How to Obtain a Service Dog

hi there thanks for joining me my name is katie i am the founder of little angel service dogs and i wanted to spend some time going over all of the different ways you can receive a service dog unfortunately it is a very real problem in this industry and in our world today that people will be hurt when they try to get an assistance dog from a business who is unscrupulous or from a trainer who really doesn't know yet what they're doing and i'm not going to say that all of them are out there trying to hurt anyone many of them really do see the benefits that service dogs have they perhaps have had someone in their life looking for an assistance dog who was really hit with a lot of barriers because it is very hard to get an assistance dog through an organization if you contact these organizations or do any research at all you see that the waiting lists are really just so long and it's really disheartening there are people out there who really are trying to help with this problem that we have of having not enough supply to meet the demand however a lot of the trainers who are doing this really don't have the skill set to train these dogs appropriately what's happening pretty frequently is that people are paying tens of thousands of dollars for a dog who has not had the right training and would really be more of a disservice to them than a benefit the first thing that i would recommend for you is that you visit a website called assistancedogsinternational.org assistancedogs international is the leader of this industry they are a governing body that will help to provide standards worldwide for assistance dogs and thank goodness that they exist if they didn't we wouldn't have so many laws that are being passed we wouldn't have an advocate for this industry and an advocate for the dogs and all the people who are benefited by these dogs as well as the public i'm sure all of you have seen fake service dogs or service dogs who are so poorly trained that they are actually a hindrance when they're going into public i mean how many of us have been barked at or growled at by a dog that is supposed to be a service dog i have seen dogs lifting their legs and urinating on grocery store shelves i have seen dogs lunge at children i've seen dogs chewing on restaurant table legs i mean it just it goes on and on and um if we didn't have this governing body that is trying to provide standards for the industry it would just keep getting worse and worse and worse now a lot of people are thinking because they are met with these barriers of long wait times that they're just going to go train their own dog but then they can't find a trainer that is able to do that for them they might find a trainer who says that they can do that for them but the trainer really has no idea and they just know how to market themselves and then they go through a lot of heartache trying to get this dog to behave for them when really it never had the inherent ability to be a service dog at all i've been training service dogs for over 20 years i went to school for three years full time to be able to learn what it is that i do most trainers who truly have the skill set to train an assistance dog have been through a very long schooling process or they have actually worked for or apprenticed for an assistance dog organization outside of that it is difficult to find someone that really truly understands all of the details that will go into an assistance dog and our involvement in assistance dogs international doesn't end just with our yearly conferences but we have access to a lot of different committees a lot of articles all of the new laws we get to be notified when new laws are changing or when new acts are passed i've been on a couple different committees where we are working to standardize the policies for all of the different organizations that are out there it's just a really beautiful program and i love how supportive all the organizations are with each other i can genuinely say that we are not in competition with each other we are all helping each other to provide service dogs for the disabled communities throughout the world what they're going to be able to do is to give you a list of accredited organizations that train service dogs you can get on there and be specific about the area that you would like to get a dog from and of course you want to be specific about the type of disability that this dog is trained to assist with my first suggestion is not necessarily to limit yourself by location because it is very normal for people to travel a good ways to get an assistance dog let's use this scenario as an example let's say that you live in colorado so you only contacted and applied to organizations in colorado and let's say that those organizations asked that you were involved in a very heavy amount of fundraising and let's say that they also have a wait time of five years and that's not atypical unfortunately in this industry but then let's say that there was an organization in new york that would be able to help you and they didn't require that you were in any type of fundraising whatsoever and they could have a dog for you in a year for most people it would be well worth it to travel to new york to get that dog assistance dogs international really takes all of the guesswork out of you finding an organization that is reputable and that can help you when little angel service dogs went through our process of accreditation we were candidate members for seven years and that's because it takes quite a bit of time to be able to build up our kennel and all of our policies and all of the procedures that are required by assistance dogs international to make sure that the dog is going to be protected that the recipient is protected and that the public is protected there's really three different ways that you're looking at this it's not just a dog and it's not just about the handler we're looking at the entire spectrum of everyone that would be affected by the training of a service dog if you went out and you tried to get all the back details and tried to get testimonials and tried to do a lot of research on different