Hi! I bought a new golden retriever puppy back in early December and she’s been an absolute joy. Our goal for our new dog was for her to pass the CGC test and eventually get certified as a therapy dog (which would be really beneficial for my clinic). She is now around 5 months and super amazing. As part of her training, we’re working very hard for her to learn not to react to other animals or humans without being prompted to. This means that if someone wants to say hi to her, we make her sit or lay down calmly before giving her the ok to say hi. For well-behaved dogs, it’s very important to drill and reinforce these behaviors early.
Part of her training involves us just sitting on an empty bench at the park and doing nothing. If someone walks by and my dog ignores them, I reward her with a treat (to reinforce the good behavior of not being reactive). If someone walks by and wants to say hi, I usually ask them to wait until my dog settles, and then I give the OK and they can say hi. I would say the vast majority of people respect our boundaries.
Yesterday at the park, we were sitting there minding my own business when a lady walked by with her kids. The kids immediately started running towards us and I quickly said "hey guys, we’re training. Can you please not touch until I say ok" but I was ignored and the kids started petting right away. I then stood up to try to stand between my dog and the kids and again I said "Please don’t touch without permission, we’re training". The kids looked to their mom and the lady just said "they’re only kids, let them touch! it’s not that serious" and then proceeded to tell her kids "it’s ok, go ahead!"
That’s when I got kind of mad and I admitted I lost my cool. My dog LOVES being touched so in her mind, she’s being rewarded without understanding the permission part. Inappropriate rewards and undo good conditioning very quickly. So I basically said "Look, can you guys fuck off, I said don’t touch her" and then proceeded to pull my dog away, waited for her to ignore the kids/mom, and then rewarded her and began to get ready to leave. The kids obviously are sad they don’t get to continue petting my dog and the mom is furious, basically calling me an asshole for ruining her kids’ day and "being mean". I essentially told her off again and said "I got the dog for me, not you or your kids".
So, AITA for telling her off after they repeatedly tried touching my dog without permission?
EDIT:
Additional info: she does not have a in-training vest on. After this incident I think I will probably get one. I also didn’t expect to need one since I’m always nearby and don’t mind people approaching her. She’s very friendly. I’m trying to train her to only reciprocate attention when given permission to. Most people (unless the person I met) will gladly wait for me to say “ok girl, calm, wait” and then “ok! Go say hi!”
Also I am not a business owner. I’m a physician who works with a lot of cancer patients and I think bringing my dog once she’s trained to my office will definitely help patients when I break bad news.
Nta parents should watch their damn kids and people need to learn how to hear “no”. It’s entitlement plain and simple.
Training your dog like that is responsible of you.
NTA! It doesn’t matter that your dog is in training. What matters is that children need to be taught to ask permission BEFORE approaching ANY strange dog. The mom in this situation is actually placing her children at risk of being bit/injured by allowing them to approach strange dogs without the owner’s permission.
Exactly! My kids are very comfortable with dogs as we have always had one or two and most relatives do as well.
I always teach them to never ever approach an unfamiliar dog, always ask the person with the dog first.
NTA. People need to train their kids.
NTA, she should be teaching her kids, especially since they’re young, to respect boundaries. That’s an awful way to parent.
I have a service dog, and I worked with a certified trainer to obtain and train him. People are frustrating. Setting boundaries with people can be annoying. You have to do what you need to to protect the integrity of your training. I don’t know if you use a vest that says in training or do not pet but that might help. We always had his service dog in training vest before he completed his training and it helped. I wish I could say it prevented every situation, but at least it lowered then number. NTA
NTA. After you asked nicely and were ignored, you don’t owe them anything.
NTA.
No. First of all, no children should be approaching any dogs -adorable puppy or not- that they don’t know. That’s a safety risk. Even puppies have a risk of biting and puppy teeth *hurt*.
Secondly, she should have absolutely waited for you to say it was okay.
Her kids were upset because she set them up, effectively. She said it was okay and of course they were going to take that as an actual okay.
They were sad because of her, when had she waited her kids could’ve been happy and the cute puppy could’ve gotten a lot of pets she enjoyed.
You’re alright, OP. NTA in any way, shape or form. The mother, not so much.
The dog entitlement genre is converging with the child entitlement genre. Like when King Kong fought Godzilla. Dogs are not people or medicine. The world’s job does not include insulating children from being told “no”. I wish I could watch with a box of popcorn.
INFO: Is your dog wearing a vest saying that they’re in training? If not, you should get one.
NTA. So many people are weirdly entitled about petting dogs, especially when it comes to little kids wanting to pet the dog. Next time consider telling them that the dog bites. Sadly people will respect that more than being told a dog is in training.
ESH
I’m really surprised that you never had a training vest. Are you enrolled a proper dog training course?
Part of professional dog training for therapy or service dogs includes teaching the handler how to manage public interactions. This means calmly explaining to strangers what “in training” actually means, setting boundaries, and preventing confusion for both the dog and the public.
The training vest is a key part of this because it signals that the dog is working.
Repeating “she’s in training” without further explanation or a vest skips over this essential step, which led to the mother ignoring your instructions and why the whole situation escalated. Telling little kids to “fuck off” is totally unhinged, to say the least.
The part where your dog has to wait until you give permission… what will that look like with your patients?
Are you really going to pause and make every patient wait for permission before touching the dog while you’re delivering bad news? That seems completely impractical.
Some patients might have dog allergies or phobias and might not even want a dog there.
Is this just an excuse to bring your dog to work? You even said, “my dog is for me, not strangers.”