[nagdu] An Introduction

[debby phillips]

Hi Valerie, your post was very interesting, and I can see that 
you have put a lot of time and thought in to the process.  I do 
not believe that every blind person should and could train their 
own dog, but I have seen one that was awesome.  The man who 
trained him did a great job.  I believe though that his next dog 
was from one of the schools.  I think I do have a couple of 
concerns.  One is this: traffic is becoming more and more 
dangerous.  It doesn't mean that we should all stay home and 
never go out.  Lol.  But it does mean that we, and our dogs need 
to be extra aware.  Gone are the days of simply listening for a 
surge of parallel traffic and heading across the street.  There 
are turning lanes, right on red, and cars are just plain quieter, 
and I'm not even talking about the hybrids.  Seeing Eye does a 
lot of traffic training with our dogs, some of it using the 
general public and some of it that they set up.  Keeping a 
certain distance from traffic is important.  So if you can find a 
trainer who is willing to work with you on that part, I recommend 
that.  I hope that ow am not sounding like I am against what you 
are doing, I'm not.  I admire you for your effort, and wish you 
success.

I may offend some folks when I say the following: I do not 
believe that a blind person can train me with a dog.  Dogs and 
people move faster than people who travel with canes, (though I 
know some very fast walkers who use canes.  There are certain 
parts of instruction that a blind person could do, like some of 
the dog care, things like that.  But instructors see how the dog 
and person are walking together, they can often figure out 
whether a different kind of harness is needed, for instance.  
Right away, my instructor saw that I was not giving Neena enough 
tension in the harness, and that sometimes I was pushing her.  I 
don't think that a blind instructor would see that.  In those 
early days of training it's so important to get feedback, and I 
really believe, that at least in this situation, that feedback 
needs to come from an instructor who can make visual 
observations.  Now, I have had two blind mobility instructors, 
and they were awesome, and I had no issue with them.  But I think 
there's a difference between cane travel and traveling with a 
dog.

It's okay if you disagree with me, I had a friend while I was a 
student at CCB and we debated this issue a lot.  He never did 
convince me, by the way.  (Grin).  But it wasn't for lack of 
trying.  But that doesn't mean that I haven't learned a lot from 
other people who use dogs as guides.  I definitely have, but not 
the basics, and not stuff dealing with dogs and traffic.

Well, I really need to be in bed now.  Tomorrow is Friday, yea! 
Maybe I'll get to more email then.  Again, good luck, Valerie!    
Debby and Neena