I attended a Handler Stress workshop April 18, 2015 with Rock Solid K9. I originally signed up to do the workshop with Mickey, but he has an injured Iliopoas (inner hind leg muscle/tendon issue). This will take several more weeks to recover.
Divine passed her Nose Work level 1 (NW1) trial January 2014. She has been more of a NW+ dog the past year. She can search the three odors, but since her trial, we haven't done a lot of work on converging odors, multiple hides, and inaccessible hides. We have done some container exercises with distractors.
The goal in this workshop was to add something extra to create a more stressful practicing environment for the handlers. This included distractions, giving different times for searches than is normal, add multiple hides with an unknown number beyond three, add a square zone where odor will not be in the square, etc.
My first challenge was to get over what we call in the service dog world, "second dog syndrome". When you have developed years of working with your first service dog, then you retire that dog and work with the new one, y ou are on edge because the new dog isn't as good as your old dog. You don't remember the growing pains you had with your first dog, you remember how you worked together, like a well seasoned partner. The bond is great and now to develop a new bond with the new dog is a bit unnerving. With Divine, getting her to NW1 level isn't that big of a task. But as you move up into converging odors and more complex hides, your ability to read the dog is at a higher level.
We will miss our first dog and while working with the new one, we start missing our first dog even more. We start to compare, which is unfair because we haven't invested the same amount of time with the new dog. After 28 years of experience in the service dog world, I have seen this issue a lot and with most people it takes a year or more to develop the working bond with your service dog. I am on my 6th service dog and each time there is an adjustment period, a doubt period, a frustration that you want it to be easy like you had it with your last dog.
Divine isn't a replacement for Mickey in Nose Work, Mickey is the dog I have practiced and trialed with the most. I am more comfortable working with him than Divine. I raised Mickey from a puppy, I didn't Divine. Mickey and I read each other well and we have a stronger bond.
The stress that came out of me in this workshop, was my ego got a bit tarnished because Divine and I are essentially new partners. We haven't put a lot of hours in Nose Work with each other. My ego would focus on that I felt I was performing with less finds than I would if I had Mickey. That terrible thought of, "oh I could have done better with Mickey" did creep in. It is hard to admit I did this, but I must confront it if I ever want to succeed with Divine.The frustration that I wanted Mickey there, as he was the one I had signed up with originally, was a mental process I had to tell myself "let it go, move on, you are working Divine now". Once I can get over that hurdle, Divine and I will succeed and have a beautiful dance together.
The first search was an exterior. It was in an area that it was partially under a overhang with several school benches that were made from a press of grates. It wasn't solid. The benches were put in an arrangement that you would have to go around to the other side. There were some folding chairs set around in the sun is a random arrangement. They were not there when we did our walk through. The addition of the chairs was to add a stress factor to our training. There was a some swirling wind. The temperature was warm, not hot. In the grass field nearby were a bunch of young kids playing soccer. They were noisy. We had trash bins as our starting cones.
Divine started her search by being attracted to the chairs. I don't know if odor was swirling there, but before long she went to the pole that held up the overhang, and indicated on the odor. Because she has indicated a foot or so away from odor in the past, I wondered if it was on the other side. I also do not have a lot of experience developing a gut feeling with her. So I did pull her off odor to go to the other side. She searched, went under the bench, and then indicated that "I can't get to the odor from here." Divine pulled me back around the benches and brought me back to the pole where the odor was indicated and I called alert. This did look bad like I can't read a clear indication. What is the hardest on this is I felt like such an idiot in front of everyone. I felt that my instructors don't look at me as a great handler, just someone that really doesn't get it. I wanted to scream but I have a title in NW3! I would have done so much better with Mickey. I can do this, I really can be a good handler! This voice screaming inside me, but I put on a cool face. No one knew I was crying and screaming inside. This is why I hate videos and this video was shown to the class at the end of the day. But again, I had to put ego aside, and look at what an amazing thing that happened. Divine pulled me around the tables and back to the odor. If that were Mickey, he would have gone on to something else, but Divine kept focus that she hadn't gotten paid on that odor yet, and she was determined to get that pay for that odor. To me, I find that rather amazing.
The next challenge was a container search in an auditorium with carpet. There were boxes and buckets, some on folding chairs and a few other items. There were probably something like 60 containers. When the door was opened and we went inside, coming in from the extremely bright sun, so the fluorescent lit auditorium, I did my instant panic of I can barely see. My eyes do not adjust fast coming in from a bright light. Then as my eyes adjusted a little more, I could tell there were 60+ containers on the floor. Oh wow! Divine has never worked that many boxes. I have done crazy stuff like this with Mickey, but not Divine. I knew if I had Mickey we could have worked through the issue, but with Divine, it was a bit of a panic. I let her go. She ran to a box, showed interest but then I called way too soon. Nope, that wasn't the box. The bucket next to it had the odor. We went on, and Divine hit on another box, and at this time I was really losing confidence in myself and a bit nervy. The "I'm not succeeding and I'm looking like an idiot" set in to paralyze me a bit.The instructor told me where the odor was and we started working Divine to treat her on the box with the odor. That box had a tin with 13 or 17 swabs.
