Her Trauma Turned This Dream Dog Into a Monster | Better Human Better Dog | S04E09

It's never acceptable when a dog is aggressive, but when that dog gets aggressive to a pet parent, that's an emergency. I'm on my way to help a young woman who says her dog has turned against her husband. She says the aggression is so bad that they can't even hold hands in the dog's presence. This is a situation that I can't allow to continue. Hi, this is Ami. And this is Adi. We married in May of 2016. I never had dogs growing up. He also never had it. But I always wanted to have a dog. Simba is our very first dog, and his breed is Golden Doodle. We got him as a puppy, and he was, like, this small. Now he's four and a half years old. Ami was apprehensive in the first. But that was only for 15 days, because Simba became my dog. From morning to night, he's just mama's boy. I jokingly always say to Ami that I'm the third wheel. Ami and Simba are the couple. Right. That's true. He has to be around me all the time. But it can have a very bad implication. He thinks that his only job in the world is to protect me from everybody, including Adi. He gets aggressive. There are boundaries that I cannot cross. Like, if I cannot push him away when I want to be next to Ami. Bark really loud. He would just bark and bark. He would not stop. He would not even let us hold hands. You see? It's all right. Sorry. This happens every single time. He would try to scare you off. Like, show your teeth. He can, like, growl a little bit. It's scary now, because I don't think we have control over him anymore. Now, the barking and growling is getting worse. It's not just Adi. Now, that behavior has crossed a limit. This behavior is on the road. In the car. And when we go out for a walk, whenever we pass a dog, Simba would like to lunge over him or bark really loud. He will protect Ami at all costs. It's all right. But we just don't know how to handle this kind of behavior. It is very frustrating, you know? You just give up. That now, you know, it's all right. You win and we lose. Yeah. And now Simba has gone to that level that we avoid people. We never invite any of our friends because of this behavior. And that restricts our world. The worst case scenario with Simba here is he will attack. Thankfully, he has not bit anybody, but that's in my mind forever, that what if he does it? I genuinely believe that Simba can hurt somebody to protect Ami. We need help because Simba is a very big part of our life. Hopefully, Caesar can get me, my wife back. That's what I'm looking for. We need Caesar's help desperately. How are you guys? Hi. Nice to meet you. Ami. Pleasure, pleasure. Nice to meet you. So tell me about Simba. Simba is our first dog ever. And he's protecting me, but I don't know when his protection became obsession for me. He needs me all the time. Bigger problem that we have that Ami sits on the couch, we watch TV, whatever we do. Simba has to be right next to her. And if I try to approach or be in that vicinity, he barks. I don't let Adi come close to me because I'm very scared of Simba barking or his aggressive behavior, which can lead to bite. Has he bitten anybody yet? No. But what if he bites him or anybody around us? So I never let Simba meet anybody. We have very few friends who come and visit us because of this fear. Ami and Adi say that Simba is aggressive, but also mentioned that he hasn't bitten yet. What is clear is that Ami is scared that he will bite. Her fear is obvious, but for me to really understand what the issues are in this pack, I need to watch them in action. I want to see the behavior. I'll be monitoring from outside. You just interact with Simba like normal. I just want to see exactly what happens in your house. Thank you. Thank you so much. Don't worry about it. Thank you. Yes, let's get the knowledge going. This is the only time when we can hold our hands because this is not possible in front of Simba. Not yet. Okay. Okay, Ami seems afraid. She's pacing and the dog is not even in the room yet. Release Simba. Release. There is nobody. She's talking to him in a high-pitched nervous voice and that's confusing him into thinking that it's a threat. He needs his pet parents to give him calm so he can stay calm. Okay. Okay, now she's laughing even as she backs away like she's afraid. Ami is giving Simba very confusing signals. Her fearful energy, tone, and body language make him confused about what she's afraid of. Okay, Ami, now you go sit and hold hands with Addy. Her body language shows a lot of hesitation and fear. It's a very confused dog. Simba's picking up on Ami's fear and started barking at the moment his pet parents held hands. But instead of making him stop, Ami keeps petting him, which only