You might have noticed that here at NoCo Unleashed, we're pretty obsessed with Leslie McDevitt's Control Unleashed program. We want to show you why - so we're bringing you CU Success Saturdays! Every Saturday, we're going to share a story that shows why CU is so awesome. Today's story is brought to you by our trainer Megan Wallace, and if you have a CU Success story you'd like to share send us a message and we'll feature it on our Facebook page!
My CU Success Story, by Megan Wallace
Since I’ve been using Control Unleashed for close to 14 years now, to tell my entire story with CU would be a long one. I’ll try to sum it up – I first heard about CU on one of the training Yahoo Groups, back when that’s how we did things. I had two dogs (Pirate and Tori) that struggled to deal with the world around them in different ways, and I needed to find a way to help them. I was a novice hobby trainer, with some experience, but not in how to deal with these two opinionated Border Collies!
I spent my early adult years soaking up all the information I could from the internet, and much of that was from the Control Unleashed Yahoo Group. I got the chance to go to one of Leslie’s seminars with Pirate as a working dog (I think in 2008?), and immediately felt a great connection with her and her work. It has shaped everything I’ve done in training my own, and clients’ dogs.
Pirate and Tori are both gone now, and I’m proud to say that both lived full lives filled with adventures, and challenges, and a whole lot of change. What CU taught me is how to be their partners, to communicate with them about their needs, and how to ask them to compromise when I couldn’t meet those needs. We went to dog camps, and competitions – we learned about disc sports, herding, Barn Hunt, and most importantly NOSE WORK! Both dogs were titled in multiple venues, only at the novice level, but it wasn’t about the titles, it was about the journey.
When Fawkes, my Ridgeback, came along, I used CU methods to teach him to stay focused on me in the face of distractions. He has become an incredible partner in my training business working as a neutral dog to help my clients dogs feel safe working around another dog. Because of CU, I felt completely comfortable adopting Lucy, a Border Collie who had lived as a yard dog in Wyoming, and had some seriously reactive behavior when she came to us. She is titled in Barn Hunt and Nose Work, and is a best friend to our whole family. And lastly, my puppy, Han Solo, not really a puppy anymore – he’s a 15 month old Border Collie, full of big feelings, and I give a lot of credit to raising him with the CU philosophy for his ease of handling, adaptability, and just being an overall good boy.
Kudos to you if you read this to the end, it’s hard to sum up the impact Control Unleashed has had on me over the years!
