DOG IS DESTROYING HOUSE

Question
We have just took in my boyfriends dog as his mother and father is no longer fit to look after it. She is 7 years old and is a Pitbull/Staffordshire bull terrier cross. Can you tell me why just recently she has been destroying the house when we leave her on her own. Her bed is in the kitchen and she is opening the fridge and eating all our food or making a mess with it. Then when we left her in the living room she destroyed our rug and the living room door. She was a well behaved dog until this and we do not know what to do or what has went wrong?

Answer
Hey, Jacqueline,

You're not doing anything wrong. It sounds like the poor dog is suffering from separation anxiety/distress, which is essentially a feeling of panic that comes over her when she's left all alone. Remember, she's been living in another household for the past 6+ years or so, and she's in a new environment, so she's freaking out about that. She probably feels helpless, anxious, and terrified. (And when you ARE home she's probably a little overly affectionate.)
Simply for the purposes of preventing her from doing more damage to your home, or to herself, you might want to consider leaving her in a crate when you're not home. That probably won't stop her from feeling panicked, but it might help. She should also be getting lots and lots of hard, vigorous playful exercise, where she gets to chase and "kill" a toy. Do that before you leave her every day, but also give her a cool down period of about 20 mins. or so. Also, don't make leaving or coming home into an emotionally charged even. Try to keep things on an even keel as much as possible, emotionally. Dogs are very sensitive to our emotions, and I'm sure you're very stressed about this. But your stressful emotions will only make matters worse for her (and for yourself). So try to take some deep breaths and keep a Zen attitude (if you can). It's hard to do, but it's going to be very helpful in the long run.
Other things that might help are DAP, a calming scent based on a pheromone that dogs give off which has a calming effect on any other dogs who smell it, and Rescue Remedy, which is a homeopathic de-stressor. (You put a few drops in her water bowl.) Both items work a fair percentage of the time. You can also do therapeutic massage, found in books and videos about T-Touch. It also works a certain percentage of the time.
If it really is SA/D, these will probably only be stopgaps. You'll probably need to talk to a trainer who knows how to deal with these issues.
You can call the contact number on my website if you want more information.

Best of luck,
LCK