From our trainer Andrew, who is working with Wounded Warrior Amber, who suffers from PTSD, Major Depression, General Anxiety Disorder, cervical strain, lumbar Degenerative Disc Disease, Right Knee meniscus tear, and hearing loss, and her SDIT, “Brinn”.

“On September 22nd, 2014, I had my first session with Amber and Brinn. We mainly talked about the expected capabilities of her Service Dog in Training, what she has already worked on with Brinn, and what help she needs from Brinn the most. Brinn already knows a plethora of commands, as Amber has been working with her daily for the month that she has had her. She knows basic obedience such as sit, down, come, wait, leave it, load, unload, and already how to “cover”. What Brinn needs is reinforcement, so we focused on that. Brinn does have a problem pulling on the leash when she has on a normal nylon collar, so I showed Amber a technique for loose leash walking. Amber has begun working with Brinn on it already.

Amber’s family is also fostering a dog named Wendy and, together they both are not good at focusing on the commands as they want to play instead of listen. Wendy is more versed than Brinn is and responds better than Brinn to the commands when she is alone with a handler. We discussed working with them and scheduling times to teach the more difficult commands.

All in all, we had a good session. I was only needed to instruct them on reinforcement of the commands that Amber has already been working hard to teach Brinn and we will continue to do so in future sessions.”