I had a private lesson with our trainer, but it was more of a talk. I sent to her a point form list of all of the things with Toby that I wasn't sure how to deal with. It was quite a long list.
Firstly, I think we've come up with a probable cause of his anxiety. Toby came from a puppy mill in the states and was shipped over the Us/Canada border in what was probably a big truck full of puppies. That would definitely account for his fear of metalic sounds and truck engines and starting. He was probably shipped during one of his fear stages and it scarred him emotionally.
As for training, in a nutshell, I'm not doing anything completely wrong, which was a big relief. I explained to her that I realize that as far as a rescue is concerned, that Toby is pretty near perfect, but that I wanted to make sure that I was dealing with his anxiety correctly since I've never had to deal with anything like this before. I didn't want to have to undo anything I might be doing wrong.
When I'm working with him outside I'd stopped giving him treats as a reward and instead only gave him verbal rewards. After talking to my trainer I think I'm going to return to giving him treats to reinforce appropriate behavior.
For inside anxiety she suggested a couple of other things to try. She suggested when he's afraid to give him a different outlet other than running around in a panic and barking. She suggested teaching him a hand touch so that when he's afraid, he can touch my hand and get praise instead. I'm half way there with this one, as I've taught him how to hit a target and was treating him for the look command outside.
She also suggested I try a thundershirt, which she's heard of some people having success with, as well as rescue remedy and TTouch ( both also suggested by some of our forum members). She demonstrated TTouch to me and gave me some printouts about it to try with him.
I'm feeling much more positive now that I have some more ideas to try, and I'm really excited to get a couple of thundershirts; I think that Ginny would benefit from one too. I'm going to try and get some rescue remedy tonight.
Another good thing that happened last night was that Toby acted up at class and actually demonstrated some of his anxiety. It was small in comparison to what I often deal with (I told the trainer to multiply that display by 10), but my trainer was at least able to see how he's reacting and that I'm in fact NOT causing his anxiety because I'm not able to anticipate what will set him off. What relief to finally be able to prove that one.
I really hope we can get his anxiety under control. My trainer said that he may always have anxiety, which I already realized, I just hope we can get it under control enough so that he can be a therapy dog. Or at the very least so that his quality of life is better.
) I finally figured out he did not like the wind blowing across it. On cold and calm days he would go in when he got older. Rain didn't bother him so he stayed out in it. Once I put it in next to the grill it was OK since there was no wind. Fortunately Sca is either, happy, ecstatic or sleeping 
