K-9 you believe it! - Eric Beck - Beckin' Call Dog Training affiliate of Lorenzo's Dog Training Team.
To current time and place in November of this year we had the privilege to bring home another boy named Fred. Now Fred is a 3 year old Bull Mastiff. He has been in and out of fosters and shelters most of his life and due to a need to re-home him once again, I refused to let such an amazing boy back into that life. So we started the initiation process of introducing him into our pack. That seemed to go very well after a couple very supervised meetings. We then brought him home permanently. And for 2 weeks we seemed to be making progress with Fred's trust and inclusion into our home, while understanding it can take months to fully settle in.
We did notice that while Waylon was interacting with him well, there were definite signs of dominance/boundary setting. Then one Friday, the 3rd weekend in November the wheels came off and Waylon snapped. He first went after Fred, then a day later went for Shandi, and then once again went back to Fred where he was literally on the back of Fred grabbing the back neck meat, trying to get him down. We of course then separated and segregated our home for everyone's protection and safety. Of course tension and emotions were high, it was a horrible time in our home. To be transparent even in our marriage, as we faced conflict with each other on the status of our dog pack and family.
After being completely devastated and feeling absolutely defeated and confused as to where did we go so wrong? And why would this happen, when they have everything they need, toys, treats, beds, food and water, companionship etc.?
I sat in my dark living room alone, processing. Now, not sure where you are in your faith walk but I just asked God to help. I began on Sunday night of that same weekend at like 8pm at night blindly searching for answers on the web, ultimately focusing on a professionals help. Again, this was a Sunday evening at like 8pm at night. I will preface with I never do this. So I never fill out the online "free consultation" prompts BUT THIS TIME I DID.
Enters in - Beckin' Call Dog Training - Eric Beck, affiliated with Lorenzo's Dog Training Team.
As I live and breathe today, I completed that free consultation invite and 10 minutes later, Eric was already calling me. I was truly shocked, and as I heard his voice on that initial call, so balanced, calm, concerned and wanting to help, it's like a peace came over me.
He asked more detailed questions, then proceeded to say yes, this is not a good situation and stated safety is absolutely the most important thing right now. He confidently stated that he wants to help us and when was the soonest we could meet so he could further assess the situation. He would want to see the environment, our interaction with him and then Eric's interaction.
Again, blowing my mind we made a time to meet that following day in the evening. When Monday arrived I received a call from Eric at 4:45pm letting me know he had a change to his schedule and could come out sooner if that worked for us. I said how's 5:20pm, he said no problem he will be there.
Eric arrive right on time, entered our home, all dogs were crated or sectioned off and leashed for handling. From there all four of the dogs began to bark, cry and act out as if they'd never seen a person before. Waylon was crated right next to Fred and was staring at him like I'd not seen before. Eric calmly sat down seeing all the chaos and began to ask questions and then proceeded to request we take Waylon out and have him interact with the commands and leash handling. Now side note, since Waylon was a pup, along with Ben and Shandi they were on harnesses not collar leashes. So we then learned leash breaking is a thing.
Waylon was like we'd not seen him before, making these weird back kicking motions, completely distracted and not responding to any commands or communication. Both my husband and I had a very poor interaction with him at that point. Eric then said okay, and took the leash. He talked us through the entire thing, and what was going to transpire. Oddly enough at which time I felt a sense of peace he knew exactly what to do. He began the "battle" with Waylon, as hard as it was to watch and listen to the rest of the dogs go crazy I knew it needed to happen. All while this was occurring Eric remained unbelievably calm, direct and professional while understanding this was a lot for people completely unaware of this process. He was amazing, and was able to get through to Waylon in a very short time (which felt a lot longer lol) and Waylon finally submitted to Eric.
Eric then continued to advise us on his recommendation of a 2 week board and training being the only option at success because of the environment and circumstances. He explained what that looks like financially and procedurally, with training schedule etc. Eric then let us know and was very clear the success of the t read more