Oooh, wonderful news!

[conuly]

After three years of effort, Finn has finally stayed on command for long enough for me to bring my mother her coffee and then walk back across the room to him. I mean, it took him a few tries first, and I had to sprint on the way back to get there and snuggle him before his butt left the floor - but still! He stayed! When he didn't want to! Good dog!

I'm not sure how you're supposed to do it, but I'm pretty sure that we lucked into this. Over the past year and a half he's grown a lot more used to the idea that we leave the room and then come back, and so he doesn't start howling and dancing around the instant he finds himself without a human in view. Better, he's even worked out that sometimes we go and come back so fast that it's not worth getting himself off the bed/couch/cushion just to catch up to us right as we finish peeing/getting water and head back to him. But he likes to know if he ought to, and so once I realized he doesn't always follow I started letting him know if it was going to be a short trip out of the room or a long one, by either signalling "come" or "stay" at him. I wasn't trying to train him to stay anymore, having given that up as a lost cause, I just didn't want him to follow me if he didn't want to and I was only stepping out to take out the trash, or to wait for me to come back if I wasn't planning on it. (If he thinks he's been abandoned, he still starts howling about half the time instead of coming to find us.)

So I think he finally understands what I've been trying to tell him! "Stay" means "I'm coming back, you goofball!"

(I'm reasonably sure he doesn't fully believe it's possible I might not want him to follow at all, but he's trying.)

Comments

[affreca]

Go Finn. Or stay..

[bibliofile]

Yay!!!! Best Finn.

(You always come back. Not that they always understand that.)

[conuly]

He's getting there. It's taken him a while, but he's definitely improving.

[cactuswatcher]

I had a dog that never learned to stay properly. She understood sit, but not stay. She'd get excited and come to me and dragging her butt across the ground. Obviously I'm not the greatest dog trainer. She learned a few clever tricks, but never 'stay.'

[adafrog]

Yay!

[marahmarie]

Your Finn and my Bowie sound highly interchangeable. Bowie spends his life following me unless he's deep in sleep - to the door, the patio, howling at me through the window or door screen (even if I'm just checking the mail or taking the trash out), etc. I go upstairs, he follows. Bathroom? Watches me, walks me back out. Downstairs? *boop boop boop* there he comes, right on my heels. Cooking? Hey, let's let Bowie help. Eating? He will sit in my face watching every bite I take while head-butting me. Unlike some dogs he can't be "trained" not to, either.

[conuly]

He dogs your every footstep, sounds like.

[marahmarie]

Pretty much, yeah.

[rahirah]

Good dog. :)

[swingandswirl]

Awww, yay! Good doggo.

[silveradept]

Good dog. Now comes the distance and time training, but good dog all the same.

[chez_jae]

Aw, poor guy!