My dog is almost five and a rescue.
I work from home so he spends all day with me; he's always been funny about going on walks without me if I am in the house. If I'm sick and want to stay in bed, he'll walk with my husband until he notices I'm not there, then run back to find me.
Our dogwalker has never reported this kind of behaviour; he seems fine walking without me when he knows I'm not home.
This year, my husband has been working from home too. Before, the dog was always fine walking without him, but he seems to have gotten so used to us both being around that he'll refuse to walk unless both of us are with him. It's getting difficult to co-ordinate between meetings and work, to always walk at the same time.
A few times, one of us has had to leave mid-walk to get back for a meeting; the dog will finish the walk when this happens, but he seems a little worried, stopping to stare in the direction the other person went and needing a lot of coaxing to start moving.
I don't think this is separation anxiety; while he loves being with people and will spend the whole day on my lap if I let him, he's not shown any worrying behaviour left alone - he doesn't destroy anything, howl, or cry. On top of which, my husband spends most of his day in his office while the dog is with me; he's not being torn away from my husband to come for a walk!
It's also not a problem with the walk itself; he loves walks and he'll do it happily if we're both with him.
Does anyone have any advice on breaking our dog from this cycle?
We've tried:
- saying goodbye to the dog and hiding quietly in another room for 10 minutes, before the walk, as if we've left home.
- putting on a big show of being ill and needing to stay behind.
- games and treats while we were out without the whole house.
TL;DR: dog won't walk unless everyone in the house walks with him - but he's fine when left with his dogwalker for the day and walks happily without us when he knows we're not at home.
