Testimonial 43 - Raylan

I came to Helping Pets Behave when I realized that my dog’s obedient behavior in the house wasn’t coming with us outside in new settings. The Professional Handling for Everyday Obedience class taught me ways to help Raylan deal with his uncertainty around new things and places and how to encourage him to focus on me in any situation. I can already see him realizing that scary things now mean more treats and more fun! I am so grateful to Mary for boosting Raylan’s confidence and improving my understanding of how to best help him.

The class was great because I learned just as much as Raylan did! Mary was able to provide feedback on how I could more effectively communicate to him and how to read what his body language is telling me. Since applying the techniques we learned in the class I feel like our bond has improved, he is more in tune with my expectations, and I am more confident in my training implementation. Mary ensured that each dog in the class moved at their own pace and never got overwhelmed. I was very impressed with her ability to customize the training based on each dog’s needs and personality.

Mary has the unique ability to adapt training methods into simple and, most importantly, effective exercises. She is very good at explaining not just how to perform the exercises, but why we are learning them and how they influence the dog. This class helped me learn skills that I can use to teach other behaviors and even apply to my other dog with different issues. It was an absolute relief to find a trainer committed to positive training, knowing that I would not be pressured to use any compulsion tools or techniques.

Mary offers classes on wide range of topics and we can’t wait to see what we’ll learn next!

Anne V. Baltimore, MD