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The Everyday Trainer Podcast
The Everyday Trainer Podcast
Inside Your Dog’s Reactive Brain: Hormones, Habits, and Training That Works
Leash meltdowns aren’t random—they’re rehearsed. We pull back the curtain on what “reactivity” really means, why barriers like leashes and fences supercharge emotion, and how to swap chaos for structure without crushing your dog’s spirit. We map the two major lanes of reactivity—overarousal versus fear—then connect them to what’s happening inside the body, from dopamine-fueled excitement to cortisol-driven stress. That biology lesson turns into timing and tactics you can use today.
We start at home, not on the sidewalk. You’ll learn a simple marker-based game that opens and closes a training window, plus why tethering is a crucial skill for teaching calm under restraint. We share step-by-step ways to build reliable loose-leash walking in low-distraction spaces, then show how to move from management to real behavior change. When and how should you layer tools for clarity? Why are forced sits and tight leashes making things worse? How can a flexi line help you test choices safely in open areas? We answer it all, with examples from Bella’s progress and Muffin’s spicy genetics.
Along the way, we talk emotion in training, why precision can wait, and how structure builds confidence in anxious dogs. If dog parks and on‑leash greetings have been fueling your problem, you’ll leave with a practical plan: short engagement loops, crate and tether reps, movement over standoffs, and controlled exposures that don’t reward barking. Plus, we share facility news, new classes in Upland and San Diego, a community holiday party and giving tree, and details on an upcoming seminar with our mentor Oscar focused on markers, communication, and play.
If this helped reframe your dog’s outbursts, tap follow, share with a friend who’s struggling, and leave a quick review telling us what you’ll try first. Your questions for Oscar are next—send them our way.
Visit us on the website here to see what we've got going on and how you can join our pack of good dogs and owners.
Hello, hello, and welcome back to the Everyday Trainer Podcast. My name is Meg, and I am a dog trainer. Today's episode, we're gonna be talking about reactivity. I know you guys want to learn more about it. I've done a few episodes on it already, but we're gonna chat about what goes on in our dog's brain when they're reactive, the hormones that are released, and what we can do to work through that reactivity. You know the drill? Grab yourself a tasty drink and meet me back here. Hello, hello. Welcome back. It's been a bit. Welcome, Toma.
SPEAKER_01:Meet us back here.
SPEAKER_00:Meet us back here. Toma's with me in this episode.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, it's been a minute since I've been on.
SPEAKER_00:We're chilling at the facility. I don't even remember the last episode that we recorded. I probably should have gone and looked at that. But I took a little break over the holidays. It was super busy, and I feel like every time I have a board and train, I just it's a lot. Like, I don't know how I did it with so many dogs at the house.
SPEAKER_01:We got a different change of pace now, and that's okay too.
SPEAKER_00:We got a different change of pace now. But I recently had board and train Bella. She has been home for about what a week and a half now, two weeks maybe. Um, but she was reactive, and so a lot of my content over the past month, I would say, has kind of revolved around her and her journey in working through her reactivity. And because of that, the conversation of what to do with our reactive reactive dogs and why our dogs are reactive has come up a lot for me in conversation, in comments, in direct messages, all of that stuff. So I was like, you know what? It's time to do another reactive episode. And I don't even know what I've said on previous ones. So maybe I'll give you some new information after you know all of this time in growth as a dog trainer. But before we get into that, a few updates for you guys. You know that we're at the facility, but we haven't really opened it up to the public just yet, outside of Thomas classes.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, basically been doing like intro to sport, so some obedience and a little bit of bite work. Um just like play development with your with your dogs.
SPEAKER_00:And you have a very good community of people.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, it's been a lot of fun. Um been training what, three times a week, having like a different goop class, and uh it's been it's been cool, pretty consistent, like the same people coming, and uh it's it's really nice to see the community that we built and also like everybody like improving. So yeah it's been a blast.
SPEAKER_00:I feel like you're very good at you're like a good entry for it because I feel like sport can feel very intimidating, but you don't feel that way at all. And I see it in the people that come to your group, you know.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I've made a huge like emphasis of being like welcoming for everybody, and people are like, I don't know, like I have a pet any level, yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, literally, I'll have to doodles, yeah.
SPEAKER_01:And then in the same session, have like a duchy, you know.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, you'll have like a police dog, and then you have like a little doodle, yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Which I think is cool too, because people well, one you get to like work on your handling like wherever you're at with your dog, right? And there's it's really judgment free. There's no, you know, there's no issues like regarding it, like where you're at, but then also it's cool to see dogs that are further along, so people stay.
SPEAKER_00:It like gives people hope. Yeah, like wow, that's so cool. You know, you get to see like what the goal is, like what the end goal is. Exactly. Yeah, so so Toma's been doing that. He does that Wednesdays and Fridays at her facility in Upland. And if you don't know, Upland is like east of LA, it's kind of like at the foothills of the mountains. That would be muffin barking in the background. She said, Oh, you're talking about reactivity. I'm gonna bark. That's my little reactive dog. Oh my goodness, Muffin. She literally never stops barking. Like she is the worst in the crate, and I feel like, especially recently.
SPEAKER_01:It's pretty funny.
SPEAKER_00:Oh my gosh. And she's just like, it's not even a bark, she's like, oh, like she's like talking, you know. Oh, there she goes. Muffin, stop. Okay, anyways, and then you do your I got another Saturdays in San Diego.
SPEAKER_01:Yes, correct.
SPEAKER_00:Correct. So if you guys are in Upland, or not even just Upland, but the whole LA area. The whole LA area. We got people coming from everywhere. Or San Diego, go to Toma's website and sign up for bite work. And I I hate calling it bike bite work. We need to come up with I feel like we should just call it group.
SPEAKER_01:Well, it's funny, it's funny because like I literally like pretty much insist on people doing obedience. Like for me, that's super important. Um, the obedience portion. Like, if you don't have control in your dog, like let's not teach it to be unhinged. Yeah. Um and like for me, that's always been the more interesting part of like sport work. Like, we do, you know, a sport called PSA. If you don't pass the obedience portion, you don't even move on to protection. So I think it's very important that you kind of build up both elements kind of as you progress. And maybe at some stages, okay, we do two rounds of protection, but you you still do need to be practicing your obedience. And it's funny because sometimes people come to me and they're like, No, I just want to do two rounds of protection. I'm like, okay, that's cool. And then like they come a couple times and all of a sudden, like, they see everyone else like doing obedience, and their obedience is like improving and stuff. It's like, ah, okay, I'm gonna start working on obedience.
