I am afraid of (most) dogs. Anything larger than a terrier.
Anything smaller than a terrier I’m not afraid of, but I don’t actually like.
Terriers seem OK. If I like a dog at all and find out the breed, it’s a terrier.
I was charged by a (large) dog as a child, and by a Doberman on a leash with an unattentive owner who realized the dog was after me at the last second. In neither case was I injured, just freaked out.
I’m paranoid about people’s dogs in public. I feel like dogs approach me more than other people, and I really don’t like it. Especially if the go for the private areas! Which they seem to a lot! I recognize this could just be the fear talking though and that I am not treated any differently by dogs.
I really don’t like being in enclosed spaces with dogs, especially multiple ones. I flew to LA with the woman sitting next to men carrying the dog in her (huge!) purse and it was just gross, but not scary.
Is there any truth to the notion that dogs can “smell fear”? That seems like a myth to me…
Why am I starting a thread? I guess I am just wondering if this fear is more common than it seems to be. When I say I’m afraid of/don’t like dogs, mostly people just laugh. Or say, “but my dog is soooo friendly!”
Were you afraid of dogs and got over it? If so, how?
I know rationally that the (huge) (fluffy) dogs in the elevator aren’t going to knock me down and bite my face off. But it still makes my heart race when they bare their teeth and growl at me.
And I do wish owners of dogs on leashes would pay attention if the dog seems to be approaching someone who is not interested in interacting.
Too bad you couldn’t of met my dog Romeo (black lab) before he died.
He seemed to take notice of people who were nervous around him (mostly kids). And when he did, he would take the most submissive posture possible until the Nervous Nelly finally broke down and petted him.
Seriously, he would crawl on his belly and lay at your feet until you petted him. I’ve seen kids go from “Get that scary monster away from me!” to “D’aw let me give my new friend a hug.” in a matter of minutes.
Dogs can smell the sweat and adreneline produced by fear. They can also recognize fearful body language. (Dogs - all animals, really - do a lot of communication via body language.) People who are scared can make dogs nervous and upset, because the dog doesn’t understand what the problem is.
It’s ok, though, because domestic dogs in the US, on the whole, are not man-eaters. You’re more likely to get attacked by the human on the other end of the leash than the dog. Some dogs will bite, yes, but mostly you won’t find those dogs being walked around by their owners. (And no, I don’t actually believe the doberman or the dogs in the elevator are planning to kill you.)
It’s possible to overcome a dog phobia in the same way it’s possible to treat other phobias. Until then, I suggest you be upfront and forceful with the dog owner and just tell them you don’t like dogs. Don’t say, “I’m afraid.” say, “I don’t like them.” and walk away. That last bit is important. Don’t stand there or get on elevators with them. Move aside; cross the street; take the stairs. If you want people to take you seriously that you don’t want the dogs to stand near you, then you need to make it clear that you are serious about not wanting to stand near the dog.
I used to be very scared of dogs, no matter what size. Then I went to an NLP/Hypnosis seminar in London, someone took away the fear in about 15 minutes and since then I have been working in that field and have helped people overcome fears/phobias of many different kinds in a very short amount of time. Oh yeah, that seminar was 20 years ago.
Find a good NLP/Hypnosis practitioner and you might be surprised how quickly you can get rid of your fear. Good luck!
I was chased by a couple of dogs when I was 5 or 6 and from that point on was very scared of them. Any interaction (even being near them) with dogs was very uncomfortable for me.
A couple of years ago I got a new girlfriend (now fiancee), when the time came to meet her parents there was no way of avoiding meeting their pair of Collies. These two dogs could not have been better behaved, waiting to be called over before saying hello to anyone new, sitting to be petted etc. After an hour or two in their company I found myself out in the field throwing a stick for them.
Fast forward a year or two (am 32 now) and I’ve got my own pooch, a Beagle called Luna who I absolutely adore. I would’ve scoffed at anyone who said it before, but being around dogs really enriches your life.
…Of Course Not!
…there are usually cameras in the elevator. Take the stairs on a day when the owner puts them on a diet & we might as well call you ‘Miss Kibble’…
Count Blucher – not cool. Luckily for you, I’m speaking not as a mod, but as someone else who really doesn’t care for dogs.
I’m not phobic, and I don’t have particular experiences to point to – but between dog and no-dog, I definitely prefer no-dog.
I have a friend with a dog I get along fine with – mid-sized mutt, super friendly – who sometimes comes with us when we go out for coffee. She’ll want to say hi to everyone nearby, and I’m always the one who calls her back close in (yes, she’s on a leash): my friend doesn’t realize that there are people who are too polite to say “I really would prefer not to have your dog come up to me.” Not phobic, not a huge problem – just, like me, people who prefer no-dog if given a choice.
