Rachel Friedman

Bubba-Composite-august-11showtime.jpg

Rachel Friedman has worked with both people and animals since very early childhood. A childhood rich in dog, horse and small critter experiences, Rachel carved an interesting and somewhat meandering but nevertheless meaningful route towards her career in the world of dogs. She has a B.A. in Social Sciences from The University of Michigan, a Master's Degree in Social Work from The University of Pennsylvania, and remains an independently licensed social worker (LISW) in the great State of Ohio. 

Combining her passion for and long experience in working with animals with her extensive social work training and work experience, Rachel became a full time dog trainer in 1999 and founded her company, A Better Pet LLC. Her background makes her uniquely qualified to help clients learn how best to teach their dogs, and thus how best to create a harmonious household. She also consults with social service organizations interested in incorporating animals into their programming and provides that overlapping in the Venn Diagram between Dog Training/Behavior and Social Services.

Her passion and commitment to providing the best training possible -- for all dogs -- resulted in the invention and patented Har-Vest, the first and only combined no pull harness and vest/backpack on the market today. Har-Vest helps bring out the best qualities in dogs -- calms overbearing dogs, instills confidence in overwhelmed dogs -- a 3-in-1 Backpack for Dogs (and there's a version for cats coming soon!).

Rachel currently lives in Cleveland Heights, Ohio with her three teenage daughters and an eclectic menagerie of pets and usually a service dog project underfoot. Hard at work on finishing her multi media opus, The Six Pillars of Dog Training Wisdom, Rachel is quite accessible and can best be reached by email: [email protected].

Blog posts by Rachel Friedman

SwearJarComposite.jpg

3rd Quadrant: The Swear Jar

Long ago and far away I recognized my greatest strength in learning something new is through visual and kinesthetic experience. Hence I model for clients, handling their dog in their home, how best to achieve learning for the dog during a training and then work with the owner to transfer that knowledge to them before I leave. Practicing the newly taught skills enough, along with truly understanding a lot of useful information about how dogs actually operate (which is often antithetical to the average person), helps ensure a transition to a better behaved dog if the individual is motivated (which I assume they are by having hired me to come into their home for 3 long hours or more!). I also give a lot of written material to clients, including a manual I am always updating for those who are more reading/writing learners. But I'm always on the creative and visual lookout for new ways to inspire myself.

 
FallingDogsMirror2_08.jpg

The Mirror Dance

The first definition in the dictionary for ANXIETY is

1. distress or uneasiness of mind caused by fear of danger or misfortune: He felt anxiety about the possible loss of his job.

I define it in my dog behavioral consults as manifestations of behavior including poor impulse control and see it on a scale from 1 - 10... 1 would be, "yes I have stress in my world but I handle it gracefully and within what I define as normal limits for me" and 8-10 being "whoa, things are really not going too well and it negatively affects function and, well, it's a big problem." That scale is subjective and varies from person to person and, well, also from dog to dog.

 
Sophie-Lily share treat-1.2.jpg

ELECTION DAY 2008

Election Day has arrived. I’m hopeful that the results are clear, non contested and we select the individual who can bring about change to best benefit the country as a whole and impact in good ways in the world in general—economy, security, improved standing in the world, health issues of the population and the general health and well being of this third rock from the sun we call Earth. We all know the promises the candidates pledge cannot all be realized; there is that checks and balances system we call democracy, but one promise Barack Obama made, win or lose, was to at last acquire for his beloved and cherished daughters a puppy!

 
FuzzyLola1.jpg

The Rehabilitation of Lola

I don't think you "own" cats as much as cats deign to be in your life. One of those forwarded posts that goes in fits and starts around the internet seems to be recirculating as I have had it forwarded to me twice in the past few days..you know, the one called Dogs Vs. Cats and is as follows (this time with that Canadian or England English spellings!):

"Excerpts from a Dog's Diary......

