[nagdu] was Matching, now Owner Training

Tamara Smith-Kinney tamara.8024 at comcast.net
Tue Apr 27 17:28:04 UTC 2010 

Rebecca,

As an owner-trainer, especially in Mitzi's teen phase, I often romanticized
the value of having teams of experts on hand for problem solving.  /smile/
Since I was also training myself about being a guide dog user, I had to try
to look at things from every angle.  Every evening when I did my review of
the day and planning for tomorrow, sometimes my internal team of nonexperts
would end up having quite a contentious discussion!  /lol/

But you're right.  The guide dog schools do have long experience and
knowledgeable trainers and vet staff (I think) and so on.  That doesn't mean
they will get it right or won't just get it wrong every  now and then.  It
just means they have more tools to bring to the job of turning a puppy into
a guide dog with enough training to go out in the world with a blind handler
and put the training to use.  I've heard the phrase "fully trained" enough
times to choke on it -- especially when it's in reference to my
owner-trained unreal guide dog.  But people who know realize that a dog who
has graduated from the training phase and is thus moving into the working
phase of its career still has a whole lot to learn.  And a lot of growing up
to do!  A two-year-old large breed canine may be physically mature, or close
to it, but they are still definitely subadults at that age.  They have a
stunning degree of advanced training, but they still need to grow into the
responsibilities of their work.  Some just step into the workaday life of a
guide dog without a hitch, like they're been doing it all their lives, and
then they go home for rest and genteel play.  Others aren't so smooth right
off in their work, and they come home to be rowdy puppies around the house.
/smile/  If you, the guide dog user, are not in a position in life to have a
rowdy puppy around your house, that's a bummer!

I do like what you said about the difference between expectations and
reality.  That myth of the perfect, fully-trained guide dog and all the
wonderful things it is supposed to do for you is good for fundraising for
the schools, and it has seeped into society and media...  I did notice in
the time I was contacting guide dog schools back in the day that the
majority of the people I spoke with painted a super rosy picture and
answered my questions with hearty assurance that all would be great.  That
sort of thing wasn't on my radar yet, but I think that many people who think
that what blind people *really* need is self-confidence -- and that's the
*only* thing we really need; the rest is just to make us feel better about
ourselves, you know -- take it upon themselves to give us self-confidence by
assuring that the real world is A-Okay and wonderful and they're here to
help!  I'm not sure how persistently inflicting a distorted view of reality
on someone who is just trying to learn a thing or two is supposed to give
them self-confidence.  Especially when it starts to seem that everyone they
talk to in their quest for information to make choices appears to be
completely divorced from reality.  But that's just me.  /smile/

Anyway, your comment sort of answered a question I've often had about the
experience of bring a dog -- especially your first, home from guide dog
school.  After the application process and interviews and video tapings and
27-hours a day of training for a month, you come home with a real dog.  A
dog with really incredibly training and a mind-blowing skill set, but still
a dog.  And you're still you, and your life is still your life.  Except that
you got this here dog now...  /grin/

And everyone around believes the myth!  Honestly, I believe the freakin'
myth.  /smile/  Deep down inside, I still have the childhood romanticized
image of the perfect guide dog...  Then again, deep down inside, I have the
image of Hogwarts.  Only nobody (well, except a kid every now and then or an
inspired jokster) looks at my cane and assumes I've gone to school with
Harry, Ron and Hermione and expects me to be just like them only better.

In a way, I guess I shouldn't get so annoyed when people ask why I didn't
just get a real guide dog, because they're fully trained, you know.  With my
unreal, partially trained dog I've taught a few tricks to, at least I don't
have to live up to all that pressure!  /grin/

Actually, to be truthfully, it's only people in the "blind community"
including those with vast experience helping the blind who are really
obnoxious about the "that's not a real guide dog" business.  I'm gearing up
for another round of trying to get the adaptive tech I paid all those taxes
for for all those years -- and would like to pay more taxes again!  So I
expect to be in a meeting and listen patiently while the VR director carries
on about how much I suck and that they have determined I'm unemployable (I
was employed and had just received a promotion to management when they first
determined that, but they're not about to let facts dissuade them) because I
can't carry through with a task -- let alone a project to save my soul.
Also, I can't control my temper!  I will cave and point to the poodle
sleeping restfully beside my chair while I am being aggressively insulted
and start to point out that I have trained my own guide dog.  With the
intent of following up with the value of the resource there, among other
things.

