Beginning Training With a Service Dog

service dog photo
Photo by swong95765

First, I need to apologize for the long hiatus to those of you who have been reading for a while. I’ve unfortunately been in the middle of selling, buying and moving houses and it’s been an absolute nightmare. We’re finally settled into our new place now (hallelujah!) So much more space and a beautiful neighborhood.

Lots of changes have come to us. Bronco, my sweet German Shepherd, is retired now and living with my brother and his fiancee. He loves relaxing and snuggling with them all day long. I’m sad to have had to retire him, but I knew it would have to happen soon. Unfortunately, as he was a dog of “unknown origin” it can be hard to tell how health and temperament will hold up over the years.

We’ve acquired a new puppy who I hope to train to be a service dog for me. She’s a Rhodesian Ridgeback from a reputable breeder that I know personally. She’s absolutely adorable and naughty, but she loves me to pieces. Her name is Luna.

Those of you who have seen this post, I’m happy to report that the officer read through the applicable laws and called me personally and apologized and did say I was correct about what I had told him. He thanked me for educating him so that he could be better informed in the future. I appreciated the gesture and the lack of a citation. Cops aren’t all bad. 😉

So now that I’m all settled, I’m hoping that I can soon get started on an ebook and online courses for training your own psychiatric service dog. I’ve been wanting to do that for a while, because the resources out there are limited right now. I’ll keep you updated on my progress.

In the meantime, I had a comment full of questions on my blog post about How Do You Know if Your Dog Would Make a Good Service Dog? that I thought the answers would be good information for everyone starting to train their own service dogs.

Elizabeth asked:

– How did you know that your service dog was right for you? Did you just kinda know? Did you perform the tests above?
– What are your favorite resources for training your own service dog?
– How was it for you getting officially classified as disabled, especially with a psychiatric disability?
– Was it difficult to get used to having a service dog with all the time?
– How do you make sure your dog knows when they’re on duty and when they’re not?
– How do you train your dog to do your specific tasks? Should I work with a private trainer or do it myself?
– Do you have specific products you’d recommend for training? What about clicker training?

How Do You Know Your Service Dog is Right for You?

shelter dog photo
Photo by Steven-L-Johnson

For me, Bronco came to me. He clicked with me. This was before I knew about service dogs, or was even diagnosed with bipolar disorder. He was especially sensitive to my moods and he was snuggly and sweet and automatically attentive to my needs. When I learned about service dogs, he naturally became the prime candidate for that.

However, he was a stray before he came to live with me, so temperament wise,  I couldn’t necessarily trust him around other people wanting to pet him. As a dog trainer, I know better than to put dogs in any situation that could make them uncomfortable, so I only used Bronco in limited situations that I knew he was solid in and comfortable with.

As he got older and then especially when we moved (even given time to settle), he got less trustworthy and more anxious, and I had to make the difficult decision (for me – dogs tend to be fine with rebonding with a new family, especially people they know already) to have him live with my brother, where I knew he would be comfortable again because he wouldn’t have the responsibilities he was shouldering with me.

This is part of having and choosing service dogs. You have to be able to read dog body language and see how they are and how they act. If a dog you are training or have trained begins to fall apart because the stress of something is too much. You need to be ready to say, despite that dog being a “heart dog”, that you’re not going to keep forcing them to work or live where they’re uncomfortable – because that’s dangerous.

So the temperament test is a tool I wish I had had when originally choosing a dog so that I could have known how reliable he was in stressful situations before I had gotten involved with my heart. But it’s not the whole picture, because the dog also needs to be people oriented. The dog needs to be interested in you and want your affection.

With Luna, my new puppy, I did the temperament test and she passed, so I’m confident as long as I raise her correctly she’ll be just fine as a service dog. 🙂 I also visited her as she was raised and I know her breeder and have known both her parents since they were pups themselves, so I know her entire past, which helps with being more confident about her ability to perform in the future.