SPEAKER_00:So yeah, obedience is a thing that you have to spend so much more time doing for sure. And I think it's like easy to it's easy as a handler to just pull your dog out, put a slap of them on a harness, and then be like, There you go, Toma. Yeah, work my dog.
SPEAKER_01:But then in front of other people to actually work on your timing marker and all that stuff.
SPEAKER_00:Nerve-wracking, yeah, nerve-wracking, but I think that is a skill in itself and like makes you a better handler and a better dog trainer, is like train your dog in front of people, do it with an audience. I feel myself like even during club, like I train very differently when it's just like me and Muffin versus at club, you know, and I'm comfortable with all of you guys. But even like in the beginning, it was like, oh my gosh, or when we like first started training with Oscar, like I feel comfortable in front of Oscar now. He doesn't stress me out as much, but in the beginning, I was like, oh my gosh. It's just so you get so nervous doing that. So yeah, if you guys are interested, you don't have to have a Malinois or a German Shepherd or anything like that. Toma has all types of dogs come to his group.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, it's it's really been fun. Like we got literally all levels. And as long as like, you know, your dog has some level of drive and you're looking to fulfill him, like provide an outlet, we'll be able to improve on something. We'll we'll definitely progress. Like even if it's like not like bite work directly, like we'll do a beetle and teach you how to play.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, you'll start with like a flirt poll or there's always somewhere something to work on, you know? And it's cool to just meet other dog people.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, and I I I I like that I'm basically the air like the the entry level to sport because maybe down the line, even if like the dog you currently have isn't gonna be like your next like you know, sport dog or whatever, compet competitive sport dog, let's say, um, we're improving your handling, and then maybe your next dog is gonna be, you know, a sporty dog. Yeah. So I like I like that.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. So we've been doing that at the facility, but we haven't opened it up to other classes. But I need like a little drum roll. Uh starting in January, we're gonna open up more classes. I'm gonna be teaching some classes, Toma's gonna be teaching some classes, Saul is gonna be teaching some classes. We're gonna have uh Saul's gonna teach canine good citizen classes, which I feel like everybody's gonna love. Toma's gonna do like keep doing his bite work group, that sort of stuff, detection, obedience, sport prep. I'm gonna do a group hike, which I'm excited because we have like these trails by us that are like 10 minutes down the road. So I'm gonna do a group hike uh over there. And then at the facility, I'll do reactivity classes, puppy classes, basic obedience, and just like a couple other classes sprinkled in. So I'm excited to get into that. We, of course, will announce it on socials and you know, share the website with you guys to sign up, all of that. But since you are podcast listeners, we have to share it with you first, of course. And something else that we have coming up very soon, the 19th of December, we're gonna be hosting a holiday party, a little Christmas party. That's gonna be kind of like our grand opening for our facility. We haven't really done anything fun like that because I feel like we've been working to make it more homey, you know, it's very industrial, but I've been trying to make the inside like nice and cozy because it's like kind of our home right now. Um, and it's our home and hangout spot for all of you guys, too. So that's gonna be Friday, December 19th. I haven't figured out a time yet, but we're gonna have like cookie making and hot chocolate, and we're gonna put Toma in a Santa suit and do like Santa bites and hopefully have a photographer there to take pictures. It'll be lots of fun and we're opening it up to everybody. We're also gonna do a giving tree for the animal pad. So my trainer Danielle works with she like manages the training part of the animal pad, which is a rescue in San Diego, and they're always in need of donations. So she gave us a list that we're gonna put together a little giving tree so you guys can bring donations that we're gonna give to the Animal Pad in San Diego, which will be very exciting, and um I'm pumped. It'll be good. I bought a Christmas tree today. It will be getting delivered tomorrow.
SPEAKER_01:Let's go.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:That's the spirit. No, it's definitely spirit, it's definitely uh becoming a very cozy space. Like we got these colorful locker rooms, we got a a new couch, it's like fancy Persian rug. My Persian rug.
SPEAKER_00:And then uh I told my friend uh Cassidy, I don't know, has she been on the podcast before? Just for the she did the uh the retreat, the Josh Retreat. Yeah, so she was on that episode, but she's a dog trainer here in LA, and like Cassidy, how do we explain Cassidy?
SPEAKER_01:She can have some side quests, you know.
SPEAKER_00:Cassidy loves a good side quest. And I was like, who can help me find a big ass like Persian rug? And I like messaged her and I was like, Cassidy, I need you to find me a rug, and she was like, Amazing, how much money do you want to spend? And I like gave her a budget, and then just like randomly, it was the weekend of the mine and Shane's seminar. She like FaceTimes me and she's like, No, that's a that was hilarious.
SPEAKER_01:You were busy, so she FaceTimes me, and I'm like, I didn't even know you put her on this task.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, she's like at in some attic of like this rug shop in like downtown LA, and she's like talking to this like guy, and he's like showing us these rugs. I don't know, it was just so funny.
SPEAKER_01:We're having her like unroll these giant rugs.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, it's too funny, and then she delivered it.
SPEAKER_01:It was great during the seminar.
SPEAKER_00:But yeah, we have a cool ass rug that's like from the 70s. There's probably like cocaine in it still or something. I don't know.
SPEAKER_01:We got a bunch of super cool new lights, you know, a lot of warm lights.
SPEAKER_00:We love the lights. You guys know I love my lights.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, no, it's it's coming together. It's a nice space.
SPEAKER_00:So you guys should come out from far and wide, please. It'll be so much fun. I would love for you all to come meet us and see the facility if you haven't been out yet. But yeah, Southern California people are honestly like I was just in Arizona. Arizona's not that far from us. If you're in Arizona, you can come out. Like, please come out, it'll be a great time.
SPEAKER_01:Um what's funny too with this space is originally this was Oscar's old space, and when we first set foot in here, we're like, oh, this is a really cool space. Cool space. Let us know when this becomes available.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. When I originally came out here was, I don't know, two or three years ago, I met Oscar, and it was, I didn't really like know Oscar personally when I had him on the podcast the first time. It was he was like a friend of a friend, and so he like agreed to be on my podcast. We came out here, met him at the facility, and that like weekend, I was like, I love this facility. Like, when you get rid of this, will you tell me? I really want this space, and he's like, ha ha, yeah, whatever, girl. And then we got it.