nurtures the barking. It's all right, let's just go there and sit. Okay, he's gone. Goodness gracious. So she sends her husband away instead of calming down Simba. That's crazy to me. That's just the human going to another level of confusion. They can't have an intimacy if the dog is there. So unfortunately, Addy has to be in another couch. Ami is nurturing Simba's barking when she should be correcting it. No wonder Simba is confused. One minute, one minute. What do you want me to do? He's asking the dog. Barky boy. We absolutely seen enough. Let's go help. All of Simba's problems are the result of neither pet parent giving Simba clear leadership he needs. So the first thing I need to do is enter the apartment with calm, confident energy, and that will clear up Simba's nervous confusion. Hey. Please come on in. Hey Simba. Hey. No touch, no talk, no eye contact is the best way to come in. Sit down. You haven't seen her. No, you sit, you sit, you sit. Ah! No. All right, Ami, it's all right. Go sit. It's all right, it's all right, Ami, all right. Ami, sit, it's all right. It's all right, Ami, go. Just be careful. I don't want him to bite. He's a professional, he'll figure it out. Yes. I somehow thought that Simba tried to bite him because that was going on in my mind. Okay, relax. Nothing's wrong, it's all right. What you're doing is you're holding fear. And that's why, you know, I just lost my control and started crying. Ami, Simba's absorbing your fear and is confusing him. The only one who is going like this energy is you. As I sat down on the couch, Simba crowded in out of curiosity, not aggression. But then when I extended my hand to give a simple correction, Ami screamed in terror. Ah! It's the most extreme fear I ever seen in a pet parent. Okay, relax. Nothing's wrong, it's all right. No, yeah, no, no, no, you need. No, no, no, don't touch him. Don't touch him. So if you're gonna do that, don't touch him. She's completely misreading her dog, which is leading to her panic and fear. And then she's transmitting that fear to Simba with her terrified words and energy. So your dog is gonna, what's wrong? These people are fine. Why is something wrong with it? Your fear is telling him he should be afraid of us. Did he try to touch you or anything? No, I touch him. Yeah. Far from the aggressive dog Ami and Adi described when we first spoke, Simba hasn't shown any aggression so far. He barks and crowds his pet parents because Ami is not leading him and gives him a confusing mix of fear and affection. The real problem here is Ami's extreme fear. It is clear something deep is going on with Ami and that's what we are going to work on tomorrow. You need to change fear for leadership. If you take care of the energy, bites never happen. Yeah. And we need to learn how to take care of that energy. Your energy, not their energy. Ah. Yeah. They are just a reflection of your energy or knowledge. Because of my fear, you know, I always think about something that is not, you know, happening. But when I heard everything from Caesar, how it works, the logic behind that behavior, it made a lot more sense and I really want to work on it. I wanna invite you to the ranch tomorrow guys so we can start our work. Yes. I just can't wait to see you guys again. Oh, thank you so much. The next day, Ami and Adi head to the dog psychology center with Simba to begin their rehab work. I'm very, very nervous and a little bit scared. Adi. I have met a lot of fearful pet parents, but I have never met one with such extreme terror as Ami. And while fear can be a healthy thing in the right situation, in this case, it is the source of all of this pack's problems. It makes Ami see danger that just isn't there. It's gonna be all right, Ami, relax. That is what we need to start to change today. How are you? Good, how are you doing? Really good. Welcome to the DPC. Hi, thank you so much. Bring the guy out. I feel very scared. What if he bites? Okay, he senses your fear. So if your energy is tense, nervous, you're gonna tell him, this place makes me tense, nervous. But it's not the place, it's you. Right now, Ami is too fearful, which is only going to confuse Simba. I need to remove Simba from her energy and replace it with something healthier. So I'm gonna have Adi, who's calm, introduce Simba to my well-balanced pack that will refocus him away from his pet's mom's fearful energy. Let's go. There we go. Yeah. I'm just so scared of him biting anybody. Oh, please. Ami, your fear is gonna make Simba fearful. Adi, please go back and support her. Yeah. I'll take care of your dog. Yes. Ami, it's gonna be all right. Hey, hey, hey, he's gonna be all right. Let's do the German Shepherd first. Now that he's separated from Ami, I am able