Puppyface and agility class fail.

First...puppy!

After hours of deliberation, this is the one I picked! He's the blue boy that I liked from week 3. It was a tough pick, in part because 5 of the pups were so close to what I wanted. I debated really hard about one of the blue girls and a black girl, and the other blue boy, but ultimately this little guy won. He's adapted well so far, he had to go with me to an agility trial all weekend and did great. Met lots of people, saw lots of things, met a dog or two, rode in the car, pottied in strange places...all pretty much without balking. He was a little overwhelmed by Saturday night, but Sunday did well and has been a trooper so far this week. I of course have paranoia that I am going to do something wrong, but hopefully experience and training will prevent that from happening. There will probably be lots of pictures of this little guy soon. I'm a bit concerned about some shyness that was not evident in his temperament tests or with his litter but have popped up over the last week...but he's a baby and has a lot of socializing ahead

Agility trial was good for Griff as well. He q'd in 6 of 7 runs, and was overall way more focused than I had any right to expect. We didn't q in our second standard run as I forgot to get the turn command out and caused him to back jump (off course), but it was totally my fault.

However...agility class on Tuesday was a nightmare. I could do nothing right as far as my instructor was concerned, and I ended up leaving class in tears. Griff was disconnecting because he saw how upset I was. I don't know why she decided to ream me...I know I was setting him up at jumps closer than I should, but most of the start lines were really near the other dogs and I didn't want him to get overly excited at the barky sheltie and leave me. However, the more I was berated, the worse I got, until I couldn't remember the courses at all. Finally, I just said I wasn't going to correct any mistakes and just let Griff have fun. I went out in the parking lot after class and cried like a five year old.

I know that trainers get to the point where they've seen mistakes people make a hundred times and it must be frustrating. However, training is as much about being compassionate to the people as it is the dogs. I am not trying to be unfair to my dog when I don't handle as well as I should. I'm just new at this. Berating me is a great way to make me shut down and make more mistakes....I wish I knew what to do about this.