My friend’s guide dog, lying down

My friend’s guide dog, happy to be out and about

alicetheowl:

Yesterday I took my friend out for lunch, a movie, and ice cream for her birthday. My friend so happens to have a guide dog, pictured above.

I’ve learned a lot about guide dogs in the years we’ve been friends, and not just because I’m nosy and ask a ton of questions. I’ve seen a lot of how people react to the dog, and to my friend’s handling of said dog. I’ve seen the direct consequences of strangers who don’t know how to treat guide dogs in public, too.

I realize there are a lot of these already out there by guide dog handlers, and you should really defer to a handler, not to me, if what we say seems contradictory. Still, I’m told that this information can’t be repeated often enough, so I’m repeating it.

Do not distract a service animal. In my friend’s case, the dog serves as her eyes. You wouldn’t put your hands over someone’s eyes while they’re walking. So why would you deprive a blind person of their accommodation that allows them to navigate the world?

Service dogs are still dogs. They’re extraordinarily well-trained dogs, but they still like attention, they can be distracted by loud noises, they’re frightened of scary things, and some things will inevitably grab their attention. My friend’s previous dog always forgot herself and barked at other dogs, so I’d physically interpose and verbally warn my friend if we were walking near one. Her dog before that was distracted by children and wanted to go say hi, which was a bigger problem. And lots of people want to offer food, which was a huge problem for the dog that had some major dietary restrictions because eating the wrong thing could kill her.

You know those studies that show that humans have a finite amount of patience, and they can only resist so much temptation before they give in? I’ve seen that happen with her dog. She’s been so good, put so much effort into doing her job right all day. At that point, all it takes is one whistle from a stranger, one, “Here, puppy!” and that dog is no longer guiding my friend. That dog is off to greet the friendly human.

Guide dogs guide blind people across streets, around obstacles, and up curbs and stairs. A distraction during any of those activities could be dangerous, possibly even fatal. Dogs trained to detect seizures could miss a crucial moment, and then the handler cracks their head open on the edge of a store shelf.

Yesterday my friend and I were walking through the mall when a fire alarm went off. It blared so loud, it cut off all hope of communication until it stopped. While it was still going off, a stranger who saw the dog coming crouched down and opened his arms. I steered her as far away from the stranger as possible (the dog was following me at the time), and she asked him to please not distract her dog as we walked past.

I didn’t catch his reaction, but I could imagine it. People are generally hurt or defensive when told to leave the dog alone. No matter how gently my friend asks them to let the dog do her job, they get huffy, like they’re entitled to interact with her visual accommodation. One woman, after being told no, once followed my friend so she could pet the dog as soon as my friend’s back was turned.

I understand, to an extent. We think of dogs as companions, friends, made to be snuggled and petted.

I always ask before I touch her guide dog. I’ve rarely been told no. Do you know why? Because I know to ask when she doesn’t need guidance. When she’s at home, when she’s off her feet, or when she’s in the car, she doesn’t need the help the dog provides. I still ask, a lot of the time, in case I’m accidentally reinforcing bad behavior or undermining their relationship.

One of my favorite things happened yesterday, too. As we were walking past a small child, the kid was saying, “It’s working, do not touch!” I don’t know if the child was telling themselves, or the parent (which does happen, and greatly amuses my friend). 

Children are a lot more receptive to being told no. A lot of them already know not to bother the dog, and it’s their parents who want them to push the issue. I imagine the schools teach them, because they clearly didn’t pick it up from their parents.

If she has time, my friend will ask the child to wait a moment. She’ll brace the dog between her knees, and take off the harness (a clear sign to the dog that she’s off the clock). Then she’ll say it’s all right to pet the dog for now, and explain the important job the dog performs when the harness is on. Kids are, inevitably, delighted to meet the dog that has a job, and it eases the parents’ embarrassment that they didn’t know not to push the interaction.

Of course, my friend doesn’t always have the time. She rarely does, in fact, because she’s relying on me to get around, and I am always late.

But also, it’s not her job to educate every single person about the etiquette around service dogs. She shouldn’t have to. She’s just trying to live her life, same as anyone else.

Don’t distract service dogs. Don’t get huffy when asked not to. Don’t let other people distract them.

Just let the dogs do their jobs.

nonespark:

pardonmewhileipanic:

soldierporn:

painsomniac:

shawnnarie:

lizplz:

derpy-greyhound:

strongbirdjay:

noodle-dragon:

rambo-psd:

How can you tell the fakes from the real working dogs?

1. If the dog is confined or has restricted body movement due to being in a carrier, stroller or shopping cart, it is unable to physically preform tasks in order to aid their disabled handler.

2. If the dog exhibits poor behavior and the handler isn’t trying to correct it or isn’t removing the dog.

3. If the dog is entirely focused on interacting with its environment, it cannot be focused on aiding it’s handler.

Certification, ID tags and vests don’t make a service dog. A dog is considered a service dog when it is trained to physically do something (performs a task or work) in relation to the handlers disability. The dog must be doing something for you, that you cannot do for yourself.

