The Things You Don't Think About

When I became a dog trainer I wanted to help people with their problem dogs and also help people raise puppies that were exactly what the human wanted. I raised my puppy Nigel this way. I formed him to be my training partner. He has hundreds upon hundreds of hours of training and socialization. I started his bite inhibition training and socialization the day he came home at ten weeks of age. He is as close to perfect as I wanted him to be. He is good puppy trainer and a great helper at in-home private training sessions as well as in obedience classes. I'm proud of him as a mom and as a trainer. Since him, I've adopted an adult pit bull and married a man with four dogs that have pretty good training considering my husband a "civilian".

Training priorities changed when I became disabled. I never in a million years expected to be diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis. It really changes everything when it comes to how I want my dogs to behave. MS causes different issues for different people. For me, my main issue is balance. My legs are weak and spastic and I stumble easily. This poses quite a problem when two of our dogs are Saint Bernards that are clumsy and weigh nearly as much as I do. They love to bump into people, lean into people and their brakes don't work very well when they are gallivanting around the yard chasing each other and don't see you standing there watering your plants. They also take up a lot of space when they sprawl out on the floor (and they always have to be touching each other-yes they are litter mates-so they ALWAYS lay near one another). If I'm touching a wall or a piece of furniture for balance, I have no problem stepping over them. We also have five other dogs of various sizes that mill around the house, under our feet. They all now know "out" when we need them to move out of the kitchen and they all (mostly) know "move" when they are laying down or standing and we need them to move out of the way. One thing that both of us humans have been working on is making sure that the dogs lay still unless we ask them to move. We don't want them to get spooked when we try to step over them. If a 130lb dog stands up suddenly it could knock anyone over let alone someone with balance issues. Certain things that I had no reason to think about in the past are now priorities in my home.
As a trainer I had considered training service dogs but now I'm even more interested in helping people train their own dogs to be exactly what they need them to be. When my legs feel weak I can count on my pit bull to stand strong in front of me so I can push off of him to help me stand. So far the that is the extent of useful things that I have taught my own dogs to help me with. The other six are here for comic relief, head-dip push-hugs, snuggly cuddles and to make sure that I never get so down that I forget supper time.