Service
Separation Anxiety Training (Regional South Australia)
A dog that panics when you leave is not being naughty. It is genuinely afraid — and forcing through it makes it worse, every time.
In short
Separation anxiety is a panic disorder, not a behaviour problem. A truly anxious dog is in genuine distress when alone — heart racing, drooling, sometimes self-harming. The fix is desensitisation under calm leadership, not crate-and-cry, and not "let them get used to it."
Sound familiar?
- Destruction the moment you leave — doors, frames, carpets
- Howling, screaming or non-stop barking when alone
- Self-injury (chewing paws, scratched flank)
- Refuses to eat unless you're home
- Follows you from room to room, can't settle anywhere alone
- Toileting indoors only when you're out
Why this works where other methods do not
- Crate training a panicking dog (often catastrophic)
- "Let them cry it out" — escalates the panic
- Long-distance day-care or "tire them out" approaches
- Calming chews, ThunderShirts, lavender — managing symptoms, not cause
- Calm leadership lowers baseline arousal so the dog can learn
- Graduated desensitisation at thresholds your dog can succeed at
- Owner habits adjusted (dramatic exits/returns drive anxiety up)
- Drug-free protocol — the anxiety itself gets resolved, not masked
How it works
- 1
Free Behaviour Test
Confirm it's genuine separation anxiety, not boredom barking or under-exercised arousal — they look similar and need different fixes.
- 2
Video diagnostic
I'll ask you to record what your dog does when alone. Without this, we're guessing.
- 3
In-home or online consultation
Full assessment, leadership reset, desensitisation plan tailored to your dog's threshold.
- 4
Graduated desensitisation protocol
Patient, structured, drug-free. We extend alone-time at thresholds your dog can succeed at — typically eight to sixteen weeks of progression with email support throughout.
Inside the process
What actually happens when we work together
Separation anxiety cases start with a video diagnostic. Before we do anything else, I need to see what your dog actually does when alone — and crucially, what it does in the first 15 minutes, the middle 30, and the back end of an absence. The behaviour is wildly different across those windows, and the diagnosis depends on which pattern is dominant. You set up a camera, leave the house in your normal way, and send me the clip.
My preference for every anxiety case is in-home. Sitting in your real environment, reading your dog in the room, and watching how the household interacts gives me information no video can. For owners outside the drive radius, online coaching is a workable alternative — but where the geography allows, in-person is always the format I recommend. We start with what the video tells us. Then we audit the build-up to your departures, the departures themselves, the goodbyes, the returns, the routines around door handles and shoes and car keys, and the cues your dog has learned to read as 'they are leaving.' Most owners are unintentionally amplifying the anxiety through the way they manage their own departure ritual; we reset that first.
The active training is a desensitisation protocol structured to your dog's current threshold. If your dog panics at 10 minutes, we work in 8-minute graduated absences; if 2 minutes is your dog's ceiling, we work in 60-second blocks. The work is patient, repetitive, and measured in small wins. We do not skip steps. We never let the dog panic to a baseline we have already moved past.
I don't support medicating a dog. In my experience, once dog owners follow this method the dog's anxiety can be handled without the need for medication. Email support runs for the full duration of the protocol — typically eight to sixteen weeks, with bi-weekly check-ins and ad hoc questions answered within one business day.
What changes
- Calm goodbyes — no whining, no panic
- A dog that settles when you leave the room
- Sustainable time alone, gradually extended
- A household that can leave for work, dinner, holidays
- A regulated nervous system in your dog — not just managed behaviour
Who this is for
- FIFO and shift-work households where routines shift suddenly
- Households that adopted during lockdowns and never re-introduced alone-time properly
- Rescue dogs with attachment trauma
- Owners returning to office work after years of remote
Expected outcomes
What you’ll notice — and when
The first sign of progress is your dog settling within the first ten minutes of an absence rather than escalating. That is the inflection point. Once we can hold that pattern reliably, every subsequent extension is technical work — adding time, adding contexts, adding variety — rather than the desperate firefighting most separation anxiety owners come to me from.
Week one to three is mostly about you. Your departure ritual changes. Your goodbye is removed. The build-up cues — picking up the keys, putting on shoes, going to the door — get rehearsed at random times when you are not leaving, until they no longer predict an absence. The dog's anxiety baseline drops simply because the world stops broadcasting departure signals every time you reach for your keys.