organizations it can still be misleading because they're only going to give you testimonials from recipients who are happy with them there may not be a lot of information online because it might actually be a newer organization they may not be a non-profit they may not have trainers that have the skill set to help you they may not be there for years and years to assist you if they're promising to be there for the lifetime of your dog but the organization or the business has only been in existence for two years i think it's pretty hard for them to guarantee that they're going to be there for you in the future when you have a problem and the thing is that we are not matching robots with the disabled we are matching flesh and bone dogs and dogs have a mind of their own and so they could be trained in one way and then start to exhibit a behavior years later well you would need to be able to go back to the professionals who trained that dog who are available there to support you to make sure that that dog is not hindrance to you or the public or themselves and that they can continue helping you for years to come when you're getting a dog from an organization most of the time you can count on the fact that that dog has been in training for one to two years before you ever meet it so usually you're going to be meeting the dog that is fully trained on day one these dogs generally come with a very long wait time and a lot of fundraising whether or not you are involved in the fundraising is going to be up to the organization but it is very expensive to produce these dogs it can easily cost fifty thousand dollars for an organization to put one of these dogs through training and most people are faced with some serious sticker shock when they're saying 50 000 for a dog but if you sat back and you looked at how much it would cost to board your pet dog for two years then it starts to make some sense so these dogs have a lot of boarding and it takes a lot of facility and staff to board those dogs for two years there is a lot of food a lot of veterinary a lot of supplies and then the organization usually does not only have the expense of the dog itself and the training so of course you have training staff that are spending 600 hours or more training each individual dog but then there are administrative staff so you have people who are helping with fundraising you have staff that are looking at the applications you have staff that's working on websites you have follow-up staff that are working with the recipient for the lifetime of the dog not just a quick here you go and good luck but we are actually going to support you through the lifetime of the dog each of the organizations will function a little bit differently as far as how the dog is put through training so the facilities might be a little bit different and how they utilize fosters may also be different most of the organizations nowadays will utilize prison programs to train the dogs and this is something that i'm so excited about i i just love it um i will visit our prison programs and i will go and work with the inmates there and see all of the work and all the love and care that they are pouring into these dogs and they are so dedicated to the well-being of the dog i mean we'll get a phone call if a dog has a hang nail or a little hair is out of place we're gonna hear about it and i love the idea that they are able to give back to the community not all but a lot of the inmates have never had love reciprocated and the dogs can do that for them so there is a very special bond and a special relationship between our inmate trainers and the dogs that are matched with them and these dogs will work in the prison program being trained sometimes for six months and sometimes up to two years before they come back to our facility where we continue training the dog and we take the dog on a lot of field trips and give the dog a lot of exposure to all the different things that they were not able to come across in the prison programs when you receive the dog from one of these organizations you will usually have two weeks of training and the training is going to be where you are shown how to reinforce the training that the dog has already received so you're usually going to be working with an instructor sometimes it's going to be on a one-on-one basis and other times it's going to be in a group or a classroom setting where you're working with other individuals and families who are also receiving a dog at the same time you are another nice thing about working with an accredited organization is that we are all getting together once a year for our conferences and they're held throughout the world the beauty of these conferences is that we can all come together and we can discuss what works for us and what doesn't work for us we get to go over new studies we get to go over new articles that have been published we get to hear from a lot of professionals in the industry to see how they are implementing new practices in their programs so we can always stay on top of the technologies and the new training methodologies that are out there to serve our recipients and our dogs so how you get a dog from these different organizations really will vary greatly i did mention earlier that it's very normal to have a long wait time but the wait times will vary from one organization to the other some of the organizations will have a higher amount of fundraising involved and some will have none at all so when you're talking to them you want to be sure that you are going the very best route for you on the other end of the spectrum we have individuals who want to self-train their dog now if you wanted to self-train your dog you really have to be very careful with that because maybe 50 of the time even if you follow very specific direction in a book and it could be my specific direction in a book or if you were watching youtube videos from a professional who really knows what they're talking about you still have maybe a 50 50 chance that this dog is going to work for you and that may not be a good enough chance for you to get involved and go out and have this dog once you have that dog you