Community Helps 6-Year-Old

Back in early 2019, the Bowling family had a goal. They wanted to get a service dog for their 4-year-old son, Mason Bowling, but they didn’t have enough money. Mason has autism and a genetic chromosome disorder, so they thought a service dog would help him in his daily life.

However, an autism service dog costs about $25,000, so they had to find a way to get that much money. To their surprise, they received an incredible amount of support. Many kind community members helped raise money to get Mason’s new service dog named Kevin.

Danielle Bowling, Mason’s mom, wanted to get a service dog for Mason to help him develop socially. She hoped that the dog would help calm him down and make him happier. Sadly, Mason has a hard time making friends at school, but a service dog would help him feel more confident. Of course, the dog would also ideally be like a best friend for him.

Additionally, Mason’s service dog would also be trained in search and rescue to help prevent Mason from getting lost. Danielle thought that all these skills sounded perfect for Mason, but they still had to find a way to get the money. So, Danielle created a Facebook group to help reach out to the community. In the group, she shared charity events for Mason as well as updates on their progress. At first, donations came in slowly, but every day, more and more people stepped up to help. Damon Johnson, a former professional basketball player, even organized a special charity event to help Mason. Johnson set up a charity basketball tournament, raising thousands of dollars for Mason’s service dog. Thanks to Johnson’s help and the generous donations of many other community members, Mason eventually met his goal. All the family’s dreams were about to come true!

Now, Mason is 6 years old, and he finally brought Kevin home in April. Kevin is an adorable black Lab who is being trained specifically to help Mason. Currently, Kevin is working on controlling Mason’s meltdowns and aggression, along with helping his social interactions. He’s even being trained for search and rescue and for retrieving medication just in case either is needed in the future.

Even though Kevin has only lived with the family for a short amount of time so far, he has already bonded with Mason. The sweet dog is already adjusting to Mason’s lifestyle, and he seems to feel comfortable with his new family. Mason even got to graduate Kindergarten with his new best friend by his side. His family took plenty of adorable graduation photos of the two of them together. It might’ve been a long and difficult journey to bring Mason and Kevin together, but judging by the happiness on their faces, all the hard work was worth it. Congratulations Mason and Kevin!

Shelter To Soldier Receives Donation

Shelter to Soldier recently announced a generous donation from The Patriots Connection under the Rancho Santa Fe Foundation to supply turf to build five new pet play yards and one new training yard at the Shelter to Soldier training facility in Oceanside. The new training yards provide the Shelter to Soldier training team with ample space to observe “social distancing” during the COVID-19 outbreak as well as increase space for dogs to relieve themselves for potty breaks and a new training yard to increase the amount of training sessions occurring simultaneously. Shelter to Soldier is taking extra precautions to protect both clients and team members during the pandemic.

Shelter to Soldier (STS) serves the post-9/11 veteran population by providing psychiatric service dogs at no charge to veterans suffering from Post Traumatic Stress (PTS) Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) and other injuries associated with wartime deployments. The national statistics in this category show that on average, 670,000 dogs are euthanized nationwide annually. Every day, an estimated 16 U.S. veterans lose their lives to suicide; and in 2018 alone, 6,317 veterans succumbed to suicide. STS has achieved significant results to help alleviate the burden of mental illness for veterans and provide a new purpose for homeless dogs, documented by success stories on the STS website at sheltertosoldier.org.

According to Kyrié Bloem, co-founder and vice president of Shelter to Soldier, “We’re tremendously grateful to The Patriots Connection for providing us with funding for the additional turf needed to create the expanded space to train the dogs we adopt to help our veterans in need. Our overhead to feed, house, train and clean our facilities continues to grow along with the veteran population who need our services, so we are particularly grateful that The Patriots Connection has stepped up to assist us in meeting the demand.”

Shelter to Soldier is fortunate to have a pet turf partner in Envirogreen, which has heavily discounted the product and installation for all of Shelter to Soldier’s turf projects to-date. Anthony (Tony) Gourlay, owner of Envirogreen, lost his son to suicide and has been a supporter of Shelter to Soldier for three years. Gourlay’s son, AJ, was a veteran of the United States Marine Corps, a dearly loved son, brother, friend, and dad to his cherished dog, Gunner.

