# Snapping when sleeping and paws are touched



## Entities (Jun 26, 2015)

This happened a couple times since we had our 18 month old Vizsla Otto but lately its been happening with more frequency.
When he is laying on the couch either asleep or getting there if we come close to his paws or bump his paws he jumps up growling and bites pretty hard. What is the proper way to handle this? He is fine when hes awake and we touch his paws.


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## Pecan_and_BB (Jun 15, 2015)

Prior to our new V, we rescued a Walker Hound who was a year and a half old. He was an extremely sweet dog who was well behaved and who bonded with both of us fairly quickly. Within a month though, we noticed that when he slept, he never did quite relax and go into that floppy rag-doll sleep. Prior to him we had 2 fox hounds so we were experienced with the hound characteristics and this behaviour in him was different.

One morning, my wife woke up, pet the dog prior to him waking up and it startled him. He went into defense mode and bit her causing 8 stitches. We consulted a dog behaviorist and did a little more research on him and found that this was one of the reasons that the original owners gave him up, however they didn't disclose this with the rescue facility. The behaviourist said that this can manifest because of a traumatic experience when older while sleeping, when a puppy isn't left with his/her littermates long enough, or she's seen it when puppy's grow up only sleeping in their crates and lack contact/noises.

What she recommended we do is protect our hands and arms (I used oven mits duct taped to an old thick leather jacket) and begin the process of conditioning the dog to a LOT of touching, moving, pushing, noises, and contact once asleep. If he woke up startled and begins to bite, let him (on the mits and leather) and reassure him he's in a safe place with a soothing voice. Once he stops, reward him and once you are certain he is out of that startled wake up mode, praise him. Well, after doing this for about 3-4 months, 10-15 times per day, we finally saw him go rag-doll while sleeping and he began to completely relax. At that point, when we would force contact and noises, if he'd wake up nice, he'd get rewards and cuddles right away.

The entire re-hab process where we felt he was finally trustworthy took about a year and a half and even then we continued it for another 6 months of incident free wakeups. It can be extremely frightening and I will say this re-hab technique isn't for everyone (my wife didn't participate for the first 8 months) and I would consult an expert in your area if you feel that you cannot trust your V while sleeping around your family before undertaking such a process. I just wanted to share with you a potential path that you might want to take, albeit a difficult one, if you see the behaviour continue.


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