Tonight is Lexx's third obedience class, I'm really hoping that my regular instructor is back, because I wasn't such a fan of her replacement last week.
Lexx has been coming along well with some commands while he seems confused or unable to perform others. While I have to admit that his sits HAVE gotten a wee bit better, he's still cheating the tuck. He knows not to move his front feet back, so instead of tucking his back feet in, he just stretchs back and sits, not moving his front but ending up in the exact opposite of a compact tuck.
I feel that this means that he's understanding the concept, but may not be able to tuck his hind end perfectly, we've been working hard at it.
His focus is great though his positioning is still sketchy at best, especially when at a heel position. I've been making a large effort on my part to ensure that the lure is always exactly on my hip and not to reach around my body at all in hopes to keep his hind end straighter and less at a 45 degree angle.
His COME command is fantastic, he will come straight from any angle, including when i have my back to him, my side to him or am standing in another room. His fronts of course are not as good as possible ( back to the sitting issue) but I actually caught him correcting himself yesterday once or twice which made me unbelievably happy.
Im really trying to remain positive about training, stopping when I get frustrated with an exercise and keeping practice sessions short. I still don't feel like he's improving as much as he should, but at least I feel like he's TRYING and thats a start.
Nothing we can do about physical issues, but trying is important.
I'm trying to remember, its ALL ABOUT FUN leanne... don't make it more serious than it has to be. I'm becoming more and more ok with the idea of Lexx just being my best friend and not a championed obedience dog. Every day it gets easier and the lower my expectations, the less disappointment I feel.
Hopefully tonight will go well and I'll be excited again, because last week, I never wanted to go back.
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Yay you are sounding more optimistic, it's good to see :) I had a long and extremely hard time getting the "having fun is important" part about training as well, but once i "got it", there was no turning back and i wouldn't want training to be any other way, even if we didn't or never competed.
Hope class tonight goes well for you, can't wait to hear all about it!!
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