SPEAKER_01:It's funny because I told manifested that I told him the same thing the first time I set foot in the facility.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, this guy, when when he went to get rid of it, he didn't even tell us. Roel told me. He was like, Oh, yeah, this is Oscar's last week in the facility. And I was like, What? What?
SPEAKER_01:Hey, we ended up getting it.
SPEAKER_00:We ended up getting it, and it's it's been genuinely so nice to have a home base. I like doing both. I like having a home base and I like doing van life, but honestly, van life is exhausting and I feel like it's very glamorized. I never, I never kind of like fell for the glamorized van life trap, and I knew that I didn't want to do it forever, but it was kind of my escape from like Florida, I guess. Like I knew that I didn't want to stay in Orlando forever. I at least wanted to like leave and go explore and like see other places that I wanted to live. And I feel like that's what's cool about van life is that we got to see so many different places. You know, like originally when we came out here, we wanted to be in Northern California.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, that's the best thing, right? Because people they want to explore like a city, but then it's Lucy just scratching under the bed.
SPEAKER_02:Under the bed, under the bed. She's literally stuck.
SPEAKER_01:No, it's a it's a very easy way to explore places and kind of see where you want to end up. And we ended up in LA.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:You good girl? She's like scorbing her way.
SPEAKER_00:Oh my gosh.
SPEAKER_01:She's like still halfway stuck.
SPEAKER_00:Lucy. The floor is slippery. She can't get out from under it. I don't know why she needs to crawl under the bed though. Are you pulling her out? Oh my gosh.
SPEAKER_01:She's out. She's made it. Ridiculous. But going back to this used to be Oscar's facility, we're actually hosting him.
SPEAKER_00:We're hosting Oscar. You guys have probably seen. So the end of February, the weekend of February 21st and 22nd, Oscar is going to be hosting a workshop here. Or I guess more of like a seminar for pet owners, dog trainers, anybody who wants to elevate their dog training. So if you don't know, Oscar has been our mentor for the past year. We are very, very blessed that we have been invited into the inner circle and we get to work with Oscar, and he's just he's just taught us so much. I remember some of the first few times that we have worked with Oscar, and we are not we were so bad compared. We progressed so much since we've been talking about progressed so much since training with him, like genuinely. And I don't know. I'm just I'm incredibly grateful, and I think everybody should have the opportunity to learn from Oscar.
SPEAKER_01:Absolutely.
SPEAKER_00:Anybody that you know that has worked with Oscar is probably a good fucking dog trainer.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, hands down, he he makes some good trainers.
SPEAKER_00:He makes some good trainers, and also he doesn't ask for anything in return.
SPEAKER_01:Like he is like no, he's done it all from the kindness of his heart.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, he just genuinely wants to help people be better, you know? So he's gonna be teaching us marker words, communication, and play. One of the things that I really like about Oscar's training that I think I have uh grown a lot in is he's really big on emotion in training. He's like, yeah, I don't necessarily care. It's not that he doesn't care about the behaviors, but like you need to sacrifice precision in the behaviors sometimes for like the emotion that you get from the dog. And I didn't really understand what that meant in the beginning when we started working with him, but now that I like see Minka versus Muffin, you know, like I think Minka would be a completely different dog if I had somebody like Oscar to mentor me while I was in the process of training her, you know? And of course, they're like different dogs, like Muffin and Minka are very different dogs, but I didn't really get that. I didn't really get the emotion side of things before I started working.
SPEAKER_01:You can teach behaviors in a very correct manner, and the dog's doing the positions, right?
SPEAKER_00:But if the emotion isn't there, you're not gonna and that's what I would say most people do. Everybody, like, think about it. Like every time we do a lesson with somebody, they're so hung up on like the correctness, right? And especially like online dog training, it's like everything needs to be precise and perfect, and like that is not how Oscar is. Like, he has the best trained dogs.
SPEAKER_01:That's the end picture.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, that's the end picture, but he's so big on like, nah, we need to get the emotion first, and then we can work on the precision. And I don't know. I really like that. Like, I've learned the most from Oscar than I have anybody. I like Oscar's training more than anybody else's training that I've seen. I think Oscar is a very fair trainer. I think he also. Also holds the dogs to such a high standard, which I've never seen before. I feel like a lot of trainers treat their dogs like they're stupid, right? Like, even the session with Muffin that we did the other day, that was a long ass session. Like Muffin's not even a year old. Anybody else I would take Muffin to a session with, they would do it's fine. They can have those. It's like a parasock. I gave it to them. Okay.
SPEAKER_01:I was just looking at what he had in his mouth. I wasn't like, yeah. Um most trainers would be like, keep the session super short.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, keep this keep the session super short, like bare minimum from the dog, but Oscar holds the dogs to like such a high standard. And we did a session with Muffin the other day, and it was like long, I was out of breath, Muffin was out of breath, but like she looked really good. You know?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, absolutely. And chances are like we would have ended it shorter.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, we would have ended it shorter, and I wouldn't have asked so much of her, but like you see, like Galan just turned two.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, that's pretty crazy.
SPEAKER_00:Like, did Oscar get his twos with him? Um or was that his ones? The last trial. His ones?
SPEAKER_01:Shit, I should know this.
SPEAKER_00:I think it was his ones.
SPEAKER_01:Yes. He closed out his ones, he's training for the twos.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. But like he could go trial Galan for his twos. Like he was debating on doing it that weekend.
SPEAKER_01:That's the thing. Like they're already they're training for 2.5s already.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, and Galan just turned two. Like, that's so crazy. But it it works. Like the dogs are capable of it, but Oscar is training his dogs like every single day, you know, and like that's the thing, too, is I don't really know anybody who's training their dogs more than like Oscar and Shane.
SPEAKER_01:For sure. Chris.
SPEAKER_00:And Chris. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:No, Oscar Oscar definitely holds his dogs to a high standard and the people that he trains with as well. And like you could see, you know, the people that he's turned into trainers.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. So sign up for Oscar's workshop seminar. February 21st, 22nd. If you sign up before December 15th, then get access to a play-in plan. Payment plan. Split up over three months. So that should help you out a little bit. But yeah, we'd love to see you guys there. It's gonna be at our facility, Oscar's old facility. Should we get into reactivity?
