Non-reactivity heals

Nero (my dog) met Shiva (Chris‘s dog) today. Shiva is a Cane Corso and Nero is a Cane Corso x terrier of some kind

Nero was amped, sniffing Shiva like crazy, self-soothing by gathering as much information as possible and turning the unknown into the known. Empty space can be scary, right?

Shiva was a champ and stood still, allowing a very highly strung Nero to get all up in his business. Then, with a gust of wind, Nero felt something touch him in and read that as a cue to go into pre-emptive defence mode

He absolutely went off, spitting, snarling and screaming. Shiva made distance and I held nero by the harness while he loudly told Shiva, now a fair distance away, exactly what he thought of him

For Nero, the harness helps neutralise the encounter. It’s comfortable, so I can grab it and restrain him without adding further distress. This prevents him from associating the choking feeling of the collar with the other dog

Because Shiva was so calm and gave Nero zero reaction, and because Nero is increasingly better at relaxing, I felt more confident letting them try again in a few minutes. We all ran through the park together. Again when Shiva came close, Nero postured, barked, growled, but a little less intensely

The pitch was lower. Before, it sounded like a panic attack; all high up in the throat and chest. Now that Nero’s arousal level had dropped, he had more space within himself to process fear and was therefore less twitchy and reactive. I can’t help but see ALL the parallels between this and the social aspect of the pandemic

I could see Nero trying to control the encounter with Shiva so that he could feel safe, using his pre-conditioned method - staunchness. He was threatening Shiva because he thought he felt unsafe… but as he began to understand Shiva was well-meaning, he was able to self-soothe by sniffing instead

Nero started to remember that he was on a walk - his walk - and that he could enjoy the experience whilst also being near another big black doggo. He left behind the cancel-culture attitude and realised all was safe. A great deal of this is thanks to Shiva’s beautiful lack of reactivity. He basically gave Nero free therapy

I usually don’t believe in letting dogs ‘sort it out’ is the way. This attitude could go very wrong if you don’t truly know your dog’s default patterns around various types of other dogs AND their owners. Having worked with and studied Nero’s reactive patterns for years and having developed as a handler, I felt capable here

This post is NOT dog socialisation advice. It’s a celebration of non-reactivity, calmness and space-holding. These things heal. We can and should all flex this ability to hold space for ourselves and relax behind the experience. Some of us learnt young and some of us learn as adults, but we can all learn

By channeling the love and understanding while developing our ability to interact and communicate, we inevitably help others too. Shiva is proof. His no-f*cks-given, playful mojo rubbed off on Nero within 10 minutes. By the end of the walk, the growls were playful, the dog’s walked side-by-side

What can we learn from this? A great deal, I think