Eliminating Fear through Desensitization

Anxiety is a bully that needs to be removed in order to have a balanced dog. Before your dog can learn how to deal with its anxiety, you must be able to define what it is you and your dog are doing to keep that anxiety alive. Once this is defined and corrected you can begin to eliminate fear systematically. One of the best methods for this is desensitization. By exposing your dog to the things they fear, deliberately increasing anxiety short-term, you free him/her of that fear long-term. This method forces your dog to accept and tolerate the things that needlessly bring fear, causing future anxieties to become less severe and pass more quickly with each session until your dog learns how to remain calm and conquer its fears.