Olive: Learning to Share the Things She Loves
Olive has always loved with her whole self. Her mom Becki’s lap, favorite spaces, treats and toys can inspire a lot of devotion from this little Yorkie-mix, whose household schedule includes a nightly event known as the “treat train.”
Her toys receive a different expression of that intensity. Give Olive a squeaker and she approaches its removal with the focus and efficiency of a tiny demolition contractor. Some of the things Olive valued could also become difficult to share. She sometimes guarded access to Becki, particularly while sitting on her lap, and another dog’s approach could make her uncomfortable. Bully sticks and other valued resources could bring out similar behavior.
We started looking at those moments through the same question: what did Olive value here, and what happened when she became uncertain about her access to it? That question helped Becki and Peter see a broader pattern in Olive’s relationships with people, spaces, and resources, then use that understanding to make everyday life feel more predictable.
Becki Is a Very Important Person
Olive’s attachment to Becki runs deep. She likes physical closeness, follows her people closely enough that her nose can touch their legs, sleeps near them, and has been known to mope when work travel separates her from Becki. That closeness gave us useful context for understanding why Becki’s lap carried so much value around other dogs. Olive had access to someone deeply important to her, and another dog entering that space could change her behavior quickly.
Then Olive gave us an especially useful clue during boarding. She sometimes guarded access to us and, to a lesser degree, other members of our household. We brought that observation back to Becki and Peter because it expanded what everyone understood about the pattern. Olive’s behavior extended beyond one person or one lap, showing how strongly she could value access to people once a relationship became important to her.
That discovery gave Becki and Peter something new to watch for at home. They could consider who or what Olive valued in a particular moment, how another dog or person entered the situation, and what Olive communicated as that access changed. Context added another important piece. At Half Moon Bay, Olive could move around off leash, sniff, explore, encounter dogs, and disengage comfortably. At home, another dog approaching while she rested close to Becki created a very different arrangement around something she valued deeply.
Sharing Starts With Feeling Secure
Our work focused on making access to valued people, spaces, and resources more predictable for Olive. She spent time around another dog while still having proximity to trusted people, room to move, and plenty of good things available to her. Dude became one of the dogs who helped us explore those conditions. We started with parallel movement and enough space for both dogs to settle into each other’s presence, then adjusted according to what their behavior told us.
Those observations gave Becki and Peter practical information they could use at home. They learned to anticipate situations where Olive might place particular value on a person, resting place, food item, or other resource and arrange the environment thoughtfully before tension developed.
Predictable routines, thoughtful spacing, reinforcement, and careful decisions around valued resources became tools they could use themselves. Becki and Peter could watch Olive’s response, adjust the arrangement, and help her experience another dog’s presence while good things remained available to her. For Olive, security created more room for sharing. For Becki and Peter, understanding what Olive valued made those everyday decisions clearer.
The MGM Lion Has Entered the Chat
Olive also brought considerable enthusiasm to everyday events. Doorbells, deliveries, transitions, leashing, and television could all inspire strong opinions, and television produced one of our favorite Olive discoveries.
Dogs on screen could trigger barking and charging toward the television, with the MGM lion earning a particularly enthusiastic review. Eventually, we noticed that Olive knew the sequence so well that the music preceding the lion captured her attention before he appeared. That tiny detail mattered. The music gave everyone an earlier point in the sequence to notice, which meant Becki and Peter could respond while Olive was still anticipating the event.
We practiced with those predictable sounds and images at manageable levels, giving Olive opportunities to hear the music, see the screen, and settle into another activity. Becki and Peter could apply the same process to familiar household events such as doorbells, knocking, and deliveries by noticing the earliest part of the pattern and guiding Olive from there. During a later extended stay, Olive watched nearly two hours of television filled with dogs. A few early redirects helped her settle into the evening, and she spent considerably less time managing the entertainment industry herself.
For a dog who once treated the MGM theme as a call to action, that qualified as a favorable review. It also gave Becki and Peter another example of how anticipation, predictability, and an early response could shape what happened next.
More Room Around the Things She Loves
Becki and Peter carried those observations into ordinary life. When something outside caught Olive’s attention during a Zoom call, familiar household events approached, or a valued resource entered the picture, they had a clearer sense of what to notice and how to arrange the situation. They could anticipate patterns, consider what Olive valued, give her useful choices, and watch her response. The same curiosity that helped everyone understand her attachment to Becki also helped them navigate dogs, resources, household activity, and the small transitions that fill a day.
That understanding fits the adventurous life Olive already shares with Becki and Peter. She has traveled, camped, explored wine country, and become thoroughly woven into the routines that make their life together theirs. She still adores Becki, takes the treat train very seriously, dispatches squeakers with professional efficiency, and packs considerable personality into roughly fourteen pounds of dog. Her devotion remains unmistakably Olive.
Olive has more ways to move through moments involving the people and things she values, and Becki and Peter have a richer understanding of how to support her through them. She can care deeply, stay connected, and discover again and again that the good things in her life remain available when she shares the world around them.