8:00 am - Dog food! My favourite thing!
9:30 am - A car ride! My favourite thing!
9:40 am - A walk in the park! My favourite thing!
10:30 am - Got rubbed and petted! My favourite thing!
12:00 pm - Lunch! My favourite thing!
1:00 pm - Played in the yard! My favourite thing!
3:00 pm - Wagged my tail! My favourite thing!
5:00 pm - Milk bones! My favourite thing!
7:00 pm - Got to play ball! My favourite thing!
8:00 pm - Wow! Watched TV with the people! My favourite thing!

 

Today On Today

I usually don’t have the time to lollygag in the morning, but today I did. I usually don’t put on television in the morning, but today I did. And today on Today, as it happened, there came upon my screen a story about “Medicating Your Animals.”(Click on pets link to see the video - it’s called “Prozac for your Pets”.) Apparently a lot of dog owners don’t have the time to actually develop a relationship with their dogs that, gasp, takes time! Would that they did! According to a statistic Matt Lauer posited, no credit given so I’m not sure about the validity of those stats, but, he said: “Americans spend $15 million on mood altering drugs like Prozac and Zoloft, not for themselves, but for their pets.”

 
RadarWolfieTripTugoWar.jpg

What is a Treat? What Isn't?

In my ongoing quest to help people think out of the box, at least with respect to interacting with their dog, I have put together a list of some treats. First, the definition: A Treat Is Something Your Dog Likes. You Need To Be Honest About That! If you say “good dog” thinking it’s a treat, think again.

You can certainly TRAIN your dog to think “good dog” is a treat, but without actually doing that, the probability that “good dog” has the same cachet as say, liver, is doubtful. The dictionary states treat (noun) as “an event or item that is out of the ordinary and gives great pleasure.” If you can keep that in mind, it helps.


Treats can fall into TWO categories. FOOD and NOT FOOD.

 
BeanHalloweenHarvest.jpg

Fall is in the Air

Back in June, during the dog days of summer, you may recall I drove ol' now 7 year old Trip down and back to Columbus (five hours driving) for a half hour photo shoot that culminated in this past Sunday's Joann Fabric insert in the local Cleveland Plain Dealer. I actually forgot it would be in this week but as it happened (and they say there are no accidents!) I had to get some drapery hooks and while I was at the store, looking at the circular for sale items, lo and behold on page 10 I found my Pumpkin clad boy emanating out of the pages photoshopped into a picture of a woman in a creepy outfit with a scythe and a little pink clad ballerina!!!

 

Yesterday Was Trip's Birthday

Back in my day, after Simon and Garfunkel separated into their solo and other collaborative careers, more prolific Paul released an album called STILL CRAZY AFTER ALL THESE YEARS with a song called HAVE A GOOD TIME

This morning I crooned the lyrics on behalf of my now 7 year old JRT, Trip:

Yesterday it was my birthday
I hung one more year on the line
I should be depressed
My life's a mess
But I'm having a good time

Oo, I've been loving and loving and loving
I'm exhausted from loving so well
I should go to bed
But a voice in my head
Says "Ah, what the hell"

Have a good time
Have a good time
Have a good time
Have a good time

 
EnderSplash.jpg

Dog Swim!

Time to put those white shoes away until fall, breath a sigh of relief that Gustav wasn't the same pack of punch that Katrina was, dust off your water wings and find out if you have a local public pool Doggie Swim! Local public pool Thornton in Shaker Heights is having their annual Doggie Swim this Saturday, 10-12.

 
KittyFayandBurn.jpg

Kitten Karma

It was 12 years ago this summer I first took on a proactive animal rescue role. My brother and his then wife had just moved back to Cleveland a year after I had and the day the moving van rolled up to unload, my ex sister in law found a cardboard box on the lawn of their new suburban manse that she didn't recognize. Upon closer inspection she found inside a wriggling mass of kittens. Terribly allergic, her first instinct was to call the local animal control officer who promptly came and took in the litter of 6. When I learned of this a few hours later, I was aghast and went to the depressing shelter and paid $10 per kitten to release them to my custody. I encased them on my porch and socialized them while seeking permanent homes. We ended up keeping two of them -- an all black one we called Willow and a white one with black ears we called Leaf. All the others were adopted.

 

Pages

Subscribe to The Dog Blog
Need CEUs? Join the Top Dog Academy!