Hello! Hope that you are ok!
I know the struggles of a screaming screeching bird, I have a 2 year old african grey and sometimes he screams for the sake of it!
Firstly, don’t feel like a failure as on my experience you can never train screaming fully out.
I will give you my experience and hope you can take something from it
We bought our boy when he was 5 months old, he was perfect for months and chatted whistled etc then all of a sudden the worst screams in the world started! We would leave the room, scream. Come back in the room, louder scream.
My boyfriend was thankful at the time we had no neighbours but his screams were so loud and high pitched i got headaches.
The forum helped me, I stopped giving him attention when he screamed. Luckily our boy was young and not used to getting attention for screaming. So I started to train myself rather than the bird.
If we left the room to do day to day activities and Bo screamed he would get zero attention, wouldn’t talk shout or anything.. the minute he whistled or was silent we started to talk to him from the other room. If he screamed again we stopped talking and waited for the silence.
If we wanted to return to the room we would wait until he stopped screaming and then went back in, if he screamed we would walk back out and return when he had stopped.
It took a while, and we weren’t perfect. Times we snapped and said ‘Bo stop screaming, we don’t do that’ and funnily enough when Bo screams now he laughs and says ‘Bo we don’t do that’
If we were sat inside the room and he screamed, despite the horrible sound we didn’t move. Didn’t look at him, didn’t react at all because any little reaction seemed to break our cycle and we would go back to the start.
Bo eventually learnt that screaming doesn’t get him attention and that’s not fun.
That been said, Bo still screams.. this morning I was in the kitchen and he screamed so i didn’t speak to him (as normal) and he said ‘that’s better’ because sometimes he screams and when he stops we will say is that better, did you get it out your system!
In relation to work, I had a period where I had to work from home due to self isolation from work. Bo loved having me home for a longer period than normal so his naughty side came out!
Have you offered foraging toys to entertain birdie when you are on video meetings?
Bo has a selection of foraging toys, he has the wheel, the ball and a strange shaped one ha! He has a coconut filled with shredded paper and a nut or two, he also loves old egg boxes stuffed for him to forage in. With bo they don’t take long to destroy or figure out but it entertains his mind for a while.
When I worked from home if I needed a bit of quiet time for a call etc I would fill one of his foraging toys up and pop it in, he was so entertained he forgot I was in the room!
Make the foraging toys into a game, let her pack the toy with you or see you putting fun exciting things in there and she will be itching to get the goodies out.
Another thing is, although it seems tedious can you include her in your day? So for me if im at home and cleaning I talk with Bo, i say mums going to hoover now or shall we dust this down etc and he chats back to me. Even with work stuff I would say mums just going to have a look on here, and have a bit of pointless chatter with him but that kept him feeling included.. if that makes sense?
Training any bird can be a long slow process, i also have a parrotlet who 2.5 years later has only just started to allow me to train her properly: she loves my boyfriend but it’s taken a long time for her to trust me, which is funny because I have done everything with her from day one!
Don’t beat yourself up, you will get there and don’t feel a failure