SPEAKER_01:Let's dive into it.
SPEAKER_00:Let's dive into reactivity. Uh reactivity is always a hot topic, right? Like so many people struggle with reactivity. Dog trainers talk about reactivity all the time. Reactivity, reactivity, reactivity. Like that's like the number one thing that somebody's gonna call a dog trainer for. Lay down. They're being really annoying. Lucy, go lay down. Oh my goodness.
SPEAKER_01:The nail scratching on the floor.
SPEAKER_00:All of them. All of the muffin barking, the nails scratching on the floor. Ugh.
SPEAKER_01:It's really not that bad.
unknown:No.
SPEAKER_00:I've been with them for three days straight. We've just been staring at each other all the time. Okay, so let's talk about reactivity. First of all, what is reactivity? In my definition, reactivity is when our dogs have some sort of explosion due to, in part, a barrier. That barrier could be the leash, a window, a fence, anything that is like restricting our dogs in some way. Holding, just think like holding our dogs back, you know. So there's a difference between reactivity and aggression. Aggression is when the dog has intention. Like the dog wants to hurt. There is true intention behind reactivity. There's not really intention. So if we get rid of that barrier, I'm typically not seeing those explosive behaviors.
SPEAKER_01:I'm sure you guys have seen like videos on Facebook, you know, where you got two dogs barking through a fence, they open the door and the door and the dogs scurry away.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Or they just like stop barking.
SPEAKER_01:No intent.
SPEAKER_00:No intent. So that's what we're talking about when we're talking about reactivity. We're not talking about aggression. It's very different. So reactivity is typically divided into two camps. There's the reactivity that is caused by stress, fear, alertness, frustration, or the reactivity that is playful, social, and just overexcited. This is why dog trainers tell you to not do on-leash greetings. Not only is it probably not going to lead to like a good interaction, but that's where we can see the overexcitement reactivity. Your dog sees another dog and they go, Oh, I get to greet that dog. And when we hold them back on a leash, that frustration causes your dog to bark and lunge. We see it with people too, right? When we let our dogs go say hi to everybody that they see on leash, and then one day we're like, no, I'm not gonna like, we're just gonna keep walking. And your dog is like, well, what the heck? I want to go say hi to that person. They hit the end of the leash and they're barking, barking, barking. I would say that a majority of reactivity is in the camp of playful, social, and excited, or just maybe not even playful, but just like over-arousal. I think a lot of people think that their reactivity is fear-based because that's kind of like those trigger words that we see online all the time. You know, like I'm I'm thinking of I have a client in San Diego, um, and one of the first sessions that I had with them, they were like, Oh, I my dog is fear-based reactive. And I was like, Oh, why do you think that? And she was like, I don't know. And I was like, Okay, does your dog go to daycare? Yes. Do you let your dog say hi to other dogs on the walk? Yes. I'm like, okay, let's see the reactivity. And we see the reactivity, and it's a thousand percent, it's not fear-based at all. So I feel like a lot of people think that their dogs are fear reactive, and I'm not like discrediting you if you feel that way. Like you very well may have a dog that is fearful reactive, but I think a majority of the time the reactivity is coming from a place of just a lack of impulse control. Our dogs are used to doing whatever they want whenever they want, and when they're restricted on a leash, that frustration causes them to bark. So let's talk about. So, since this one is more common, why do I think it's more common? Because a lot of people allow on-leash greetings. We go to dog parks, we let our dogs like say hi to every single dog that we see.
SPEAKER_01:Uh, we don't or people like get pet by people.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, or get pet by people. Um, and that is reinforcing, right? And so when we put a leash on our dogs and restrict them, that causes that frustration and kind of that like you know, leak leaking of excitement. They they start barking because they're like, oh my gosh, I am excited because I like seeing other dogs and I want to go and see them. And I'm also kind of frustrated because there's a leash that's holding me back and I can't do the thing that I want to do. And I always get to do the things that I want to do. So, some hormones that are going on with this overexcited reactivity. Dopamine. Dopamine is our feel-good neurotransmitter. This is tied to reward and motivation. This is released during fun or anticipation, right? So we talk about the importance of our markers. Dopamine is a huge player in our marker system because our markers create anticipation of a reward coming. And that anticipation is what gets the dog to do the behavior again, which is caused by that dopamine. So, reactivity, this like excited reactivity is also self-reinforcing. Our dogs get dopamine from the act of barking. And this is something that we do in training all the time. If we see that our dogs are getting a little bit flat, we'll get them into barking, right? And I did a post uh a couple of weeks ago that was like, your dog thinks you're boring, and I start my sessions off with barking. That's how most of us, you don't, you're not allowed to start your sessions with barking because Hawk is He's amped up enough. He's amped up enough. Um, but with Muffin, with Minka, Shane does this with his dogs. Uh, Kate does this with her dogs. Like we all kind of do this with our dogs to get them up in emotion. Oscar has taught us this, right? Up in emotion. And one of the ways is getting them barking because it releases dopamine. It feels good for our dogs to bark. So the act of reactivity is reinforcing sometimes. The other hormone, serotonin, this regulates mood and calmness. It increases in positive emotional states. And then the last thing endorphins. So this is natural pain relief and pleasure chemicals associated with excitement and play. So all of these hormones are getting released from the act of this over-excitement reactivity, which is also why one of, not one of, but the way that I work through reactivity is we first have to stop the reactivity. We have to stop our dogs from rehearsing the behavior that is reinforcing to them. So Bella, for example, Bella, her reactivity is coming from this overexcitement, social, playful place. She sees a dog and she wants to greet them. Now it's also coming from for her specifically, it's also coming from a place of a lack of impulse control. She's before the Border Train, she was not really crated that often. She was never tethered, right? And that's something that I have a lot of my reactive dogs do, especially in the home. If your dog cannot be calm being tethered, so a tether is just putting your dog on a leash and tying them to like a piece of furniture or the leg of a chair, something like that. If they can't be calm in the house where there's very minimal distractions, they are sure as heck not going to be calm out of the house when we start to introduce distractions. And it also is really valuable in practicing some controlled restraint, I guess, right? Is that the word that I'm looking for?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Like reactive dogs, dogs that practice reactivity on the regular are typically not restrained in their everyday home life.
