Week 7: Adolescence | MK9Plus
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Week 7 ยท Adolescence ยท 6 months โ†’ 2 years

Your dog isn't broken. You're living with a teenager ๐Ÿ™„

More emotional. More impulsive. Completely unpredictable. This lesson explains adolescence better than you have ever heard it explained, and then flips the whole thing on its head.

๐Ÿพ Free ยท 60 seconds Hey! Let me send you something personalised for your dog. Tell me their breed below and Iโ€™ll email you their personal outlet blueprint: the job, the activities and the training they were bred to need.

Think you've got more than just an adolescent problem?

You might be right. And by the bottom of this page you'll know for certain. If you already know, the door is right here.

Stop surviving the teenage years. Start enjoying them

Not just video lessons. 1-to-1 email support directly with me, weekly lives, Zoom calls, and the full Adolescence Series, a proper plan instead of "wait it out".

โœ… 7 day free trial ๐Ÿงค Money back guarantee โœ… Cancel anytime โธ๏ธ Pause up to 3 months
Give Me The Plan, Free โ†’

Free for 7 days ยท Bare Hands money back guarantee ยท No risk

Everything you just watched is broken down visually belowโ†“

๐Ÿฉด ๐Ÿ—ฏ๏ธ ๐Ÿ’ฅ ๐Ÿฅพ
The lesson, laid out

Life with an adolescent dog right now ๐ŸŒช๏ธ

Emotional, reactive, impulsive. So the days become one long game of damage control.

๐ŸฅŠ Fighting ๐ŸŽ›๏ธ Controlling ๐Ÿšจ Managing ๐Ÿ˜ค "Be firmer!" ๐Ÿ“‰ Worse recall ๐Ÿซฅ Less engagement
"All that controlling and managing ends up ruining the most important thing: your relationship. And that creates even more problems." Max Randall ยท MK9Plus

The teenage brain develops back to front ๐Ÿง 

Between 6 months and 2 years, insulation called myelin wraps the brain's wiring and speeds it up. The catch? It starts at the back.

โšก โšก โšก โณ EMOTION ยท WIRED FIRST LOGIC ยท STILL BUFFERING Amygdala: acts NOW Cortex: thinks... eventually
Emotion runs on the fast wiring. Logic is still on dial-up. So they act first... and only then think: "this is a terrible idea, dude." The adolescent brain in one sentence

The advice everyone gets ๐Ÿ™ƒ

Two classics. Both of them leave you doing exactly nothing.

๐Ÿ—‘๏ธ "Don't worry, they'll grow out of it"

Just wait. Get to two years and collect your logical dog. Except I have watched plenty of dogs hit two, then three, then four... with exactly the same problems.

๐Ÿ—‘๏ธ "Nothing you can do until they're two"

Apparently you're just screwed while the brain develops. Lovely. Eighteen months of white-knuckling it and hoping. That is not a plan, that is a prayer.

Both belong in the bin ๐Ÿšฎ

๐ŸŽ Your bonus training video

"Just teaching place"... it really isn't

On paper we teach the dog to go to a mat. But it is not about what you teach. It is about how you teach it. This one is shaping: I say nothing, I do nothing, and the dog figures the whole thing out.

๐ŸŒก๏ธ

Works the emotion

The dog hits little walls of frustration and learns to work through them, building the frustration tolerance adolescents are famously missing.

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Works the impulses

Recall, sit, down, stay, ignoring food. The dog learns there are other routes to what they want. Not "I want it, I take it", but figuring out the maze.

๐Ÿค

Works the relationship

No commands, no telling off. The dog makes every single decision from start to finish, and you become the fun puzzle. Get the monkey moving.

Do it in the kitchen, the car, outside. We don't want dogs that think in straight lines. We want dogs that figure out the maze.

But does that solve adolescence?
You're not having adolescent problems.
You're having dog problems

Here's the proof. If adolescence were causing your issues, they would be shrinking as the brain matures. So be honest: which way are yours going?

6 months 2 years ADOLESCENCE ยท EASING โ†“ YOUR PROBLEMS ยท RISING โ†‘

๐Ÿถ At 6 months

Not much exercise needed. Not much mental stimulation. Not much breed specific enrichment. Honestly? Quite an easy dog to have.

