When I first started training my little Papillon, he was really good. It only took an hour and a half and he learned to shake paw, to lay down and to come here. I started out by giving him a small treat when he did what I asked, and then eventually stopped giving him treats and he still did what I asked. I worked with him for a couple months and now he’s got those commands perfect.
I recently started trying to teach him to sit. The first time I asked him to sit, he did it, but he got really upset. He started shaking like crazy and he ran away from me and hid behind the toilet. After I got him out from behind the toilet, he wouldn’t come near me for the rest of the night. I ask him to sit like once a day, I thought maybe once he got used to the word, and used to doing it then he would stop being afraid, but he hasn’t. He knows how to sit, but I have to ask him to sit 50 million times before he will do it because he is so upset and trying to get away from me. He won’t even take a treat after he sits, and he doesn’t care how much I praise him after he sits. After he runs away, I tell him to come here and he does, and then I ask him to sit until he does. He acts like I’m hurting him by trying to get him to sit. After he finally sits, I tell him to lay down or shake a paw, but by that point he’s so upset and wants nothing to do with me. And btw, I’ve never hurt him. He’s never been hurt by me. I’ve had him for like 7 months and he’s definitely used to me. He’s like my baby and always wants to be around me, so it confuses me that it scares him so much that he’d want to run away from me. And it’s not just me, he will run away from my fiance if he asks him to sit and he runs to me.
I got him from a shelter and he was a puppy mill dog. Could something have happened to him at the puppy mill that would make him afraid to sit?? Any ideas why his behavior has suddenly changed?
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