A wonderful update from our trainer in Austin:

“Hi Laurie!

This was my first training session with Meghan, who suffers from PTSD, severe anxiety/depression, night terrors, and fibromyalgia, and her SDIT Precious. When we first met awhile ago, she wanted to make her dog, Maximus a Service Dog – but within the last couple of weeks, Precious showed up in her life and has done an amazing job of keeping her calm and safe when she is not feeling well. Precious already instinctively knows what his job is. He was made to be her Service Dog!

I met with her and Precious at her apartment. We started out the session outside working on heeling with distractions around. He was good at heeling, but needs more practice. I started out training Precious on “close”, and he caught on quickly! He is a smart one!

Precious gets super excited when he sees other dogs out in public, so I taught Meghan the “look at that” technique where you treat the dog before there is any reaction. So, you have to be on guard when you see another dog nearby. You click before there is a reaction and treat them for it – this prolongs the dog from reacting and keeps him looking back at you because you are treating him.

Then, we went upstairs to her apartment and worked on “leave it”. Precious has a habit of eating Maximus’s food once Maximus walks away and takes a break. So I recommended to Meghan to use this opportunity to practice “leave it”. He got it! As soon as he would walk over to Maximus’ bowl, I stood in front of it and told him to leave it. He sat right away and did not move, then I treated him for that.

This dog chose Meghan for a reason and I am super excited about working with them!”

SUCH WONDERFUL NEWS, MEGHAN AND PRECIOUS! GREAT TRAINING!