The score at the end of the first scrimmage stands Yorkie 1 Amgene 0
Seriously, though, you are letting her win. And the more she wins, the more convinced she will be that she has every right to be out when you are gone.
This puts me in mind of my youngest skinkid...at about age 2-3, he used to have falling-down hysterics when I left him at daycare. It traumatized me to see how he reacted to being left by me! Sometimes I would even cry on the way to work
Then one day I had to park around the corner and walk to the daycare. Then I got back to my car, I realized I had left my car keys on the reception desk. I walked back to get them, expecting to see my hysterical child still prostrate on the floor near the door. Nope...he was in one of the playrooms laughing and playing with another child.
I learned a lesson that day...he was hysterical only as long as there was a chance I might change my mind and give him what he wanted. Once I stopped feeling guilty and validating him by saying things like "Oh, I'm sorry my baby, but I have to go to work..." (implying there is another option), his attitude improved too.
What I am getting at here is that you have given in to her and she remembers. The behaviour that got you to give in was for her to get hysterical and have a screaming mimi of a temper tantrum. She had a tantrum, you gave her what she wanted. The only way to stop that is to stop giving in. As long as she has food and water and something to entertain herself, she will be fine...
A caveat here---I have a rescue dog who came to us with a severe case of separation anxiety. He'd been bounced from foster home to foster home and, unknown to us, separated from his littermate with whom he had lived for 6 years. He would howl from the time we left the house until we returned...non-stop.
The solution was a playmate. We got another little dog and once they got over their initial antipathy towards each other, they are inseparable. And he has not howled once since she arrived. If your pup is a rescue, it may have some trauma in its previous life you know nothing about...but if it is not, then she's just found a way to push your buttons to get what she wants from you. Just like a two-legged kid! |