The Meet & Greet in Service Dog

Today I went to a service dog meetup at the mall. It was my first ever service dog meetup. Mind you, I’ve met up with other service dog teams before, but never like this. It’s always either been on single person on a plan to go out, or a few people with service dogs happening to be at an event where there’s accessible seating, and we happen to have all been sitting together. There were three of us in total. Never before had I been to a service dog meetup.

Now, if you’ve read along before, you know Nika’s had a few incidents that make her nervous around other dogs, the big one being an attack the summer before last by an off-leash dog when she was working. There’s also a couple neighborhood dogs that have been problems, one in particular who gets out all the time or attempts to go after her through the fence. Because of that she’s been a little skittish with other dogs. I was worried we’d go and she’d bark or growl or something, though that’s usually not her thing. She’s usually just trying to keep an eye out for the other dog and might go out of her way to try to sniff. It’s when the other dog turns around and gets in her face that she gets a little unpredictable. I was super worried that I’d be judged because of her behavior, but I decided to go and hope for the best.

It also didn’t help that Nika’s claws were crazy long. She badly needs a trim, and I’ve been getting on Oz to do it, but I found out today that he lost the clippers, so I had to go buy new ones. She also chewed a raw spot in her tail, and has a chewed spot on her butt, so that was extra embarrassing, but no one seemed to mind. I was suggested to give her honey and possibly some benedryl to help with the itchies, so I think we’re going to try that.

When I got there all seemed to go okay. I must admit, I was a little off-put by one of the girls, but I’ve got to expect stuff like that. Some service dog handlers are a little harder to take than others, especially with my own extreme sensitivity and extreme anxiety. She’s an intense person and is very clear about how she expects people to treat her and her dog, and people that are that direct, to the point of being straight up harsh, tend to make me super uncomfortable. However, everyone else was really nice. I had a surprisingly good time. I’d only intended to stay for an hour or two, because I started the day with no spoons and lots of pain, but I ended up staying for four hours, and only left then because J was picking me up!

It was also nice to be around people who were a little more productive for once. It was a little uncomfortable when everyone came to a stop whenever another dog appeared in the mall. If it were just me I would just avoid any potential conflict and continue on my way. However the group did stop to deal with the issue of pets that clearly didn’t belong in the mall. In one case it was a family where the little girl, couldn’t be more than four, was holding the leash to this little dog, which she lost on more than one occasion, and it even had to be grabbed by a stranger at one point to prevent the little dog from running at all of our dogs. I will be honest, there were a couple service dog handlers that kind of instigated with the little dog, but the end result was still the same, that little girl had no control over the dog and had no business being responsible for it. The parents did nothing bout the dog, even when it was causing problems with legitimate service dogs, so security was called. Apparently she’s caused problems before and she was asked to leave, and when she didn’t, she was escorted out by security, being told she was welcome back any time, so long as she didn’t bring the dog.

After our adventure at the mall, Nika and I went to PetSmart because I had to replace those nail clippers. I wanted to get her training treats and a new training treat pouch, too. I spent way more than I wanted to, but it’s whatever. Unfortunately, while I was there several people with their dogs had no respect for a dog with a vest. One dog wasn’t terribly bad, but did try to snag a sniff after Nika and I passed without their owner reacting. Nika spazzed a little bit (and by that I mean she whipped around and when the other dog barked, she responded with a really quiet woof). Then there was the puppy that insisted on getting all up in her business. The owner was completely oblivious and wasn’t even looking in the direction of their dog, which was being dragged behind them on the leash, since it was trying desperately to get at Nika. I was so annoyed. This is why I don’t take Nika to more pet-friendly places! Once she’d gotten comfortable with the other service dogs and started to relax, she was fine. She didn’t even really react in the whole incident with the little dog or anything. However, she was all on edge again when we were around these ill-behaved pets. It was so frustrating.

Before this I’d decided that this meeting would determine if Nika had to be retired as a service dog after the attack or if she could continue to work. Is there still hope. The good news is I think there’s still hope. She’s highly distracted with other dogs, but she’s getting there. I think if she keeps meeting up with the other dogs she’ll eventually learn how to handle herself and she’ll be okay. This is good news because we’re still a ways before we really need to consider what comes of her during retirement. And she was very aware and alert to what was going on with me, which is amazing. I’m actually pretty confident we can bounce back from this and get her right back on track, so that’s good.

But in general, this is pretty scattered. I’m completely out of spoons after today, and I’m ready to be over it. We worked hard today, and even Nika is pretty wiped out. There’s another meetup on Wednesday and I’m going to see if I’m up to making it. I really hope I can, but I’m super exhausted, so we’ll have to see.