By uniting Military Veterans and rehabilitated Shelter Dogs, we are rescuing one to rescue another.

Our next training class was starting beginning of September. We recently joined with Oakland County Pet Adoption, who volunteered to donate dogs to our organization! Appreciative of the offer and  anxious to save money for our  next class, we loaded up the car and drove the hour drive to the Shelter….

The days when we look for dogs are full of emotion, excitement for the possible contenders and sadness for the ones we couldn’t help. I remember walking down one very noisy isle. There were at least 10 cages lining the wall- stacked on top of each other. The Shelter was full and loud. Once one dogs starts to bark, they all join in.  Donna and I walked past the cages, each had a black Lab looking dog inside, cage by cage, was the same dog; black, big and barking.

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A new class of dogs in training is always an exciting time for Stiggy’s.  New smells, new tails, new wonders all greet us and new challenges meet us.  One of those challenges is sustaining the funding necessary to train a Stiggy’s Dog.  Remember, Stiggy’s Dogs is committed to providing psychiatric service dogs free of charge to veterans.  That means 100% of the cost needs to be funded elsewhere.  And, unfortunately, it doesn’t look like any of the dogs in Stiggy’s Class of Fall 2011 came with pockets full of money.

People often ask how much it costs to train a Stiggy’s Dog.  There’s no one simple answer because each dog and each veteran has different needs.  However, on average, a Stiggy’s Dog costs at least $6,500 to train and deploy.  Stiggy’s saves money by employing a trainer in house, rather than paying for individual training for each dog.  If we didn’t, costs would skyrocket to at least $11,000 per dog. (more…)

Some conversations stick with you, as in this particular one. There is that point in a conversation, when you have nothing left to say, and you dare say the words ….”Trust me”…

One of the things we stress when working with our Veterans is communication. Honesty and trust are key components throughout this process. The day before Jason was to travel here, we were having that conversation.  Upon being vague many times throughout it (not being able to answer questions about his dog, what if they don’t bond, how long will it take)…..I ended it with saying  “Jason, when you leave here, you will be  100% satisfied with your dog……Trust me...”

Long story short, he was! Jason, happy and grateful for his service dog Brutus thanked me as he left. “You told me to trust you, and that was huge for me, but I did “ he said “And when i get back home,  I want to do something for you and Stiggy’s Dogs to help raise money and help other Veterans like myself.” Then he added “Trust me”…

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Looking for dogs for our next training class is one of the best parts of what I do. This time I am excited announce that we will be working with  Oakland Pet Adoption Center!!! They have agreed to donate dogs for FREE to our program! They believe in our mission and are excited to help and so are we….

Donna Fournier (Dog Trainer), Jamie Gorm (Dog Trainer apprentice), his wife Lillie and myself headed out to see what we could find Friday. In the car on the way, I knew I had to have ‘the talk’ with Jamie and Lillie. Going to a Humane Society or Animal Control is very hard…seeing the dogs living in that environment. With Jamie in training and observing body language, he would surely see many signs of stress and anxiety. I needed to prepare them that we couldn’t save them all. And with that being said, I went directly into the details of what we were looking for in this next group….

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Hi, my mane is Fiona. It wasn’t always that name, my life wasn’t like this. I don’t remember much of my past, as I like to live in the moment! I do remember living somewhere far away from here; I drove a long time in the back of a truck, in a cage with other dogs like myself.  I remember waking up in a strange place…..I was sore, tired and confused. I heard someone say that I was spayed…..whatever that meant. I have had babies in the past and I wasn’t much interested in that again. I was put in a room alone. Someone even brought me dinner! I didn’t have to try to catch it; it was placed right in front of me. My mouth was sore…..but I could still eat the niblets better. I was now missing a tooth, and it was hard to keep my tongue in my mouth. I tried to smile pretty when strange people would come look in at me, they did that all day long. These people would take other dogs out of there room, and then the dogs would never come back- just being replaced with other dogs. I got the impression that I was ‘ugly’, I heard someone say that one day, I could tell it wasn’t good cause of the look on their faces when they looked at me. Sympathy and sadness was what I saw all day long, for almost 2 months…until one day when a nice lady took me into a room….

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