Well, whaddya know? Nice to see I was wrong and at least one place out of all the media outlets who covered this story – including The Today Show, no less – who’s not asleep at the switch and went right to the heart of the matter.

Peggy Fox at WUSA in DC nailed it – watch the short video and read the story:

“Seizure Dog In Heat On Its First Day In Class”

A coupla minor quibbles as always for me, but not many, and, frankly, if every service dog story I saw was this accurate, I’d be happy – the vast majority aren’t. It answers most of the questions I asked in my last post (“A Service Dog IN HEAT? You Gotta Be Kidding Me“), and in so doing raises new ones.

As I said in that post, I very intentionally stayed away from this story, and only finally said something when I heard the dog was in heat because of the big red flag that raised. I also didn’t realize this was an active duty Army family, which puts a whole ‘nother angle on it for me with my focus on service dogs for veterans.

Now that I AM looking at it more closely, it’s simple: the more I see, the worse this gets.

Remember, my concern, as always, is providing those who need them with only the best service dogs, and ensuring that when they deal with organizations, they only deal with the best, most responsible places who will not only give them a highly trained dog, but will provide them the lifelong support they need. That’s one of the biggest, and also most overlooked, reasons for going to an organization as opposed to an individual trainer or trying to do it yourself.

That’s my focus in this case as well. All the discussion about the legal issues, or whether it’s appropriate for a young child to have the responsibility for a service dog without an adult facilitator (many organizations won’t place a dog with someone this young), or how well the dog is trained to perform her assigned tasks… those are all legitimate discussions, but not stuff I’m gonna get into.

What I AM gonna get into and am very concerned about here is the organization where the family obtained this dog. Unfortunately, the common thought here seems to be that that’s just some secondary issue that’s overridden by those others, i.e., if everything works out, the dog does what it’s supposed to, the family’s happy, then everything’s OK. No way. Those things go hand-in-hand, and that issue is even more important given the high visibility this situation has gotten.

What I fear is that many families who are dealing with tough situations like this and are desperate for anything that will make things better will turn to places they shouldn’t, and we simply cannot let that happen.

I did some looking last night, and found some very interesting discussions about this placement in a German Shepherd forum, including posts from the father in this story. Never been to this particular forum before, but I have many years of experience in online forums that’s given me a very clear idea of places that are “the real deal”, and this one definitely has all the signs of being just that. Here’s the link to a current and very relevant thread: “Alaya Not Attending School This Week”

Too long to go into detail about everything there (and the tone and nature of the discussion really does shed a lotta light on this whole deal and tells you a lot), but let me address one very important thing: this dog was already five years old when she was placed in November, which adds even more on top of an already bad situation.

First, this is yet another “Service Dog 101″ issue – service life of the dog. You want the max amount of time for a team to be together, so you normally place a dog old enough to have been socialized, trained, and effectively work for someone, but still young enough to have the maximum service life. Most organizations who breed and raise dogs specifically to be service dogs (which doesn’t appear to be the case here) very intentionally place the dogs with raisers when they are 8 weeks old, they stay with those raisers until they are about 1 1/2 years old, the dogs then receive advanced training from professional trainers for 6 to 12 months, so they are usually around two years old when placed with their human partners. Five is not terrible, but sure not ideal, either, and would normally only be done by exception.

Second, that means, obviously, as was mentioned there, this is not the first time this dog has been in heat. Which makes that situation even more unbelievable. And when the dad says “…I am fairly certain the GSD forum understands why the breeder and trainer did not want her spayed until confirmation of a good pairing was acknowledged…” – well, yeah, unfortunately, I think I do: $$$. What possible other reason is there?

(You can also wade through this much longer thread that’s been going on for some time and appears to deal mostly with the legal issues with the school – I only took a brief look, but it gives more background and a definite feel for things I have seen nowhere else: “School Denies Student’s Service Dog (GSD)”)

OK, so let’s be clear about a couple things here, right up front.

