Shockingly wonderful

You could say we've been having issues with our outdoor dogs and barking. They bark at everything, all the time. In fact, it's rare for them not to be barking. When a leave blows by they bark, when a bird crows they bark, when a cow farts a mile away they bark.....you get the idea. They've gotten to the point that they sit outside the bay window while we are eating dinner and bark nonstop because they want to come inside. It's beyond frustrating.

I started looking into bark collars about a month ago. I knew once the baby arrived they would be spending more time outside and therefore would be barking more than they already were. First I looked into the Citronella Collars. These collars spray a puff of citronella in the dogs face when they barked. It was supposed to be "kinder" than the shock collars. I read every review I could find and it was a mixed bag. Some people said they worked wonderfully others said their dogs figured out how many sprays were in a can and would empty the can so that they could bark nonstop. I also looked into shock collars and was on the fence about that whole concept. I didn't like the fact that it would hurt the dog but I also couldn't take the constant barking. Something had to be done or I feared the dogs would have to go live somewhere else. Sean was pretty much at his breaking point. I reviewed several different collars and found two different brands that had high ratings and weren't overly expensive. I remembered that Sean's brother had used shock collars with their three large dogs so I emailed my sister-in-law to see what she thought about the collars. I learned a lot about bark collars through emails with Becca and she even offered to mail two of their unused collars to us to see if they work.

Well, it has been two weeks since putting the collars on the dogs and it has been the most sane two weeks of my life (and with a newborn that's saying something). Do I feel bad that they get shocked? At first, yes, but that quickly disappeared. When we first put them on they both barked once and got a mild shock. I have to admit it was slightly satisfying watching them "learn" to stop barking (yeah I know I'm a horrible person). But they did learn quickly. Sophie learned with just one bark. Both collars are set to the lowest setting and they apparently are doing fine at that setting. They will bark on rare occasions when a neighbor dog comes to visit, apparently the shock is worth it. It's truly been like heaven, the peace and quiet is wonderful. I can't thank my brother and sister-in-law enough! Thank you Becca and Jeremy! I just want to smack myself when I think about how many years we've lived with the incessant barking when it was this easy to control. I feel my sanity slowly returning.