My Favorite Resources for Training My Own Service Dog

Well, to be honest, there’s not a whole lot out there. I don’t have a ton to direct you to. Especially psychiatric service dogs. That’s why I started this blog, because there’s hardly any info for people wanting to do psychiatric stuff.

First off, I’m all about the positive training.

I believe that especially when you’re working with a dog that’s going to be your partner in the world, you need to nurture that relationship with trust and love.

So you won’t see me directing you to anyone who uses choke chains or pinch collars or remote collars or the like. This will damage your relationship with your dog who will see you and the world as unpredictable and painful. I originally learned from a trainer who thought that pinch collars and dominance were the right way. My dog died because of it. I no longer believe a word of what he taught me.

Anyway, positive training resources!

I like Sue Ailsby‘s stuff for basic training and for explanation of training as “steps”.

Kikopup on YouTube has some good basic obedience stuff (teaching shaping to give you an idea of how to each your dog to do what you want, solving behavior problems), but sometimes the explanations aren’t that great and the older videos are hard to see, the newer videos look nice. The logic is sound though.

(From here down are some affiliate links, just so you know. 🙂 I appreciate the support.)

I love love Grisha Stewart for any fear or social skill type stuff your dog might need help with, even if minor. Her book can be found at Amazon, here. I like her a lot because she also helps you learn to read dog body language and stuff, which is super important as a service dog parent. She helps you stay out of situations that might turn your dog into a fearful or aggressive dog, which is such an important skill to have.

The books Teamwork I and Teamwork II are really good for learning some specific service dog training things, but are geared more toward physical disabilities. I did find the information to be fairly helpful though.

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Getting Officially Classified as Disabled When it’s Psychiatric

Ok, so this is sort of complex. You do need to be disabled to have a service dog. But you do not need to ever tell anyone what your disability is or carry a record of it with you or anything – unless someone were to take you to court over it, then it would be a good idea to have documentation, to back yourself up.

The ADA’s definition of disabled is:

An individual with a disability is defined by the ADA as a person who has a physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one or more major life activities, a person who has a history or record of such an impairment, or a person who is perceived by others as having such an impairment.

Kay, so because of your psychiatric impairment, whether or not it’s been documented, you have a hard time with major life activities. If your service dog can be trained to do a task that will help alleviate your impairments, then you may have a service dog.

You don’t need a doctor’s or anyone’s involvement (though I would advise you do, if you can.) This even applies to people who take medication/do therapy that keeps said impairment under control (see: “a person who has a history or record of such an impairment.”)

There is a big long webpage on the ADA.gov website somewhere that breaks this down into exquisite detail for you, but I can’t find it right now for some reason, so you’ll have to take my word for it.

Was It Difficult to Get Used to Having a Service Dog With You All the Time?

Yes. It’s a bit difficult, because sometimes employees at certain stores will ask the “Is this a service dog?” question (perfectly legal to ask). And even though it is, you feel nervous and worried that they’ll confront you and argue with you. After a while though, you realize that most of the time the employees will leave you alone if your dog has a vest, and after a while lose that scared feeling.

It’s kind of like that feeling you get when you walk out of store having not bought anything, trying to look like you didn’t steal anything because you didn’t, but you still feel guilty anyway.

It’s even more nerve-wracking when you’re a trainer taking a dog that’s not your service dog, but is a service-dog-in-training into a store and walking around with it, because you feel like a fraud of some sort. But you get used to it. Dogs need practice. 🙂

Before you start going out with your dog, it’s good to practice what you’ll say or do when people ask you questions. This blog post covers what to do when people talk to you about your service dog or want to pet him or her.

How Does Your Dog Know When They’re On Duty And When They’re Not?

service dog vest photo
Photo by IndysMom

Basically, over time you kind of “demand” strict obedience when the vest is on (or when a certain collar is on) and then give leeway when they’re wearing something different. It’s akin to how you act when you’re dressed in a tux or an evening dress vs wearing sweats. You act differently based on how you’ve been taught to act in context of what you’re wearing.