First, this family NEVER should’ve been placed in this situation. Yeah, fine, apparently they sought this place out, signed a contract or had a private agreement stipulating to this arrangement, missed an appointment to have her spayed, still plan to do that, are sticking by and singing the praises of the trainer, and, sure, we’re all responsible for our own decisions, but no matter. C’mon – who’s the dog expert here? And who’s getting paid, and a lotta money, too?

Second, barring some major changes, there’s no way I would send anyone to Seizure Alert Dogs for Life.  For all I know, Jon Sabin is a tremendous trainer, really great guy, very well-meaning, super humanitarian – I have no idea. But I’ve seen enough here that service dogs are not something I would go to him for.

No doubt some people will think that it’s very responsible for them to offer to take the dog back, and, I assume, refund the Stevens’ money (and, according to the dad, they “…would provide us another dog in a heart beat…” ). It is not.

Look, this isn’t something like a TV or an iPad that you just return if it doesn’t work and get another one (or your money back if it’s an organization who charges). Yes, that does happen (rarely, fortunately), and if you’ve ever talked to someone from an organization who’s been involved in something like that, you know just how painful it is for everybody concerned. Which is why the best places go to the great lengths they do, including a through application process with extensive personal interviews, to do everything they can to ensure that doesn’t happen and they make a successful lifelong match. They’re also committed to placing another dog with the person if that happens, as well as a successor dog when it’s time.

And they STILL neuter or spay all the dogs BEFORE they are placed.

Some other points from the WUSA video:

• Great to hear Peggy mention the behavioral issues. As I said, it’s not just a case of putting a diaper on a dog.

• “…there is no guarantee when training a seizure alert or seizure response dog that a dog is going to work with any individual person…” There’s never a guarantee when placing ANY service dog, but, among other things, that doesn’t mean that you don’t spay or neuter them before you place them.

• Service Dogs of Virginia is listed as a full voting member of ADI, not ADI-accredited. That policy is changing, i.e., you have to be accredited to be a full voting member, so I’m guessing they are working toward that. That’s one of the quibbles I have here, but it has no bearing on the thrust of the story.

• Now the number is $18K, before it was $20K, the dad says he had to save $6K on their site. I’m still not sure exactly what the family paid here, but it was a lotta money, no question.

So where do we go from here?

At this point, the best we can hope for is that everything works out for the Stevens family, Alaya is spayed, and Seizure Alert Dogs for Life supports them in the manner they need to, and for life as their title suggests.

But let’s not forget what’s gone on with this placement, either. And let’s not compound the problems by sending anyone else to this organization or putting any other families in this situation.

I’m no expert on epilepsy or seizure alert dogs, but I know enough to know this. There are a number of very well-known ADI-accredited service dog organizations with excellent reputations who train seizure alert dogs (Canine Partners For Life in PA is right at the top of that list). I have no idea whether this family contacted them or not (and it would be very sad if they didn’t), but whether they did or didn’t, it doesn’t change the fact that anyone who has a potential need for one of these dogs needs to talk to them FIRST. Go here and do a fast search on “seizure”:

http://www.assistancedogsinternational.org/assistancedogproviders.php

Don’t let any of that stuff about how long the wait supposedly is stop you, either – where that “5 or 10 year” number I keep seeing comes from, I have no idea, but that’s simply not accurate. Yes, I personally know people who’ve waited several years for a service dog, and also others who’ve waited a few months – there are way too many variables, and the only way you’ll ever know is to contact them and apply if appropriate.

And if that’s the concern, fine, then let’s attack that directly and use our resources wisely. Support the good places and put your money there so they can provide more dogs, don’t squander it elsewhere.

Again, I’d never planned to write about this story in the first place, much less say as much as I have, but it was simply too important to let slide. These families already have enough to deal with without adding  the additional burden of being put into situations they simply should never have been put into by those of us who should know better.