Not every dog has had a joyful life. If they’ve had different owners in the past who weren’t kind or considerate to them, then they could have had a tough start. Sometimes, these dogs are given to a dog pound or shelter for rehousing and they’re removed from the owner. In these types of situations, it can affect the dog in various ways. Ultimately, they’ll need more attention and care to their needs to bring them out of their shell.
It becomes especially important to ensure your dog has a wonderful life. That’s the best you can do for them now. Here are 8 ways to put joy back into your dog’s life.
1. Keep Them Mentally Engaged (and Avoid Getting Bored)
Dogs are intelligent and like to keep mentally engaged with life. When they aren’t being involved in enough activities of various kinds, they can get bored. Then they will start to do things we’d rather they didn’t including searching through lower-level kitchen cupboards, being overly loud, seeking too much attention, and more.
Use different methods to keep them happily engaged with you and in their life. While they shouldn’t always need your attention, play little games with them to provide mental stimulation. Even food games where they have to investigate, locate, and gain access to a treat is worthwhile because it gets their brain cells working to figure out the food puzzle. Many vets swear by them for avoiding dogs getting bored. Every little bit helps.
2. Teach Them Little Tricks
Devise tricks that they can learn to do. You can think of the “shake a paw” as a trick. Anything that can be shown to them and then repeated until they get it right will work.
Create an obstacle course in your backyard to get them to jump through the hoops and over the false wall until they complete the course. Reward them when doing so. See if you can run through the course with them on a leash and they will quickly get the idea. You’ll have them panting and wagging their tail in no time.
If you’re staying outside for more than one activity, be sure to provide water for them, especially on a hot day as dogs can get dehydrated quickly.
3. Give Them Structure to Trust and Use
Dogs that have come from bad previous homes often had little or no structure. Commonly, multiple dogs were running around and acting unruly. In this home life situation, the complete lack of structure created behavioral problems that will take months to rectify.
It’s important to establish that you’re the boss and to lay down the law with better structure. If you’ve been less strict before thinking that would help but have been getting bad results, then neither of you is probably happy. Therefore, approach the situation anew by being stricter and clear about what’s expected from them.
Set times for getting up, mealtimes, potty time, and exercise time. Use an alarm to keep yourself on track, so you aren’t late. With enough daily repetition, they will get the idea soon enough. Then they will come to enjoy knowing what to expect with some focus in their life.
4. Give Them a Nutritious Diet
Dogs appreciate good quality food. They’re often surprisingly choosy about what goes into their bowl. You might be a vegetarian, but don’t expect your dog to follow suit. They like what they like and will refuse to eat something that they turn their nose up at.
Look for quality brands. Stick to what you know they prefer. If you need to add something else into their diet, mix it in with foods they will happily consume so they don’t notice it.
Also, don’t forget about supplements. Certainly, your vet will recommend some that they believe in. They might have already mentioned green lipped mussel for dogs to you. These are health supplements from YuMOVE that provide support for the hips and joints. YuMOVE uses supplies exclusively from New Zealand to get the highest quality to help dogs stay active for more years. Because an active dog is a happy one.
5. Train Them to Behave Better
Dogs come with their history and personal preferences. Also, if they’ve arrived from a troubled home, then they likely will have brought along some bad behaviors too. In other cases, they may not know what is the right thing to do because they had no training.
You have to meet your dog where he or she is currently. There’s no point getting annoyed at what they do today that meets your disapproval. It’s better to wipe the slate clean, meet them where they are, and train them to be better.
Dogs love to learn, perform, and please their owners. It gives them a sense of achievement and happiness. Praise goes a long way with dogs. As they learn how to be a better dog, they find their place in the world. Help them get there.
6. Help Them to Socialize Well
One of the other areas that can be problematic with dogs coming from a bad situation is that they may have a fear of strangers or other dogs. There can be a variety of reasons for this including bad past treatment or previous encouragement to distrust other animals.
While they may never get 100 percent past these issues, they can learn to be more controlled around other people or dogs. Some types of dogs they may never like being near. However, with some work on these socializing problems, dogs can be taught how to better control themselves.
Dogs are social animals. They may forget this when they’ve learned to behave badly but it’s still there. If you can help them get past their fear and anxiety, being more social is possible.
7. Let Them Smell the Roses
Dogs love to explore, sniff, and smell who’s been around the area. They must be allowed time to be themselves in this way.
Rushing them through their routine can be as bad as not having one at all. Allowing them to explore safely is mentally stimulating, which ensures they won’t get bored later. Let dogs be dogs.
8. Give Them More Exercise
For physically capable dogs, they do well with more exercise rather than less.
These are active creatures who love nothing more than to run around and have fun. This is why they love playing fetch and especially kicking up sand on the beach. Give them ample chances every day to get out into the world – it’s often their favorite time of day. Their wide smile, panting, and wagging tale confirms it.
Vary up the exercise routine, route, and activity. Still give them regular places they will recognize but add in new ones to give them fresh places to eagerly explore too.
For dogs that have had a tough start to life, don’t believe that that cannot be turned around. It’s all a matter of taking the right approach, setting them up for success, and letting them do it. By setting appropriate boundaries and a good routine they can live by, they have less anxiety and more predictable life. Then add in surprises and puzzles to keep them on their paws. Then you’ll have a happy dog on your hands for the rest of their life.