Well!  That's not a real guide dog.  Just because I've taught her some
tricks...  Etc.  Oh, I can hardly wait!  /evil grin/

Anyway, I've kind of digressed on that subject.  I'll answer the "how do you
know" question separately.  Except to mention that I am *so* glad to be well
past the constantly wondering phase!  Ugh!  It's necessary to ask yourself
the question, but it is not fun trying to come up with the answer on a daily
basis.  Yikes!  And I find I'm already planning in advance how to do that to
myself again a few years from now.  /grin/

Tami Smith-Kinney

-----Original Message-----
From: nagdu-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:nagdu-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf
Of Pickrell, Rebecca M (TASC)
Sent: Tuesday, April 27, 2010 8:01 AM
To: NAGDU Mailing List,the National Association of Guide Dog Users
Subject: Re: [nagdu] was Matching, now Owner Training

Tami and other owner-trainers, 
How do you know when it is time to give up or keep going? I've always
wondered about that. 
As for the experts knowing all there is to know about the dogs, I'm not
sure how true that is. When I got my dogs, I do remember asking
questions about house manners and guiding situations and was honestly
told "I've never seen her in that situation, I don't know". 
I appreciated and still appreciate the honesty. Still, it is hard to not
know. Also, people assume that the dog "is fully trained" meaning that
the dog will never do "anything wrong" which is also hard to deal with. 

-----Original Message-----
From: nagdu-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:nagdu-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
Behalf Of Tamara Smith-Kinney
Sent: Saturday, April 24, 2010 11:35 AM
To: 'NAGDU Mailing List,the National Association of Guide Dog Users'
Subject: Re: [nagdu] was Matching, now Owner Training

I didn't take it that way.  No worries!

There is something to be said for letting the experts do all the
groundwork.
By the time they do match you with your dog, they know the dog inside
and
out.  Also, the dog has passed through the majority of the challenges
and
tests that might wash another dog out.  That, to me, was the hardest
part
when I really started the guide part of Mitzi's training.  How will I
know
when it's time to give it up instead of finding a better training
solution
for whatever thingy we were working on?  What was a temperament or
character
issue, and what was lack of maturity?  That sort of thing.  Teams of
experts
taking of all that seemed like a good idea.  /smile/  Not that I
wouldn't
owner-train again!

At the same time, having teams of experts do all the raising and
training
and then just matching me up with the dog they believe will best suit my
needs just sort of gives me the willies deep down inside.  If I do
decide to
go through a program next time, I will gladly work with them so that
they
can give me the best match possible using their experience and knowledge
and
tried and true methods!  But my inner 5-year-old wants to pick her puppy
her
ownself.  /grin/

Tami Smith-Kinney

-----Original Message-----
From: nagdu-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:nagdu-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
Behalf
Of Jewel S.
Sent: Friday, April 23, 2010 6:37 PM
To: NAGDU Mailing List,the National Association of Guide Dog Users
Subject: Re: [nagdu] was Matching, now Owner Training

I understand that owner-trainers don't pick a dog at random. From
reading about a few people on here who owner-trained, it is much more
complicated than getting a dog from a guide school. But what I was
trying to say was that if I wanted to do the work of choosing my own
dog, wouldn't I just owner-train? By going to a guide school, I am
allowing them to pick the appropriate dog for me, instead of doing all
the hard work myself. For some people, this is the best way to go. For
others, picking their own dog is important, for one reason or another,
like having very particular needs or having very few requirements
other than wanting a rescued pup. I wasn't trying to say that
owner-trained dogs are picked at random. I apologize if it sounded
like that. I was just trying to say that I don't want to have to deal
with all that hard work of finding the perfect dog myself; I don't
think I'd be very good at assessing a dog's potential. So, I turn to a
guide dog school, where they have trained people who do the
assessment, and take that responsibility off of me.

~Jewel

On 4/23/10, The Pawpower Pack <pawpower4me at gmail.com> wrote:
> Jewel,
> Owner trainers don't just pick dogs at random.  the process is a great
> deal more involved and time consuming.  An owner trainer may look at a
> hundred dogs from breeders, shelters, and rescue organizations without
> finding a suitable dog.  If the owner trainer is lucky, they will have
> someone who knows their needs and who knows dogs assist them in
> temperament testing the dog.  Before said testing begins, time is
> spent making lists of possible breed choices, learning as much as
> possible about health problems and temperament issues of said breed/s.
> We don't just randomly pick dogs because they come up to us and "pick
> us" or because we like them or think they're cute or because we have
> an instant bond.
>
> The guide dog programs spend a great deal of time on matching and
> owner trainers spend probably just as much time, if not more, on the
> same.  We need to do it differently, but in order to minimize the
> potential of washing a dog out, most of us will spend more time during
> the matching process.
> Finally, I have yet to meet a "self-trained dog."  By definition, a
> "Self-Trained Dog" would be one which had already trained itself.  I
> assure you that none of my owner trained dogs have been able to do
that.
> Goddess knows I'd love a self-trained dog.  On those rainy Sunday
> mornings it could take itself outside and work on traffic training or
> curb to curb turns while I lay in bed and drink coffee and eat
Beignets.
> People who train their own assistance dogs are typically called owner
> trainers and our dogs are owner trained-- being that they are being,
> or were trained, by the owner.
>
>
>
>
> Rox and the Kitchen Bitches
> Bristol (retired), Mill'E SD. and Laveau Guide Dog, CGC.
> "It's wildly irritating to have invented something as revolutionary as
> sarcasm, only to have it abused by amateurs." -- Christopher Moore
> pawpower4me at gmail.com
>
> Windows Live Only: Brisomania at hotmail.com
> AIM: Brissysgirl Yahoo: lillebriss
>
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