to really see the attachment that Ami and Adi described to me yesterday. I never seen a dog meet my pack and completely ignore them. Shh, hey. Ami, your fear is confusing him, and when you hide behind Adi, he growls. So here, I am disagreeing with him vocalizing a growl. So this is not healthy. Yeah. Because it's like a kid in school that doesn't wanna interact with the rest of the kids. When Ami step behind Adi, Simba growls. Hey. But he's only getting aggressive because Ami's terror is making him confused. It is the first sign of aggression I have seen since we met and it's entirely due to Ami's fear. This is because of you, Ami. He needs for you guys to feel okay because that tells Simba he should feel okay. This is why we are here. Nothing bad is happening. Yeah. It's only in your head that any moment now, something bad can happen. You just have a dog that is pretty confused. Yeah. I'm just not comfortable that Simba goes off leash, you know, with pack of dogs. So when I saw him off leash in that small area, I was like, do we have to do this? Can we just go right now? Hey, hey, Andre, correct that. Yeah, yeah. Sorry, sorry, sorry. It's all right, Ami. Sorry, sorry, sorry. Shh. There you go. Okay, let me. Yeah, relax. Anytime a person or a dog gets close to Simba, Ami completely breaks down. Her fear is just growing and growing and it's making Simba more and more confused. Follow me. Which led to him snapping at my son, Andre, when he tried to correct him. Hey. Sorry, sorry, sorry. I have to put a stop to Ami's extreme fear now before Simba's confusion turns into truly dangerous aggression. To do that, we need to sit down and talk so I can better understand where her fear is coming from. The way you respond, where does that incredible amount of fear comes from? When I was growing up, in India, there are street dogs, you know? And then, you know, multiple times they bit me. I have a very bad, you know, dog history. I was bitten by street dogs four times. I still do not have hair here. And, you know, here on my heel, I have a dog bite mark, so it's very scary. One of the street dog had some disease. So when the dog bit me, I had to go through, like, you know, 21 injections on my tummy. And the entire, like, you know, process was very painful for me. So- Anybody. Yeah. The treatment Ami is describing makes me think she was bitten by a dog infected with rabies. For many years, in much of the world, the only treatment for rabies was a series of 21 painful shots given with a long needle directly into the abdomen. Now, rabies treatment are much less stressful, but I can only imagine how traumatizing it will have been for little Ami. I still feel the pain. I know it's just in my mind, but I still feel it. I understand the fear behind not just the bite. What if I catch the disease? Yeah. Yeah. Once you have a trauma, but you never dealt with the trauma, then it travels with you. When you are afraid, the fear makes you create possibilities. The dog is going to bite somebody. Fear has levels, right? Because when it paralyzes you, it's just- Yeah. You know what I mean? Like- Yeah. It's not the dog, obviously. It's definitely the trauma that was never dealt with and the knowledge that was never absorbed or taken in. So Simba is the perfect dream dog, but once you have fear and no knowledge, you can create a monster. So my goal is always to help people remove themselves from the past, do not anticipate for the future. We stay focused on living in the moment. Yes. That's the goal. Thank you for sharing with me. All right, let's go. Now this case is making more sense. While Simba is too attached to Ami, the real problem here is Ami's unresolved fears from her childhood bites. I have never encountered fears as extreme as what I'm seeing in Ami. This is a very unique and difficult case and I have to get it right. And for that, I need an evening to think this through. The following morning, Ami and Adi return to the DPC with Simba. How are you? Good, how are you doing? Good to see you. Hi, good to see you. Thank you, thank you. Come on, follow me. This challenging case has reached a critical turning point. This is what I really want to do for you guys because I really want to get to know him more. Yeah. In order for him to do other activities, he can't be around you. You need to leave Simba with me and have no contact with him for two weeks. He needs some time away from you, Ami, because you are afraid he's picking up the energy. He is attached to toxicity, so he has to learn to detach from the wrong choices and attach to the right energy. Can I ask you one thing? Yeah. What if he does something bad? Will you just take him away from us? No. I don't want to take your dog. I want to help your dog