After these two searches, I had a very bruised and punctured ego. I know I can do better, but I was just not doing well. I have been under difficult or unusual situations with another instructor with a different dog. I have trialed at higher levels. I had to really coach myself to get over my ego. I get too fixated in what others think.
Divine's issue of alerting on neighboring boxes have surfaced. We haven't been under a stressful situation in awhile. We haven't worked enough together to know how to work through this issue. I had to remind myself this is a learning situation to become a better handler, it isn't about pampering my ego.And although successes are good, we also have to be put under stress tolearn how to deal with them. That was the sole purpose of this workshop.
The afternoon we had two rooms and vehicles search. One room Divine went in and got one hide, false alerted on a desk and then about 5 seconds after time was called she found the last hide. Because the time was short, I jumped a bit on calling the desk instead of working it out.
The next room we were given 99 1/2 seconds. I couldn't stop laughing. Divine found 2 hides, however, there were a total of 7. I didn't know this until our debriefing. Normally with Mickey we either get all hides or close to all the hides. Again this really took a stab at my ego. I'm not a beginner, I can do th is, I know what it is, and no one looked at me as the seasoned handler, but someone fumbling. I certainly didn't show I was a seasoned handler.
But setting ego aside, Divine never done more than about two hides in a room before. She isn't aware that she can go and find several other hides. We haven't worked those issues. I have never done unknown number of hides with Divine. With Mickey, I have done blind hides of unknown numbers of 12 hides and he got them all. I am use to working multiple hides, but Divine isn't.
I thought because I have done unknown number of hides, I could work Divine through this, but when your dog isn't use to dealing with it, you will have problems if you don't realize how many hides there are in the room. Divine in her little mind we had success. In practice I will build her up to more hides slowly and I think she will do great. She just needs to learn the new game.
The vehicle hides were ok, we found 3 out of 4. The soccer game had a lot more noise. There were kids nearby playing with balls bouncing, which my hearing aids picked up fairly well. It did interfere with my concentration. I did get a little lost. I had worked hard with Mickey to not get lost in vehicle searches, but with a more experienced dog, it does make a difference. Doing this search with Divine we did ok. I don't think she has ever done more than two hides on vehicles. Divine during the day kept wanting to go back to the search area. Which is a good sign she really wanted to do more. So I don't think my stress issues affected her in anyway. Divine is less affected on my emotions than Mickey. She is more solid in that regards. That doesnt' mean she has no response to my emotions, she is just a lot less than Mickey, which is a good quality of hers.
I have a huge fear of performing in front of people. More so in a class situation than a trial. For some reason I can focus on a trial. In a class learning situation, I am much more distracted and on edge. When I have somewhat of a relationship with my instructors, I feel more I have to impress them. When an instructor thinks you are good, even their attitude is different towards you than if they think you are so so. All I ever want to do is be good at what I do.
At a trial, there is no impressing, just focus on what you need. Yes, I know that mind set would work in a practice, but when people communicate to me, it takes much more effort for me to concentrate. In practice, instructors interfere, I have that in the back of my head. At a trial, there is no communication or talking. You just do, they say yes, no or thank you. Once in a rare while you can ask to move something or have a question about an area, but that is rare. Generally you are focus, no interference of communication. When I am half worried about what someone is going to say to me, I am not completely concentrating on fully on my dog. In a trial, I just focus on my dog, become one and in zone with them.
My NW3 title I got with Mickey, the thought all day was "to make Mickey happy". The other two NW3 trials I didn't title with Mickey, I wanted to title and do well. With Divine at this workshop, it was "I want to do well". I took the focus off my dog and on myself. Wanting to do well is more ego. When I think I want to make my dog happy, we perform much better. If I think of making my dog happy, I will stop comparing with my other dog and realize I'm there with that dog in front of me. When I think of the more experienced dog, that is my ego taking over, which in the end ruins it.
At the end of the day we watched the videos of each student. Each person put on the spot. Some were trying to save face by excuses or other tactics to get off the fact that they messed up. I did the same. I did it lightly outwardly but was in pure panic and upset internally. Which really is a waste of energy and you do not learn as well. But it is a situation I have anxiety. This workshop made it loud and clear I still have major ego problems. I am still hung up on trying to impress and please people. If I can just get over the ego issues, I will really go forward with my dogs.My dogs feel the stress and know I am not completely focus on their success.
Nose Work is the sport of the dog, we do better if we leave our egos out of it.
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