More Stuff You Might Not Know About Service Dogs

Last month I posted some facts you might not have knownabout service dogs.  Here are a few more.

• The full cost of a service dog is usually about $20,000.  Depending on what the dog must be trained to do, it can be twice that much.  Most people with disabilities do not get service dogs given to them for free.  Most programs that train and place service dogs cover a lot of the cost themselves (through donations and occasionally grants) but it’s common for a person with a disability to have to pay somewhere between $2000 and $5000 for their service dog.  Health insurance doesn’t cover the cost of a service, either, at least not in most cases.

• Churches are exempt from the Americans with Disabilities Act, which means they are not required to let a person with a disability bring a service dog to church services.  The same goes for other places of worship, like synagogues and mosques.  Some do welcome service dogs, but they are legally permitted to disallow them.  (They must allow service dogs at events that are open to the general public though.  For instance, if a church holds a community craft show or allows AA groups to meet in their building, service dogs must be permitted there.)  Do you know if your church allows people with disabilities to bring their service dog to services?
  
•  Hotels must allow people with disabilities to stay there with their service dogs, even if they do not normally allow pets.  They are not allowed to charge an additional fee for the service dog, even if they typically charge an extra “pet fee” for pets (because service dogs are not pets).  If a service dog does any damage to a hotel room, though, the owner must pay for that damage.
  
• While most businesses must allow a person with a disability to bring their service dog into that business, they are not required to provide any special supplies or services for the dog.  For instance, restaurants must allow me to bring Isaac in with me.  However, they do not have to provide him with a dish of water (and in fact, I should not be giving Isaac food or water in the restaurant at all.  I keep water, and if necessary, food, in the car and feed or water him before or after I go in to eat).

Service Dog-Related Expenses Count as Medical Expenses

At least, they do according to many government agencies, including the Social Security Administration, the Internal Revenue Service, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, and the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services (the current name for the state welfare agency in Ohio, which seems a bit of misnomer to me, since I have neither a family nor a job but still require services from that agency).  This means you can deduct service dog-related expenses from your taxes along with any other medical expenses (if you itemize when you do your taxes, and if your medical expenses total more than a certain percent of your income; talk to an accountant or your tax preparer, though, don't take tax advice from me!).  It means you get lower rent if you qualify for subsidized housing with the Department of Housing and Urban Development and you may get more in food stamps and your Medicaid spend down may be lower.  Those agencies adjust your income by deducting certain expenses, like medical expenses, when determining how much assistance you qualify for.  So does the Social Security Administration, if you receive SSI and return to work under the Ticket to Work plan.

When I moved a couple months ago, I moved from one county to another withing the same state.  I guess because efficiency is not something valued by my state government, I had to reapply for Medicaid in the new county.  This meant I ended up having no Medicaid coverage at all for almost two months and that a caseworker had to spent time handling my application and reviewing all my documentation, even though my income had not changed and I had only moved 30 miles from where I used to live.  There are your tax dollars at work.

Since I had to reapply, I decided to provide verification of all my service-dog related expenses because I had not done so where I previously lived (because it was a pain in the butt to do so and I am lazy) and I expected that by doing so, I would qualify for some food stamps and that my Medicaid spend down would go down.  A Medicaid spend down, if you're not familiar with the concept, is like a deductible that must be met each month before your Medicaid kicks in.  My spend down was$538.  Yes, that meant the state of Ohio felt it was reasonable for me to spend $538 out of my pocket each month on medical bills, and then the state would cover the rest.

So I provided all the paperwork I could gather up, including:

• copies of receipts for dog food, dog treats, and dog toys
• copies of receipts from veterinary care, including the monthly flea prevention stuff I buy from the vet and then apply myself
• copies of cancelled checks from payments I've made myself to the program I got Isaac from (money that's been donated to help pay for Isaac doesn't count, of course)
• copies of cancelled checks for Isaac's dog walker
• an itemized list breaking down the average expense for each service-dog related item per month
• a copy of the certificate from Isaac's program, stating he is a trained service dog

Based on my medical expenses, which do include some other expenses but are mostly related to Isaac at the moment, my spend down dropped from $538 a month to just $158.  That was worth the paperwork hassle, I'd say.