are responsible for that dog's welfare even if it doesn't work out for you so questions that you need to ask yourself when you're self training is how am i going to be able to provide for this dog if it's not a good fit for me what if it doesn't get along with your other animals what if it is a risk to your children you can't necessarily say i'm going to keep a dog regardless of the circumstances because if it's hurting your other animals or if it's hurting your children you can't keep it it's not a safe situation you would have to be able to rehome it into a situation that is good for that dog and of course when you're going out and selecting a service dog you're trying to get one that will be friendly toward everyone and everything a dangerous dog has no place going out into public it's a huge risk not only to the public but also for your liability and also the life of the dog if that dog bit people that dog could be taken away from you and euthanized all for traits that are very natural for the dog to have it is so normal for a dog to want to protect you and if you're having a seizure in public and the dog realizes that you're vulnerable it may be very natural for that dog to try to protect you from people who are coming close to help you you can't have that happen with a service dog it's really dangerous for everyone involved so if you were going to be doing self training you want to make sure that you get a lot of instruction and that you really feel confident that you're going to be able to do this you have to be very patient and always remember that this is a dog and even though they have the ability to perform these miracles of seizure alert it takes a lot of time to get from point a to point b and then there's another option where you're not really training the dog all by yourself you might be working with a professional that is guiding you and with these options you really have to do again a lot of research i will say that there are accredited organizations who will help you self-train your own dog they are few and far between but they are out there and you can get their information off of assistance assistancedogsinternational.org and then we have options that are more like a hybrid program we have a program like that called angel retrievers you can visit angelretrievers.com and with this program you are not going out and training a dog all on your own and you're also not getting a dog that is fully trained with this option essentially you are getting a dog from our breeding program that we've selected for you and we've matched it to you based off of this dog's personality and propensities and then looking at your entire life we're looking at the very great details of your application we're looking at who's living in your home what is your personality what are the different places that you visit what type of errands are you typically running what type of work do you do are there children in the home if there are pets what type of pets are there and then we match you with a dog that we've already started to train this is a nice option for someone who maybe does not want to wait as long to get a service dog maybe they don't want to do as much fundraising to get a dog but you are willing to have all of that patience and spend a lot of your time working on finishing a dog's training the nice thing about these hybrid options is that the trainers that have this dog they know the dog already it's not that they just went out to a shelter and temperament tested for an hour or went to a breeder and played with all the different puppies they might have actually welt those puppies they might have been with them from the day they were born and then really saw their personalities develop and of course they've been able to train with them to see some more of those personalities and some of those different behaviors surface so having a trainer that's really familiar with the dog already before they match it with you really reduces your risk that the dog is not going to work but you still have a risk so anytime that you are self training a dog even if it's like a hybrid program and even if you're working with a professional organization there's still some risk that the dog is not necessarily going to work out well for you again these are animals they're flesh and bone and they're making real time decisions so no trainer can guarantee what a dog will do all they can do is guarantee that they are going to be there to support you in the future and even exchange that dog for another if it didn't work out for you so again when you're making these decisions on which route you would like to go always start off with the idea that if you are doing any type of self training whether that's in conjunction with a program where we're looking at a hybrid option or if you're training a dog with a trainer that's going to go out with you to shelters and test dogs or look at different puppies from breeders and help you from the time that that puppy is able to come live in your home or if you are trying to self train all on your own there is a risk that this dog is not going to make it as a service dog it is going to take a lot of patience and i will tell you it is a very narrow path that a dog has to walk to become a service dog so not only are we looking at maybe one in 300 dogs that can be a service dog at all i mean it has to have this inherent ability to be a service dog you cannot take a dog that cannot be one and then transform it into one it already has to have the right traits to be a service dog to start with but then you have to have the skill level you have to have the instruction you have to have the patience you have to have the time to take that dog from point a to point b and then if you're looking at organizations which if they're accredited organizations of course that's going to be the safer route then you have to be prepared for wait time or fundraising or a combination of these things to make it happen so again some websites to look at would be assistancedogs international.org you can also check out our website and it tells you a little bit about our program it's little angelsservicedogs.org we