Leave the shirt on. It should help calm him faster even though you didn't get it on him before the storm started. With Teddy, he still likes going to his place on the couch with his blankie, but he doesn't shake or pace when he wears the Thundershirt.

It stopped the shaking so far it seems! And he just took the food from me so he's definitely calmed down. He did go back under the bed though for now! But at least he seems more chill.

Awww I thought Jackson was tough! Can you take him out from under the bed and play with him to get his mind off the thunder? At least you are getting some use out of the shirt!

Glad to hear he is relaxing. Being under the bed isn't such a bad thing. I think as long as they aren't trembling and stressed, it is better for their health. :)

Nope, he's a big baby, LOL. No really thunderstorms don't usually bother him and he was upstairs with me about an hour ago with light thunder and was fine, laying down in the bed with me and my lil sister just hanging out. But then there was a few loud BAM's! and he ran off the bed to the gate shaking like crazy, that was when I quickly slapped the thundershirt on him, lol.

He won't play when he's in that scared mode... he doesn't care about toys that much but food I think I can definitely distract him with. But I think he's okay under the bed for now. He will hop up when he's ready (sometimes he falls asleep under there first anyways so it's not totally abnormal).

The Thundershirt does not overcome the spookiness of my bedroom during an electrical storm. We had a fairly spectacular lightning show last night and it was lighting up my vaulted ceiling. Teddy was okay at 2 am wrapped in his Thundershirt, but I woke up to him crying at 4 am. :( I brought him down to the family room couch and he relaxed. Long night.

Jackson hopped up on my bed around 2:30am and started rubbing around so I took his Thundershirt off, lol. But it seemed to help during the worst of it. He was fine the rest of the night once the storms calmed down.

I can't decide if it's too big on him or not... lol. When looking at the other pics of your guys dogs, it just looks smaller than it looks on Jackson. I saw Pet Valu selling them the other day so maybe I will go try an XS on him just to see. I mean, it definitely was snug but I stretched the velcro or whatever all the way to the tightest it could be.

Brit, judging from your pictures, there seems to be a significant difference in size between XS and Small. The Small covers a lot of Jackson. I was wondering if the additional coverage makes the Thundershirt more effective.

For Teddy, the XS is sort of short in length and short in the neck area, but I'm pretty sure the Small would be too large to fit tightly around his torso. I'll try to post pictures later. Another case of being in between sizes. :rolleyes:

We received our Thundershirt for Izzy a couple of days ago. Today we tried it out on her while we were vacuuming. Mind you, Izzy totally freaks out over the vacuum cleaner, but she seemed much calmer even though she went and hid. However, you usually won't see her for 1 or 2 hours after vacuuming, but today she came back downstairs as soon as we put it away. As far as I'm concerned, that's an improvement for her.

Pixie woke me up this morning around 5 am shaking. A minute later I heard the thunder. I put her on and 10 minutes later she was in the back of my closet laying down. I put a soft crate in there in case she wanted to sleep in it I fell back to sleep and when I woke up ay 8:30 I didn't see her so I looked in the closet and she was sleeping in the crate. I definitely think it helps. I won't know how much until she is over whatever she is going though right now since she is hyper sensitive.

I tried Chester's thundershirt yesterday. I think it is too small. The reason I say that is it rides up on his upper half. It doesn't stay in place very well.

Anyway, my roommate had a friend coming over, so I put it on him ahead of time. They came in and I didn't hear a peep out of Chester. Normally he barks (in a mean way) and jumps. I was so surprised!!

Finally got around to taking pictures of Teddy in his Thundershirt. He is 11.5 inches tall and long. This is the XS on him (he didn't have his bath because we have had thunderstorms off and on):

Yummm, lunch:

Attachment 349549

Attachment 349550

Whether or not it fits properly, it works. :thumbup:

Teddy looks so proud in the first picture!! It looks like how it fits Cooper. I think it fits, but regardless it works for us too!:thumbup:

LOL, I think he is saying, "I wub you mommy for giving me lunch!" :p You should have seen him on our walk this morning when we heard a big thunderclap. He ran over to Max and put his head under Max's chin. It was so sweet.

Very sweet. Does the shirt seem to calm Teddy?

Definitely. It helps a lot, although maybe not as well as it does for Cooper. At least he isn't shaking and panicked. I don't have the shirt on very tight in that picture because I wanted him to be able to eat comfortably.

I'm also realizing that the Thundershirt not only helps when he's wearing it, but it seems to be reconditioning him. It has been thundering here all morning and I have NOT put the shirt on him. He's acting normally. I've been seeing this occur more and more often lately where he's just becoming more comfortable without the shirt.