Thank You Westwood Alliance Church of Mansfield

Thank you to the deacons of Westwood Alliance Church of Mansfield, Ohio, for the generous donation!

Although I have Isaac with me now, I'm still fundraising.  I was lucky that the program that trained him was willing to go ahead and place him with me before receiving all their money, but I still owe them a little over $3,000.  If anyone would like to donate a few bucks, it would be much appreciated!

Shopping for Isaac

Yesterday I went shopping for Isaac.  I bought him three toys and four kinds of treats.  I spent $63!  But I figured it was worth the cost to buy good toys, toys that should last a long time, and toys that he won't be able to chew up and eat.  Emergency intestinal surgery to remove bits of cheap toys from his stomach would likely cost a lot more than a few high quality toys!

Here's what I got.

This is a Kong toy.  It's very durable, good for chewing, and it's hollow in the middle so you can put treats in it.  As the dog carries it around and chews on it, treats will occasionally fall out.

This is a Nylabone.  It's supposed to be bacon flavored but I didn't chew on it to see if it really is.  It's also hollow in the middle so you can stuff it with peanut butter or cheese or other yummy stuff.

This toy feels a lot like a tennis ball but it's shaped like a football, as you can see.  It's a bit bigger than a tennis ball, too, and it's just slightly squishy.  This is for Isaac and me to play fetch with.

And finally, here are Isaac's treats.  The can is some sort of peanut butter flavored stuff to spray in the hollow Nylabone.  Then there are Fruitables apple bacon flavored treats, which are good because they are small and only have three calories per treat, which is important because Isaac needs to be rewarded frequently because he's still in training but I don't want to feed him so many treats that he gets fat.  The Charlee Bear cheese and egg flavored treats are also only three calories per treat.  I couldn't find calorie information on the Nature's Recipe venison treats, but I assume they are higher in calories.  I'm going to cut them in half so the pieces will be smaller and just use them occasionally.  Actually, I think I'm going to mix some of each kind of treat in one container, kind of like a doggie trail mix, so he gets a variety and never knows what type he'll be getting when he follows a command.  Hopefully he likes them all!

Thank You Ashland Road Animal Clinic

Ashland Road Animal Clinic (in Mansfield, Ohio) has offered free veterinary care for my service dog.  They are offering to provide all their services at no cost, with just a minimal cost for things like vaccines and medications. 

I was planning to talk to the vet I take my cats to and ask if they would be willing to offer a discount for Isaac.  I know some vets offer a discount for service dogs.  I think one person told me her vet gives her a 30% discount for her service dog.  It never occurred to me that anyone would be willing to provide free care.  And as you may know already, I spend a fortunate on veterinary care already, for my cats.

This is fantastic.  It will make caring for Isaac easier and more affordable for me.

People Aren't Dying from Lack of Health Insurance?

Mitt Romney announced that people in the U.S. do not die from a lack of health insurance.  I guess the 45,000 people that die each year because they can't get medical care due to lack of insurance will be happy to know that.  I bet their families feel better now, too.

That number comes from a study conducted by Harvard, by the way.  But I guess Romney has conducted his own research and considered his statistics more accurate.

He explained that people without health insurance don't die from lack of medical care because they just go to the hospital and get treated anyway and if they don't have insurance, some charity, the government, or the hospital pays for their care.  I bet all the people filing bankruptcy due to medical bills they can't pay will be happy to hear that some charity, the government, or the hospital will pay their bills.  (According to the American Journal of Medicine, 62% of folks that file bankruptcy do so because of medical bills they can't pay.) 

For that matter, I have some medical bills I'm having trouble paying.  Does anyone know how to apply to get some charity or the government to pay them?  Romney neglected to mention how that works.

