Kys' Adventures in IH - need your help

[gypsyroselee]

Part two.

Some of you may remember a couple of weeks ago I began doing the exercises in Perfect Manners with Ky. And she did brilliantly - I actually thought she may have done it before as she was really fluid with it. She even walked backwards in a fairly straight line.

However today, I tried backing up through the poles in an L shape. We walked forwards through them a couple of times (she was quite suspicious of me moving them about before we started with them!).

I walked her through and on the 3rd time stopped her just beyond the end of the poles. When I asked her to take a step backwards she really freaked out! So we worked a bit more on backing up without the poles and she was fine. She again freaked out when I tried it a bit later on.

What am I doing wrong?

Our sessions are quite short, about 15 mins at most in total.
She really looked freaked out when I asked for backing up when the poles were near. (They were about 3meters apart as I didn't want to start off with them too close).

She's really responded well to coming forward, stopping and even backing up, just with out the poles in sight.

Thanks for your help, as always.

[jes]

Probably not really doing anything wrong, my lad freaked out a bit when I first started asking him to do this. I think he's just worried about touching the poles when he's going backwards.

Just take it really slow, one step at a time. Walk through forwards a couple of times, then try taking a couple of steps forward and a couple back at the start of the poles and keep going a few steps at a time.

[Garry]

As jess says, break it down into small stages. Try taking her forwrds just a step or two into the L shape and then back her up a step. Go forward two or three steps and back up again etc. You could even try simply setting up two poles parallel to each other and get her used to coping with this before attempting the L shape.

Good luck

[gypsyroselee]

Thanks guys,

I hadn't thought to walk her into the poles a step or two then try backing out... it makes so much sense in hindsight! That way perhaps she won't see it as backing into a 'space' but rather backing out of a space into the open, and it'll be less scary for her! I'll definately give that a go.

Thanks so much.