Since Kona joined our pack 10 months ago, he's been trainable and changes his behavior in every are except one - the car.

He loves rides; but if I stop the car (sign, light, etc), Kona gets nervous.
If I park, he cries and gets visibly anxious.
If I open the car to get out, he wrestles me trying to get out.
He settles if I'm at the ATM or pumping gas, but still cries
If I have to go in a building, he goes ballistic.

I've been in the gas station for less than a minute before, listening to him cry and watching my car have its windows get nose painted while people walk in asking, "Who's dog?"

Is this level of separation anxiety normal?

If so - any tips?

I'm guessing not separation anxiety but highly aroused dog wanting to explore new territory. Ami does this, we can't leave him alone in the cast, he scratches the door and destroys the door panels. We're resigned to if we're getting off of the car, so is Ami.

Lol - That's what I figured.

I would never leave him for more than a minute anyway.
Fortunately, a few of our local stops have started to welcome him!

- Kona's upper front teeth are leveled and the lowers plus lower canine is chipped. No way of knowing, but we've theorized that He may have been too much dog for his former owner and ended up chained in a yard.

When we adopted Kona, there were quite a few huskies (and of course pit bulls) in the facility. The handler made mention of "Game of Thrones Dogs".

Maybe we should stop calling huskies "High enery dogs" and use "Athletic Furry Toddler"

Kenzi becomes worked up if she thinks we are at our destination where she will be able to get out. Not destructive but some whining and general noisiness I don't appreciate in my ear. It's been excitement for us more than anything and we mostly just live with it. I swear she can pace and be worked up for a 10 hour road trip and never sit down once. Though if they were being destructive about it I would probably have to crate for car rides if there's space. If only to just save my vehicle.

Nope, sorry, don't relate to this at all.  If I have one dog with me, then I can figure they'll set patiently in my seat until I get done with whatever.  If I have two, the more dominant gets my seat and the other one hangs out in back.  I don't do three, I could but it's just too much dog for the back end of my Jeep (and I think my nerves).

If it's Sasha I have with me, she'll let me know that it's been too long (or she's getting too hot) but if I know I'm going to be a while, I'll leash whoever to the back of the Jeep with water available.  Since we're pushing 100 today, none of us are going anywhere ...

... or to answer the original OP, it's not the norm for me, but then nothing / no one in Terlingua qualifies as normal!

I wonder if he ever got left in the car for an unpleasantly long time, or if something bad happened to him while in the car once (teased by somebody walking by, people rapping on glass, etc). Anyway he clearly thinks that being along in the car is a BAD thing, poor guy.

If I were trying to train my dog out of it, I'd leave some tidbits of cheese or kibble near him, then get out and stand by the car window for a few seconds, then get back in. Then do same thing, but get out and walk a few steps away, come back in. I think it would work eventually but it sure is tedious, so I don't know if you want to take that on!

Personally it's not that important to me to be able to leave my dog in car...I just leave him at home when I go run errands! A large part of the year here, it's too hot for me to be able to do that safely anyway, so I never got in the habit. I did fantasize about tethering him outside the shady post office while I mail a package, but just my luck that somebody would come by and try to pet him and get their hand bitten off. sigh. He does come to the outdoor ATM with me! That's the only errand we can run together. ( Although he thinks he should be allowed in the grocery store, but I have explained that it's a "humans only" kind of place...)

Squirt loves the truck its her version of doggy crack. And squirt does stay inside the truck even with all 5 windows completely down.

Spider and splinter go everywhere together amd when spider first gets in the truck she starts shaking and whining. After about 10 mins it stops. When we are parked spider does trip out for a few mins but if i wait her out  she eventually lays down and goes to sleep. The bigger issue is when dogs start barking at her from other vehicles. She starts the screamy howl and splinter  starts barking.  The good news is everyone here takes thier dogs everywhere and they are not usually the worst behaved dogs in tje parking lot.