Dogs can do the same context thing. If you’ve ever watched a dog show and seen how very differently the dogs move, I can explain why. I’ll tell you as someone who participates in dog shows that as soon as I put the light, fancy collar and lead on my dogs, they know it’s show time and we are going to be trotting around the ring in a prance-y way and it’s time for best behavior and we’ll be doing certain things. They don’t pull on the lead, they are very well behaved.

This is because every time I have put on that collar and lead, the exact same thing happens, so they know what they need to do. Same thing happens as long as you’re consistent with the vest. We put the vest on after basic training is over and they’re well behaved enough to enter the public, so now, every time they get the vest put on they know… oh, we are going to a public area and I need to be behaved and do my tasks.

As far as doing tasks goes, they’re usually taught to either respond to something your body does or something that you say, so a cue you give that tells them what they need to do. All taught to them by training. This is also addressed in the next question. Dogs can get good enough at some tasks that they will do them automatically.

How To Train Your Dog to Do Specific Tasks

This is quite a question. Once you really understand how dog training works, you can train your dog yourself to do anything. Using backchaining, clicker training, marking and naming behaviors, the ideas from “101 things to do with a box” etc. you can task train your dog yourself. Otherwise, an experienced trainer can work it out for you.

Keeping a notebook is a good idea.

First, you need to know what you want your dog to do and when you want them to do it.

Then you need to know how you’re going to get your dog to do that thing when you tell them to.

Develop steps if needed. Often there are many ways to get to the end result, no one way is necessarily right or wrong.

Make it a fun game. Quit for the practice session when it’s not fun.

For example, here’s some backchaining:

Let’s say I have PTSD. I want my dog to “sweep” or check a room before I enter it and let me know if the room is “clear” of people before I enter or not.

First, I walk/run (whatever keeps interest better) around a simple room with my dog. I give him/her treats when we reach the door.

After a few practices, I begin to stand in the middle of the room and turn around while sending my dog around the room. I give treats at the end.

I then stand at the entrance to the room and send the dog around the room. Dog comes back to me for a treat, pet or toy. I give the exercise a name or a “cue”.

I stand outside the room and give the name for the exercise. The dog goes around the room, comes back for a reward.

I teach the dog to bark on cue.

I place a person in the room. Cue dog to give a single bark when it is sweeping the room. Reward dog when he comes back. Continue to practice.

I remove person from room. Do not tell dog to bark. Reward dog when he returns without barking.

Soon dog learns to bark when there is a person in the room, but be silent when there are no people.

Practice with person hiding, etc.

If part of this doesn’t work, I switch it up til I figure it out and it does work. Also, in there, we practice in different rooms, with different people, etc etc.

Specific Training Products

The only specific things I use for training are these smelly smelly treats and a clicker if I can juggle it at the same time.  Your voice can function as a clicker with the word “yes!” too, if you prefer not to carry a clicker around, but I do enjoy using a clicker quite a bit. It makes learning so much faster. Some dogs don’t like clickers though and some owners just can’t get the hang of them, so they’re not always my go to tool.

If the dog likes toys, I’ll also switch toys around with treats so we can keep it fun. I also recommend head halters (like a Gentle Leader) or front clip harnesses for bad pullers so you can still take them for walks while you’re teaching them to walk nice on a flat collar without reinforcing the pulling.

When I begin doing distance work, I also use this 50′ nylon lead (tie knots in it every five feet or so!) so I can keep control of the dog while he or she is at varying distances from me.

Don’t Get Overwhelmed

It’s a lot to look at, but just start with basic obedience and go from there. As you start down the road to learning how to obedience train, you’ll learn so much about dogs and dog training that you’ll soon become an expert on the subject yourself and you’ll be able to help others as well. 🙂 It’s worth it for your wellbeing.

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Photo by swong95765