HELP!! my 9 MONTH OLD BOSTON TERRIER HATES MY HUSBAND

Question
Hi.  My name is Eve.  I have a boston Terrier female and her name is Gussy.  she is 9 months old.  I have a really bad problem.  Gussy does not like my husband.  We got Gussy when she was 10 weeks old.  something must of happened.  We also have 2 girls ages 4 and 10.

But when my husband goes near her, she goes crazy.  She barks at him and growls and snarling so much.  Its making life really hard around here.  I have no idea what to do.  Every time she does this, I yell at her and say NO!!

Please help.  Do you think medication would work or clicker traning???

Thank you.

Eve

Answer
If you yell at her every time she appears frightened of your husband (the barking and growling may be evidence of fear), then you may accidentally be increasing her anxiety and making her more fearful, which will only lead to more barking and growling.  First, tell your husband not to stare directly at her, or reach for her, right now. Also, assign him all the feeding duties, and you and the kids avoid feeding her any food or treats while he is being the primary caretaker.  You know your husband better than I, but it isn't necessarily that he did anything to scare her.  Some dogs are just more afraid of men than of other humans.  After all, they're bigger, louder, and often seem more stern when they talk to dogs.  Tell him to soften his voice when he speaks to the dog.  Another thing you can try is to have him take her for her walks.  If he cannot get her, just let her trail a leash that you put on, then he can step on the end, reach down and grab it by the handle, so he won't have to reach for her collar.  If your husband has "corrected" the dog, or been loud or frustrated with her in the past, this will take longer, but most dogs can be convinced to forgive.  If he doesn't want to cooperate with the program, you can still do something - just feed Gussy some tiny pieces of roast beef when hubby comes in the room.  Stop feeding her when he goes out.  Pretty soon, she'll think that it's pretty cool to see him coming;-)