[blindlaw] {Spam?} Re: Guidedog verses white cane

[Shelley Richards]

Hello,
I have used a guide dog for 13 years now.  Whether I chose to use my
dog or cane never seemed to matter professionally either in law school
or while working as a lawyer.  The only difference is that I find I
meet more people with my dog at events because people are curious and
want to come over and ask questions.  For me this is wonderful, since
I am shy about approaching people myself.  Neither my dog nor my cane
has ever caused any inappropriate disruptions in any professional
setting though.
I also have a child, and a second one on the way.  My dog never had
any trouble with the baby, and hopefully she will still be with me in
6 months when number 2 comes.  She got a little jellous at first
because I spent so much time with the baby, but I found that she got
over it quickly once I let her hang out with me and the baby.  I also
know several other handlers who have children, and I have never heard
of any of them having had problems with their dog and the babies or
older children.  Also, if the school knows you have small children
they will usually keep that in mind when choosing your match.  Of
course there are dogs out there who do not like children, but I have
not yet met a guide dog who is bad with children.  Just a guess, but I
have always figured that they need to be at least very tolerant of all
types of people including children in order to properly do their jobs
in public, so guide dogs are probably less likely than other dogs to
have a problem with children.
Good luck working it all out
Shelley


On 7/22/16, David via BlindLaw <blindlaw at nfbnet.org> wrote:
> Dear Paul,  I am partially sighted with about 5 degrees of central vision.
>
> 1.  I can't help with the crawling baby issue from a personal experience
> standpoint, but I've seen dogs around babies without issues.  Your
> question is a good one for your guide dog school.
>
> 2.  I used a white cane during the last 9 years of my career as general
> counsel of an insurance company.  I met with senior executives and
> general counsel of some of the largest corporations in the U.S.  My
> white cane was an issue for about the first 10 seconds of first meeting
> someone.  It is also a non-issue in court.  I traveled as much as 80,000
> miles a year.  I did lose two canes to limo drivers in Manhattan.  The
> only other negative experience I had was one time when meeting a
> corporate general counsel, he shook my hand with his left hand. I
> stupidly asked him if he had hurt his right hand.  He raised a leather
> covered fist prosthesis and said, "Here."  The meeting was toast.
>
> In my opinion, your acceptance of the white cane by others depends
> entirely upon your attitude, how you feel about it, and how you carry
> yourself.  I find it is the same with a guide dog, but except for bar
> association and board meetings I have not used a guide dog in
> professional settings.
>
> David and Claire Rose in Clearwater, FL
>
> On 7/21/2016 11:13 PM, Paul Harpur via BlindLaw wrote:
>> I have a professional and personal question I wanted to ask for people’s
>> views.
>> I am totally blind and went from using a white cane to my first
>> guidedog back in law school in 2000.  Since then I have always used a
>> guidedog.  I tried for a while to use a white cane when my first baby
>> came home and now that he is 1 I put my name down for a dog again.  I
>> am not sure how:
>> 1.	A guidedog will go with a crawling baby; and
>> 2.	How I will be received using a white cane in the profession.
>> Has anyone had experiences good or bad they could share with me?
>
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-- 
Thank You
Shelley Palmadessa
shelleyrichards9 at gmail.com