Feeling Very Discouraged

A local church had told me they would donate $1,000 toward the cost of my service dog.  I was elated to hear the news.  They requested documentation from my physician proving I am disabled and in need of a service dog, which seemed very reasonable to me.  So I got that and sent it to them.

Today I learned that they will only provide the $1,000 after I've raised the other $5,000.  Now, I know they are still offering to help and it's not like they owe me anything, they are doing me a huge favor by offering to help at all.  But I feel like I am almost back at square one because now I don't have $1,000 that I thought I had.  And it suddenly feels like it's going to be impossible to raise the money.

Also, I feel like the church told me one thing and then changed their mind.  When they requested the documentation from my physician, my understanding was that they would donate the money after they received the documentation.  They did not say that if they received the documentation, then they would donate the money after I'd raise the other $5,000.  So I feel like they are not doing what they said they would do.

And again, I realize they don't have to give me any money.  I realize they are doing me a favor and I'm supposed to be grateful.  I am grateful, really, although I realize I don't sound like it right now.

But now I don't know if I can really trust them to come through with the money at all.

Also, I understand how expensive it is to raise and train a service dog.  Most programs that train and place service dogs rely on donations for a large portion of the cost, but most also ask recipients to cover some of the cost because they simply don't receive enough donations to cover everything.  It costs at least $20,000 to raise and train a service dog, so if I only have to pay $6,000 of that, that's a bargain.  These dogs undergo an extensive and expensive medical evaluation.  They are socialized, then trained on a daily basis for about 18 months.  The trainer works with them every single day.  They are fed good food, they get all the routine veterinary care like vaccines and heart worm prevention, they have treadmills so they can exercise when the weather is too poor to exercise outdoors.  Seriously, these dogs have a good life!  But all this good stuff is expensive.

But $6,000 is almost six months income for me.  How many people could afford to pay six months worth of income for something, even if it was a good bargain and something they really needed?

And I have severe, disabling depression.  If I didn't, I wouldn't be on disability and I wouldn't need a service dog.  Well, severe, disabling depression makes it difficult to do all the things I need to do in order to try to raise this money.  Many days, it's all I can do to take a shower, feed myself, feed the cats, take my medication, and maybe do a few dishes or a load of laundry.  I'm sure all the fundraising stuff would not seem so daunting to someone that was not severely depressed.  For someone that is depressed, though, I think it's the equivalent of telling someone with a broken leg that if they can just walk ten miles uphill to the hospital, they can get a cast on their leg and some crutches.  Sure, the person with the broken leg needs medical care and crutches.  But are they really in any shape to hike to the hospital?  Would anyone really expect them to do that?

Some Good News

The other day I was looking at my bank account online and saw the Social Security Administration had made an unexpected deposit in my account.  The deposit was for the amount normally deducted from my SSDI payment for my Medicare premium.  I had no idea why I was receiving that deposit, so I had to call the Social Security Administration to ask about it.  Not that I don't appreciate some extra cash, but if they make a deposit in error, at some point they are going to want it back.  And if they were refunding my Medicare premium for some reason, I didn't want to discover that unbeknownst to me, my Medicare policy had been cancelled.

If you've never had to telephone the Social Security Administration, well, you're lucky.  They have one of those phone trees where they tell you to press one if you are calling about disability, press two if you are calling about Medicare, and so on.  You have to work your way through layers and layers of this.  They don't tell you what to press if you want to talk to a real live person.  But after ten minutes or so, I was informed that my call would be transferred to a customer service representative.

I then was on hold for 17 minutes waiting for someone to assist me.  And believe it or not, that's a short hold time when calling Social Security.

It was worth it, though, because when I finally got to talk to a real live person, I was informed that I now qualify for the state to pay my Medicare premium for me.  I'm not sure if that's because my income has dropped slightly since last year, due to getting less work from one editor, or because of changes to the Medicaid system thanks to Obama-care, or both.  But who cares?  This means I'll be receiving almost $100 more each month from SSDI.  Which happens to be exactly the amount I've been informed it will cost to care for a dog.

