Anti-depressants can shorten a human’s life span by 33% according to most studies. Anxiety medication may also shorten a person’s life span by up to 40% by most western studies.
Do you really want to take your dog to a dog trainer who is against adversive training tools but ok with promoting drug medication to help them produce results they normally can’t do on their own using their current methodology? Isn’t a dog’s life span short enough already?
Our dogs will always need drug medication for all the different ailments that they often get into or they find themselves in. However, there is still an old guard of dog trainers who promote the use of drug sedation and describe it as anxiety medicine when treat training or dog hyperness is more than their dog training ability was able to provide. Do you believe drugs should be allowed to make a dog calm or make it easier to train a dog?
We understand there are acute cases for dog anxiety but here’s some questions we ask for you to consider before agreeing that drugs should be easily prescribed in place of dog training that works.
- If your full time dog trainer is not able to effectively train dogs without the use of drug medication, are they really a dog trainer?
- Does your full time dog trainer deem drug medication acceptable but neglect the breed type high energy characteristics? Examples: Collies, Shepards, Terriers, Cattle dogs, Huskies, Dalmatians.
- Does your full time dog trainer have one of these high energy breed types and also give drug medication to calm their own dog down for specific situations or certain parts of every day?
- Has your full time dog trainer used all the tools available to them to train a dog rather than drug medication OR do they justify some tools as adversive so they can use drug medication instead?
- Does your dog Trainer actively promote, “Let your do be a dog!” but also promotes drug medication which in fact is NOT letting your dog be a dog?
- If anti-anxiety medication shortens a person’s life span, would you still feel good about using that on your dog if you love your dog? Or would you invest in better dog training results?
We will all have our different views on the usage and acceptability of drug medication. Situations are different. Some will need it to give a dog a sizable chance at not being put down. However, it’s fair to say that any dog trainer who promotes drug anxiety medication is not truly an advocate for a dog’s long term health life. And the chant, “Let a dog be a dog” is full of hypocrisy when they are tearing down another dog trainer who uses adversive tools. Do you still want to use Anxiety Medication for your dog?
Is your dog’s current life span worth it?
