Who is The Dog Nanny?
I am Sonia Quertenmont and as far as I remember, I’ve always supported animal welfare. I had a dream of saving and defend all animals of the planet.
After a boring career in the Human Resources Management field, I decided to leave the corporate world and work with dogs.
In 2009 I created The Dog Nanny, a professional dog walking service. Combining work and passion was a true calling. Turning it into a career made absolute sense. Turning it into a career made absolute sense. My profession helped me observe and understand canine interactions.
I learned on a daily basis how to decipher dogs’ apeasement, fear, or play signals.
Thanks to my passion for dogs, I naturally tended towards towards a dog training and dog behaviorism.
My experience on the field is of course an absolute plus.
Nevertheless, I also needed to acquire some solid theoretical and practical knowledge, and to learn from the best. I chose to get that education with one of the pioneers of positive training, based in the USA. After many selection interviews, dozens of assessments and exams, I got my Certification from the prestigious Victoria Stilwell Academy for dog training & behavior.
Science evolves everyday and I make a point of keeping up to page with new scientific studies, attending webinars, seminars, and reading the most recent articles.
I am the happy owner of Simone, my mini Dachshund, who is my dog behaviorist sidekick! She helps dogs and their owners feel and heal better , thanks to her wonderful spirits and her kind and friendly approach of her peers.
June 1996 : Master of Arts in Information and communication sciences at the University of Brussels (ULB)
June 1997 : Master in Human resources management at the ULB
After 12 years of working in corporate, I started my own business:
April 2009 : Creation of « The Dog Nanny », a professional dog walking servicewhich I handed over in 2023 to dedicate myself exclusively to my work as a dog trainer and dog behaviorist.
October 2022: Certification as a dog trainer and behaviorist from the Victoria Stilwell Academy for Dog Training and Behavior, USA.
Since my certification, I have continued to train with the best professionals in the canine field, especially neuroscientists, geneticists, behavior researchers, and renowned ethologists, to understand what a dog is, what it needs, what it feels, and what it learns.
I have attended and continue to attend numerous training sessions and seminars given, among others, by:
All these training sessions allow me to understand dogs and to adapt my modern approach as an ethical, compassionate, and respectful behaviorist. Key moments in my academic journey, in addition to my training at The Victoria Stilwell Academy, include my participation in the Dog Behavior Conference a three-day Seminar organized by Victoria Stilwell in January 2023, along with my attendance at the Resilience Framework Tour, a two-day Seminar on canine resilience given by Dr. Kathy Murphy, veterinarian and Ph.D. in Neurobiology, in Denver, Colorado, USA, in May 2023.
To ensure my knowledge is up-to-date and that I use gentle, effective methods aligned with the latest scientific research, I am a member of The Pet Professional Guild et de The National Institute for Canine Ethics, international organizations that certify positive trainers in continuous education.
My recent continuing education:
I keep on learning every day to be up to date regarding the last research and discoveries, ignoring any « to-go » training method and keeping the emphasis on data and science based studies.
Nevertheless, I will forever keep using positive training as it is the only one who respects dogs and works on the long term. Coercitive methods only raise fear and pain in dogs, whichever the origin of the behavior is. For that same reason, we don”t punish puppies.
A happy dog needs to be happily adjusted to his environment but we have to attend his basic needs as well and let him be a dog: create social interactions, run free, smell the world, have a strong bond with his owner and make it a confident dog. I will teach you all of that.
The Dog nanny is a certified and registered company.
When you consult me I don’t look at my watch and often leave without getting paid because I forget to ask! This is how passionate I am. I will give you the necessary amount of time because my work is my passion and my ultimate goal is better the relationship you have with you furry companion and make you and him happy
I don’t ask for extra money if I have to stay a bit longer.
I do need to earn a living of course but conflict resolution and successful positive training come first.
When I meet your dog he immediately becomes part of The Dog Nanny’s family. Every dog I trained or helped takes a special part in my memory and heart.
I will always ask you to keep me posted on your dog’s progress, even at the end of the last session. You don’t have to give me any news of course but I am grateful when I get some because I really care. Every conflict resolution, every positive training is a shot of happiness to me! Making a dog and his family happy is what makes my career worth pursuing.
Every dog that becomes non-reactive, every dog that obeys out of desire, represents a real victory in my eyes: I’ve made a family happy and a dog feel good about itself.