because you don't have an aggressive dog. You have more like a confused dog. Okay, yeah. You must address your fear head on, Ami, for your trauma therapy is necessary. And then you should spend some time around dogs at a dog park. Okay. Yeah. It's better if he keeps Simba here. After talking to him, I realized that, you know, this is the best thing for Simba and for me. So I'm going to keep him here and I'll send you videos and pictures and all of that stuff. Okay. I'll see you guys in two weeks. I trust myself with your dog, with me. I'll miss him. A lot. Yeah. A lot. I'll miss him a lot. But we did enough of delaying my problem. Yeah. You know, now it's time for me to just face it. And I'm very hopeful. The next day, Cesar begins one-on-one work with Simba on his attachment and confusion. Without Ami, he's still dealing with so much fear because he literally has absorbed her energy. As you can see, he's giving me the back. He's just completely avoiding me. He's so attached to Ami that when she's not here, he avoids everything, even my back. He doesn't even have any desire to get to know something new. He's like in a shell. There. See? That. See, he wants to hide. He literally goes behind things like a little kid. This is not normal for a happy-go-lucky dog. Now he's exploring, which is good. His wagging tail, his wagging tail. A big wagging tail to the right like this means he's feeling happy-go-lucky and relaxed. That was monumental, people. That was monumental. That's the first sign he's coming out of his shell. I want to build on this. I am putting him in the pool to challenge him to move because he's very, very tense. We're helping him to remove some of that tension. And asking him to challenge itself a little bit more. Unlock the body. Unlock the brain. He did it. He did it! Woo-hoo! You did it! Simba is really responding well now. Creating opportunities for him to play with the pack is starting to bring him out of his shell. Good boy. Now that he's starting interacting with my pack, it's clear that Simba is actually a happy-go-lucky middle-of-the-pack dog. This is good. So he learns to be touched by another dog. Ami's constant fear has him super confused because he naturally wants to be happy and social, but she's telling him to be afraid. The bone retriever came out. I hope that Ami has spent these two weeks really working on her fears. All right, this is it. Going to my first therapy session. Excited and hopeful. Okay, I'm out. During this session, I realised that I was just stuck in the negative or the bad chapter of my life with the dog-biting experience. I just cannot wait to visit here for my second session. I'm very hopeful about this entire process. I realised that this is the time I have to face my fear. Adi and I, we have been going to the dog park. I started trying to approach the dog and I realised that when I show hesitation, the dog reacts to me with the same hesitation. But when I touch the dog with free love and free care, they react the same way. So I realised that it's just my energy, which is bouncing back to me, but I'm still working very hard to get over my fear. After two weeks of one-on-one rehab with Simba, Cesar invites Ami and Adi back to the ranch to continue their work. Welcome back. Hi, Cesar. Welcome back. How are you? Thank you, thank you. How are you? Good, how are you? Good to see you. How's life been without Simba? We felt a little different, but there was no tension in the home. We talked so much. You catch up, yeah, you catch up, you catch up. How was the experience with Simba? Simba is the most confused mirror of the pack dog I've ever seen in my life, in my life. I screwed him with my insecurities. Yeah, but at this point, we're not gonna say what we did wrong. We're just gonna, yeah, I did that, but now I understand what not to do. And how was your work on yourself, Ami? We have been going to the dog park and I went to visit the therapy. I'll have to work on it because it cannot happen overnight. You were having a relationship with your fear. Yes. Yeah. It takes time to heal from the extreme fear she has carried for so long, but Ami has made an important first step. She says she made progress on her fear. So for her reunion with Simba, I am also gonna invite my well-balanced pack. This will let me get a sense of how far Ami has come with her dog fears. Okay, Ami, I'm gonna put you to the test. Yeah. Go away in the Serengeti dog park and Addy and I are going to get my pack. Yeah. My brother, you come this way with me. Yeah, you go that way. That's right. Come confident. I'm gonna have Simba in my pack greet Ami in the dog park. And I wanna see if Ami can keep calm and not show any of the extreme fear she showed a few weeks ago. Here