“wow, you have such a COOL job! you get to play with animals ALL day!” I hear this statement on an almost weekly basis. Particularly when telling people what I do for a living. They then continue on to tell me that they think they should quit their corporate job and become a dog trainer because they’ve “loved dogs all their lives”. If only it was that simple.
First off, 95% of being a dog trainer, is the ability to teach people how to work with their dogs. It is rare for me to actually spend time playing with a dog. Not in the sense of just throwing a ball or taking a walk with them anyways. I deal with people from all walks of life, and try to explain their dog to them in a way they can understand. I serve as a type of family counselor in some situations, and a dog expert in others. Take for instance the family whose wife loves the dog and refuses to get rid of it, and whose husband hates the dog and insists he stops chewing IMMEDIATELY or risk being sent to the pound. It’s my job to come up with the compromise and to make life more bearable for the dog.
Then there’s the “know it all” types of clients. They hire me to come out so they can tell me how they should be able to fix the problem. They read a book, or watched a trainer on television. Then when I give them a program to modify their dogs behavior, they want to argue that it’s not the way the book says to do it. Many of these often take a few lessons from me, or attend a class, and then hang a shingle and become self proclaimed dog trainers. They advertise 30 years experience because that’s how long they’ve owned dogs, and they try to smear me all over town. I pretty much have to ignore these types and move onto the clients I can help.
Next are the abuse cases. There was the 4 month old pit bull puppy I worked with once. When they told me the dog jumps on them, I asked what they had tried to fix the problem so far, and they said “well, we beat her with a 4 X 4.” And the sad thing was, they were serious.
Follow these with the clients who treat the dog like a piece of furniture. If I can wave my “magic wand” and have the dog trained like lassie in an hour, he can stay because he matches the furniture. Otherwise, they’ll move on to the latest rage in designer pets.
And then, the never so popular having to tell a client they should consider euthanasia. I have VERY strict policies on what constitutes a case like this. I hate doing it. Particularly when there are kids in the family. I get to be the “bad guy” and tell them to PTS the dog. This is NEVER a fun session.
Take into account all the types of cases, and throw in dealing with dogs who want to tear into me on a regular basis, and you get more of a glimpse of my job. At least the downsides to it.
Plus of course, a good dog trainer must also be a good business person. There are endless phone calls and client emails, a need for constant advertising and interaction with other pet professionals, and a whole lot of paperwork.
If you were to look at a typical day during my busy season this is what it would look like. Get up at 6:30 to feed and clean up after my own dogs. Take them for a walk or head to the kennel to work with whatever board and trains I have in at the time. Depending on how easy those dogs are this could take a couple of hours or longer. Then drive sometimes over an hour to go to a private session and help families solve problems for 1-1.5 hours at a time. Repeat this a few times in a day. Head back home to work my own dogs, feed and clean, then relax from about 6pm on, or spend a couple of hours on the phone or email with client questions, generally hearing the same types of questions again, and again, and again and again and again. On nights when I have classes, I generally get home around 8pm, head for bed, and start over the next day.
Don’t get me wrong. I LOVE my job. I’m extremely passionate about the dogs and I love my clients. Sure, there are sometimes clients I’d prefer not to deal with, but for the most part, I enjoy spending time with them. I enjoy the puzzle solving and heavy thinking it sometimes takes to fix the problems. I enjoy it when the dogs love me and remember me when they see me on the street later. I love how it feels when I see a dog change from an aggressive teenage brat, to a sweet and loyal companion dog. And I love the depth it adds to the families I work with when they can now enjoy their pets.
I think it’s just important to put it into perspective though. My job is tough. It requires lots of thinking, people skills, and a LOT of continuing education to be good at this job. It requires EXTREME amounts of patience, and the ability to speak a foreign language (dog-ese). And not only must I have these skills, I must be able to instill them into my clients in order to be successful.
So no, while being a full time professional dog trainer is fun, it is a lot more work then meets the eye. I can’t even skim the surface in a blog post.
