Afraid of me?

So i like to think that me and Diesel have a great bond and relationship, i give her lots of cuddles and attention, it tends to be me that takes her long walks, trains her, feeds her and plays with her in the house (chase, fetch, tugging and sometimes a wee bit wrestling) and its always me she listens to,
however i was just reading up on dog body language on a few various sites and well Diesel seems to display quite a lot of fear/submission traits towards me.....think i've always thought this but the sites just strengthened my thoughts....
I have noticed for quite sometime that if i have been away at work when i come home she is excited but i always ignore her until she's calmed down a bit, not jumping etc and only give her attention when she has settled and sitting nicely, but sometimes when i go to stroke her she lowers her head and tucks her tail between her legs! when she does this i don't give affection as don't want to reward this behaviour, am i right in doing this?
Also sometimes she hangs her head and shoulders low when i re-enter a room after being out,

Although i want her to know i am the boss i dont want her to fear me!
any ideas why she is doing this? how can i increase her confidence? should i b worried??

Submission isn't the same as fear. Course the body language signs can be similar, but I doubr she's fearing you, just respecting your authority, so to speak. Loki always acts submissive with my dad, but he craves his attention as much as anyone else's, enjoys a really rough game of tug-of-war, etc. Don't worry about it, she's not scared just because she's lowering her head and whatnot. When I stroke Loki, he always yawns, and yawning can be a sign of stress. But he's certainly not stressed

so do you think its ok that she tucks her tail between her legs?

I dont think I would worry either sounds much more like submissive behaviour and not fear

Not sure. I have one that does the same thing, but he isn't really afraid of me. I am just patient and let him come up to my hand before I pet him when he acts that way.

Was her tail tucked completely in-between her legs, or just a bit? Loki sometimes has his tail very slightly tucked between his legs, but it seems to be more of a relaxed thing than anything else. Like he doesn't care where his tail is so I don't think it's always fear.

Dexter can be a touch like this with me, only slight and I don't pay any mind to it just carry on as normal. I am also the one he follows more and listens to more on the whole - he will go out with me even in the rain that he hates so much so I echo what folks are saying about it not likely to be fear. Just keep giving her all those loves

Yeah. Imagine if you were a dog and you had to constantly control how high/low your tail was, whether or not it's wagging, etc. You'd eventually just decide not to bother. Loki hardly ever wags his tail even when I know he's happy . Basically, what I think she's saying is, "I don't care what my tail's doing, just shut up and give me affection, will you?"

When i go to pet her she tucks in, like right in tight...
my oh did warn me not to read too many things on internet coz it would make me into a hypacondriac (excuse my spelling)
thanks all for putting my mind slightly at ease that i'm not raising a nervous dog thats scared of me!

Now I am no expert by a long shot and I wish I was as knowledgeable as I am good looking pmsl,but have you watched your training vid? Because I have and all I see is a dog confident that you won't hurt it, the amount of times your hand flashes past diesels head and not once is there a sign of nerves that a slap is imminent,I just think it's a I'm ready to please posture and you should be pleased that she loves you so much

dave742 wrote:Now I am no expert by a long shot and I wish I was as knowledgeable as I am good looking pmsl,but have you watched your training vid? Because I have and all I see is a dog confident that you won't hurt it, the amount of times your hand flashes past diesels head and not once is there a sign of nerves that a slap is imminent,I just think it's a I'm ready to please posture and you should be pleased that she loves you so much

aww thank you x.

diesel
+
karen
4eva

i can defo say a slap would never be imminent! Not a method i would use, my oh has in the past and he's recieved a serious slap from me for it!