Fearful dog

my shepard is a 1 1/2 years old, when she was about 4 mos. while playing with our 3 year old pug she ran into the portable cage fence that was set up for them . Upon running into the fence it fell over and made a loud bang which frightened her so much so, I thought that the fence actually fell on top of her and fortunately it didn't. Ever since that she has been so skiddish and afraid of loud noises (loud cars, garbage bins being rolled out to the street, lawn mowers, etc.) We've tried not acknowledging her behavior, we put her out where she can't run from such situations and nothing seems to snap her out of that state of being. She's constantly running in fear even when inside the house. It's become an issue while taking her for walks, especially on busy streets. Please let us know what else we can do to help her.

Hello :)
   
So there are a few things that you can do to help your shepard.
   
First we have to make sure that you arent feeding into her fear, and what i mean by that is: When she is around a loud noise, you arent trying to coo her or comfort her. If you do, its sending her the signal of: well im being praised for acting this way so it must be okay.
   
On the same note, it isnt advised to scold her either. If she is acting skiddish using loud voices, or reprimanding her will only add to her chaos.
   
I found a great article that had a few ideas on how you can work with your shepard. One of their suggestions was to teach your dog some new tricks, play with her. The article suggests that a dog will be having more fun learning and bonding with you that it will be distracted, and therefore not give loud noises too much notice over time. This method is called the distraction method. And it works by simply distracting your dog from what causes it turmoil.
   
Also it suggested recording some everday noises and play them back to your dog. Start at a very low volume, where it is barely audible to your pet and appears to cause her no stress. Then gradually increase that volume over the weeks and have it play while your dog is enjoying her everyday adventures, playing, sleeping, eating etc..This is the desensitization method.
   
I think that if you combine these methods in your training it will have positive effects on your shephard. This is a slow process but undoing all the fears or noise she has gradually collected over her life span is going to be slow, and of course you as an owner will need patience. :)
   
Let me know how it goes and if you need anything else :) Good Luck.

It may help if you try walking with her while walking with something she is afraid of such as a rattly shopping cart or walk her while driving a noisy car with her leash out the window. Just keep going like everything is normal and try not to stop for her when she pulls away. Just ignore her and keep going at a swift pace so she has to concentrate on following. hopefully this will help. I've worked wish skittish dogs before but its hard to tell just what to do over the net when I cant see her or what she's doing in person.