also have angel retrievers.com and any of these websites can point you in the right direction and at least give you some more information to do your research while you are deciding the best route to take to get your service dog thank you so much for joining me and i wish you all the best in your journey care of the puppies 24 7. they are noisy cute and hungry good mamas make good puppies [Music] [Music] at two weeks old our eyes open and we learn to walk so [Music] outdoor play makes for tired puppies socializing our puppies with children is extremely important [Music] at about five weeks old they love to learn new things [Music] [Music] at eight weeks old we prepare them with vaccines microchips for their road ahead we say goodbye and a new journey begins now the trainers get to meet the new puppies the staff and little angel service dogs start a new journey [Music] [Music] [Music] as the dogs get older they begin to learn new tasks [Music] ready you really going to push before i tell you to push doc's journey begins back to the ranch for advanced training at the ranch our dogs go on field trips to doctor's appointments sea world they learn about roller coasters noises experiences that are important for their future questions the dogs are learning how to retrieve open and closed doors and dial 911 at this point reality happens and the director informs you the dog is ready to be [Music] placed our dogs now get to meet their recipient as you can see this love at first sight a day the recipient has waited a very long time [Music] so [Music] my name is colleen stewart i am here for my mobility dog at little angels hi i'm greg stewart husband and this is a life-changing opportunity for us here we can't be more grateful to the guys the whole team at little angels and all the fosters for doing such a great job with denny he's uh he's within two weeks actually on the first day he was immediately part of our family and uh i've seen an immediate change in colleen's health and psychologically and physically over the last two weeks it's this is a really great opportunity for us does it feel good hold on it feels excellent it's just i feel safe [Music] denny is going to enable me to take a walk down the street three times a day and give me the exercise that i haven't been able to have it's going to help my health um so much with my oxygen and my exercise and muscles and it's it's going to change my life completely i go to sea for a living and that means i'm gone for at least two and a half months at a time and uh for the last five years i've been very concerned with colleen's well-being when i was away at sea and now i don't have to worry about that anymore because denny's there with her if she has any issues he'll dial 9-1-1 and get ems services there immediately and help her get exercise and get healthy so it's this is a life-changer for me too not just colleen and her health issues but my my peace of mind it's really really been a big help it's a long long wait to get your dog but it's worth every single minute when your dog improves your life as much as denny has for me the people who trained him are miracle workers and have done an unbelievable job with my boy it's the most wonderful thing and little angel service dogs has created it for me and everybody else against one of their dogs pots or postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome my name is elaria and i'm here for a medical alert dog i was so excited he was so beautiful and he came out and he came up to me right away it just i was overcome with joy and like so many emotions so in love with him potts is characterized by an increased heart rate drop in blood pressure and dizziness upon standing at times people can lose consciousness or faint dylan is trained to pick up items on the floor brace for balance perform deep pressure therapy and dial an emergency phone really excited to like start doing things on my own again like i'm 22 and i don't get to do the things that other people my age can do on their own so i'm really excited to be able to go to my classes and stuff well i started crying because it's it's independence for her i saw her stop her shaking which is the first time in i don't know how long and it was very heartwarming and overwhelming i'm just it's like she gets a whole new lease on life after three years of this horrible thing she's been going through so it's just i'm so excited for her everything you hoped for the wait was so long but it was so worth it and you still have that smile on your face from me yeah i can't stop smiling during the two-week handler training the recipient learns the ins and outs of caring and managing a service dog while the service dog gets the opportunity to get to know their new recipient better good right so real quick now that you're ugly crying what's it mean to go through this together it's nice it feels good to have someone with you yeah like especially someone of the same age yeah that's really cool um like we're not alone and we could see it like for each other so you think brothers are gonna stay in touch yes i interviewed you two weeks ago and has everything you think like met your expectations um exceeded my expectations it's just been a really wonderful experience what's the first thing you're looking forward to when you get home to do with just still um going to the market alone and then maybe eventually the parks i mean i think that like dylan being in my life has been so wonderful and i feel like we were meant to be together and i i understand how much work everyone else put into him and i'm just so grateful my daughter is now going to have some independence and i won't be the service dog anymore so i'm kind of excited about that and she can finally live on her own and go to school by herself and so this is it's such an amazing amazing experience and i can't thank all of you enough it was fantastic [Music] uh i just met my best friend [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] do [Music] do [Music] do [Music] do [Music] do [Music] dex would stop about mid way through to do the task and look me dead in the eye and he did that probably twice or three times twice