I saw the same kind of conditioning in Teddy for a long time, but last night and today he seemed to revert to his old ways, so I brought out the Thundershirt.

Reviving this thread.

Uni is fine with t-storms, but I wonder if this would help my fosters. Chloe is a barker, she barks at nearly everyone who comes in the shop. The door beeps when it opens, maybe that scares her? and often times she is just sitting there shaking slightly. I don't know why. At home she seems just fine, this is just at work. I thought maybe she really needed to pee or something but not really. Then Smokey has anxiety when I leave and he can't see me, he starts crying a lot. Even if I am in the next room, if he can't see me he'll start to cry. Do you think the shirt would help them?

I wonder if this would work for Rizzo's people and big dog anxiety... I may have to give this a try.

I am hoping it will help my Sassy with anxiety, she starts jumping at the gate at night to wake me up so I will come in the sunroom with her. Still waiting for DH to agree, he thinks it would not help her at all.I know they will return your money but not sure if she wouldn't try to chew on it to get it off.

I finally got Sassy a Thunder shirt on Sunday. I put it on her short periods of time on Monday. Monday night I put it on her at bedtime, she would not lay down in her bed and acted like she felt trapped and didn't want to move. I went to bed but stayed awake making sure she was ok. She slept good until 1:30 am then she woke up and started jumping at the gate, I waited an hour before I got up. She was fine when she saw me and I took the shirt off. Tonight I put the shirt on her and she trembled the whole time and acts like she can't breathe. It seems like she is afraid to move with it on. My husband took it off of her because she seemed scared. Is this normal behavior? I want to relax her but it makes her nervous even if I am with her. I am really hoping this will help her. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

We found Thundershirts at Petsmart this weekend. The smallest size they had was a Small, and from their chart it looked like Layla would need at least an XS or smaller. They said they didn't get anything smaller than a Small in, and they didn't know when they would get more, or if they could guarantee a smaller size will come in the next shipment. Since there's a money back guarantee anyway, we thought we'd try the small and bring it back later if it didn't work.

We put it on Layla when we got back, and it's long on her but seemed to fit pretty snug at her chest (her chest and front legs are more muscular than most dogs!). She went to lay down immediately, but she didn't really relax. She just panted a lot. We used it the next day in the car, and she was still panting and screaming. We used it this morning in the car too, and she usually will lay down and relax, even sometimes fall asleep while we're on the highway but will freak out in the city... but even on the highway she seemed uncomfortable, fidgity, and would not stop panting. Actually, we put it on earlier this morning so she'd be used to it when we got in the car, but she refused to move and eat her breakfast while it was on.

Maybe the size is too big for her, or maybe it just won't work because of her paralysis, because she can't feel most of it :confused: I really wanted this to work :(

Thunder Shirts
 

Just bought both my 'senior' yorkies, 15 & 13 their Thunder Shirts for the main purpose to help with their anxiety. They are bearly 4 lbs and wear the XXS size, it fits them like a glove. They are much calmer, noise don't bother them, and the storms are nothing to them now. I wish I got them years ago. They are guaranteed, if they don't work, bring or send them back. The returns are donated to rescue dogs.
My oldest is blind, so the shirt helps her to be more confident with her issues of not being able to see where she's going, she seems to walk along a little faster. Her sister, younger one seems to not bark as much and seems calmer also. Don't forget to give a treat when you put it on them, like it says in the video. Here are my little ones pictures with their Thunder Shirt on. I highly recommend them !

They are adorable! I'm so happy the Thundershirt works for them and even helps boost confidence. We are big fans as well!

Sadly, it didn't help my sisters dog. :(

Ginger recently got a thundershirt. For her, it works some. We had some serious storms the last couple of days and she wore it. She still was trembling and had to be with me. Wasn't quite as bad as usual but almost. I'm hoping it will get better with time.

Ginger has also been wearing it on her walks. I think it helps more in this area for us. She seems more confident and doesn't act as crazy as she has in the past.

i also got my little oscar the xxs thundershirt. it fits him perfectly. i got his to wear in public because he gets very nervous when we go out. i conditioned him first to wearing in the house then i took him out to the pet store and he was much calmer and actually let someone pet him ( a miracle )..

It worked for Jamie during the fireworks show on July 4th. Usually she gets crazy around fireworks. This year she went nuts for a couple of minutes, then calmed down and seemed to really enjoy the show. She wears the xs but she is 10.5 pounds with a 15 inch chest. Fits her great. Got the pink one!