It’s all good until it’s not!
- Oct 15, 2025
- 8 min read
This blog entry starts from a super nice session.
We worked on ZEN - the forward focus with a platform and I felt Seraphina was really making a super progress with it. The reason why I find it important for her is that it’s a great way to learn how to ignore “background noises” which I know with her - cause her some stress and higher alert emotions. Focus with her is not something that comes as naturally as it did with her dad, but it only means I would have to work harder and it will make sure that I’ll cover all the training methods and techniques to teach her all about the fun of focusing, so in the long term - I am sure it will be even better for her.
After playing with ZEN it was time to play with the toy. And we did the delayed reward exercise with her favourite tug ball. It’s crazy how much she loves this exercises and how good she is becoming in it. I love watching how she is wagging her tail while ignoring the toy and how excited she is when she hears me say her keep going signal. I am really proud of her for that.
After some silent followups I asked for actual commands which were a bit harder for her but she did her best!
When I felt delayed reward was too much with the tricks I switched to tricks with the toy in my hands and she was doing that absolutely great! I know some tricks are still not so exciting for her but either way - she is trying super nicely to be correct and I have to give her super big credit for that!!!
When I felt she was too focused on the toy in my hand - I changed again to the delayed reward and after a few repetitions I could see that it was starting to be too much for her, so I started changing exercises to work on her self control and make sure she at least tries to cooperate, even when she is a bit more tired and whenever she did - I gave her the break and we just had fun with the toy!
The next day it was Rhythm’s birthday and I spent most day with him celebrating! But when the evening came - I made sure to have fun with Fina with a fast pace session;
First we did some backwards repetition with only cones instead of platforms… not because she was ready, but because I was too lazy to move the heavy platforms around…her line is getting so much better with this, but still the road is going to be very long for us in this trick.
Then we changed to a conditioning exercise where she has to control her movement while performing a change from sit to stand and vice verse.
Here it’s not only about her, but also about how I show her to move with my hands position and body weight. Funny thing is; I love accuracy but I totally get bored when working on positions so it’s a huge challenge for both of us to complete these behaviours. At this point it’s still not a high difficulty because there is a big surface for her - but the goal is that the hind legs would stay static and won’t move at all when she changes between the positions.
When the “boring” technical part was done - I changed to our around the cone “favourite” exercise with food. She is making a HUGE progress with this one too. But on the other hand - she was able to crush my face once more. I cannot explain how hard it is to keep calm when it’s so painful - but I honestly think that if I would say or do something that would show my disappointment or anything like that she would stop to even trying to cooperate - so who cares about my broken face?
When I finished with that exercise I tried to do a small sequence with her without any food or toys next to me and she did so I made sure to run and bring the toy as a MEGA reward! And then we just played with it, did some tricks and enjoyed with the tug ball.
On the following day we had a really nice afternoon together.
The first exercise was a nose touch with a platform and she showed some real power with it. After the nose touch I was so happy that I just messed around with her and had fun trying some funny tricks which she doesn’t even know yet and rewarded her for just paying me attention and being sweet to me.
I also went back to the exercise from the night before for backwards with only the cones to see how she handles it when the environment is a bit more busy with noises. at first it was a bit harder for her but it wasn’t too long before she understood it’s “working time” and gave herself into it.
After the short food sessions we changed to the toy to play with delayed reward and she was PERFECT 100% of the time!!!!!!!!
The next morning I wanted to do something that we didn’t do for a long time and work her rear legs target “STEP”. I realised I didn’t put so much work into it as I planned to so when she was younger because I was struggling with her concentration throughout sessions, among other things….
So I brought an easy platform to try and see hoe it goes - and she was actually pretty good with it. After a few repetitions, I went to another exercise and worked the around the cone and my main concern was to keep her happy and joyful about the training because I saw her a bit distracted with the environment.
Then I brought the toy, and we started with ZEN to the ball. She did it super well and I wanted to challenge her a bit with a focus change, so if first she had to focus on the ball, now she had to focus on me even though the ball was on the ground, and while it was really not easy - she handled the challenge like a PRO and made me the proudest dog mom ever!
When the evening came, I tried to work with food, but at the first minutes of the session she was really not with me. It’s not that she didn’t do what I asked for, just her energy wasn’t connected, and of course, it made me think again about all the things I am doing wrong with her, and wonder about my abilities as her handler but I had to get myself together so that it doesn’t ruin our session completely. And luckily I was able to.
I kept it not too hard to minimise frustrations and eventually after a few minutes of working tricks I brought the ball to reward her for trying to keep up with me.
With the ball it was a different story. He concentration was there of course and we could just have fun together and enjoy the evening. I started to work with her on catching the ball from above her (as preparation for heelwork reward placement) and then did some tricks and fun moves together along with some delayed reward and other funny stuff.
The ball really saved the day in this session !
On the last day of the summer holiday I took her to the shopping centre to work in front of EVERYTHING; shops, kids and their parents and basically the most noisy environment possible.
It was a not so good idea because it was a bit too much and it even stressed me out, but I learned from it for next time for sure.
I had the toy and the food and the leash and I was super messy because my mind was already imagining everything that could go wrong and honestly, it was just NOT FUN for me to be in the situation so I can only imagine how Seraphina felt.
Again, for someone watching from the side, it may look great because it’s a young puppy doing what she’s told in a busy environment, but for me it’s about the emotions, the harmony and the bond - and in this case - I felt it was all off.
It took me a day to recover from that before I could work with her again
Short session with backwards, just to explain the ending position of the trick in a straight line in front of me, followed by some tricks that were even enough to distract her from the noises around us of kids walking through our street on their way to school. I wished for something more and better but I got what she could handle and do, and this was and still is my lesson; to accept her as she is.
After this session I wanted to rest. I felt as if my energy was drained. As if my whole body was tired, but I didn’t know why. It was hard for me to believe that I am so tired just because of a not so perfect training but I decided to rest from Fina anyway until the next day and worked only with the other dogs during that day.
When the morning came, I still didn’t have the energy to train her, and it stayed that way until afternoon.
On the first part of our session, I worked on nose touch from different positions and she was really incredible.
Next I worked with her on her front paws control. Giving a paw without moving the rest of her body. Figuring out how much power she should use while stretching our her paw and she was trying so hard to be good and had many successful attempts.
The last part was tricks, some of them with luring, some without, some with repetitions and some without. I felt like she also needed that resting day between trainings because she was so WITH ME, and finally I felt like “OK, we have this”.
Some of the tricks we did with with social rewarding followed by treats and I made sure to show her how proud of her I was!
The next morning, I took her with me to a lesson of my student who is also the owner of her granddad. I wanted to take advantage of the environment and the fact that I can control most of it and work with her on her reactions to me outdoors and help boost up her confidence.
It was super hard for her to concentrate with me at first but once she figured out that its much more fun with me she was happy to come back to me. We also worked on going to someone with command and coming back on the recall. Her main challenge is to keep the concentration, but the first step; getting back once she got distracted already improved so much even just during this session.
After that I placed her in a crate while I was teaching and at the end of the lesson she ran around with my students pack and had some play time.
It was such a good day, really… I was so proud, and I was filled with hopes about everything we can do together once I manage to solve this issue…
And then… as I arrived home, I started feeling ill….
Like really bad…
And within a few hours I couldn’t move anymore and was totally sick.
I took a test and discovered it is COVID ……
Well….
It sure gave Seraphina more than enough time to rest between her last session and her next one.