Shadow only gets in the truck to go to the vet because he gets carsick. And like before the truck is even turned on he gets car sick

So one thing i realized with spider is me hearing the howl and coming out to check her reinforced the if i scream you come running. Once i decided to let her scream it out she stopped after a few mins because it did not get the desired results of me coming back out

Lostmaniac wrote:

Shadow only gets in the truck to go to the vet because he gets carsick. And like before the truck is even turned on he gets car sick

So one thing i realized with spider is me hearing the howl and coming out to check her reinforced the if i scream you come running.  Once i decided to let her scream it out she stopped after a few mins because it did not get the desired results of me coming back out

Wow, how does that even happen! He feels sick just sitting in the truck??!

That's a really good point about not just coming right back out when they bark/howl.
Then they feel like calling you back worked, and they'll keep on doing it.

Really dont know why the motion sickness. The funny thing is he gets so happy and excited about getting in the truck but within 5 mins he either pukes or has explosive diarrhea and sometimes both. He apparently did the same thing in planes. It was 1 of the 2 reasons he failed out of the air force at 5 months old

Explosive diarrhea in the car?!! Please no!

Yep I would not be driving him many places either!
Poor guy - I get airsick and boatsick too, but it takes a bit of rocking/turbulence for me.

If he feels sick sitting in a truck that isn't turned on it's probably not motion sickness. At least not all motion sickness. Could be vertigo if a tall truck, or he just has a nervous stomach so the excitement of the truck gets his stomach worked up.

Jenn your probably right. When he goes in the truck he gets super excited then starts foaming at the mouth. The only thing that makes me think its motion sickness is i get him motion sickness pills from the vet and that solves it. We also found out that if he is in the stock trailer hes fine even without the pills. Last time it happened i didnt give him pills he was fine all 50 miles to the vet fine at the vet then puked the second i put him in the truck to bring him home. Its way perplexing.

Motion Sickness

Ginger helps a lot - my parents gave caplets with ginger powder to their hound before sailing

Ill have to try ginger next time he goes to the vet. Thats about the only place he goes now because of the vision issues. I think really all he can see is shadows and the color red at this point. He will be completely blind eventually. I was really upset when he got the pra diagnosis but as long as i dont move too many things or leave things on the floor he seems ok

@Lostmaniac Aww - Macie (our Dachsund mix before Kona) went blind from diabetes. She rarely ran into anything, but she also walked at a much slower pace, so it wasn't much of an issue. We decided that we would have her put down when she started having more bad days than good. Instead, she passed on her favorite couch cushion.


On the Kona side of things - Today I realized too late that I was low on fuel and would have to stop - with Kona in the car. After a minute or two of very vocal wrestling and a few laughs from people walking by, I had to take Kona inside the fuel station.

I lost this skirmish!

I would have let spider scream and throw a fit, which i do and now she stops after about 5 mins. Unless its extreme circumstances though i dont leave her in the truck because im afraid someone will try and steal her. It happens around here

Lostmaniac wrote:

I would have let spider scream and throw a fit, which i do and now she stops after about 5 mins. Unless its extreme circumstances though i dont leave her in the truck because im afraid someone will try and steal her. It happens around here

Same here - seems ironic to arm the car alarm when there's a furry siren going off inside the car!

Kona_18 wrote:

@Lostmaniac Aww - Macie (our Dachsund mix before Kona) went blind from diabetes. She rarely ran into anything, but she also walked at a much slower pace, so it wasn't much of an issue. We decided that we would have her put down when she started having more bad days than good. Instead, she passed on her favorite couch cushion.


On the Kona side of things - Today I realized too late that I was low on fuel and would have to stop - with Kona in the car. After a minute or two of very vocal wrestling and a few laughs from people walking by, I had to take Kona inside the fuel station.

I lost this skirmish!

Update - when I reached a destination the other day, I took Kona for a 5 minute walk before reloading him in the car - much better, although he was still singing a symphony for the 30 seconds I was gone.

Could Kona have motion sickness as well maybe

I have noticed certain parking lots have much more of a reaction then others. Even going certain directions stresses spider out. I did find a useful target for spiders screaming, dogs bark at cows on the road the cows ignore the dogs, but spider screaming sends the cows running every time.