come the dogs. Deep breath. You can do this. Look at that speed. When I saw the pack of dogs, you know, they were running, like I could hear their paws on the ground so hard. I was a little bit scared, but when I saw Simba, that was such a good feeling. I was like, okay, if Simba can be more confident with other dogs, I need to be more confident too. No touch. No talk. No, I can't talk. There you go. Good job and great energy. This is much better than your last visit, Ami. You're doing great. I love your confidence. That's just what you need to be doing. Oh, really? Yes. Yes, good. Very good. In the past two weeks, Ami has made a lot of progress and just now was able to meet my pack without the panic and terror I saw last time. Very good. Now you need to calm Simba down because he's really excited. But Ami's reunion with Simba has led the dog to immediately revert back to an unhealthy attachment to her. So I need Ami to use her body and newfound confidence to tell Simba to give her space so we break his overly attached focus on her. Without saying a name, without saying words. Just claim your space. So when you're claiming space, it's like you're moving him away from your space. You see that? Just away from your space. That's great. Yes, use your leg to move him back. There you go. A little bit more, a little bit more. Nice. Very good. Let's do it again. Ami, push him. Yeah. He's gonna do it. A little bit more assertiveness. A little bit more. Yeah, there you go. That's, we're just doing this. Eso, eso. Here, there you go. That's perfect. That's as it should be. Calm surrender. As soon as Ami used her calm, confident energy and body to tell Simba to give her space, Simba responded by stepping back and falling into calm surrender. And now his focus is not on her anymore. Once you make clear you don't want the attention like that, it breaks the attachment for him. He can go see his friends. Yeah. And he can rejoin the pack. That's beautiful. You can see that he's part of it. He's with the German Shepherds, he's with the little dogs. It's very important that he's socialized, not only rehabilitated. The next step is first, I feel like I need one more week with him, you know, for him. Yeah. And I want to see more of his happy-go-lucky, but I want to give you a dog that has less confusion, less fear. Yeah. So it's easy for you as a beginner to restart all over for your homework. Continue practicing only strong energy. And continue with your therapy, so next time you visit, we can build on this progress today. Kiri, give me a hug. Thank you so much. That's amazing. Thank you so much. Thank you. My brother. Thank you so much, Cesar. For the next week, Simba stays with Cesar at the ranch, while Ami continues her therapy at home. So Simba with Ari and Ami is very easy dog to care for. When we met, Simba was the most confused, middle-of-the-pack dog I have ever seen. As you can see, he's giving me the back. He's completely avoiding me. But today, Simba is 90% ready. Now we have to focus on Ami because Ami is so powerful in her fear. If Ami can fully put her fears behind her and lead Simba with calm confidence, Simba will quickly regress when he goes back home. What I'm going to be looking for Ami is for her to practice true, calm, confident energy, resetting the fear that she has towards dogs. Welcome back. How are you? Good, how are you? Good to see you. Good to see you as well. Are you ready? Come on. Over the past week, Simba is almost fully rehabbed, but it is Ami who still has work to do. Before I can send Simba back home, I need to see Ami fully let go of her old fears and put her growing calm confidence to use by giving Simba the leadership he needs. Oh, this is so cute. This is an obstacle course area. So today we're going to do an exercise that will teach her the basics of calm, confident leadership. But this is for me to see how would you guide him in a physical obstacle. So when you guys go through obstacles together, you guys will grow trust, respect, love. Yeah. And he will follow your leadership. All right, let's put a leash on my boy. In this exercise, Ami will have to guide Simba over these obstacles using only the leash. It will require her to project clear, calm, confident leadership to make Simba understand what she wants and to follow her. Show me how you would lead him over this A-frame. What would you do? Let's go. Come, come. Simba, come. Come, Simba. Here. Simba, let's go. Then I was trying to convince him to follow my instruction. Simba, Simba. He was just not listening. You have to be calm and show them what you want. He just has to follow me. That's it. Oh my God. Simba, come here. Simba, let's go. Let's go. Hold on. All right, so talking to a dog when he's learning