Tug Dogs

I think it’s best to start off with a short story. When my partner and I adopted Kylo, we went into the adoption wanting to provide a home for the breed we love, knowing there would likely be some baggage that came along with him. However, we didn’t realize just how much. After just about 2 weeks of having Kylo home with us, we saw just how much the world (and strangers) scared him. After an incident with a bite with our neighbor, we started to worry that we had made a horrible decision. We thought that we couldn’t give him the type of life he needed, one that was away from the city — and it broke our hearts. We saw how sweet and loving he was towards us and our other Mal, but once we stepped out of our home, he became overwhelmed with fear. As a last resort, we contacted Tug Dogs telling ourselves “if this doesn’t work, we may have to give him a new home”. But boy, oh, boy are we lucky we found Michelle! I credit her and the training she instilled in not only Kylo, but in us, as single handedly the reason Kylo is still with us today. We learned through the lessons, online and in person, what Kylo is seeing every time he steps out into the scary world. We were able to see what WE were doing wrong and that through patience and routine, we could provide him to become the confident dog he is today. I don’t think we will ever be able to fully quantify the impact Michelle and Tug Dogs has done for our family, but we hope you know just how LUCKY we feel to have been a part of this experience with Kylo. With all that being said, we plan on having our other Mal, Harley, go through board and train and we know she’ll come out an even sweeter, well-mannered little lady! Things we particularly loved: • Kylo trusted Michelle from day one — a perfect example of who she is as a trainer and her ability to give the dogs what they need to gain their trust • Michelle was available for consultation whenever we needed it. There were a handful of times we wanted her advice on things (meeting new people, adventures outdoors, interactions with water, etc) and she was so responsive to any of our questions • Holding us accountable — I appreciate that she didn’t let us off the hook. That’s something we ENJOY when building a strong foundation with Kylo and it paid dividends in the end • The impact of the fundamentals. While it isn’t always obvious, the fundamentals of training (walk and feed, eye contact, active ignoring, calm petting, etc) is what makes for a well-trained dog! We appreciate that we can use those to approach any situation head on.