Separation anxiety in dogs: recognizing the symptoms and what to do about it
Separation anxiety comes down to one rule of thumb: if your dog shows behavior he never shows when you are there, and he does not settle, that points toward separation anxiety. Barking at the closed door you left through, destroying things, peeing indoors, panting and drooling when it is not warm. The fear usually does not start the moment the door shuts, but with everything that comes before it: picking up your coat, your keys, putting on your shoes. By then your dog is already producing stress hormones. And because a tense dog cannot learn, every approach begins with recognizing and lowering stress, and only after that with learning to be alone. This is the foundational article; the training buildup itself, the older dog, and the question of how long a dog can be left alone each have their own article.
In short
Not every dog who struggles to be alone has separation anxiety. The three causes (panic from attachment, boredom, frustration) look alike but call for different approaches.
The signals that matter are the ones your dog only shows when you are gone. A camera and a diary make them visible.
Simply leaving him alone and hoping he gets used to it does not work. Steps that are too big make the problem bigger.
Never punish, never force, never shut him in a closed crate.
Lower stress first, train second. Otherwise you are training above the line of what your dog can handle.
The tension that already starts at the coat rack is something you can learn to see in the free webinar.
Separation anxiety, boredom, or frustration?
A dog who cannot be left alone can find that hard for different reasons. Without a clear diagnosis you keep guessing, and you may well be training the wrong thing.
Cause | What you see | What the dog needs |
|---|---|---|
Strong attachment and panic (true separation anxiety) | Panic the moment you, one family member, or the other dog leaves: frantic barking, damage at doors and door frames, never settling | Lower stress first, then build up second by second, with guidance |
Boredom | Destructive behavior and restlessness in a dog who gets bored quickly, also when you are home | Enrichment and stimulation: sniffing, treasure hunts, chewing, brain work |
Frustration | A young, active dog who is not allowed to come along or cannot get to you, and is disappointed over and over: monotonous barking, sometimes ending in a howl | Meet the need or create distance, and let the frustration work itself out |
In summary: true separation anxiety is panic the moment you or a family member leaves (frantic barking, damage at doors, never settling) and calls for stress reduction first and then a second-by-second buildup with guidance; boredom shows up as destructive behavior in a dog who bores easily and calls for enrichment such as sniffing, chewing, and brain work; frustration shows up in a young, active dog who is not allowed to come along and calls for you to meet the need or create distance and let him work it off.
In practice it is often a combination. Owners frequently assume it is pure attachment, while a large part of it sits in frustration.
The symptoms of separation anxiety
While you are gone:
Barking or howling that goes on for a long time, with deliberate pauses to listen for someone coming. This is the loneliness bark: your dog is calling his family. It can shift into a higher, faster fear bark, sometimes with a howl behind it.
Barking at the closed door you left through.
Destruction. Usually self-soothing out of tension: chewing releases calming hormones. Not disobedience.
Peeing or pooping indoors, diarrhea, not eating.
Panting or drooling when it is not warm, excessive scratching without an itch, obsessive behavior, never settling.
Does your dog also bark when you are home, at things happening outside, and does he settle again afterward? Then that is probably not separation anxiety.
Before you even leave, when you stand up or walk toward the door:
Yawning outside the context of being tired.
Tongue flicks: the tongue darting out briefly.
Slowing down or freezing, or lying down by the door to keep an eye on you.
Showing the whites of the eyes or looking away.
Lifting a paw: he is torn between staying and following you.
If you see these signals while you are still walking to the door and you leave anyway, the step has already failed. You are training above the line of what your dog can handle. All the stress signals in order are in How to recognize stress in your dog.
Why “just letting him get used to it” does not work
The most common mistake is taking steps that are too big. Yesterday he managed five minutes, so today it is six. With steps that are too big, your dog is overwhelmed or panicked again and again, and he learns exactly the opposite lesson: see, being alone is miserable. The problem grows instead of shrinking.
Other pitfalls that make it worse:
Generic internet advice. Radio on, curtains closed, one minute longer every day. None of it connects to the cause or to what your dog can handle that day. Closing the curtains can help take away triggers, but it is not a solution.
Punishment. Punishment and threat increase stress and fear and teach your dog that he cannot trust you. Punishing chewing or barking is therefore counterproductive.
Shutting him in a closed crate. That removes too many natural needs at once (finding a cool spot, being able to relieve himself, moving, social contact, good sleep) and raises stress. Crate use can even cause separation anxiety. Why that is, you can read in Crate training a puppy: why we advise against it.
