid of Them if they give me too many problems. Kids, especially mine, ill work And work with. Of course! That love wont go away.

Im just tryin to make a point to my boyfriend. If she growls at little things, she'll bite at the little things.

we havent done anything yet. My boyffriend refuses to see the problem and gives her excuses. I told him you're goinG to see the end results of your ignorance. As for now, I keep telling him to give her to his ex

I told him if she does bite me, im moving out. he said if she bites someone, he'll get rid of her.

I dont want to wait til a bite happens. In general, im not a dog person. So I dont want to give her the attention she thinks she deserves
I meant to type more...

this is the only thing we argue about. I have a lot of patience for everything. And i do phrase her but she gets no better.

I guess me and him are on different pages with dogs. I dont care much for them. he thinks their his kids. I love max because he isnt a bad dog. he knows if he fucks up, he will get yelled at, marley just thinks shes the ruler of everything. I hate it

just tonight i went to wake pete up, barely touching him and she growled at me. I cant stand it anymore. but i devoted so much of my time here, that im not leaving cause of some bitch dog.

 

You need to train the dog. He needs to acknowledge that it needs trained. Its not a bad dog, just an nonsubmissive one. For the growling over food, take her food and keep it out of reach. Make her do somethi g to earn it, then work your way up to taking it while shes eating. Then take it and give it to the other dog while she sits and watches. If she growls, it gets put back up and the process starts again. Aggression cannot be tolerated. Take her toys and bones randomly to show that you are the boss. Dont let her on the couch or bed with you. Dont give in when she bugs you unless it is to go potty or something. Give her treats when you are about to do something that triggers hee aggression, like waking up your dude. Give her a treat when she sees people or other dogs. And for the love of god, get hee fixed if she isnt.

 

It sounds like a problem is the normal one:

Human expectations.

The dog has NO idea what's going on, what you're saying (99% of the time) and the only way to change this is slowly, with trial and error training. And sometimes you can't even show the dog what you want, you simply have to wait for them to do it, if you want it to work.

I'm currently training my chihuahua not to lick people. Yelling at her makes her look sorry, she crawls towards you with her tail between her legs.... and licks you to say sorry for licking. If you tell her she's good for not licking, she licks to celebrate, and show that she's good. So, I'm buckling down, and doing nothing at all. If she licks or gets in my face, I get up, and go away, or sometimes give the other dog attention instead. It's been 2 days, and she hardly licks at all, and if she does, I simply give her no attention unil she's been lick-free for a few minutes.

Obviously this is a little thing. But it's an example of the consistency and patience needed.

And if you don't see the attachments people have to dogs, and think you can just have someone get rid of their dog, how can you have kids and understand those attachments, or the massive amount more work and patience that kids take?

 

I feel sorry for those dogs...Even the one that meets the standards to be loved is subject to fail at some point.

Embreezy, what you are suggesting should be done when a dog is young or by someone that really knows what they are doing...NOT by someone who is basically greatly irritated by (hates) that "bitch dog"/isn't a dog person. Taking food or anything away from an adult dog that already shows agressive tendencies toward the person you are suggesting take the food or toy away is stupid, imo.

 

Didn't you say this dog is a pit? I think your boyfriend should find it a good home. Normally I wouldn't be in favor of getting rid of a dog because dogs really aren't hard to train, but if your boyfriend babies the dog and refuses to train it and you don't like dogs and won't train it then it deserves a home that will give it direction. Not to mention an untrained pit bull showing aggressive tendencies is basically a ticking time bomb.

 

Do the dog a favour and give it away to someone who is going to love and care for it. Your problems aren't a dog problem but a pet owner problem. Do you think this dog can't feel your agressiveness toward it?

 

Problem with stacy is of course that she is not the owner guys. It sounds like the dog would be gone for a long time otherwise. It's really bad that the guy who owns a pitbull or similar breed doesn't take his full responsibility, it is what gives other owners and the dogs themselves a bad name. To be honest I never digged pitbulls and the like and I am definately a dog person. Some dogs just need more discipline and attention (wich does not mean yelling and more obviously giving in when the situation gets too intense)

 

Shoot it.

 

A baby in a house with untrained dogs? Bad shit coming. This whole deal is pretty sad and those dogs need homes with people that have at least,a lick of sense. From what I've seen and with whom I've lived over the years, experience has shown that not many women will take the time to actually make sure that a dog is trained. Don't know why that is--but it seems to be true. So that eliminates one from the household that knows or cares anything about dogs. The other is eliminated because he is the "owner" and has done nothing in the right way to fix the situation. Therefore,I'll repeat--bad shit coming ---eventually. For the poor dogs and the clueless people. PLEASE-PLEASE,don't bring a child into this mess.

 

After reading the OP's comments, I feel inclined to share my pit bull story as well.

In 1991, I went to the Humane Society to adopt a dog. I didn't intentionally set out to adopt a pit bull, but there was a gorgeous 6 month old chocolate/white pit bull/lab mix that was just absolutely begging me to take him home. I filled out the adoption paperwork, and the Humane Society had to come for a home visit to ensure I wasn't a renter and that I had a stockade fence around my yard. The adoption was approved, and I brought my dog home with me.

For the first four months of ownership, this dog was an exemplary canine citizen. I enrolled him in obedience school, he picked up the housebreaking routine within the week of bringing him home, he was perfect on (and off) the leash.

But then, something changed in the dog.

I was taking him for a walk one day, and had let him off the leash for a bit to burn off some excess energy. When I noticed another owner walking a dog in the distance, I called my dog back to me to put him back on the leash. During the recall, my dog started running towards me, and as he came closer to me he gave no indications of slowing down, and launched himself directly in the air at me. All that came to mind to do was put my hands out in front of me and block him. His head hit my hands, and he crumpled to the ground, and got back up again like nothing had happened. The incident shook me up to say the least.

Two days later, I was out running errands with my dog, and when I returned to the car he was all happy to see me and climbed over into my lap. I gently pushed him back into the passenger seat, and watched (seemed like slo-mo) as he curled up his lips and beared his teeth at me, and bit me directly in my arm, completely unprovoked.

The next day I took him to the humane society and had him put down.

This is a breed I would never choose to own again.