Is My Dog Trying To Dominate Me?

by Leonard “Buzz” Cecil, CTDI*, Cert.CBST**

Two more questions you have to ask before answering that one are:
Why would my dog want to dominate me?
What's in it for her that she doesn't already have?

These three questions are actually quite intertwined, so let's look at the situation with her - oops, I mean OUR pack:

She gets 2 squares a day. And that doesn't count all the treats for doing tricks, coming back on recall and such. Would she somehow get MORE to eat if she were to win domination over me? Maybe a better quality? Are you inferring, that what she gets now is of inferior quality and that by dominating me, she would get better food? Or more?

She gets all the water she can drink, both from her water dish, but also on walks from the various fountains and water troughs. Now if she were to dominate me, would she somehow demand and get more and better liquid refreshment? German white wine, French red wine? Maybe a real Czech Pilsner beer. Single-Malt Scotch (from my collection?)?

If she were to win domination over me, would she then get to leave the house before me? Maybe. But it's very possible she wouldn't live very long, charging out the door in front of me into the street. But then I'd just have to get another dog to dominate me. And another. And another. And then where would she want to go? Can't go shopping with no money. She's not crazy about the movies unless they're animal films.

If Vela were trying to dominate me, what would she have to gain by walking in front of me. Well, for one thing she would have to STAY in front of me. What a drag, if there was a lovely piece of cow dung behind me or to the side of me. She'd have to make that hard choice between cementing her domination over me by staying out in front of me and perhaps losing her domination by falling behind to savor that dead bird. Choices, choices and the RESPONSIBILITIES attached to them. What's a dog to do?

And of course, she'd have to choose the route to take, determining where we are to go. Fine. And if there's no food or water there when we get there, is she supposed to force me to provide it for her wherever we end up? Now try this with your dog, just what I tried today. My dog was sniffing dominantly 10-20 yards in front of me. We came to a fork in the road. She headed down the right fork and I, being the rebellious soul I am, purposely took the left path. I would have thought, her being the dominant wanna-be, that she would have insisted, that I come to her, but no, low and behold, without me even calling to her, she not only was suddenly running past me up the left road, but when I then decided to go on the right road, she then bounded on by me and up the right road. Well, ok, I see your point. What a cunning little cur. She actually TRICKED me into thinking I was dominating her by going on the left road, when she knew, that I would eventually see it her way and go on the right path, which she'd originally been on. Sometime you don't have to dominate with force, you can do it by cunning and treachery.

Now, when I come home, it's obvious who is the dominant one in the house. As soon as my key hits the door, Vela is at the door, demanding my attention. It's quite clear, that if my wife were actually the leader of the pack (for what husband is EVER the leader of the pack?), she would come right to the door, beating my dog by a nose to greet me at the door, I would then give her a big smacker, a bunch of roses and a bottle of champagne. Or something. But it's apparent, that Vela has banned my wife to the kitchen, in order that she can take over this dominant function. This has caused countless "discussions" between my wife and I - and tears. But we have been able to strike a compromise. I will not kiss Vela on the mouth any more and will wash my hands and face before kissing my wife. I try ignoring Vela when I come home, but that simply doesn't work. She just follows me everywhere I go, sometimes running up ahead of me, for example on the stairs. The more I tried to keep her behind me, the more excited she becomes. And of course my wife hollers down "If you would ignore the dog, maybe she'd stop pestering you. And why should you deal with her before even saying hello to me?" So I had a choice. Either keep peace with my wife and ignore my dog in her attempt to dominate me or accept the fact that she'd already dominated my wife and ignore that in favor of trying to first greet my dominated wife, thus not allowing my dog to dominate me. These dogs can put you in an untenable position. I guess that's part of their plan.

One aspect where Vela has completed her move to take over domination of her humans is how she will lay down on our feet, taking over our space, claiming her rule-of-dog. Now she doesn't do this all the time, but does whenever the fancy strikes her, whether we want this or not. We've of course given in lock, stock and barrel to this overt domination, so much so that we do not wear slippers any more in the winter, knowing that Vela will claim her rightful spot on our feet. Frankly, this doesn't really bother us much, especially in the winter in the kitchen/dining area where we have stone floors. But it is of course the idea of allowing her to dominate us and claim a piece of our space that needs to be noticed here.

I'm sure, if our furniture were more comfortable for her, she would try to show her dominance over us in this respect also, but she's never shown any inclination to get up on the the sofa, my office chair, the dining room chairs or the junk-chair (I suppose you have one too, a chair that just seems to fill up with all sorts of junk that has no other place in the house) by the door. She also has never shown any inclination to counter-surf or beg at the table. I suppose that's because in order to fulfill her domination over us, we see that she has her own place by the table or the sofa near us at all times which she can use to keep a watchful eye on us. To appease her dominating character, we will occasionally give her a pig's ear or ostrich tendon while we're eating and that seems to give us a break from her iron-pawed rule of the house. Strangely enough, when we're on trips, she's never tried to claim a spot on the hotel bed. Maybe she'd prefer sheets and blankets to the usual Nordic bed coverings? We count ourselves lucky here.

She has shown however some cracks and inconsistencies in her drive to take over the alpha of our pack. One such area is play-time. There seems to be no pattern to when she wants to play and when she doesn't. In fact, she's always up for a long game of tug. I suppose if we always gave in to her she'd try to expand this dominating behavior to Checkers, Monopoly (what would be more natural for practicing the domination of the world except for Sim City?) or even Chess. We did see a film of one lady who taught her dogs to play chess with her, but we've been warned not to even entertain the idea of this, in as much as chess is THE game for aspiring socially upwardly mobile dogs, looking for any way to take over control. We've also only ever played poker, cribbage and (yes, I admit it) Masters of the Universe when she's been asleep in her bed in her room (well, it's actually the stair well next to my office, but we call it her room). We have been able to hold her blatant dominating scheming in this area at bay. So it's a small price to pay, to play tug with her sock - used to be my sock, but she claims them, when they get holes in them. I wonder how the holes get in them ….

As you can see, we're fighting an up-hill battle on all fronts with Vela. Her seemingly sweet demeanor and wagging Retriever tail is obviously just a ruse for a plotting, scheming canine version of the next military K9 junta, just waiting to lay claim to the leadership of our pack. We've been able to work out our compromises, but we feel we need help to reclaim our house and family.