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A topic of conversation that usually comes up is separation anxiety. I dealt with this problem with two of my dogs. Yes, one of them Snickers. Separation anxiety is something that may not be entirely preventable and is something again that you can change by spotting the early warning signs or triggers in your dog.
Dogs usually have a very strong emotional bond to their people. It is why they seem to do just fine when being removed from their litter. It is also to be said that studies have shown that they never forget their litter or their mom. The reason they never forget is that they have their memory linked to smell in their part of the brain. When a dog or a puppy see someone that they've had fun with or a positive experience with early on. They remember them through smell most of all. The interesting part is it doesn't matter how much time passes they will act the same exact way. The reason is the dog will do what it did in that moment of it's life. Snickers my dog for example did this. When he was a puppy my oldest brother was in graduate school and earned an internship to Kansas City. Snickers was very young but they had super positive experiences during this brief time. One puppy thing he used to do was urinate everywhere. Out of excitement. A behavior he grew out of as he became like a year old. About 5-6 years later. My brother came to visit my home and asked if Snickers would remember him. I said in theory yes. So when my brother came in I had Snickers on a treadmill and then he looked over at him and let out a bark. Next he smelled my brother and then I had a 90 pound puppy urinating and going nuts trying to play. It was as if the smell had brought him back to being this crazy puppy jumping and peeing everywhere. Snickers seemed to have no control over his emotions. This goes to my main point of the story. Dogs are mostly reactionary. They need us to help them associate positive things in our environment. When the connection is made they'll never forget and never go back unless something disrupts that process. Like if my brother would have hurt him in some way on his visit home. That would've disrupted Snickers and would now have a different reaction to my brother.
Why is that important when it comes to leaving the house and stopping your dog from howling or being destructive while you're gone? Well your dog has at some point associated you with leaving and coming home as a sign of stress. Maybe in the beginning it was when you left. Then the dog started to tear things up and then when you got home scolded or yelled at the dog, maybe even hit the dog. Even though the dog has no idea what it had done to the house. It now is scared of the owners return. So the dog feels trapped in a way. That the process will just repeat itself time in and time out. The hard part is how do you correct something that you're not there to see? How do you disrupt that pattern?
One way is like is said in the beginning is to see where your dog is unsure or showing signs of acting different. Sometimes it'll be with you grabbing your clothes for the shower. Maybe putting deodorant on. It also could be grabbing your keys. That's usually a big one. If you see signs of your dogs demeanor changing. STOP or take a note and work with your puppy as soon as possible. It's often times these subtle things that turn into big things. If it's when you grab your keys then set the environment up in away that you when you go for your keys and see the dog change.... you just wait. Wait for a more calming behavior. As soon as your dog acts uninterested mark the behavior with the keys. Then pet and love your doggy. Once you do this and your dog sees the keys and associates them with affection. Then it's time to work with the actual sound the keys make. This process is rinse wash repeat until you're completely out the door. Once out the door and your dog is calm when you leave.. Now it's time to work on that good old return home. If your dog has had anxiety after leaving and not show anxiety at all during that process but shows signs of tearing things up. Then most likely the dog was bored. The anxiety would then be triggered by the greeting of the dog that day when the owner saw everything tore up. In the dogs mind it is confused. Do to it not knowing he is the cause of the destruction. You see, they only comprehend most things in the now, the present. They're super reactionary. So when you are upset with them on the coming home. Of course they'll cower because they don't know what is happening. So if everything is all good when you leave and your dog is basically finding a spot to get comfortable then you've one the battle on the outgoing. First start out with like minutes of leaving like five minutes or so. Just standing quietly outside.. or driving the car down the road and coming back. When you get back observe the dog. If your dog is unsure then try not to engage. Wait. Let the dog roll through it's mind that nothing bad is happening. That you're not angry nor super happy. Your dog will change it's behavior to try and get a response. If it's more of a happy go lucky then shower them with love as the first actual engagement when you get home. Rinse wash and repeat when you get home. The dog will take less and less time to get that affection. When the dog starts greeting you like that you are golden. Then you can start to apply some extra training to stop the jumping.
Dogs are genuinely happy. We are their supply of happiness. When this gets ruptured it is usually a breakdown in communication that stems from us expecting them to understand us more than we do. We are the more emotionally intelligent species even thought it's most certain that when they feel things, they feel them stronger than we do. This is do to the dog not being able to adjust it's brain and regulate their feelings. For example when you go to your kids friends party and there's cake. Your kid is stoked right? Now if it was his/her party they'd have trouble sleeping that night. Waking up super early asking how long until their party. See a dog if he learns to associate with cake. He would act the same way if it was his party or someone elses. That's why they don't judge. Love is love and on some level they can experience love, happiness, sadness, anxiety, and anger much stronger than we can do, to no filter being put on the dogs brain. It is our responsibility to make sure they're constantly sure of us and they're doing the right thing. Just like us we like to know we did a good job. They love it too. IT'S HOW YOU TEACH YOUR DOG TO BE HAPPY GO LUCKY!!!! So understand they're way more conscious to little changes in the environment. Once they associate with something negatively they will need help to overcome it. They cannot rationalize that you'll be coming home in a few hours or that you'll give the toy back tomorrow.
I hope this makes sense to you. For more on how a dog associates with it's nose. I made a 6 minute video of how the mom wolf will interact with its pups to teach through smells. If you like the video there are more on my channel. Please subscribe and you'll hear and see more as I talk instead of having you to read;) Enjoy your day and as always I appreciate you reading and hopefully you take away some little nuggets to help with your dog.