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New Greyhound- Freezes And Refuses To Walk


Guest Brindler

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Guest Memphsmom

My Memphis freezes up on walks. We have had him for years, live in a quite rural neighborhood and mostly walk on dirt roads. I figured out that the way to make him walk is simple let him lead, sometimes he just wants to walk on the other side of the road or walk off to side more, stop and smell a smell, who knows. When DD first got him he would only walk behind her, this made freezing a real problem, but time has worked it all out ok. Now when he freezes I stop and kind of let him have some slack, when he starts to move, I kind of follow until I can get him going the way I want him to. He still slows down on the way home, but it's just that he loves walks and doesn't want to go home yet, some time we move at a snails pace but we get there.

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Guest SkyeDakota

Thanks for the suggestions. I decided to bring Skye to a doggie daycare that has a large outdoor run. So he is in a safe environment, can play, run and if something should happen, help is right there. I will bring him for he first time tomorrow morning. I hope this will boost his confidence and burn some of that energy.

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Guest ApacheWalton

I have a similar problem; I've had Apache for just under a month, and yesterday, she refused to leave my apartment. It was extremely frustrating because I knew she had to use the bathroom, but no treats or anything could convince her to move. When I came home at lunch, of course there was poo and pee in the house; I had expected it since she hadn't gone at all since the night before. I tried for an hour to get her out of the apartment; I have no idea what's going on, as she'll jump up happily when she hears the leash, then freeze as soon as we're out of the apartment. I really don't want to spent my lunch hour cleaning poo and pee out of apartment indefinitely, so any additional advice would be appreciated! The strange thing is, at lunch and when I got home from work, she was begging to go out and was thrilled, but didn't want to go for her 'last out' at night or in the morning.

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  • 1 month later...
Guest Brindler

I'm back....and not with great news:( Our Kaia has had some major setbacks these past couple of weeks...:( she never really stopped freezing but it was somewhat manageable. Lots of things going on, most outside of our control- like, massive construction raging outside in our entire apartment complex, and now a new project to fix the walls and paint the decks of our apartment- it's pure hell. Kaia seemed to be ok with this chaos, and things were relatively ok but now we have new issues- she now refuses to walk even in the morning, where before we used to take really nice, long walks and she used to love them.. then another new bad thing is my husband knocked over a gate we put by our bedroom door in the night (she had been sleeping with us ever since we got her), and she completely lost it. We managed to get her back into the bedroom that night but she was anxious and stressed out all night so no one slept well...the next night same thing so we decided to let her sleep in the living room. It's been 3 nights- we are working to get her to at least step foot on the hallway that leads to the rest of the house, and the bedroom. It's like she's creating an invisible fence within the house. THEN the past 2 days she won't eat her food. Like she'll have a few bites then leave, sometimes she'll come back and eat a little more. We don't know if we should take the food away or just leave it there? She used to gobble it down in no time before.

On a positive note, she used to HATE to walk at night and now we are enjoying some nice late night walks.

 

We have to board her for the first time in 3 weeks and I am dreading that thought! We checked out the place and she seemed to like it, but who knows how this will affect her.

It is just so stressful and I feel SO BAD for her....we also have lovely moments when we play and bond, and it's so frustrating that right after that we can have a total fiasco of a walk or a feeding...

 

I am considering using the Adaptil collar or some other medication when we get back from our vacation. Why are greys so complicated?? ...

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  • 1 year later...
Guest Big_Bad_Jon

Hi all. I adopted a grey, Falco, about 5 days ago. It's clear that we need to take time, and I do my best to let him sniff things and get familiar with life. We are in Brooklyn, NY, and the front of the building, where we would exit to go for walks, is pretty lively. It scares him, and if he realizes we're going out the front of the building, he freezes or will only go forward a foot at a time, stopping at the door.

