This Is The First Change I Make With Every Chaotic Dog

When I work with chaotic dogs, there’s one change I’ve learned to prioritise above everything else.

The very first change I make is kickstarting regulation.

Over the years, I’ve learned that most behavioural struggles aren’t actually training problems — they’re lifestyle problems...and until the dog’s system has space to stabilise, behaviour change will always feel slow, frustrating, fragile, or short-lived.

In this post, I want to explain why regulation is always my starting point, why it works when everything else feels stuck, and how changing the conditions around a dog often creates more progress than adding more “work” ever could.

Even though it might feel like it, dysregulation isn’t a dog being difficult...

It’s what happens when a dog’s internal system becomes overloaded over time...not all at once, but slowly, quietly, and often unnoticed until things start to unravel.

At its core, dysregulation is the accumulation of:

Together, these form what I call the Unholy Trinity.

When these three keep stacking up without enough regulation, recovery, or downtime, the system eventually reaches capacity, and when a system is overloaded, that pressure has to go somewhere. Just like a volcano, it doesn’t disappear, it erupts into behaviour.

Early signs of dysregulation are often subtle:

This is why dysregulation can be so confusing for owners...there’s often no single moment where things “went wrong.” Instead, the system has simply been carrying more than it can handle for too long.

This is why behaviour change feels so frustrating when regulation isn’t addressed first. You might see progress one day, only for it to collapse the next...learning doesn’t stick, expectations feel unfair, and everything feels fragile.

Trying to build behaviour change on top of dysregulation is like building on unstable ground.

There’s an old parable about two houses...one is built quickly, without a proper foundation. The other takes longer, built on solid ground. When a storm comes, only one remains standing, the one with a solid foundation.

The storm didn’t decide the outcome. The foundation did.

Chaos is unavoidable in a dog’s life. Stress, frustration, and arousal will always exist. But without a regulated baseline — without a lifestyle that actively supports regulation — the Unholy Trinity will always dominate.

This is why so many owners feel stuck. Not because they’re failing, but because they’re trying to fix behaviour without first stabilising the system underneath it.

This is where things start to shift.

The first change I make with chaotic dogs isn’t asking for more effort or more control — it’s changing the lifestyle that’s creating dysregulation in the first place.

Kickstarting regulation means lowering the overall load on the system so it finally has space to stabilise.

In practice, that often looks like:

This isn’t about doing less forever. It’s about doing what supports regulation right now. Sometimes the fastest way forward isn’t pushing harder...it’s removing the pressure that’s been blocking progress all along.

And this is where something important happens...

Some behaviours reduce dramatically, and some disappear entirely. Not because they were “trained out,” but because many of them were never problems to fix...they were coping mechanisms for a system under constant strain.

When the lifestyle stops fighting the nervous system, the dog suddenly needs far less management and intervention. Life becomes easier, not because the dog is being managed better, but because they’re no longer drowning in chaos.

A regulation-first approach doesn’t mean training doesn’t matter...it means training comes at the right time.

Regulation stabilises the baseline. Training is what you build on top of it.

Once regulation is in place:

Training becomes clearer, fairer, and far more effective — for both the dog and the human.

This is why with every chaotic dog I work with, the first change I make isn’t asking for more...

It’s kickstarting regulation, creating better habits and routines, meeting real needs, and building a foundation that training and lasting change can actually sit on.

Because when the lifestyle supports the system, everything else gets easier!