(The law does NOT recognize ‘emotional support’ or ‘comforting’ to be trained tasks)

Credit: 

Assistance Dogs of the Carolinas

Ok I’ve seen the anti-faker movement cause a lot more problems than it aims to solve, so I’m going to try to do some educating here.

Federal ADA law states that a dog need only be task trained to mitigate a handler’s disability, potty trained, and not aggressive. ANYTHING ELSE (including bad manners) does not mean the dog isn’t a service dog in the eyes of the law.

Many dogs can perform tasks while being held or confined (toy diabetic alert dogs can still work while being carried or in a purse, for example). Some tasks actually look like bad manners. Mobility/forward momentum tasks can look like bad walking manners, for example. For that matter, dogs are not robots. You may see a dog that looks like it is completely distracted, when it’s really just having an off moment.

If you don’t know the handler, you likely don’t know the nature of their disability and how the dog has been trained. “Outing” someone who happens to look like a faker (at least based on posts like this) can be hugely triggering. I’m tired of hearing about friends being attacked for this sort of thing, when their dogs actually do fantastic work. You can’t tell just by looking at a SD team what their whole situation is.

To be clear, I don’t condone faking AT ALL. It’s gross behavior. I don’t condone skipping public access training (unless you’re an at-home team), even though it’s not required. Taking a sloppy service dog out in public reflects poorly upon all SD teams. But we don’t need a witch hunt based on posts like this.

Lastly, it is not federally against the law to fake. Some states have laws about it, but I’ve spoken to the Department of Justice on this and they confirmed that it is not a federal crime.

My seizure alert dog is trained to have her eyes on me at all times. When I leave the room without her or she’s taken away from me when we go to the vet, she gets frantic. Not because of separation anxiety but because that’s what she was TRAINED TO DO. When she makes low barely audible growls she’s alerting me that something is wrong. She’s not a biting dog and is trained to vocalize instead of any kind of attack, she’s not vicious, she is trained to alert me. When I go into places that have food, I put her in a carrying bag. She is a very small dog, a ten pound westie. For this reason people assume she’s not performing a task and hassle me about it. I don’t like the stares. I don’t like the questions. I just want to be able to go places safely. Not all service dogs are big labs or shepherds- my tiny white dog is highly trained for specialized tasks and knows over 200 commands. Don’t assume.

Yes it’s bad when people fake having a service dog but it’s worse when assholes assume a dog isn’t needed because of the reasons the op is trying to say. Just don’t assume. Don’t approach us.

This is super important

Please please please everyone needs to read this commentary

Kaos is trained to watch the ground when given certain commands when I can’t see as well (I have a tendency to trip when my vision goes blurry). He is trained to pull me out of a store or away from ppl when I’m dissaociating.
He recently picked up barking at ppl who try to touch me when I’m having super high pain days. We are trying to get him to alert in a different way but it is a work in progress.

Some days I don’t even bother taking Kaos with me because it is to stressful to be called a faker every five minutes.

Moonshoes pulls me around. Literally. I don’t have the energy to walk around all day and she can go forever, so she pulls until I tell her not to. She watches my surroundings so I can relax because of my PTSD; I don’t need her to watch me all the time. I need her to make sure I’m safe. She might need to be on my lap or licking me a lot. She might need to be bringing me toys (which she’s done before in Target and we had to buy a stuffed animal because she was helping me). She might need to jump up on me, or a counter.

If you see a dog doing something in public that might seem like bad manners, as long as it’s not aggression or eating off the floor, chances are it’s doing it for a reason. Everyone is quick to scream fake without knowing the handler or their disabilities. So stop.

[OP is a prime example of how ignorance begets discrimination. Be careful; perception is not reality. Educate yourself. Check out the “service dog” tag. Check out the Battle Buddy Foundation. Atlas and his human, Kenny, help maintain their Facebook and are always answering questions about service and companion dogs.]

The VA plans to resume their PTSD service dog study with improvements, for instance to now include emotional support dogs in addition to service dogs. According to Rebecca Ruiz’s piece in Forbes, “veterans who use PTSD-trained service dogs say the animals help them manage the condition by performing tasks like waking a veteran from a nightmare or creating a buffer in large crowds or public places.”

Atlas the Wonder Dog.

Jesse & Chance.

Sergeant Pepper.

Yvette and Blondie.

Roscoe

There’s literally a 3lb service dog called NORBERT “the dog” (on instagram) who is so small he could be carried in one hand, but he is still an emotional support service dog, and his ability to be picked up and carried (often for his own safety as he is only 3lbs and thus VERY tiny) does not impede his ability, nor does it make the owner a “faker”

persons without disabilities sure do love to try having some “AH HA! GOTCHA!” moment in order to valid their feelings that disabled persons are being coddled rather than helped. 

tldr;

• every disabled person is different and has different needs.

• many disabilities are unseen.

• every service animal performs different tasks, and you can’t know what they are by looking at them.

• contrary to what you may believe, you are not the disability police.

• IF A PERSON’S SERVICE DOG IS NOT CAUSING A DISTURBANCE OR HARM, THEN LEAVE THEM THE FUCK ALONE.