Friday, December 17, 2004

Surgery for you - what to do with your SD?

It's been quite awhile and I apologize. I had surgery November 12th and well, i'll get into all of that soon.

Preparing for surgery didn't include making sure someone was here to pickup mail for me, or just simply packing. I had to decide what to do about the question that haunts all of us SD users.
To bring the SD or not to bring the SD? That is the question. Well after weeks upon weeks of concideration, debate, and emotin I decided that it was in SSD Winston's best interest to not come along with me to the hospital. At the point I had planned to have bilateral hip abduction and both large toes fused, apparently causing five days max of hospitalization. Okay so now, I had made my decision about where he would be...what next? Well, if he is not going to be with me, where is he going to be? so I sat down and concidered everyone. People constantly offer to dogsit him. By all means, he really is a pleasure to have around. But that does not mean in any way that they are suitable to care responsibly for my $17,000 service dog/love of my life. Here were my options. Err, here is my list.
My Moms Boyfriend Bill - Alcoholic and horrible with the challenges of animals
My Dad - Not positive reinforcment based / thinks dogs should just stay in the yard
Megan - Never owned a dog and works full time
Joni and Dave - Both work full time, but are AMAZING with their chocolate lab
My Sister Erika - Lives in an apartment that doesn't allow dogs and works full time
Marilyn - Works full time again
Julie and Brian - Home with the baby, they have two other dogs that Winston loves and arevery fimiliar people to Winston. Julie loves positive reinforcement and is 100% trust worthy. Bingo. So, Julie and Brian it is. Now, how do I prepare? First, I wrote a detailed list of commands and normal activities for winston. Then a list of things he is not allowed to do and finally a list of emergancy contacts including my vet, emergancy vet, number i could be reached at, and most importantly the organization that trained him. Other than that it's just choosing what to pack, like favorite toys, plenty of food, ect.


1 comment:

Rodney Robbins said...

Dear Winston Owner,

It is hard to get most people to understand that THEIR word or gesture for SIT might not be the word MY dog knows as SIT. So glad you have service dog to help you. One of my friends with Periodic Parallysis has a service dog that can tell when she's going into an attack. Mine just thinks I'm asleep!

Best wishes,
Rodney Robbins