SPEAKER_01:They don't have enough boundaries for sure.
SPEAKER_00:They don't have enough boundaries, they're not created, they're not tethered. And so the only time they're restrained is on the walk. And then we uh we throw in distractions in there, and then we're like, why are they barking? Like, what is this coming from? And it's like, well, they would probably bark inside the house, too.
SPEAKER_01:Let's uh backtrack a little. You said stop the reactivity. Um, you mean by not even letting the dog get to that point? Yeah, be out of the out.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I'm not even saying like correcting, I'm just saying, like, how can we prevent the dog from rehearsing the behavior that is reinforcing to them?
SPEAKER_01:Set the dog up for success by training in low distraction environments first.
SPEAKER_00:Yes. So that is where, like, with Bella, for an example, we started her training at the facility. So she's in a she was an adventure board and train, but especially with my reactive dogs, I like starting them off at the facility because we have the very sterile space. It allows me to build up my communication with the dog, which is super important. And I talk a lot about like building up a game with the dog, and the game is basically just practicing our communication. So lots of get it. I do get it, and then I'll toss a food. The dog chases the food, they grab the food. How do we get the dog to come back to me? Yes, dog comes back to me. I shuffle backwards, I'm pulling the dog in with my body language. I pay, pay, pay. Yes, equals reward on me. Get it is reward away from me. So I can kind of play this game with the dogs inside the facility. I build up this communication with them and they're like, oh, this is fun. I'm keeping them moving. We're practicing our marker words, like there's lots of good stuff that's going on. So I'm gonna start my reactive dogs with tray training sessions that look like that. I'm not going to take a reactive dog and go, all right, let's go work outside of a dog park. And when you go be reactive, I'm gonna string you up and correct you. Like that's that's not it.
SPEAKER_01:So first you teach the dog the language, the terminology that you want to use in order to reward behavior.
SPEAKER_00:Exactly. Exactly. I teach the dog what I want them to do when they see a dog, or I teach them like it could be anything. I could be, you know, running the dog through obedience. I could just be doing get-its and yeses, I could be doing walking drills with the dog. Like, it doesn't really matter what the behavior or the game is. I just need to have some sort of game that I can do over and over and over again that becomes so familiar to the dog that once the dog is familiar with that game and how to win it, I can start to take that game out around the things that the dog would react around. Does that make sense?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, absolutely. Okay, so we practice first the system of communication and then the expected behaviors in sterile environments first and take it out and about.
SPEAKER_00:Yes. Okay, and going back to tethering, I really like doing tethering, and this is where I think I've kind of changed some things. I used to really like practicing crate and place, which I still do those for sure, but I almost like tethering reactive dogs better than I like place because I feel like place is a behavior, right? And we can put the dog in behavior, or we can just tether the dog, which I feel like is more relatable to how the walk looks. So tethering is I tie the dog to a piece of furniture, right? I'm not putting that dog in a down, I'm not putting them in a sit, I'm not giving them any sort of command. It's I don't really care what you do, but I'm not going to take you off of this tether until you've settled. So I'm teaching the dog how to settle with that barrier. If the dog can't settle with that barrier in the house, they're definitely not going to be able to settle outside of the house with that barrier, which is most of the time our leash, you know? So in-the-home behaviors are by far the most important when working through reactivity. How your dog behaves inside the house matters so much. And I need you guys to start adding some barriers into your dog's daily routine. So for Bella, now that she's home, I have her owner tether her. I have her owner create her, just, you know, restraining her in some way and not allowing her to bark and fuss and get what she wants. Because a lot of times when our dogs, like, I remember we were doing the go home and the husband's like, oh, she's whining. Why is she whining? And I'm like, because she wants off, right? She wants off of place or she wants out of the tether. And it has probably worked for her in the past. She whines, she barks a little bit, she gets what she wants. Or she whines, we let her pull over to other dogs, or we let her go say hi to a person. And so we need to make sure that we're not allowing those behaviors to continue first and foremost. I don't necessarily mean correcting dogs, right? I don't mean like, oh, okay, well, just stop your dog from be from being reactive. Just correct them when they're being reactive. No, no, no, no. We're gonna build up this game first. And then once I've got that game, I'm gonna start taking that game around other dogs. And we start this game the same way every single time. So the start of our training sessions, what does it look like? What do we say?
SPEAKER_01:Are you ready?
SPEAKER_00:Are you ready?
SPEAKER_01:So Mars dogs, bark, bark, bark.
SPEAKER_00:With okay, but not with our reactive dogs. Sorry, I was thinking sports, too sporty sport, too sporty, too sporty for our pet dogs. Are you ready? That is marking the opening of the window to that game, right? So I'm always gonna start my training sessions with, are you ready? That means we're about to do it. We're about to train, we're about to do the get-its and the yeses, and I'm gonna run you through your obedience. So we're gonna do some fun little walking drills. I'm keeping the dog moving. These are fun, these are fast paced. I'm using food, I'm rewarding the dog. It's a great time. Whenever we're done with the training session, I'm gonna go all done. Okay. So that is closing that window of training, closing that window of play with the dog. So then I'm gonna take Bella. We're gonna go outside. I have a friend near. By with a dog that's barking, and I'm gonna work Bella the same way that I worked her inside our facility around minimal distractions. I'm gonna say, Are you ready? And she's gonna go, Oh my gosh, she's gonna perk up. I know what that means. Get it. I'm gonna get her chasing her little piece of food. Get it, chasing another piece of food.
SPEAKER_02:Yes.
SPEAKER_00:Walter perks up. He's like, What?
SPEAKER_02:Let's go.