That sure works out nice.

Or Maybe Not Such Good News…

You know what they say about if something sounds too good to be true.

So I emailed the service dog program lady and asked if she could put me in touch with a couple of people she’s trained service dogs for.  Asking for references seems like a reasonable thing to do, right?

She emailed me back and said that there was one person she might be able to put me in touch with but she had to check with him first to make sure it was OK to give me his number, which is perfectly understandable.  I would be concerned if she just gave out people’s numbers without their permission.

But then she said that as far as all their other clients, she was sure I understood that most of them have psychological disorders like PTSD and it was hard for them to even let a trainer into their lives and she would not even think of asking them to speak to anyone about their experiences with the program.  Um, no, I don’t understand that.  I have PTSD and I would be willing to talk to someone about my experiences with a service dog program.  It’s not like I want personal information about people.  I want to know about their dogs.

Then she said that they are a small program and that is how they keep costs down.  I don’t understand that, either.  How does refusing to provide references keep costs down?  I provide references for my life coaching business and it does not cost me anything to do so.  It’s not like I pay my clients to provide references for me!

And anyway, this program charges almost three times as much as many other programs.  So it does not appear that costs are being kept down.

So now I’m very skeptical.  I will still speak to the one person she said might be willing to speak to me, if indeed he is willing.  And I will still see if I can find any additional information about this program.  But it looks like I may be going back to my original plan for training a service dog.

This Could Be Good News!

Yesterday morning I emailed my application to the Greater Dayton Labrador Retriever Rescue (along with my $25 non-refundable application fee, which is deducted from the $275 adoption fee if I end up adopting a dog from them), and in the afternoon I received a call from someone with the rescue.  Her name was Renee, and she was calling because she saw on my application that I was looking for a dog to train as a service dog and she wanted to make sure I was aware of the service dog training program that is associated with the rescue.

Of course, I was not aware of the service dog training program, since there is nothing about it on the rescue website.  I went back and looked at the site after talking to her on the phone, and no, there is nothing.  And I did not find any information about it when I was googling service dog programs in my state, either.

But there is a program, and it is called K-9’s in SpecialService (K.I.S.S.), and they do have a website, although it does not actually provide very much information.  And it turns out that they are looking for volunteer puppy raisers right now, if anyone is interested in raising a puppy that will become a service dog for someone in need.

Anyway, she told me some stuff about the program, and it sounded good.  There was a lot of static on the phone, and I think it was her phone, not mine, because I usually get pretty good reception and I even went outside in the 92 degree heat to see if I could hear better but it didn’t really help.  So it was kind of hard to talk to her.  She is supposed to send me an application for the service dog program and also links to some videos I can watch online of a couple of the dogs trained by the program.  I’m going to try to do some research and see if I can find out more about the program, including how satisfied or dissatisfied some of their prior clients are with their dogs.  I’m also going to ask her for a couple of references so I can talk to some other people that have dogs from that program.

One of the best things about the program is that their waiting list is very short.  I’m not sure why that is, though.  Does it mean no one wants dogs from them?  Or does it just mean their program is not very well known yet?  I don’t know.  But I could get a dog in as little as four to six months, if my application is approved.  That is just amazing.  Most programs have at least two year waiting lists.

Another good thing is that they are local.  They are maybe a 90 minute drive from where I live.  So I could easily go back and forth to do the training with my dog.  That was a big concern for me with programs in other states.  They want you to fly there, stay in a hotel there for two weeks or so, and train with the dog.  I’m thinking that, for someone with anxiety issues, flying across the country alone, then having to find their way around a strange city by themselves, well, maybe that would create a little anxiety?  I get anxious just thinking about it!

