Help Sam Get a Life-Saving Service Dog

A few years ago my wife, Sam, had her first seizure. After her second seizure, a few months ago, she was diagnosed with two forms of epilepsy. The seizures have increased steadily in frequency and intensity. It has affected her work life and her ability to be independent. Last week she had two seizures within a couple hours of each other. She is covered in bruises from falling down and bit huge chunks from both sides of her tongue. The second seizure was dangerously long so we spent all day at the ER making sure she wasn’t in immediate peril before returning home.

The bottom line is that as much as I’d like to, I can’t be there for Sam 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. It’s becoming apparent that she needs extra help.

We’ve decided to get a service dog. Epilepsy dogs can detect when seizures are coming and help you when they do. They not only warn you that a seizure is imminent but they can, for example, bring you a mouth guard so you don’t injure your tongue or bring you a pillow so you don’t damage your head while convulsing. They can help ease you to the floor if you collapse and can find additional help if you need it. An epilepsy dog could save Sam’s life in an emergency.

Our plan is to take the cheapest route possible to accomplish this goal. We’re going to adopt a young dog, enroll her in service dog school, and train her ourselves. A pre-trained dog can cost $15,000 to $50,000, which is insane. We’re both dog people and lots of folks train their own service dogs so we’re taking that route.

Update: Thank you so much for the donations!

We found a dog! Now we need to get her trained!

We adopted Rory a few weeks ago. She’s a Great Pyrenees with the perfect temperament for a service dog. We’ve been taking her to Petco beginner puppy classes and she’s a quick learner.

There’s a long ways to go with her training and we’re only at the least expensive phase. Your donations have gotten us to where we are but we’re still short of where we need to be. We have several classes at The American Kennel Club to pay for then she’s off to Two Tails K9 training for advanced behavior and public access training (https://twotailsk9.com/). We need to get her through Canine Good Citizen certification then she’ll be ready for the actual service dog and epilepsy assistance training at Atlas (atlasdog.org).

We’re on the way! Every little bit helps. Thanks!