This monday I took him on his very first walk, he is 4 months old, will be 5 on the 20th. It was a long walk, me and my girlfriend took him to a park nearby and he had loads of fun, honestly I think he did really good (It's my first dog though so I have no point of reference). I've been talking him on walks every day since
However, his behaviour at home has gotten way worse and keeps worsening, the only thing that calms him down is going on a walk, then he'll be fine for the next few hours. Biting, jumping, barking for seemingly no reason, it's a mess. His behaviour while on the walk has also gotten worse, but I guessed this would happen, he was probably so stimulated and distracted during his first walk he couldn't even think of misbehaving, he still jumped and barked at people/dogs but he does a lot more pulling now and picks up a lot of garbage, he also just up and took his harness off yesterday right next to a busy street so that was really fun.
All that is very annoying yes, but I think probably the worst part of it all, is how ABSOLUTELY IMPOSSIBLE it is to put the harness on him. I get it, he'd probably rather not have it on, and he gets really excited when he sees it because he knows he is going on a walk, but he completely loses his mind, he seems aware that he has to stay still because he tries to sit down but he can't contain himself.
I walked him on our backyard a few times before and it was difficult to put it on him but not nearly this much. I would put a treat on the ground and tell him to stay still, then i'd put the harness on him and once I was done i'd let him have it, it worked alright and a couple times he actually did it perfectly. But now, he won't listen to anything, he'll bite our hands and the harness and fight us with all he's got. It takes so long to get it on him, especially because when putting it on he always grabs it with his mouth making it so it can't close, I take it out of his mouth and he just grabs it again. It's impossible, the only way to do it is restricting his movement fully, closing down his mouth and holding his head. I know it's not comfortable, I know it will probably only make him more and more neurotic, but there's legitimately no other way, if I don't hold him down to put the harness on he just won't go for a walk. Will he ever realise that he's only ruining it for himself by fighting us? Will he understand that if he just chills out for a second he gets to go out quicker? What can I do to get him to calm down.
submitted by /u/Sc4tt3r_
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