My friend and her brother are living together, and he has a dog named "Queen" whos two-years old.

She was abused by a former owner, and acts like a puppy- she pees inside the house, and rips things apart with her teeth, shes completely out of control and tears into anything.

I was wondering what we could do to help train her so she stops being so destructive?

Thanks guys.

~Layla

All of our dogs are rescue animals, and some of them have "issues". Our Corgi mix, Freeway, was abused by his former owner and is still rather skittish (especially with men).

The key word with abused animals is PRAISE. You can't punish them or yell at them without scaring them half to death and often making the problems worse....so instead of reacting when they do the wrong thing, you have to lean more towards reacting when they do the RIGHT thing. When the dog pees outside, praise her lavishly - I mean seriously act like she just crapped gold bars or something. Give her a treat, a hug, pet her, do the "Gooooooooooood Doooooooooog!!" stuff.

If she is ripping up the wrong things (shoes, pillows, furniture, etc), give her the RIGHT things to chew on - a NylaBone or a Kong (you can put peanut butter or a treat in the Kongs, keep her busy for hours). When she chews on the right thing, praise her again. If she goes back to chewing on the wrong thing, give her a firm but calm NO and take it away from her.

Other things to remember with abused animals is to control your tone of voice; softer and higher-pitched for praise and love, quiet and lower for reprimands......and to squat down to their level when you can, so they are not intimidated by you towering over them.

Good Luck!

I would agree with Shines advise.
I have found that most dogs will come good given a little love & respect & time.
It may take a while for the dog to gain total trust in you but keep at it with kind words & praise, soft tones, no physical punishment at all (or even sudden rushed movements near her if the dog is nervous at all).
Try getting into routine times for walks & meals (if possible).
Respect the dog & dog will respect you.
Temperment & behaviour can be influenced by breed also. It can help to have an understanding of what type of dog it is (eg sight hound or herder, guarddog, retriever etc etc etc).
What sort of dog is she? Do you know?
It may also be helpful to know how the dog was abused; eg if beaten or neglected (or both) as this may affect how she responds in some situations.

Good luck with her, I hope she has found her 'forever home' now...

***BUMP***

How's the woofa doing now Layla?

Didn't see your post till it was bumped. Hope it's going better by now.

Queen sounds like my current foster dog. I wouldn't trade Skip for nothing, but I feel your frustration. Housebreaking an adult dog can be difficult. I pretty much couldn't leave him out of my sight for several weeks/month. Even needing to teether him to me at times. Just to clarify, is Queen peeing because she's not housebroken, or is she peeing out of submission or excitement? The later two cases require a completely different manner of handling. You mentioned that she was abused, so that's what makes me wonder if it's submissive peeing that you're talking about?

Peeing and chewing have less to do with being abused and more to do with being an untrained dog. Crate training can be a lifesaver if it's done correctly and the dog is accustomed to the crate slowly. Make sure when no one is around that there's nothing available for her to chew up, otherwise she'll keep teaching herself how fun it is to chew things up.