for the first time is not good. So it's easy for you to guide him and for him to follow you when you're quiet. Can I do one more time? Yes. Let's do it again. Try to do it, no sound. Okay. Yay. There you go. Let's do it one more time without hesitation. Yeah. Just guidance. Silence and guidance is more powerful than sound. Good boy, Simba. This is the first time I have seen Ami give Simba the leadership this happy-go-lucky dog needs. By confidently using the leash to show him where she wants him to go, Ami's learning the silent confidence speaks much louder than fearful words. Next, I want to work on one of this pack's biggest problems. On day one, Ami and Addy couldn't even get close to each other without Simba barking. So now I will show Ami how to make Simba stay calmly on a platform while she and her husband sit together and hold hands. So you bring him here, you tell him to sit, stay, and then you're gonna move away. He can't follow you. You have to use your energy and body language to keep him on the box, he can't react. Okay, let's do it. Yes. So that sitting that he's doing there, he needs to do it in the box. Let's go, come here. Jump, Simba, let's go. There you go. Sit, sit, sit, sit, sit. So one sit. Sit, sit, sit, sit, sit. So try to avoid too many words. Okay. Stay, sit. Okay. Say it one time, and then the rest is energy body language. Okay. Okay, now drop the leash there. Stay. Then come and sit over here. Stay. That's it. Yeah, and then back. Let's go. Sit. Stay. A little bit more firm with the tone, a little bit more firm. Yeah. Right. So the ideal is the human comes here, and then it tells the dog, sit, stay. Wow, and then you go. Let's try it again. Let's go. There you go. Tell him to stay. Sit, stay. And then come and sit with us. Yeah. Now, you two get close. Which is so good, you know, I put my hand here and he didn't even react. He's watching, you know, what a romantic couple looks like. While we were doing that agility exercise, I realized that when I took the charge, he did really well. So he just needed a good leader. Sometimes you just guys wanna sit together while he's in a distance on his bed. That could be his bed. All the dots are connecting now. Isn't it great? That's great. So I think you're ready to take Simba home. Really appreciate that. I appreciate it. But for your homework, you need to keep working on leading Simba with calm confidence, not fear, just like you did today. Yeah. Ami and Adi are finally ready to take Simba home with them. But it's clear Ami has much, much more work to do, both on her own and with Simba, before I feel confident that her fear is truly a thing of the past. Simba has made amazing progress, but Ami must keep moving forward to prevent any regression. Over the next week, Ami works to fully put her extreme fear behind her as she hones her calm, confident leadership with Simba. I felt good at the ranch, but transferring all of that back home has been hard. With Simba being in the house, we've managed our same routines, like walks, drives. Simba! But when I give him any command to either sit or, you know, go to the place. Stop. Hey, that's it. That's it. That's it, Simba. I have to tell him the same thing again and again. That's it, Bubu. That's it. Let's go. Bubu, let's go. Let's go now, bubba. Hey. I have to do it a hundred times, but still I don't give up. So that's a struggle, yeah. I have been sticking to the therapy sessions. I did not know how much the fear is controlling my life. I got a chance to learn about me during the therapy sessions, to work on my insecurities and fear. I'm still very scared, but I'm still, you know, working very hard on myself. So we are getting there, yeah. Caesar's back in Studio City to check on Ami's progress. The last time we worked together, Ami had made great strides moving past her extreme fear of dogs. Hey. Sorry. Sorry, sorry. It's all right, Ami. So she could lead Simba with true calm confidence. Sit. Stay. But the question remains whether Ami has been able to continue moving forward so Simba doesn't suffer from any regressions back at home. I can't wait to see and hear how the past week has been going. Come on in. Come on. Sit. Stay. What? Yeah. Stay. What? Stay. Yeah. That was fantastic. So how's it been having him home with you? He's doing so well. We can sit together and not worry about anything. Since last few days, he's definitely, you know, listening to us. It's no stress at all. Everybody has their own space. Now he's a happy-go-lucky and a confident dog, you know? Yes. Everything I'm seeing today makes clear you really put in the work. So Ami, this final challenge is going to be for you. Okay. Ready for it. On day one, Ami and Addy talk about how they haven't been able