Leaving Home Without Nina

When I returned home to find her greeting me at the door after her escape, I found nothing amiss in the house during the time she was out. Thinking that maybe it was just a crate phobia, I began leaving her out all day while I was at work. Everything was fine for a week or two. But gradually, I came to expect a call from her walker each day around lunch to report on what Nina had destroyed that morning before she had gotten there. Each time the destruction escalated and had no rhyme or reason. I had no choice but to crate her again. In desperation, I contacted my vet. What I decided after talking to him was that her earlier experience with my stepdaughter, compounded by me going back to work, had contributed to shape a tragic emotional disorder in Nina. His diagnosis was that Nina was suffering from a severe case of separation anxiety.

I did some research and found out that dogs with this behavioral problem are extremely stressed when separated from their owners. Dogs are decidedly social creatures and some can form morbid attachments to the members of their pack. When the owner is absent, susceptible dogs experience intense amounts of anxiety, resulting in disruptive and destructive behaviors. It is easy for the owner to jump to the conclusion that this disturbing behavior stems from the dog being spiteful or angry about being left behind. It is really more of a distress response, due to the pet's uncontrollable anxiety. Because the dog cannot control this behavior, it should never be punished for it. Verbal reprimands and punishment can actually make the dog more anxious, thus making the problem worse.1

In his book, The Dog Who Loved Too Much : Tales, Treatments, and the Psychology of Dogs, Nicholas H. Dodman reports, "about 4 percent of the 54 million dogs in the United States suffer from the wretched condition known as separation anxiety. In this condition, dogs become so closely bonded to their owners that they virtually have to be pried off them, and parting is not, as the saying goes, such sweet sorrow, but more of a living hell. Affected dogs are often gentle, doting, and sweet-natured, but the anxiety-related havoc they wreak in the owners' absence is sometimes misconstrued by the owners as being malicious, vindictive, or retributive.2 This description certainly fit

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