My 18 month old goldie bitch seems to have developed a dislike of being handled. She is fine with me, or anyone she knows well. She is only a pet (Not show) but we took part in the KC silver award to day, and when the tester tried to check her teeth she growled. She has regularly been handled in the same whay by my trainer and the helpers no problem, and my mum and i can do anything to her. This evening she had something caught on the roof of her mouth and i had to open her mouth and remove it and she was fine. When she was younger she snapped at the vet out of the blue, but she was suffering from a phantom pregnancy at the time, which is what the vet put this down to. She has since been spayed and had no problem with the vets touching her. She is a nervous dog, and really dislikes eye contact and is wary of strangers, so this could be playing a part. However the only thing i will say about today is that there was a very unruly boxer who kept lunfging at ellie, making her very defensive. (She hates big bouncy dogs). SHe was next in line to the boxer for the handling and was barking and growling at his manic behaviour when he was being handled, so i wonder if the growling was a reaction to the adrenalin created by this. However i don't want this to become a problem, but as she doesn't do this to me i don't know how to solve it? When she was younger a friend (with a lot of doggy experience) clipped her nails for me (also when she was having the phantom.) She growled alot, but my friend continued and just ignored the growling. She never attacked, so i'm pretty sure they are just empty threats as she is a very vocal dog, but i still don't think growling is acceptable. What would you suggest?
(Amazingly she did pass the silver by the way!)

Well done on passing the silver.   It sounds to me that it was a stressful occasion and when her stress levels rise, so too does her fear/suspicion.  I would try to avoid situations like this that cause her stress levels to rise, even if it means forsaking the 'gold'.   The more she 'practices' this behaviour the more it will become entrenched in her brain and the more it will escalate.  It is not so much a handling problem but a fear problem.   Not all dogs can be brave!

Wendy