A chance encounter inspires my first bill: Legislation making the service dog program more affordable for our troops.
After I met Luis, I did some research. Service dogs like Tuesday can be of immense benefit to vets suffering from physical and emotional wounds. Yes, they provide companionship. But they can also detect changes in a person's breathing, perspiration or scent to anticipate and ward off an impending panic attack with some well-timed nuzzling. They are trained to let their masters know when it's time to take their medication and to wake them from terrifying nightmares.
Service dogs raise their masters' sense of well-being. There is evidence to suggest that increasing their numbers would reduce the alarming suicide rate among veterans, decrease the number of hospitalizations, and lower the cost of medications and human care.
Veterans report that service dogs help break their isolation. People will often avert their eyes when they see a wounded veteran. But when the veteran has a dog, the same people will come up and say hi to pet the dog and then strike up a conversation.
When I was at the VA Domiciliary in Prescott AZ, there was an older gentleman who brought his old Rhodesian Ridgeback named Buddy to the chow hall once a week for all us Vets to interact with, and we looked forward to his visits "Hey, it's Tuesday. Let's go pet Buddy!". Buddy was a certified, trained, VA-approved service dog and just sat there quietly while a hundred different guys petted him. This gent volunteered his time, but it was an official VA program.
While I was there, Buddy died. His owner came by at the regular time to tell us. A whole bunch of pretty hard old dudes cried.
Service dogs for Vets are a good thing. Kudos to Senator Franken and I hope his bill passes.
Just for grins, go read about the NAVAHCS at Prescott. There's a video at the website as well. It's a recruiting video, and it loads a little funny (did for me anyway) and starts and stops, but it shows the facility and surrounding area pretty well. Made me homesick for the joint. Full screen it, icon lower right. If they'da let me have a dog there, I'd be there yet. Mrs. G woulda probly let me.
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