[Help] Rescue of 2+ years still has issues with being overly avoidant/cautious dogs

I've decided I want to see if there's anything I can do to help the relationship between myself and one of our two dogs. A bit of background:

My family are long-time dog owners; we've had them since before I was born and we're currently on the third "generation" so to speak of family dogs. We've always owned labrador retrievers, and one of our current two dogs is Opie, a 4 year old chocolate from a local breeder. He's not the problem. About two years or so ago we decided to adopt a second dog (not our first time having two at once, but our first time adopting), who we named Lucie, and she's some manner of German Shepherd mix.

Opie: http://ift.tt/2cLYOjZ

Lucie: http://ift.tt/2cdtlBO

Both of them: http://ift.tt/2cM0t8X

Lucie is of indeterminate age, likely 3+, and is a rescue from Tennessee. She was brought north to an animal hospital where we adopted her around two years ago. She grew accustomed to our house quite quickly as far as I can recall, and never really had any problems with people. Several months after adopting her we realized she was pregnant, but it was too late to avoid puppies and so the animal hospital took care of her until and after she had them, after which she was spayed. We got her back not long after. She's generally in good health; there's a small scar on her front left leg we don't know how she acquired, and she has a cataract/detached retina causing her to be blind in her left eye. She isn't bothered by it at all, but we still give her glaucoma drops once or twice a day to help with the cloudiness. She's otherwise quite well, and she's very friendly, excitable, and affectionate with the family - except for me.

While Lucie is very loud when it comes to strangers (she barks at people she doesn't recognize, but she's never hostile otherwise), the only people she seems particularly disturbed by are young men. We think she might have been abused in her former home by a young male with medium-long hair, as those characteristics in particular really get her barking. While she exhibited some avoidant behavior prior to having her puppies, after we got her back from the hospital there was a marked increase in her avoidance of me (25y/o male). I say avoidant and not fearful because she never does anything to particularly suggest that she's afraid of me, but she has some characteristic behavior that keeps her from getting close to me. In particular:

• She's only okay with petting if it comes on slowly. One hand is typically preferred. Two hands extended and she'll generally try to move away. Picking her up is an absolute no-no.

• She 'gives up' her spots when I appear. If she's on the couch downstairs and I come down and into the room, she'll get up off of the couch and move to the floor even if I'm not moving to disturb her.

• She always tries to face me. If I come up behind her at all she'll rotate to make sure she's facing me. This includes changing positions on the couch to keep her eye on me.

• She avoids my room. She'll go into my sister's room, my parents' room, sleep on their bed, etc, but she won't come into my room. Sometimes if she's curious she'll stop at the door frame and look in. If I have food she may come inside, but it's very hesitant and if I stand up or move closer to her at all she will flee the room.

• She's more comfortable with me when I'm below her. If I'm standing over her she's most avoidant. She'll be more willing if I'm on my knees. If I actually want her to approach me I need to be laying down, then she may actually get close and sniff/lick me.

• She's more comfortable with me when other family members are around. As long as someone else is present she'll generally let me get closer, use both hands, put my face against her, etc.

• Despite all these characteristics it doesn't seem that she's "unappreciative" of my presence, for lack of a better word. If I'm downstairs alone at night and open up the refrigerator she'll come down and look to mooch. If I've been gone out of the house a long time she'll approach and sniff me. If I've been gone particularly long she may even jump a bit as though she were excited. If a family member is present with me she may join me on the couch, even let her head rest on me in rare circumstances.

She has none of these issues with any of my other family members, my sister, mother, or father. They can all pick her up, pet her, she'll willingly get close to them and snuggle up on them, join them in their rooms, etc. I've never purposefully done anything that I can recall that should make her avoidant of me personally; I tend to be as gentle with my approaches to her as I can. I've tried doing things like setting down food close to myself and seeing if she'll approach, amateur dog stuff to try and get her more comfortable, but it hasn't really had any effect.

I'm only just now making this post because it's never really been an issue other than it prevents me from getting to close to her. But if there's a way, I would like to get her more comfortable with me, to have her treat me like she treats the other members of my family, and so any advice in this regard is super helpful.

I've excluded the details of our other dog, Opie, since this post is already long enough, but in a nutshell he has no issues with Lucie or our family. The only way I could think of him being useful is as some kind of role model for being affectionate toward me, but obviously the fact that he and I are perfectly fine hasn't influenced her.

I'm super grateful for any ideas or responses on steps I can take to get Lucie more comfortable with me.

Submitted September 10, 2016 at 02:13AM by LucieDogProblems http://ift.tt/2cfTiD9 dogs