SPEAKER_00:He's looking around. That's a good conditioned marker right there. But I need to teach the dog first what I want them to do before I start holding them accountable to let's say, you know, correcting reactivity or things like that. So you'll see a lot of trainers say, like, you shouldn't correct your dog for being reactive. That's what they're talking about, right? Like you shouldn't just fix reactivity by taking the dog out and start correcting them. We need to build up some foundations first. So those are the foundations that I build up first. So that is just getting the dog around the trigger and not rehearsing that reinforcing reactive behavior. But let's say we've done that for a while. I'm ready to kind of hold my dog to a higher standard. I want to take a reactivity training to the next level. So I've conditioned my e-collar, I've conditioned our marker words, I've conditioned the leash, I've taught my dog a loose lead walk. Now's the time. Once my dog understands all of those things, I can start to hold them accountable to that. And so what does that look like? Well, that could be we're walking around our neighborhood, walking, walking, walking. Your dog is in a nice loose leash walk. Maybe we have them on a flexi. They're just hanging out in the little bubble next to you. Maybe we're on our hands-free slip lead, hanging out. Okay, another dog is approaching. I want you dog, your dog. I want to see what the dog does. Right. So I want you to let's see. Let's see what the dog does. We're not gonna tighten up on our leash. We're not gonna start correcting our dog right away. We're gonna see what the dog does. This is why I love uh flexi once we get to this stage of our reactivity training, because it allows the dog to go ahead, leave me, see, see what happens, right? And if I've e-color trained my dog and they choose to leave me, they're gonna be 10 feet out in front of me. They're gonna commit to lunging and barking at that dog, and that's when I can correct them. And that's where I think true like behavioral mod comes into play. Is okay, we've set our dogs up for success. We've taught them what we want them to do. I don't want to hang out in management forever, right? Hanging out in that game forever is not really fixing the issue because that's a lot of management, but it's very, very important to do that stage because I need to get reps of the dog being around dogs or being around people without being reactive. And once I've got those reps in, and once I've taught the dog, you know, a loosh leash, then I can hold you accountable to it. And so when you commit to leaving me, I can correct you for leaving me and choosing to go be reactive. Your dog has learned, oh my gosh, I left my owner. I got corrected, I'm gonna come back to them. And I want the corrections to happen away from you. I feel like a lot of times we make the mistakes of tightening up on our leash when our dogs are in that heel bubble, right? Or we get really tense because we see another dog and we we know what's gonna happen and we tighten up on that leash. But that's what we're doing in like our protection training.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. The restraint once again creates frustration, which promotes barking, creates that frustration.
SPEAKER_00:And so when we tighten up our leash, it becomes a cue for your dog to be reactive. So making sure that we set our dogs up for success, we are not rushing the process. We stay in that management of you know, using our food and our get it, get it's and our walking drills and our redirection as long as we need. And when we're ready, we can see what our dog is capable of. Put them on the flexi. I like the flexi when we're starting to test that stuff because there's no, there's no like hitting the end of the leash, you know. Obviously, we're not gonna let them like get up in the dog's space, but the dog can like kind of commit to going for it, and they're not immediately hit like they would be at a six-foot leash, you know. So we get to really test the dog's uh intentions there.
SPEAKER_01:This is still very much like in the training phase, so you'd be doing this in like a wide open space with flickers.
SPEAKER_00:It's very controlled. I'm not, oh my gosh, yeah, I'm not putting a reactive dog on a flexi in a busy area that is not ready for it. Like that is what gives flexi leashes a bad reputation. That is not at all what we're doing. It is very, very controlled. And a lot of times when we do this, it's like with our own dogs that we have control over that are neutral. We'll put them even in a down, or we've seen Shane do this in his lessons and his workshops and stuff. This is like his favorite thing. I actually learned the flexi stuff from him. Um, and you can't always do this in all areas, right? But like if you've got a big open park and you can start to work on this, put, you know, a trained dog in a down or have a friend, you know, bring their dog to the park and see. And the reason why I like to test this out on a flexi is because a lot of people's goals with their dogs is that they're off-leash, right? And so we're kind of mimicking this off-leash with the flexi, but we still have that flexi just in case we need to lock up and press that button on our flexi, you know?
SPEAKER_01:Absolutely. So the dog doesn't reach so the dog doesn't reach the other dog, exactly. Just being safe.
SPEAKER_00:So my approach for both types of reactivity is pretty much the same. But let's go ahead and talk about reactivity that is caused by stress, fear, alertness, and more frustration. So the hormones that you're gonna see, well, first of all, the sympathetic nervous system activates, and this is the same uh like human stress response. So when you get stressed, you have the same hormones. Adrenaline is gonna be our main one. This increases heart rate, primes body for action. This is our fight or flight. Okay, so fight or flight, right? Reactivity is fight, right?
SPEAKER_01:Your dog is like very ready to go, popping off, popping off, and then the trigger leaves, or we walk away, and then inherently the dog feels like more powerful. Like, yeah, I got the trigger to leave.
SPEAKER_00:So, like, think about the mailman coming to your house, your dog bah bah barks at the door, mailman leaves. Your dog is like, Yeah, I did that, I did that. And that's another area where like reactivity can become reinforcing. So if your dog is barking at the door, barking at the window, barking at the fence, that it I mean, I had a million conversations with reactive dog owners in the past three days because they did a lot of lot of phone calls, and all of them, all of them barked at the door and barked at the fence. And I was like, all right, how are we gonna prevent that?
SPEAKER_01:And then that's reps on reps on reps of rehearsed behavior.
SPEAKER_00:Every day your dog is practicing that behavior. Like, imagine if you worked out every day, you would be fit. Your dog is your dog is fit with reactivity, like they are so good at being reactive because they practice it every day, multiple times a day. Okay, so we have to first prevent that. That's where crating your dog in the house when you're not home, so they're not barking out the window all day, taking your dog on a leash in the backyard so you don't allow them to bark at the fence, those sort of things.