Bloem elaborates, “From the time of adoption, our service dog trainees spend, on average, 12-18 months in our care, enjoying play and training sessions several times every day. The yards at our training facility are utilized to not only exercise our dogs, but also provide a place to receive elite service dog training and learn very important task work that will one day serve their veteran suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress (PTS), Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI), insomnia, memory loss, hyper vigilance, mobility assistance and more. With this grant from The Patriots Connection, we are able to build new yards and replace very outdated turf that was there when we took over the facility in September 2017.”

Debbie Anderson, Rancho Santa Fe Foundation programs director, explains, “The Rancho Santa Fe Foundation is honored to partner with ‘Organizations of Distinction’ such as Shelter to Soldier. We, at the Rancho Santa Fe Foundation, believe it’s very important to support our local military, veterans and their families and we are very thankful for the programs and expertise of our grantees in addressing our communities continual needs, particularly as they support these individuals.”

Helping Service Dogs

Two sisters, Sherry Ross and Lorette Vanourny, both of Cedar Rapids, founded a local non-profit to train and match service dogs with people in need several years ago.

Some of the first people they helped were hearing impaired, leading to the organization’s name — Deafinitely Dogs.

Ask Sherry Ross what it is about Deafinitely Dogs that brings her joy, and she pauses for only a few seconds. Then she recalls a text she received last fall.

It was from a Marine combat veteran whose motorcycle organization had partnered with Deafinitely Dogs for three years, helping match service dogs with vets with PTSD.

“After working with you these last few years and seeing the changes these dogs have had on their person — I want to be happy and laugh again,” Ross summarized. “I want to apply for a dog.”

“I was on vacation when I got that text, and I had tears in my eyes when I responded,” she said.

Ross put the meeting and training process in motion, and the former Marine was matched with his own service dog, a lab named Reggie, in December. They’ve been inseparable ever since.

Ross, 52, and her sister, Lorette Vanourny, 54, now receive frequent texts from the man with videos of him and his service dog out for walks and playing together.

“They are thriving together — I say better together because of each other,” she said.

Deafinitely Dogs provides highly trained service dogs to people who need assistance — whether it’s someone with mobility issues, anxiety or post-traumatic stress conditions, medical conditions, or blindness or deafness. The dogs are trained as puppies and eventually matched to their “person.”

“At Deafinitely Dogs, part of how we are different is that we let our dogs pick their jobs,” Ross said. “We watch what the dogs enjoy doing and gear their career toward that field.”

For example, a soulful dog that wants to be close to one person, and looks them in the eye, would be geared toward PTSD or autism work. A dog that loves to retrieve items might be a mobility assist dog. An extremely social and calm dog would be geared toward facility dog work.

The puppies are fostered by “puppy raisers” who take them into their homes and attend classes through the organization — the dogs stay in each home from six months to two years, depending on the amount of training required.

The pups are trained on age-appropriate behavior using only positive reinforcement training, Ross said.

“Our puppy raisers attend classes and go on public outings and to public awareness events with us,” she said. “The dogs get trained, but they also get to be dogs — playing ball, going on walks and playing with other pets in the home.

“Puppy raisers teach our dogs basic obedience cues, public manners and socialization.”

Communication between the foster homes and Ross and Vanourny is constant, Ross said.

The puppy caretakers provide insight to what the dogs enjoy doing and any preferences they may have — working with men or women, preferring children or being more comfortable with older adults, for instance.

“We let our dogs show us what they enjoy doing so we can put them in a job they love,” she said.

When it comes time to match, Ross said, the dogs are the ones that do the choosing. Reggie, the lab, met several applicants before meeting “his” Marine veteran. Reggie hadn’t warmed up as much to anyone else, but when they met, he went over and laid his head on the veteran’s boot.

“After the dogs tell us who ‘their’ person is, they enter advanced training to work with Lorette, our lead trainer. She teaches each dog the specific tasks needed for the individual the dog is being trained for,” Ross said. “Every dog is unique in what it learns to best help their future person live a more independent life.”

Once the dog has mastered advanced tasks, they go through one more training — this one with their new person. The dog’s person — and their parents, if it’s a child — learn things together, including how to work together.