Weeks four to eight are the desensitisation work proper. Graduated absences extend on a schedule the dog can succeed at. By week six most cases can hold a 30-minute absence calmly; by week eight, two hours. The owner is now leaving the house for normal errands without rebuilding from zero each time, and the dog is sleeping or settling rather than vigilantly tracking the door.
By the three to four month mark, most cases can manage a normal working day. Some need ongoing support to handle longer absences (overnight, weekend trips) and that is normal. A small number of severe cases — typically dogs with attachment trauma or specific neurological components — need ongoing management rather than full resolution; for these, the outcome is a dog that lives a calm, manageable life with sensible boundaries on alone-time rather than a dog that can be left for twelve hours. I will tell you honestly which category your dog is in well before we are eight weeks deep, so you can plan around the realistic outcome.
Real owners. Real change.
Owners who’ve worked with Pauline on separation anxiety
“A lot of information provided, most of the time is hands on with dog, which was very helpful. Not going to lie training is mostly for the owners not dog, they are smart enough to have already worked out who's the boss. Not going to be a quick fix if that's what you are looking for, lots of practice and repetition required to succeed. Pauline is very easy to work with, friendly and approachable. Session was flexible with working on issues and asking questions. Tilly's behaviour is improving - the small wins make it worthwhile. We still have a long way to go but now have the tools and information to get there and being able to contact Pauline any time is fantastic. Located in Port Augusta, fur-baby Tilly (American Bulldog, Rottweiler, Staffy cross).”
“Hi I'm Annie and my little dog is Tilly - a Jack Russell Cross. I took Tilly to Pauline when Tilly was an anxious, reactive, barking little dog and very much in control. But it didn't take long for me to see a difference in Tilly once Pauline started working with us. You have to be very consistent with this method and follow the process. It's made for a much happier life for me and my little dog Tilly. Thanks Pauline 😊”
“Pauline did a wonderful job of helping us to understand the power dynamics going on with our dogs. She gave us practical advice to follow that actually worked. She really understands the psyche of animals.”
Where I work
Separation Anxiety across regional SA
Pauline travels in-home across these regions — and works online with owners anywhere in Australia.
Upper Spencer Gulf
Spanning Port Pirie, Port Augusta and Whyalla, the Upper Spencer Gulf is home to working families, working dogs, and the long open spaces that both help and hurt dog behaviour. I run regular in-person consultation days across the whole USG from my Crystal Brook base — with bookings grouped together for the longer Whyalla and Port Augusta trips so the drive carries multiple cases.
Dog training the Upper Spencer Gulf
Eyre Peninsula
The Eyre Peninsula is vast — Port Lincoln is roughly 5 hours from Crystal Brook, Ceduna closer to 8. I work in-home across the peninsula on blocked consultation days, grouping bookings together to make the drive worthwhile — and online coaching is equally available for owners who prefer it or whose case is time-sensitive.
Dog training in Eyre Peninsula
Iron Triangle
The Iron Triangle — Port Pirie, Port Augusta and Whyalla — is one of the densest regional dog populations in South Australia. Heart of the Pack is based 25 minutes south of Port Pirie at Crystal Brook and runs regular in-person consultation days across all three towns, with bookings grouped together for the longer Whyalla trips so the drive carries multiple cases.
Dog training in Iron Triangle
Mid North
The Mid North is home base. Crystal Brook sits squarely in the middle of it, and my standard rotation covers most Mid North towns within an hour's drive — Jamestown, Peterborough, Burra, Gladstone, Snowtown, Laura, Wirrabara, Quorn — with regular in-person consultation days through the week.
Dog training in Mid North
Clare Valley
Clare Valley wine-country dog life is its own thing. Tourists, dog-friendly cellar doors, dog-dense events, and a population mix of long-time locals and tree-changers from Adelaide. I run regular in-person consultation days across the Clare Valley from my Crystal Brook base — about 50 minutes south — with bookings grouped together so each Clare day carries multiple consults.
Dog training in Clare Valley
Yorke Peninsula
The Yorke Peninsula is beach country — fishing trips, tourist holidays, working sheep properties, and family dogs that range from spoilt town dogs to long-line drivers on the harvest. I run regular in-person consultation days across the peninsula from my Crystal Brook base, with bookings grouped together so the drive (90 minutes to the Copper Coast, around 2 hours to Yorketown) carries multiple consults in the same trip.
Dog training in Yorke PeninsulaTown-specific pages
Separation Anxiety in your town
Local-context pages for separation anxiety in the towns I work most often.
Related services
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