SPEAKER_01:Because the more they rehearse behaviors, the more ingrained these behaviors become, both positive and negative.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. And think about it as like a drop in the bucket. You have a calm bucket and you have a reactive bucket. Every time your dog is reactive, we're putting more water, more drops of water in that reactive bucket. So now when we want to work through that reactivity, we have to get that many more reps of your dog seeing a dog or seeing a person and not being reactive, which is going to take a long time, you know. All right, the next one, cortisol. This is our primary stress hormone. So this increases when our dogs are aroused, anxious, or overstimulated. And then norepinephrine heightens alertness, focus. This is involved in arousal and reactive barking. So think alarm barking at the door, barrier frustration, and fear barking. So we've got some different hormones at play here, which I think is important to understand. But like I said, my methods are kind of the same, no matter the dog, right? We're gonna build up our communication, build up our set of skills, practice it in a low STEM environment, and then gradually start to increase the distractions, the stimulation, and the criteria for our dogs. And I think because fear reactivity is such a like hot topic trigger word, it puts honestly a lot of fear into people in using tools, you know. I feel like that's a that's a conversation I have a lot with people, is they're like, well, how are how are we going to address the root cause of the emotion, right? But when we use tools in our training, we're not just slapping an e-collar on or slapping a prong collar on and correcting our dog for doing the behavior. That is definitely not going to change the dog's emotions. That is not going to like get to the root cause of the reactivity, whether it's excitement reactivity or it's fear-based reactivity. But through our training, through building up clear communication with our dogs, through building up skills, we're also building their confidence. And I find that a lot of fearful dogs thrive with more structure and more clarity in their day. Like when you're anxious, you want to know your routine. You want to know what is coming next. And so when we practice this very clear, predictable game with our dogs, they know how to win. That in itself is gonna build up their confidence because they're like, oh my gosh, I know what's expected of me. I know our routine, I know what to do when you say get it. I know what to do when you say yes, I know what to do when you say heal. Just training your dog in general is going to build up their confidence. And that is probably the most common question that I get from people is like, okay, my dog is fear reactive or my dog is fearful. How do I build up their confidence? Train them.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, absolutely.
SPEAKER_00:Just literally train them.
SPEAKER_01:You really see the confidence of these dogs go up by giving them more structure and like fulfillment, you know, through like quote unquote work, like giving them a job.
SPEAKER_00:Giving them a job, holding them accountable to things too, I feel like is huge, you know. So, like with a reactive dog, let's say I put that dog on place. Am I not going to use an e-color with that dog because it's a like quote, fear reactive dog? No, the e-color actually adds a ton of clarity. So, for example, I put that dog on place, and let's say that dog breaks place, e-color stem goes on. That dog knows what the e-collar stim means. They go, Oh, okay, go back to place. That like clear boundary for the dog is is helpful communication. And sometimes when we coddle them too much, we're just kind of breeding insecurity in our dogs. We're not teaching them how to handle controlled amounts of stress. And that's what training is, especially in the beginning when the dogs don't know what we're asking of them. Like they might be a little bit stressed. I know that's like force-free people's favorite thing to do is to take clips of dogs training and be like, do you see the stress signals? But anytime you start anything new, it's gonna feel a little stressful. But the thing is, it's controlled. And we're always going to put the dogs in situations that set them up for success. I I like I say it all the time to my owners. I don't really see your dog be reactive because I don't put them in those situations. Yeah. Like, let's think about Bella. She was reactive on the first day I got her because I was just taking her out to go potty. You were out pottying muffin already, and I got to see her be reactive. But after that, I don't put her in those situations. Yeah. You know, I go, okay, this is what we're working on. Now I know like where we need to start. We're gonna start in the facility without any dogs out. And then by the end of the training, we're going on group walks with all of my dogs. We're, you know, at freaking Balboa Park. There's dogs everywhere.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, dogs she doesn't know and she's doing fine.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, dogs she doesn't know, we're doing fine. I I almost never see the dogs do the behaviors that the owners bring the dogs to me for because my goal always is all right, I don't want to continue to rehearse these behaviors. One, because when we rehearse those behaviors, that is like reinforcing it. And we're just kind of adding drops in that bucket. And I want to set the dogs up for success. I want them to win with me. And, you know, I did a post today that was like, please stop tightening up on your leash and forcing your dog into a sit whenever they start to be reactive, and people kind of lost their minds in that, and they're like, Well, what do you want us to do instead? This is so unhelpful. And I'm like, first of all, I have a million and two videos, a million resources of what to do, but also you need to set your dog up for success. And if every time you take them on a walk, they're reactive, then you need to stop taking your dog on a walk and you need to figure out other ways to fulfill them while you're in the process of training them.
SPEAKER_01:It's essentially getting rid of the gray, right? It's like creating clear expectations, and it's black and white. This is what we want them to do, this is what we don't want you to do, and holding them accountable to it.
SPEAKER_00:And that builds confidence.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, you don't get this insecure dog that's always kind of wondering what it's supposed to be doing.
SPEAKER_00:Okay, so things that I don't want to see you guys doing when working through reactivity. We are going to stop doing on-leash greetings. We're gonna stop going to places like dog parks and doggy daycares. We're going to stop tightening up on our leash and forcing our dogs into a sit when we like staring at the trigger. Staring at the trigger.
SPEAKER_01:So ultimately, like like redirecting drills, like walking towards the trigger, and then the dog kind of ranges out. We'll turn around, guide them back in the opposite direction. We get some nice engagement. Dog's doing good, walk back towards the trigger. They venture out in front. We'll do another directional change, maybe pop, pop, pop, back into position.
SPEAKER_00:Movement is important. So I don't like forcing the dogs to stay still, especially in the beginning of training. If later on you want to practice some downstays and your dog is successful at that, then hell yeah, do that. But if you're if you know that your dog is not going to be successful, don't put them in that situation. So maybe that means you know, you stop going on walks for a while until you can build up some strong motivators for your dog. Work on those marker words, work on your teaching leash pressure and your loose lead walking, which is kind of what Toma is describing. And some things that we can add into our day with our reactive dogs is those active training sessions, the get it's and the yeses, and you know, working on obedience, maybe sending your dog to place, calling them back to you. It doesn't really matter what you're working on. We're taking these active training sessions as an opportunity to practice our timing, our marker words, and reinforcing the skills that we're going to use to help us manage our reactivity, especially in that middle area where you know we're trying to work through it. And then I want you to create your dog during the day, tether your dog during the day. Tethering is huge. I highly recommend adding it. You'll find that your dog is probably going to be fussy and whiny in the beginning, especially if you're kind of walking around your house while ever while your dog is tethered, because they're used to doing what they want, right? So that's where that controlled restraint comes in and that controlled, like minor stress. We're teaching our dogs how to work through that stress. And it's super important that when we're tethering or creating our dogs. We're not letting them out while they're still being fussy. We're gonna wait for them to settle. And over time, they're gonna learn, okay, the sooner that I settle, the sooner I get to come out of this. Or they're just gonna enjoy the settling, you know? All of our dogs, just like we put Walter on place just now, all of our dogs know what place means and they know that place is go and settle, right? And we can almost practice that calm on command with these skills. So when we see that our dog is maybe getting a little bit worked up in the house, we can put them over on place or you know, tether them, and it creates this default calm. We're reinforcing that state of mind that we want to see more of.