Yeah, I don’t know if I have a true “phobia” or just a very strong aversion.
I do hate the mix of incredulity/sadness that people get if you say you don’t like dogs. Their dog is not to blame, and is probably perfectly nice, but it’s not a personal thing.
Uniqueorn, how does NLP (or hypnosis(!)) cure anything in 15 minutes?
I was terrified of dogs when I was growing up and never really knew why. When I was 14 and began shaving, I noticed a scar on my chin about an inch long that I’d never noticed before and asked my mom about it. Apparently, when I was a toddler, she had me out in the backyard once in a playpen. The neighbor’s dog jumped over to the fence and ran over to the playpen; I reached out to pet the doggie and it bit me on the face. I have no memory of this.
Following that, I began to pay more attention to which dogs I was afraid of: just the barking ones. Dogs that were just sitting there, or asking to be played with, never bothered me as much. I’ve been getting better and better about being around dogs, but I will still freeze when they start barking, which is probably just as well. I’m also allergic to them so I don’t hang round them, or people who have them. Also probably just as well.
I was *terrified *of dogs growing up. I wouldn’t go into the house of anyone who had a dog. I would cross the street to get away from even a cocker spaniel puppy. It was a huge enough fear to dominate a large chunk of my life. I never had any bad experiences that would explain this. (I was once bitten by a German shepherd on a leash, but I was thirty at the time and the phobia was well established.)
A few years ago, I started getting into the Cute Overload-type pages on the internet, which meant I saw lots of photos and videos of adorable dogs being adorable. One day I just noticed that I wasn’t scared of dogs any more. At all. Now I love them. I’m still kind of awkward with them, because I never learned how to interact with them as a child, but I’ll happily greet any dog that’s willing to say hello to me. (I would still be scared of a growling dog with dripping fangs bared at me, but that’s just common sense.) It feels like this intensely strong feeling just evaporated one day. Power of positive exposure, I guess.
Childhood neighbors had a Shepherd mix which knocked me over and was about an inch from eating me when my screams alerted the owners. I’ve never liked dogs since, although I can tolerate the little poofy yappy ones.
A family member who has four dogs just doesn’t understand my aversion. Fortunately, the dogs seem to suss it out.
Basically, you disassociate from a memory that evokes the phobic response, then you recreate the memory in a non-threatening way, then you generalise.
Just google “NLP phobica cure” and you will find lots of info.
If you don’t want to look for a practitioner, but work on yourself, you might want to look at something called EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique). It is based on acupressure (basically, you tap on certain points on your face and torso while thinking about the phobia) and is very simple to learn. There are many videos on youtube you could check out.
I used to be absolutely terrified of dogs. Their simple proximity would cause me to freeze up and be generally useless. I got cured of it during therapy some years back. Among other things this involved my therapist gradually desensitizing me to them, starting with her tiny toy poodle and ending with a big honking mutt that could have eaten a dozen such poodles for lunch and still been hungry.
That’s not to say I LIKE dogs now, by the way. I’m fairly fond of a certain annoying yappy dog that belongs to my sister, but apart from that I’d happily see the entire species eaten by velociraptors. Nowadays I find them revolting–just not scary.
I’m sorry you’re afraid of dogs. I’m not,but I’d think twice about getting in an elevator with 2 growling dogs and (depending on dog size) might get out/wait for the next car.
Too many people think it’s"cute" and that Pookie is just being protective. Nope.
I was quite nervous about dogs until we got one. When you are with a dog full time, not just random meetings, you soon learn to read dog language, and realize that most of the moves that seem aggressive are actually friendly.
Mostly you can stop dogs by being assertive, clear, and forceful. Yelling “sit” and meaning it works for most of them. People who act afraid are acting submissive which isn’t good. Running away from a dog will make the dog run to you - running to him will often make him run away.
We let our dog run in the field across the street, where lots of dogs go, and with maybe two exceptions in the past 16 years all the dogs have been friendly if you know what friendly means.
My current dog has been bred for gentleness over many generations. Some people are still scared of her. When my wife takes her for school visits one or two kids usually hold back, but they are converts by the end of the class. Fear has less to do with the dog and more to do with the person. Familiarity and comfort work well.
I was chased by small dogs when I was 4 or 5. It still tense up when I hear a dog barking in the distance. I do fine once I’ve gotten to know a friend’s dog. But 50 years later it is still somewhere waiting to bubble to the surface.
On a side note, if you know someone has fears, let them deal with it in their own way. My wife has a bad habit of announcing to our hosts that I’m afraid.
