# Dog Aggression after Attack



## Golden_79 (Jun 18, 2020)

Our boy was attacked the other day by another dog, which caused a bunch of trauma, both physical and mental. 15 stitches later, he is very guarded, growly at other dogs but also human strangers. He was not like this before, very social and was friendly to everyone.

Looking for ideas how we start socializing him after this incident


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## mylissyk (Feb 25, 2007)

Bless his heart. I would just give him time. Keep him home and don't ask him to interact with new people or other dogs for awhile. 

When dogs go through a traumatic experience, they will have higher levels of cortisol in the their body (it's produced in response to trauma). It may take days or weeks for that to return to normal levels. Until it does he may still be acting out of sorts and not want to be around other dogs or people he doesn't know.

After he's all healed up, and has had time to really let the trauma work out of his system, you can try visits with people he already knows and likes, and then even later visit with a dog he already knows and was comfortable with before.


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## davmar77 (May 5, 2017)

My stepdaughter's doodle has been through that twice. The first time he saw amber shortly after he was very hesitant and a little aggressive until she made him feel at ease. They are the best of friends so it didn't last long but we were a little concerned at first. Here they are with me.


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## Emmdenn (Jun 5, 2018)

My boy Denver was attacked by an off-leash German shepherd while we were on a potty walk in our neighborhood. It was traumatizing. Luckily he wasn’t physically injured, but he developed anxiety on-leash if there was an unfamiliar dog approaching. Basically leash reactivity while around strange dogs. We hired and worked with a very serious behaviorist/trainer who has Belgian malinois, so we were able to work with him around dogs that “looked” like the dog that attacked him and made him anxious. It was largely successful in that when he’s on leash we conditioned him to trust us to take care of him and work on things like likes, like obedience training or playing tug with a little rope toy. He’s not perfect and still anxious and on alert any time an unfamiliar dog approaches. We don’t ever do on leash greeting, never have. Unless we’re walking with a friend and a familiar dog. We essentially wanted to gain more tools and knowledge to set him up for success and mitigate his anxiety about dogs on leash.


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## goldy1 (Aug 5, 2012)

It's something I think about having had a few close calls over the years. You've received good advice here. Not rushing it and getting some expert help to set up scenarios for good outcomes. Your poor boy has been traumatized and it will take some time and repeated good or neutral experiences for him to trust unfamiliar dogs and people. The people thing might be easier. People who have a goodie but basically ignore him and let him go to them to get the yummy treat. Not too much more initially until you see that he is trusting strangers again.


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