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I think its great that your dog is not dependant on you and that they are well adjusted and to be completely honest, before today I really thought Chloe was a bit more well adjusted too, I knew she was clingy but I really thought she was both. But apparently I was wrong and I did not mean to make her this way. Here is why I think my dogs got the way they are and you can tell me what you think: I work from home(with a doggie related business), all my friends are married and having children and we dont hang out anymore, and so my dogs are my family as well as my lifestyle. I just dont get out of the house much. My husband is very much a "homebody" and wont ever go anywhere. I am also shy and dont usually like doing things outside of the house by myself. Therefore its me, my husband and the 3 dogs in the house 24/7(well the husband works outside the home). I dont mean to spoil them and make them have seperation anxiety it just occured over the years with the way our environment is and our lifestyle. The girls are my life and my focus and I dote alot of attention on them. Ive trained them with simple commands like sit, stay, etc and when they were puppies I would try to take them with me anytime I went anywhere so they could get used to people as this is what I was told to help socialize them. But for some reason the older they got the less comfortable they got outside of the home. My chi is very anti-social and I think its rubbed of on CHloe. I agree that its not wise to purposesly train a dog to be "clingy". But this has happened to me with Chloe and now I am going to try to change it by trying a couple things suggested to me. Until my experience today at the groomer I didnt even realize she was as bad as she is. I knew she loved to be around me, and sicne Ive never left her somewhere before today how was I to know she would freak out and have seperation anxiety? I actually take her out of the house quite a bit, I just dont ever leave her somewhere without me. She just loves me and gets really excited I just figured she was hyper and she may not grow out of that until she is older.
I dont think everyone means to do this to a dog and it naturally occurs before a person can even realize whats happening. And actually at my home my girls play with each other alot, they dont need me all the time. And outside of my home Chloe does fine with other dogs, its people handling her that makes her nervous I guess, she just feels more comfortable with me. I have a small home and 3 indoor dogs, needless to say I dont have alot of people coming over so how is she supposed to get used to strangers and being somewhere without me? How can we possibly give eachother time apart? It was suggested to me to take her to doggy daycare but the closest one to my house is not that close and to be honest it scares the crap out of me to leave Chloe in the care of strangers. How do I knwo they will watch her and take good care of her?

So where did I go wrong as far as raising Chloe?