Seconding the trazodone recommendation above. A lot of times anxious events like nail trimming gets into a nervous cycle- they’re nervous, freaking out, and then every time it gets worse. If they weren’t desensitized as a puppy, it’s very hard to do it as an adult especially when they’ve had more anxious nail trims in the past. Trazodone helps them relax enough to have better experiences during nail trims, then it can break that fear-ramp-up and show them the nail trims are not so bad, and over time may be able to reduce the trazodone dose a little, or combined with desensitization maybe stop it entirely. But no shame about using drugs to help calm them! In my vet practice, at least half of our canine patients need some sort of trazodone/ace/whatever other calming drugs for things like nail trims, anal gland expression, sometimes even just the exam.
My beagle is similar. I agree with the suggestion to get some drugs to take the edge off. For my beagle, he is happiest lying on the sofa with his paws hanging over the edge. I sit on the floor with the dremel. I might only get to dremel a couple nails in a day because I’m more interested in it being a “no big deal” event rather than getting all nails in one day. Over time, he has worked up to letting me do two or more feet in one sitting. I also find running him on a paved surface does wonders.
100% but if a few mintues a day helps its better than nothing. And is a behaviour that can be rewarded. Dew claws and hinds will still need to be trimmed of course.
@endlessclimb This can at least help the dog understand that trimming their nails is not horrible. Its something that they can control and get rewarded for. Its no different than the paint stirrer with sand paper idea.
Using tradzodone is not the 100% answer either. I dosed my dog for the new year’s eve fireworks and figured since she is dosed, I would trim her nails. She still fought it. It was actually worse because she had a hard time standing on 3 legs and felt more uneasy.
I should have clarified the scratch board is not a solution, but a stop gap to get some trimming done until the dog is properly trained to the dremel which the OP mentioned they are working towards.
Following this thread with close attention because my farm dog couldn’t stay home and had to turn into a house dog – she is 4 and never has had her nails trimmed because she wore them down naturally. She’s terrible. I can’t get them done and need a professional to do it. These are helpful suggestions!
Update! I ended up asking on a local FB group for groomer recommendations, and one particular place had a bunch of mentions, including the owner who chimed in. I ended up bringing her there… It took the owner plus one other groomer to hold her, but they dremeled nails on all 4 paws in under 5 minutes, no muzzle, and no screaming from my corgi!!! I was so shocked, you could have knocked me over with a feather.
I’m continuing to work towards doing this on my own, but for now, she’ll be having monthly trips to the miracle workers for her trims. 
I wonder if having someone hold a licky-mat coated with peanut butter would help. Only let the dog have it when first the paws, then eventually the nails are being handled.
I did one nail a day on my cat.
It was so fast she didn’t have time to get outraged.
But it took 10 days to complete.
I don’t have the patience to do that with my current cats.
I do something like this. I sit my dog, face her, and dangle a desirable treat from my mouth. While she stares at it, drooling, I lift her paws and she lets me trim them. When I started I had someone help me by holding the treat in front of her face and me doing one nail at a time. Now we have progressed to me holding it in my mouth or just having it on the floor, and I can do all her feet in one sitting.
I’d be careful though if you think your dog might bite your face trying to snatch the treat. A lick or holding a Kong with peanut butter may make the dogs move around too much, which could make it hard to get a safe cut.
This thread has made me want to try a sander though…I think my dog’s nails are a bit too long despite regular trimming. Because they are black i can’t see the quick, and I err on the side of caution, I end up not cutting enough off and I’m not sure I’m doing much good at all, at this point, other than squaring off the pointy ends.
The dremel is the only way for me to feel comfortable trimming. I have three greyhounds and most of their nails are black and crazy hard. With the dremel, you can see when the structure of the tip starts to change - I tend to dremel for about a quick 6 count, take it off, put it back on. You get a sense as to when to start visually checking for that change in structure. Once I get to that point, I maybe do a touch more on the ends, then I do the underneath to get it parallel to the pads and call it good.