Wearing your dog out with ball throwing or running next to the bike. Chase games trigger the hunting instinct and deliver a burst of stress hormones that need five to eight hours to break down. Exhaustion is not the same as fulfillment. Tired is not the same as relaxed.
Ignoring frustration. A frustration bark is a cry for help. Ignoring it does not solve the underlying need.
What does work: the order
Analysis. Spend a few days paying extra attention to your dog: what does he do when you leave the house, which subtle signals do you see, and how limiting is it for the two of you? A camera helps enormously. Keep an activity diary: note what happened each day and mark the tension level green, orange, or red. That is how patterns appear.
Learning to recognize stress. Become the expert on the changes in your own dog, especially the signals he only shows when you are not there.
Lowering stress in daily life. Stress piles up in an imaginary stress bucket. Tension from an unpleasant walk gets in the way of learning to be alone. More sleep and rest, sniffing and strolling, chewing, and no chase games.
Only then build up, in very small steps. In seconds, not in minutes, and not the same every day: you monitor daily and adjust to what your dog shows you that day. What that buildup looks like in practice is in Separation anxiety training plan: how to build it up.
And in the meantime: stop leaving a dog alone if he panics at home by himself. Arrange care at home, take him with you, have your groceries delivered. Every panic experience makes the problem bigger.
What you can reasonably expect
In our coaching work we have seen dogs who, after roughly three months, could again spend a couple of hours alone in a relaxed state. That is an illustration, not a promise: every dog is different and progress has to be followed and adjusted daily. Bad days are part of it. What we can say with certainty: it takes patience, consistency, and small steps, and fear of being alone is extremely hard to solve entirely on your own.
From our practice
An example from our coaching work: a family was convinced their dog could not be alone purely out of attachment. The analysis with a camera and a diary showed that a large part of it was frustration: a young, active dog who was disappointed every time he was not allowed to come along. That changed the whole approach. Not training the alone time first, but taking the frustration out first, and only then building up. More than 30,000 dog parents have now taken a Stressless Dogs course, and that shift, from drilling the absence to first fixing the cause, is one of the most common turning points we see.
When to get help
If your dog goes into real panic when he is alone (frantic barking, injuring himself, destroying doors and door frames), do not experiment with a buildup schedule on your own. The wrong approach can lead to apathy or fear aggression. Always build the plan together with a separation anxiety coach.
Frequently asked questions
Can I use a crate so he does not destroy anything?
We strongly advise against a closed crate; it raises stress and can even cause separation anxiety. The destruction is self-soothing, not disobedience, and shutting him in does nothing about that.
Should I punish him or ignore him when I come home to a wrecked room?
No. He cannot help it. More important than reacting to the damage is working out why he is so tense and lowering that stress. When you get home you will often see a shake-off: that is your dog releasing the tension.
He is only calm when my partner is home. What now?
Then there is excessive attachment to that one person. Spread the care (walking, feeding, playing) across more family members so your dog does not depend on a single person, and work on his confidence.
My dog was always fine alone and suddenly he is not. Is that separation anxiety too?
It can be, but with a sudden change you always start with the body and with what changed in his life. Read Sudden separation anxiety in older dogs.
Sources
de Assis, L.S., Matos, R., Pike, T.W., Burman, O.H.P. and Mills, D.S. (2020). Developing Diagnostic Frameworks in Veterinary Behavioral Medicine: Disambiguating Separation Related Problems in Dogs. Frontiers in Veterinary Science, 6, 499. Distinguishes panic, frustration, and boredom as different forms of not being able to be alone.
ASPCA. Separation Anxiety. The signs of separation anxiety, why punishment does not work, and why gradual, small-step desensitization is the basis.
Read next
Separation anxiety training plan: how to build it up
Sudden separation anxiety in older dogs: causes and approach
Crate training a puppy: why we advise against it and what works instead
Why is my dog panting so much when it is not hot?
Separation anxiety in dogs: 7 treatments compared (and why most of them fail)
First see how tense your dog really is
Before you train a single minute of being alone, you need to be able to see how tense your dog actually is. A dog with a full stress bucket cannot learn; his body is in survival mode. Reading that tension is what you practice in the free webinar on communicating with your dog, using the signals that start at the coat and the keys.
Want to go further and build the everyday communication that lowers your dog’s stress before you train anything at all? That is what we work through step by step in the Stressless Communication Course.
Thank you for reading, on behalf of me and all the dogs.
Dog Behavior Consultant & Natural Dog Trainer