๐Ÿ• Every month after

Closer and closer to their prime: a fit, powerful dog that needs more. And I don't care if it's a sausage dog, I've got one, she's hard work. If the life doesn't grow with them, the frustration does.

"Your recall, the jumping, the stealing, the barking... getting worse? Then it's not adolescence you're dealing with. It's life." Max Randall ยท MK9Plus

Deep breath. Here's the actual plan

No more chaos, no more waiting, no more white knuckles. Three steps, in order.

1

Stop waiting, and stop expecting training to fix it

Waiting is the most dangerous move available: the dog just gets more frustrated, more stressed, more aroused. And training only manages behaviour, it cannot touch the state your dog is in. Keep the bonus video above, but know what it can and cannot do.

2

Diagnose the real cause of the issue

Is it frustration? Arousal? Broken sleep? Stress? Even pain? Something is being missed as your puppy grows into a dog, and until you name it, everything else is guesswork.

3

Support that unmet need

Give the growing dog what the months are demanding, and the state fixes itself, then the behaviour follows. This is exactly what MK9Plus walks you through, step by step, with me alongside you.

+

The Adolescence Series

Help your dog and work through adolescence at the same time. Eight lessons, all inside MK9Plus.

Adolescent Behaviour and Training Kickstart
19:13
The Adolescent Brain and What It Does To Behaviour
18:36
Managing, Solving & Preventing
36:47
The Effects on Breed, Age, Health & Behaviour
27:50
Social Maturity, Being with Dogs & Becoming a Dog
08:04
Environments, Dogs, People & Training... Problems?
14:40
Over Handling, The Root of Many Frustrations
14:59
Behaviour is Shaped by Relationship More Than You Think
21:35

The plan + the series = a dog that gets helped and an adolescence you actually get through. All of it, through MK9Plus.

Unlock The Plan + Series, Free โ†’

7 days free ยท Bare Hands guarantee ยท Cancel anytime

A personal invitation

If the problems are getting worse, this is for you

I want to personally invite you to check out MK9Plus for free. It has every single thing you need: the Adolescence Series above, the whole library, and me alongside you. Because our goal is simple: give the dog what they've always needed.

๐Ÿงญ

The Adolescence Series

Eight lessons covering the brain, the behaviour, the breeds and the fixes. A plan for every month of the teenage years.

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Diagnose the real state

Frustration, stress, arousal or under-provision? The Under the Surface lessons find what your growing dog is actually missing.

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1-to-1 email support

Tell me about your teenager, and get a plan for your actual dog, not a generic age bracket.

๐ŸŽฅ

Weekly lives + Zoom calls

Rotating Q&A, topic deep dives and Zoom calls. Recordings and notes uploaded.

๐Ÿ“š

Access to the full library

Diet, sleep, enrichment, outlets, training. Everything, including every future upload.

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Community rooms

Full of people surviving, and enjoying, the exact same teenage months as you.

Risk removed

The famous "Bare Hands" Guarantee ๐Ÿงค

Start with a 7 day free trial. Then, after a defined period on the platform, if you would not pick up poo with your bare hands to stay a member, you do not pay a penny. Money back. Plus you can cancel anytime and even pause your membership if life gets busy.

Best case

The teenage months become the months you built the dog of your life, instead of the months you survived.

Worst case

You tell me this sucks within your guarantee period, get your money back, and keep everything you learned. At no cost.

Either way, the only thing guaranteed not to help is waiting for them to grow out of it.

Give My Teenager What They Need, Free โ†’

7 days free ยท Bare Hands guarantee ยท Cancel anytime

Read their stories

See how their lives have changed and what they really achieved. People here don't just get little wins. They're life changers. Because why would you want anything less?

โ˜… Real reviews ยท Live from Trustpilot

๐Ÿ‘† Press it. The stories drop down right here, and "See more" opens the full review without leaving this page.

Meet the MK9Plus members, who all started exactly where you are right now.

Don't survive the teenage years.
Enjoy them.

Join MK9Plus today. The Adolescence Series, the full library, 1-to-1 email support with me, weekly lives and Zoom calls. All free for 7 days.

Try everything. Risk nothing.

โœ… 7 day free trial ๐Ÿงค Bare Hands money back guarantee โœ… Cancel anytime โธ๏ธ Pause up to 3 months
Let Me In, Free โ†’

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