um and then after he was done with his tasks um josh put him into a down stay before he went into the downstay he potted my leg and i had a seizure like three or four minutes after that and then he potted me again like oh maybe he just wants more treats um but then a couple minutes later i had a seizure again and something that i noticed was that when you were doing that all of a sudden he just gave you an intense look in your eye again he was just like staring straight at you and then he pawed her and we were wondering well it can happen where she'll have a seizure after a seizure in a short time and sure enough he was alerting once again he wasn't just asking for traits but he was learning once again everything that he's been trained to do he actually did it yeah so it was very awesome well it's yeah it's just been absolutely amazing to see what going into it was just a dog to see dex just just perform just it's amazing um just what he's been able to do and how he's been trained and how natalie has been able to just latch on and text and that have just been awesome together and just to see that bond and just to see how dexter's gonna help natalie so it's pretty awesome pretty awesome cool to see him go from scent training with a with a scent in a little bottle and then seeing him in action with her alerting every time it's too far beyond what i expected just watching everything that we've seen go into action has been like overwhelming and we are very very thankful and just grateful for everybody that has a hand in little angels people that donate to little angels thank you yeah he alerted um he's been alerting like right from the start he's been alerting to natalie seizures and so yes the other night he alerted 13 minutes in advance and again just to see that happen is just just amazing thank you to everyone who helped raise dex and train him he's perfect for me [Music] this is the heartbeat of little angel service dogs we are a family who met as strangers united in our goal to help disabled children and adults through incredible dogs we are forever committed to our animals we rescue dogs from shelters whenever we can and when we must breed to produce excellent puppies we do so with the utmost care paying close attention to the health of our precious dogs loving families and individuals foster our dogs whenever possible and when we must board our dogs in our kennels we are dedicated to their enrichment care and happiness while they wait for their forever home we never turn our back on a dog who should not be working as an assistance animal nearly 30 percent of our dogs would be better off as a pet or emotional support animal we never return them to a shelter we continue their training until they are prepared to be matched with the perfect family we are committed to each and every dog in our care for life we care for our recipients we put the interests of others above our own we believe all people should be treated with dignity and respect in this broken world we recognize that our recipients are people just like you and me who need compassion and a helping hand not only are we committed to our dogs for life but to our recipients as well we will never leave them or forsake them and will always remain available to support them through the years with their assistance dog our dogs give strength to families enrich the lives of children and provide independence to adults living with disabilities every day we have led the way in actively training dogs to recognize and alert to seizures through scent this has taken decades of research relying on science our knowledge of animal training and the amazing abilities of canines we help civilians and veterans alike regardless of the source of trauma in their past our dogs keep children with autism safe and literally open doors for those with mobility impairments who cannot we invest wisely and responsibly dollar that is donated represents the love and care of our financial supporters people just like you who want to work with us to provide a life change through these amazing dogs we spend our money only where it is needed a single puppy requires many skilled hands to raise and train it into a highly trained assistance dog who will help rather than hinder someone who is struggling with a disability this requires years of labor proper veterinary care nutritious food and training supplies we do not waste our money on frivolous facilities that cost millions upon millions of dollars our dogs and recipients are kept comfortable at our peaceful ranches rich with nature and love we constantly seek and welcome volunteers to help us in our cause which save funds while providing more loving hands to socialize our dogs we are good stewards of the money entrusted to us we spend wisely to directly and effectively impact and assist the disabled little angel service dogs together we are changing lives one dog at a time [Music] do [Music] [Music] [Music] so [Music] me [Music] [Music] do [Music] do [Music] do [Music] [Applause] [Music] so [Music] hi everyone it's time for another day in the life video by yours truly i have been so remiss in giving anybody any updates but today is the day there are big changes in store for my family and i would say that there are also big changes in store for little angels except for that little angels isn't about one person and it's not about a small group of people there have been over 120 paid staff members that have been highly involved in making little angels what it is since i founded the organization way back in 2006 and there have been over 200 volunteers that have made all of this possible there are so many people who have really sacrificed so much to give our recipients a change to give them a better life through these incredible dogs here's some of those dogs doing now hi these little puppies are in training and some of them may end up being angel retrievers which is our self training program and some of them are going to be seeing as fully trained service dogs one day right guys we got lots in store for you currently little angels has over 20 paid staff members everything from administrations applications to recipient support