SPEAKER_01:Even our like most cracked out dog. Like, let's like talk about hawk for a second. We'll do like a super active sporty session, and when we close that window of time, you know, we talked about are you ready and then all done? It's like all done, force calm, or we put him in a down, and it's like doggy meditation. Like now you kind of chill.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, that has been huge for a hawk.
SPEAKER_01:For sure. Not not just like all gas, but also kind of adding in some some calmness.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. And let's talk about our most reactive dog, which is Muffin. I am actively doing all of this stuff with Muffin, and I guarantee if I were not a dog trainer, she would be a nightmare of a dog, just genetically. Like she has been reactive. We have a video of her sitting at a coffee shop, and she's literally eight weeks old, like barking at everybody at eight weeks old. Like she loves to bark. You guys heard her barking in the crate earlier. Like she genuinely loves to bark. But things that I'm doing with her, I crate her. I have to crate her, or she will be a complete menace. And if I ever restrain her in any way, she's gonna lose her mind. I tether her also. We're still working on the tethering, but it's something that I integrate into her routine every single day because if I don't, that reactivity is just gonna take over. Also, when we're on the walk, I don't go on long structured walks with her because that would be setting her up for failure. I do more active training sessions with her. If I do take her on a walk, I'll typically give her a ball and we'll kind of play with the ball while we're out on the walk. And it just gives somewhere for that energy to go. It would be so unfair of me to like expect her to be any different and to take her out on a walk. And then when she does go to be reactive, I'm just like choking her out on the leash. Like that's just so unfair to her. I want to keep her moving, I want to keep her engaged. Look, she started barking because she knows we're talking about her. I heard you talking about me. Take me out. She's like, Yeah, but you know, I was at a park yesterday and there's tons of dogs and people around, and she carried her ball around, and I didn't have her in like a close heel or anything, and she did great, you know. And then every now and then I would like play tug with her. We play tug, and then we go back on our walk. And that's what works for her. And I have different expectations with her because she's more of my sport dog, and you know, she's not like she's with a dog trainer. Like, I let her be a little crazy than a little more crazy than the average pet owner, I would say, wants their dog. But like for my golden retrievers, neither of my golden are reactive. That's just not something that we struggle with, but I have different expectations for them because they're just my chill pet dogs, they're not my sport dogs, so I don't need them to be super jacked up and crazy. So we practice lots of calm with them, with Lucy, with Zoe. We do structured walks, you know, that's just what we do. So it's also making sure that you're looking at your dog and their genetics. Reactivity is just so genetic. You can do all the right things, but if you have a genetically reactive dog, like they're gonna be reactive. And what you do with that, you know, depends on your training. But it it's there's so many genetic factors at play with that.
SPEAKER_01:For sure. I think like that's another element of we can kind of touch on like the active sessions, they're beneficial for your your reactive dog in the sense that it's like it's fulfillment, right? It's a different way to like provide exercise and like you know, enrichment and all that. But also I think having a reactive dog can kind of suck and like not be fun, right? And if you have a different way to enjoy your dog, I think that's huge too. It's like for the owner, you get to like enjoy your dog.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, not all dogs thrive on neighborhood walks, you know, and I I had a virtual session the other day with somebody that was like that. They were like, My dog does so well on hikes and does so poor in a neighborhood walk. And I was like, stop going on neighborhood walks, you know, like obviously we want our dogs to be able to do all the things, but while we're in the process of working through that stuff, like stop setting your dog up to fail, stop getting, you know, so frustrated with your dog, like spend more time doing the things that they're good at and fulfills them, you know. And for a lot of dogs, like so many dogs that come to bite work and like bite work using with quotations, it's really just play, right?
SPEAKER_01:Literally just teaching handlers how to play with their dog. Like sometimes I don't even like I'm not even the one engaging with the dog. I'm like literally just coaching for like how to play tug with a ball with your dog.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. And so we get to do something that is joyable for our dogs, it's enjoyable for us. And it kind of, I feel like it switches or shifts people's expectations of what being like a good dog owner is, you know, so many people are like, oh my gosh, I've like failed because I can't walk my dog in heel for three miles around the block when there's other dogs. And it's like, okay, well, maybe shorten your walks a little bit, or even just do active sessions. Not all dogs need long walks. I take walks with you know Minka. Minka does really good with that, but Muffin, like, I know that I would hate her by the end of a long structured walk, and she would just not do very well, and then I would be frustrated and she would be frustrated, and it would not be productive.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, and and that's not like to say that we don't, you know, walk her, because I think obviously like that's still like a requirement in like modern day like system.
SPEAKER_00:Yes, they should be able to do it.
SPEAKER_01:Um but yeah, it's that's not the the main source of like her physical like output in a day.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, a lot of it is in those active training sessions, and that's also on the type of dog that she is, but I will say a lot of reactive dogs are very drivey and they have nowhere for that drive to go. And so where is it going? It's going at barking at other dogs, you know? That shit's fun, it's fun. Dogs like to bark, you know, and two, it's also important to know that there's nothing wrong with your dog, there's nothing wrong with your reactive dog. Like at the end of the day, reactivity is a it's a natural behavior for dogs. Like we're restraining them. It's natural for dogs to, you know, get frustrated, get excited, to have feelings. We're working against nature here, right? But we can still do a lot of training to teach them how to be functioning members of society. You got anything else to add?
SPEAKER_01:No, I like this episode. It was well rounded.
SPEAKER_00:Well rounded. We kind of touched on all the things.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, and it ties in nicely, like the pet versus the well, and the sporty side of things. So that's literally uh the both of us. That is the both of us, uh got a yin and yang podcast over here.
SPEAKER_00:Well, it's good to be back, guys. I hope you enjoyed this episode and got some valuable insight. I think we'll leave it there. We already got all of our updates out at the beginning of the episode. So we'll see you next time. Thanks for being here.
SPEAKER_01:We'll try and have another one out next week.
SPEAKER_00:We will.
SPEAKER_01:Oh shit.
SPEAKER_00:It'll be with Oscar.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, hell yeah. Awesome.
SPEAKER_00:Oscar will be on next week's episode. So send us your questions. I'll do a post on Instagram for you guys to send us Oscar questions, okay? All right, bye. See you next week.