to invite friends and family to the apartment because of Ami's fears that Simba will bite. We never let Simba meet anybody. We have very few friends who come and visit us because of this fear. And later that day, Ami reacted with extreme fear when I came into the home and Simba got close to me. No. So for their final challenge today, I want to see if Ami is able to use her calm confidence to keep Simba calm while they have guests in the apartment. The final challenge is I'm going to bring my family from the DPC to visit Simba and for you to see how does he respond. Yes. Right? And if you feel that it's going a little too high and then you snap him out, I'm going to send him back over there. Okay. I was nervous, but I'll have to get myself out of that. So I just hope I can do it. All right. Send Nikita in. Come on. Very good. Come on, Ami. How are you? Doing good. How are you? Nice to see you. Nice to see you as well. Good correction, but where do you want him? Wow, look at that. Tell him what you want. Stay. Wow. Great leadership getting him back to his bed. On day one, Ami made no effort to correct or lead her dog and reacted in panic when a new person got close to Simba. But just now, I saw a pet mom controlling her dog with real calm confidence. Stay. That is an impressive transformation. Hi, nice to see you. Nice to see you. Earlier me, I would have just freaked out. I would have just cried out of no reason. But right now, he's a reflection of my confident and happy energy. Thank you, Nikita. Thank you so much. That was it. Thank you. That was it. Next visit is very dear to my heart because it's my dogs and my son. Ami did great just now, but for our final guest, I'm going to really challenge her. I'm going to have my son, Andre, come in with a few of my dogs. This will be a real test of whether Ami has moved past her childhood dog fears so she can properly lead Simba with calm confidence. All right, coming in. Stay. Hi. Nice to see you. Nice to see you as well. Nice to see you. Look at the difference. Right? Okay, come here. Sit. First, calm down. Sit. Stay. Wow. Come on in. Yes, yes, thank you. Thank you guys for having me. Hi, nice to see you again. Nice to see you again. Very good, very good. Wow. Yeah. Look at that, Andre. I know, it's really good. Really good. Yeah, thank you so much. Simba is a social, happy-go-lucky dog, so naturally, he wanted to greet my dogs when they came in the door. Ami allowed that without any fear and then calmly and confidently led him back to his bed. She showed Simba exactly what she wanted and her dog was happy to follow his leader. Even though they're in a happy-go-lucky state here, isn't it? Yeah. He stays with them what you're asking him to do. Doesn't matter what we bring through that door, he can get excited and then you can send him back to calm surrender. Yeah. Very good. I don't think I ever seen a more radical transformation in a pet parent in all my years of doing this work. When we met, Ami was so overwhelmed by her childhood fears that she was terrified and panicked anytime Simba got close to another person or a dog. But today, I see a pet mom who is calm, confident and in total control and I see a dog that is happy to follow her leadership. This is remarkable. Call him please. Simba. Oh, look at you. Very good, very good. Well, he chose you. Yeah, earlier he was always, you know, with me. Yeah, with you. Yeah. Yes. Caesar gave me an opportunity to go back to my past, face that fear confident, to work on it and to overcome. Today feels magical for us because we never thought that the journey would end so well. Coming out of this as a brand new woman is like so special for me. I feel so good about myself and my achievement. And I'm so proud on myself that I did it. We can sit together, do something together, watch TV, have food and have a life together and Simba can be part of it when we want it. It truly changed our life. Thank you so much for that. I'm so proud of like Simba and Ami doing this together. We know in our heart that we can manage Simba better now. Finally, you got your wife back. We got our wife back. Thank you so much. Thank you. Appreciate it for your words. Thank you so much. Thank you, bro. Appreciate it. You take care of him, okay? Didn't get it, that's right. Thank you so much. Thank you. Fear is a powerful emotion. We evolved to trust our fear because it helps us survive when faced with real danger. But when there is no danger, fear can hold us back or even create new problems for you and your dog. Letting go of a deeply rooted emotion can be scary, especially when it has kept us safe in the past. But that is exactly what you and your dog need more than anything in order to be a truly happy and healthy pack.