Corrine and Roxie’s Training Program

Roxie came into my family at the age of two years old. We got her from across the country in Texas and met them half way to bring her home. She was covered with fleas, had heartworms, and we quickly came to find out that she had a lot of behavioral needs. She would bite people that rang the doorbell, would cry endlessly unless she was stuffed in a crate with our other dog, Riley, and would bark and snap at any other dog that she didn’t live with in her home. She didn’t like to be hugged and she wasn’t happy when you touched her stomach. Needless to say, she had a lot to work on. She was part of the entire family from age to all the way to age seven, around 2016. During that time, she hadn’t made much progress on her issues.

My career as a dog trainer started in 2016. I was still in college for psychology and was taking my first behavior modification techniques course. I was assigned a group project to find a problem behavior and change it. At the time, I was back home living with my family and so was my sister. My sister had her dog, Juno, and my family had four other dogs; one of them being Roxie. Roxie and Juno hated each other. They would get into serious fights and had sent each other to the vet on multiple occasions. At the time, I was learning how to train dogs specifically through Philly Unleashed and we came up with a plan to help them get along.

Throughout the semester, I worked diligently with Roxie and Juno. The rest of the people in my group; not so much. As I continued to work, Roxie began to flourish. Her anxiety decreased in general, she stopped biting people that rang the doorbell, and she would run into my arms for hugs. As the end of the semester came, Roxie and I had created a special bond and when it was time for me to return to my apartment, Roxie came with me and became just my dog.

We started doing almost every dog sport imaginable. We began our training lessons with Sit Happens and trained in agility, rally, and trick dog. She became a therapy dog and learned how to do everything she couldn’t do before. Currently, Roxie is a therapy dog with several show titles and living her golden years as my partner in teaching other dogs how to be calm around dogs in general.

Roxie working on her dog reactivity with her sister Juno

Roxie learning to do agility to help boost her confidence

Roxie graduating her therapy dog classes and becoming a certified therapy dog

Roxie winning her first rally show