There is nothing that makes you feel worse when leaving your pets home alone than having a pet that suffers from severe anxiety that only occurs when you are not there.

 

Some pets will fret and bark, others can start to form destructive behaviours such as destroying houses and cars whilst others can escape the yard and come to grief in the outside world. Ella, owned by our nurse Ebony, is one of those dogs.

 

Separation anxiety comes in different severities and can have different causes and triggers. The main thing is that each case is treated as an individual and the right treatment selected. This can range from training techniques right through to antidepressants and other drugs. Separation anxiety is a real disease an d early treatment is more likely to yield a positive outcome.

 

Ella began showing signs of distress a few months ago. “She began by trying to get in the cupboards, in the fridge, trying to get under my feet in the mornings as I was trying to leave for work,” says Ebony. ”She was freaking out and when I left she was worse. She spent the day with my mum and she was under her feet as well. The first time it got really bad was when I left her at home in the house before Christmas and when I returned, she had fogged up all the windows by panting and running through the house distressed. She was a wreck when I got home.”  Ebony tried some medications with Ella but they made her drowsy so she opted to try the ADAPtil collar.

 

ADAPtil contains a substance called the Dog Appeasing Pheromone (DAP) which is a natural substance that humans cannot smell but is released by the breast tissue of mother dogs whilst feeding their pups. It is reassuring to anxious dogs when they smell it. It can take 1-2 weeks to notice the effects of the DAP collar and each collar lasts about a month. The collars are available in large and small and can be bought over the counter for mild cases. Melbourne Behaviour Specialist, Gabrielle Carter, recommends ADAPtil collars for the first month that a new pup spends in its new home. “The collar helps to ease the transition to the new home and helps with training,” she says.

 

For Ella at least, ADAPtil has provided her with drug-free relief from her anxiety. “She is now really happy and relaxed when being left at home,” says Ebony, “and I feel more relaxed at work knowing she is not stressing out at home.

 

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