trainers kennel maintenance we have such a solid group of people and i can honestly say little angels is like an extension of my family so going back to these big changes i would like to lead into that by explaining a little bit about josh drew josh came to our organization in 2016 as an apprentice and he came here intentionally to learn the trade so that he could learn the skill set in order to start an organization on the east coast his brother received a dog from our organization and he just loved to see how it changed his life and even his family's life it wasn't too much longer than that that we realized josh had the traits to make him a great leader it was then that the board and i approached josh and asked if he would be interested in learning to be the director [Music] [Applause] and since that time josh has been in training because as the director you have to know about convenience you have to know about training you have to know about our prison programs and how that is changing lives you have to know about our recipients you have to understand disabilities and you have to have the knowledge and how to reach people where they're at there is so much involved to make sure that the organization continues to run smoothly and we know that josh will do an incredible job okay boys are you ready to get in the rv and go to texas yay all right let's go that's right i said texas and by this point you're probably starting to realize that there is a trend for this video josh is training to become the director and is she talking about moving somewhere but it's not what you're thinking not exactly you see when my husband was deployed in guam this past year he got coveted and if you are watching any of my videos you know that he had a really close experience and it was very very frightening he sent me this picture of him entering the port of san diego and i have to tell you i have never been more overjoyed in my life receiving a single photo from anyone so this year my husband is going to be retiring from the navy and it has been a rough road and i mean i can say the navy has been good to us in a lot of ways but those seas make for some rough sailing i think for probably anybody who's been deployed or been on a ship and chronovirus really really did a number and now that he's retiring we can go pretty much anywhere this is archer and allen they're my boys they help me a lot with training and i know that you've seen a lot of really bad haircuts with coronavirus i just haven't cut my kid's hair at all but all in he he did cut his hair you see um and it's no big surprise that he was able to do it even though i have the scissors very high i work about 60 hours a week and so he found some time to go and do that i am delighted to announce that josh is going to be taking over as the director and what it does is it allows me to step back and homeschool my children which is something i've really wanted to do for the longest time and i have to say i have been failing miserably in this area and it's just because i'm so busy with all of things little angels but josh now can take over all the day-to-day management but i'm still going to be involved in fact when we move to texas we are going to be starting a third branch of the little angels this property is so incredible it has rolling green fields just like our new hampshire and san diego ranches but there's water lots and lots and lots of water but you know who's not complaining it would be a tricky [Music] [Laughter] he is literally moving to greener pastures and you know who else is not upset don't eat the hair ash and ember who were born right before our california fire evacuation and um i have to say these little california girls never thought that they would be texas goats they're obviously going to be pretty pleased about it the dogs are super excited [Music] toby toby does not like car rides and he's not gonna like driving to texas for two solid days i mean he's grumpy about everything so i guess that's okay so even with all the social distancing practices we're pretty much in full swing at both of our current ranches and we're implementing some new safe ways that we can get back to our regular handler training a lot of you know that our ranches are designed to have someone living on the facility if not several someone's living at the facility to make sure that the dogs all receive 24-hour care and the beautiful thing about me moving to texas is that our treasurer stephanie is going to be moving into my previous residence at the california ranch so as always with a lot of creativity from all of our staff it's all just coming full circle i'm going to texas stephanie is moving in at the california ranch and josh is taking over as the director to see over all of the day-to-day goings-on i'm going to be taking a step back from almost everything managerial i'm still going to be overseeing our applications process but this move not only allows me to spend more time homeschooling my children but my hand is still very much in it and i just love this program i love what it does for people i love the family that we have at little angels the community is one of the biggest blessings i've ever had in my lifetime and i'm really excited to be able to spend a lot more of my time getting back into the training and breeding of our puppies we are literally starting our road trip tomorrow morning bright and early and this adventure is beginning the texas property is going to be very similar in the way that our kennels are set up it's just going to lack the classrooms that are both at the california and the new hampshire facilities but if you are ever in east texas and you want to come by and see me if you need any refresher training i would be delighted to have you come out we can go have a picnic by the pond i hear that there are mosquitoes the size of hawks but just bring your bug spray i'm sure will be good so if i don't see you before my next video take care and i will see you soon you

Channel: Little Angels Service Dogs

Views: 10,422

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Id: hhjqKD8GJX0

Length: 61min 15sec (3675 seconds)

Published: Thu Apr 01 2021