New experiences

Kiya and I have taken on a new role in her training. Her biggest issue is socialization. She started the training process when she turned 3. The skills are easy to teach (except fetching) and she's got most of the commands down for that. But she is not used to being in public, having to behave, not greeting people, and paying attention for hours.

We've started weekly visits at a local assisted living home. It has been wonderful. She does not wear her service dog coat as that would be confusing for her. With the coat on, she needs to ignore people. So we go without the coat and she gets affection from all the residents there. They just love her and she feels the same way.

At our first visit, she leaned into a gentleman sitting at a dining chair as he petted her. She seemed really attentive to him. It was really nice.

Issue

Well this is interesting. Kiya got startled in our downstairs while on the laminent flooring. She froze. Knowing I shouldn't react and further traumatize her, I got up and called her forward to the couch. She came to me but was very apprehensive.

I knew that if I didn't deal with this issue whenever I got the chance, I would end up with a dog who would not walk on shiny or slippery floors. She certainly couldn't be a demo dog if she wouldn't walk on certain flooring.

I started feeding her in the kitchen where I have tile floor. She very carefully walked across to get her food. After about a week, she was walking through the kitchen as if nothing ever happened. She also goes downstairs just fine. She's a little cautious on the flooring but she will walk on it.

The real test will come on Thursday when we are out at Target doing some shopping. Hopefully she can walk on the linoleum flooring.

New Opportunity

Kiya has a new opportunity to expand her skills. She is going to visit a local retirement home to visit with the residents once a week! This will be so good for her social skills.

Beginning

Kiya is just now beginning her training as a demo dog. She has lived with two previous service dogs in training and knows how to do the commands needed for demo'ing. She has not, however, been given the socialization necessary to be a "service dog". Normally this socialization starts at age 9 weeks. Kiya is starting at 3 years.

She is a little skittish in public. She's not used to the traffic sounds or the people when in a crowd. She is doing well getting aquainted with the public outings. She certainly LOVES the idea of being in public. I take out her coat and she goes NUTS! She is so excited to go out to work.

She really disproves the theory that service dogs don't enjoy working. YES THEY DO! They are trained to be focused and I think that looks "sad" to some people. When the dogs are working, they are focused on the work at hand. They are not jumping around acting excited. Which does not translate into not wanting to work.