 

A couple of times, I have been able to trick him by using a different exit. We just got back from the longest short walk. Just around the block, but there was much freezing. The very first time we went around, he did OK, just getting a little scared at trucks and loud noises. This time was way tougher. Treats didn't work. Sometimes, if I got him with a wall or fence on one side, and me on the other, he felt more secure and walked. Never got angry; remained calm, though I did pull on his leash a bit here and there. It was best to not stop once we got moving.

 

Do these dogs ever stop freezing? I really need to hear from you all if every walking experience will be like mine and what you have experienced. Some of you have said that their greys are cool on one walk, then will suddenly start freezing. This would be a major issue since the goal is to walk 1-1/2 miles to work and back. If he froze on a trip like that, I would be up a creek.

 

 

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Guest Zoopy

Hi all. I adopted a grey, Falco, about 5 days ago. It's clear that we need to take time, and I do my best to let him sniff things and get familiar with life. We are in Brooklyn, NY, and the front of the building, where we would exit to go for walks, is pretty lively. It scares him, and if he realizes we're going out the front of the building, he freezes or will only go forward a foot at a time, stopping at the door.

 

A couple of times, I have been able to trick him by using a different exit. We just got back from the longest short walk. Just around the block, but there was much freezing. The very first time we went around, he did OK, just getting a little scared at trucks and loud noises. This time was way tougher. Treats didn't work. Sometimes, if I got him with a wall or fence on one side, and me on the other, he felt more secure and walked. Never got angry; remained calm, though I did pull on his leash a bit here and there. It was best to not stop once we got moving.

 

Do these dogs ever stop freezing? I really need to hear from you all if every walking experience will be like mine and what you have experienced. Some of you have said that their greys are cool on one walk, then will suddenly start freezing. This would be a major issue since the goal is to walk 1-1/2 miles to work and back. If he froze on a trip like that, I would be up a creek.

 

 

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Guest Zoopy

Big bad jon, I am very new to greyhounds and I'm sure other more experienced owners will have advice on how to work with freezing but to answer your question, yes they can stop freezing. My grey is 7, ex racer and new to me. Walks beautifully on the lead and will still occasionally freeze when he's spotted something that I can rarely see! A gentle "come on" and he will usually walk on, occasionally it takes a bit longer if its a particularly interesting sight! But that's it, he never freezes because of fear and I'm assuming that's because he's older and more experienced.

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  • 2 years later...

We just adopted our greyhound about a week ago and he was walking okay but then started to freeze randomly in certain areas. We realized from his ears being flat, head low, and tail tucked that he was very anxious and fearful. To give him more confidence in his new environment, we started letting him chose where we went on our walks. We luckily live in a large neighborhood where we have many directions to choose. And it really helped him start feeling more confident and the ears and tail have slowly started coming up. Keeping in mind safety and reason of course - there are times when we say no chose another way. And also maintaining leash manners - still no pulling on the leash. Other than that he gets to pick left or right, trail or neighborhood. We haven't had many freezes since, and when he does we listen and let him take the time he needs. 

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 4/8/2020 at 1:56 PM, DLindza said:

We just adopted our greyhound about a week ago and he was walking okay but then started to freeze randomly in certain areas. We realized from his ears being flat, head low, and tail tucked that he was very anxious and fearful. To give him more confidence in his new environment, we started letting him chose where we went on our walks. We luckily live in a large neighborhood where we have many directions to choose. And it really helped him start feeling more confident and the ears and tail have slowly started coming up. Keeping in mind safety and reason of course - there are times when we say no chose another way. And also maintaining leash manners - still no pulling on the leash. Other than that he gets to pick left or right, trail or neighborhood. We haven't had many freezes since, and when he does we listen and let him take the time he needs. 

Superb advice! I have been doing the same. He's too big to drag along and pulling him around would just make him more fearful and not solve the problem. I've found letting him choose the route has really made a difference and we can now walk cheerily without any freezing up. And if I do need to dictate the route he listens and obliges. 

Thank you!!

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