Deafinitely Dogs places around 15 to 20 dogs per year. Last year, it placed 18 dogs and was on track to place 12 this year before the coronavirus pandemic shut things down.

Families don’t pay for service dogs.

“We do not charge for our dogs,” Ross said. “But we do require recipients or families to do fundraising on behalf of the dog. We do this because if people aren’t willing to do any work before they get the dog, chances are good they will not keep up with the work and reinforcement.

“And honestly, these dogs are expensive to train and place — about $25,000 to $30,000 — so we need assistance raising the funds to cover the costs.”

Despite following different career paths as adults, Ross and Vanourny knew from an early age that bringing dogs together with people who need them was their calling.

As children growing up in Cedar Rapids, they showed an early compassion for the most vulnerable: Lorette would “bring home any dog that was out loose — stray or not,” Sherry said, while Sherry would bring home kids from school who were having a difficult time at home.

“Our parents were amazingly supportive and allowed many dogs into our home, and multiple kids lived with us over the years,” Ross said.

The two founded Deafinitely Dogs in 2014 and haven’t looked back. Their success stories keep them going, Ross said.

“A Marine’s wife texted us a week after her husband received his dog and said, ‘Thank you, I saw my husband smile for the first time since he was deployed,’” Ross said.

The man went from isolating himself from everyone — including his family — to being engaged with his family and other veterans suffering from PTSD. The dog made such an impact on the family, Ross said, that for their anniversary, the couple had the dog’s name engraved on the inside of their wedding bands.

“We had a family who got to go on vacation for the first time in seven years because they were not afraid of having their daughter away from her mental health providers,” Ross said.

“That’s what makes us happy — not just hearing about a successful placement, but knowing that families get to live their fullest lives, enjoying time and experiences together that had previously been taken from them.”

“Read To A Therapy Dog” Program

Camden County Library has virtual events every week for kids. Here are some events for the week of May 11-15. Monday morning kids can “Make Your Own Journal” with simple home supplies or join in some evening fun with “Tween Dungeons & Dragons”. On Tuesday get ready for some zany lip-syncing Zoom fun with Miss Tina and Miss Paige. Wednesday they are bringing their “Read to a Therapy Dog” program to your home via Zoom. And, every Monday-Friday at 10:30 a.m. librarians host “Little Readers Theatre” on Facebook Live.

Good Canine Citizen

From not being able to take your dogs on a walk to dealing with their frequent mood swings to rescuing dogs and puppies during lockdown, there are multiple issues to deal with for animal lovers. Paramita Das, a canine trainer and behaviourist — trained by renowned dog trainer and behaviourist Shirin Merchant and John Rogerson, a pioneer in dog training — chats with The Telegraph over phone about her journey from corporate life to pursuing her passion for dogs and also shares solutions for various problems faced by dog owners during the pandemic. Dogs who are used to long walks and outdoor activities will miss going out now. Especially for younger dogs, they will have excess energy, which needs to be directed appropriately with indoor exercises that can provide mental stimulation like scenting games — Find It (with treats and toys), Hide and Seek, Retrieving and Fetch games. Also, training your dog to new commands and tricks, practising commands that your dog already knows but is doing it differently will also provide mental exercise to them. Have fun with your dog indoors and he/she will miss their walks less.

Training Service Dogs

On the heels of graduating from college, a brother’s injury led a Villager to teach her German shepherd to help him.

To neighbors looking out their windows, it appears that Cheryl Williams is using her wheelchair to take her dog for a walk.

But the story is much different.

Williams is a puppy raiser through New Horizons Service Dogs in Orange City, and she’s been working with Rollins, a golden retriever, since February, getting him prepared for his work as a service dog with a wheelchair-bound recipient.

Sometimes her therapy Maltese, Elmo, jumps up in her lap during the training. She walks Rollins in the wheelchair, which is a heavy old-fashioned model someone donated to her.

“He’ll get on my lap, and then I’ll go on the wheelchair with the other dog,” the Village of Dunedin resident said. “I’m gonna have some guns on my arms.”

There’s a lot to look at outside for a curious dog, but it’s not a casual stroll.