The cost is an issue.  It would cost almost $6000 to get a dog from this program.  Which is more money than I have in the bank right now.  And it’s more than many other programs seem to charge.  About $2000 seems to be the norm.  But then I started doing some math.  If I got a dog from a program that charged $2000, but had to fly to Seattle and stay there for two weeks, paying for a hotel and all my meals and cab fare or a rental car, I’m guessing that would cost me close to $4000 altogether.  Except I really can’t see how I could fly to Seattle and stay there for two weeks by myself.  If Mike had to go with me, then there would be his airfare and his meals, and he would have to take two weeks off work, and that would add up to $6000 at least, easy.

Adopting a dog and training it with a private trainer could end up costing more than $6000, too.  There would be the vet bills to have the dog checked for hip and elbow dysplasia (and if the dog ended up having that, I’d have to find a new dog and pay for the tests all over again), the cost of having the trainer evaluate the dog to see if it would be a good candidate for a service dog, the adoption fee, the cost of the obedience classes, and however many hours of private training ended up being necessary.  It could easily add up to more than $6000.

Of course, the biggest issue with training a dog on my own is the idea that I might discover, six months or more down the road, that the dog wasn’t going to be a good service dog after all.  Going with a program means that the dog has already been trained and demonstrated he is suited for the work before I ever meet him.  That is a huge, huge benefit.  Not just in terms of cost, but also in peace of mind.  How expensive, and how emotionally devastating, would it be to bond with a dog and spend six months or more training it only to determine that you’d spent all that money and all that time and were not going to end up with a service dog after all?

I’m really excited at the idea that I could get a service dog from a program in less than six months.  But I have so much to think about now.

So When Am I Gonna Get This Dog, Anyway?

Good question.  I hope soon.  I am trying not to rush into things, though.  Sometimes I get excited about an idea and I want to do it now, right now.  But some things work out better if you do some planning and preparation first.

I am hoping to start searching for a suitable dog in a couple months.  In the meantime, I am continuing to do some research and learn as much as I can about living with a service dog and just about dogs in general.  I’ve always been a cat person.  We had a dog when I was a kid but I didn’t really pay that much attention to it.  I know next to nothing about dogs.  Or I did, when I first started looking into the possibility of getting a service dog.  I know a lot more now, but still have a lot to learn.

I’m also starting to save some money to cover the costs of my service dog.  I have a storage unit filled with stuff, most of it from my old apartment when I used to live in another city.  When I moved in with Mike, he already had furniture and other household stuff, so a lot of my things went into the storage unit.  That stuff has been in there for eight years now.  I’m thinking, if I haven’t used it in eight years, I probably don’t really need it, right?  So my plan is to clean out the storage unit, sell some of the stuff on Craig’s List if I can, and use that money to cover the adoption fee for my dog.  Plus, if I empty out the storage unit, I won’t have to pay the monthly fee for it anymore and that amount is about half of the estimated monthly cost of feeding and caring for a dog.  So taking care of my storage unit and the stuff in it is an important part of my plan to be able to afford a service dog.

In addition to learning about dogs and saving money, I’ve been looking for a trainer.  I think I’ve found one but I have a couple other people to call.  I guess I should check out all my options so I can make sure I’m making the best choice.  I really like the woman I think I’m going to go with, though.  Her name is Becky.  She has a little experience training service dogs, not a lot, but a lot of experience training dogs in general.  She asked really good questions when I talked to her so she could get a good idea of what I would need from her and she was easy to talk to.  She’s willing to meet with me and my therapist to discuss the specific tasks I need a dog to perform.  She’s also willing to help me select a dog.

I’m hoping to start looking for a dog in a couple months.  I don’t know how long it will take to find one.  I want to get a dog from a rescue group, and plan to contact both a golden retriever rescue and a Labrador retriever rescue near me.  There’s no guarantee either will have a suitable dog at that time, though.  I might have to wait a while or check with other groups until I find the right match for me.  Picking out the right dog may be the most difficult part of training a service dog and I don’t want to pick out the wrong one just because I’m impatient.