“You can’t let him pull you,” she said. “(There’ll be) a bunny, a squirrel, and people out and golf carts going by, and the dog has to not be distracted.”

Therapy Dog Services Suspended

Organizations including Orange County Animal Allies (OCAA), Animal Health Foundation (AHF) and Pet Partners closed therapy dog services amid the spread of COVID-19. Therapy dogs possess trained abilities to provide emotional care to an individual in difficult circumstances, however national organizations temporarily shut down those amenities for safety reasons.

Alleviations therapy dogs amend cover stress, anxiety and depression in different institutions like schools, hospitals and living facilities. Regulars who struggle with a mental illness or had routines seeing a certain therapy dog cannot visit these establishments due to the suspensions.

Since visits have been restricted, in place of in-person meetings, online visitations came to fruition. This adjustment would allow connections between therapy dogs and clients.

“As I’m sure you can imagine this has been a difficult time for the therapy dogs and their handlers,” said executive director of OCAA, Kevin Marlin. “In a time when they are needed most, we are shut out from doing much to provide comfort.”

“What we have been able to do is provide messaging on social media of our dogs and we have had teams come in via Zoom to see the clients and students they are used to visiting with. We have also allowed for our teams to  attend a socially distant visit where they kept themselves spaced apart, and stayed in a courtyard area where residents came to their balconies and windows to see the teams,” says Marlin.

He added that in order to comply with county, state and federal orders, all programs will continue to remain closed. This involved canceling nearly 100 visits in the past two months at dozens of facilities, schools and businesses. He said it is vital for the fragile health of clients that no visits take place until public health officials permit outside meetings.

“There is too much risk involved with having our volunteers enter a home, so we do not accommodate those requests and only visit with larger and known institutions and facilities,” said Marlin.

At this time, OCAA volunteers who come to hospitals and enter a home of a client would imperil their own health and also their surroundings.

“Although therapy animals cannot spread the virus, our volunteer should not be in the hospitals considering their current crisis situation and the handler’s putting their own health at risk as a volunteer,” said executive director of AHF, Pam Becker. “All therapy animals visits and visitor visits have been suspended until further notice. We anticipate it will be for at least six months and maybe a year.”

Marlin predicted the suspension will last until summer, though Becker supposed longer. OCCA and AHF do not want their volunteers and workers in an unsafe atmosphere. Before the pandemic, therapy dogs engaged in many facilities to assist children and regulars.

“Edgar current monthly visits include one assisted living facility, a special education class in an elementary school, a continuation high school, a Catholic high school and two other locations in Orange County,” said Saddleback College student and owner of therapy dog Edgar, Toni Selman. “He also subs in the Canine Literacy program as our schedule permits in elementary classrooms to help children become more self confident.”

According to Selman, therapy dogs are offered in certain schools to serve as a comfort tool. He mentioned that Edgar helped many children and adolescents calm down their stress levels in a tense environment or situation. Currently, its not possible for Edgar to visit these institution or the Saddleback College campus.

Since the lockdown became loosely enforced, therapy dogs do not have viable access to meet their clients and regulars in person. OCAA are using social media to maintain emotional bonds between the animals and their clients.

Many other organizations and institutions are dealing with the same accommodations like schools, nursing homes and hospitals. Online video services provides face to face social connections to maintain these relationships and routines.

Therapy Dogs Reach VCU Health Virtually

As the director of VCU Health’s Center for Human-Animal Interaction, Nancy Gee believes she has the best job in the world. Within the center is Dogs on Call, a therapy dog program for patients at VCU Health Medical Center, students and staff.

“It is challenging to articulate the feeling, and heartwarming is absolutely the sense of it,” Gee said. “It is — it’s heartwarming in some cases, it elevates mood. In other cases, it alleviates pain. In other cases, it alleviates anxiety. It has a calming effect.”

In addition to administering the program, Gee and other members of the center conduct research, publish studies and hold lectures on the interactions between humans and animals.

The program also offers events such as Paws For Stress, where the therapy dog teams visit the academic campus during midterms and finals season to interact with students.

“My own research has been with preschool kids and university students,” Gee said, “looking at how animals impact learning and how they can sort of participate in positive ways in various educational environments.”

Gee has served as the director of the center since August 2019. The center was founded in 2001 by Sandra Barker in the VCU School of Medicine’s patient psychiatry department.

“So the program itself has some really great research to substantiate why these dogs should be going into patient rooms and interacting … with patients and family who want to interact with them, and also into classrooms,” Gee said.

The program operates with 91 therapy dog teams, which each consist of one handler and one dog. Each team is allowed 10 visits per year due to the large number of volunteers and limited amount of events. Visits are limited to two hours out of safety for the dogs.

After the COVID-19 crisis escalated, the program’s patient visitations, end of the semester de-stressing programs and other appearances were canceled, putting the program on hold.

“It’s really hard for our dogs not to take them and do something, because everybody wants to do something,” said volunteer Denice Ekey. “It’s very heartwarming to see the outpouring of support for what we do. You know, we can’t visit right now, so we just keep telling them we’re looking forward to getting back.” Ekey volunteers with the center and participates in the Dogs on Call program with her dog Darcy, a beagle and Jack Russell terrier mix.

“We’ve been in rooms where there’s obvious sadness,” Ekey said. “We don’t know whether they’ve gotten a bad diagnosis or something, and she — they [dogs] don’t know that it’s a sad place. She [Darcy] just starts to do her little tricks and being who she is, and they just start laughing.”

When a patient requests a visit from the program, the hospital’s volunteer services department will record the patient name and unit number on a log for a team to come visit. Gee said the program is a way for people to reap the benefits of animal interaction without any charge to patients.

“It just warms up the room,” Ekey said. “It just gets them out of their sadness for a minute, you know. And you just feel glad to be a part of it — it’s just amazing. And sometimes they don’t want you to leave.”

“We get so much out of it that when people thank you, you want to go ‘No, thank you.’”

Ekey said she’s impressed by the program’s ability to go into almost every area of the hospital.

When talking to medical students on visits, she likes to have them guess which two areas of the hospital are off-limits for the dogs in addition to at-risk patient rooms — the operating room and the cafeteria.

Earlier this year, Dogs on Call visited the Virginia General Assembly in February from an invitation from state Sen. Ryan McDougle. The State Capitol Building is across the street from the VCU Medical Center.

“So the senators, their aides, their staff — basically anyone who was there — could come and visit with the therapy dogs,” Gee said. “And I’ll tell you it was standing room only. We had so many people in there wanting to visit with the therapy dogs.”

As a result of Virginia’s stay-at-home order, the program hasn’t been able to conduct their studies on human and animal interaction. Gee said that not being around patients gives the center time to focus more on research and education.

The director said she feels busier than ever before with having to shift to online communication and finding ways to support medical professionals and the VCU community from afar. The center has been conducting meetings online to discuss ways to increase community outreach on social media.

Program coordinator Jessica Hale manages the center’s social media presence and media programming. She said because the program’s schedule is now more open, she can post content more frequently.

“This is a small way we can let everyone know that we’re still thinking about them and just that, you know, we’re invested in their wellbeing even when we’re not physically there,” Hale said.

Hale said this also allows them to pay tribute to the healthcare workers at the medical center and their efforts to treat the virus.

“We want them to know that we’re thinking of them,” Hale said, “and that we love them and can’t wait to get back to help them, support them.”

Therapy Dogs Part Of Nurses Day

Workers heading to and from the evening shift change at Tallahassee Memorial Hospital received a unique honor on Wednesday, May 6. Dozens of the hospital’s therapy dogs and their handlers were lined up along Surgeon’s Drive in salute.

It was a very special Nurses Day observance. Not only nurses, but all hospital employees arriving to start their shift or those leaving for the day got a heroes’ welcome from about 40 Animal Therapy Program staff and their canine companions. Among them was Cindy Burgess and her four legged pal “Dolly.” Burgess believed it would give hospital staffers a welcome respite.

“I think it’s very important! I’ve always thought the dogs were a calming effect on anybody. Just looking at them it makes you smile because – well, Dolly’s so cute – and you know I’ve been through my troubles too and they always helped. Petting the dog, looking at them. I think it’s extremely important,” she explained.

Since the arrival of the coronavirus pandemic, therapy animal visits in the hospital and other health care facilities have been suspended.

SDSU’s New Therapy Pup