Your Emotional Support Animal is NOT a Service Dog

We've come a long way since May when we started working with the trainer for Charlie's service dog, Sunny.  At that time Charlie had already been on a wait list for over a year to get a service dog through a different service dog group and knew he had at least another 2 years on that wait list.

Our experience has been worth it and I know it will keep getting better-we've only just begun.  But one common theme we've run into since having Sunny with us is the problem of people not understanding the difference between a true Service Dog and Emotional Support Animal or even a Therapy Animal.  And this misunderstanding is giving Service Dogs a bad reputation and down right dangerous and demeaning.  Just because you call your dog a Service Dog does not mean it actually is one.  And just because your dog went through some obedience training does not mean it can be a Service Dog.

Please take a minute and read our previous service dog post here.

We have run into several instances where people think it's ok to have their Emotional Support Animal in public with them or in areas where pets are not welcomed.  Emotional Support Animals do NOT have the same rights as a Service Dog.  The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) defines a service dog as "individually trained to do work or perform tasks for people with disabilities." If the sole purpose of the dog is to provide comfort or emotional support, they do not qualify as a service dog under ADA standards.  Emotional Support Animals generally provide a benefit by their presence alone and do not require heavy training like a Service Dog does.  The presence of untrained and poorly trained dogs in public poses a great risk and huge problems.  These untrained animals can become big distractions for working Service Dogs and makes it difficult for them to do their jobs for their owners, which in some cases can be dangerous.  For example, if there is an untrained dog in public with their owner and is barking at a Service Dog who alerts their owner of oncoming seizures and distracting the Service Dog, it makes it difficult for the Service Dog to focus on their owner and do their job to detect the seizures.  There is a really great post that talks all about this and the need to stop faking Service Dogs that you can read when you click here.  You can also read up on the ADA standards on Service Animals here.

Charlie's dog, Sunny, has been trained to perform various different tasks for Charlie that are specific to his disability.  

Sunny is trained to provide tactile pressure to Charlie when he is beginning to have or in the middle of a meltdown (many things can trigger a meltdown) and will help prevent him from self harm during these episodes.  In the picture below you can see the distress on Charlie's face as he's in the middle of a meltdown and Sunny is shown putting tactile pressure on Charlie to help him feel grounded and safe which then calms him.  

Traveling is hard for Charlie and car rides are terribly distressing to him.  This makes it hard for our family to go out and do things together.  Many times we have had to split the family and one parent takes the other boys to go do something while the other parent stays with Charlie.  This has become much easier with Sunny.  In the next picture you can see Sunny resting her head in Charlie's lap during a car ride.  This also give him some tactile pressure as well as calming and distracting during the card ride.  

Sunny also helps Charlie access the community.  Along with car rides, being out in the community can be very challenging for Charlie.  Loud noises, crowds of people and unfamiliar environments are very difficult for Charlie to handle-it's overwhelming and overstimulating to Charlie and Sunny makes that more manageable for him.  Sunny is Charlie's one constant throughout the day and helps him transition from task to task.  Even the transition from going from our main level in our house to downstairs can be hard for Charlie if he's not ready for that transition- something most of us don't even think about!  The picture below is of Charlie in the community with Sunny.  Sunny is doing her job to "block" Charlie at an intersection as we wait to cross the road.  

And sleep! Sleep is a common issue among kids with Autism.  Charlie did not start sleeping through the night until just last year at age 4.  And even now sleep is still hard.  But Sunny makes it a little easier for Charlie.  We are still working on Sunny sleeping with Charlie for longer periods of time, but for now she lays with him as he's falling asleep to make that transition in his day easier and calm him down.  

These are just a few tasks Sunny helps Charlie with each day.  Even though we're just getting started we've already seen a difference in Charlie.  He and Sunny are still working on their bond, but we see a small bond there already.  People who misrepresent their pets as Service Animals just so they can take them with them wherever they go is demeaning to those who actually NEED a Service Dog.  We went through and continue to go through TONS of training with Sunny so that she is ready to go with Charlie wherever she needs to.  We knew when we started all of this that we wanted to help educate others on Service Dogs.  Please share this post with others so we can help people understand that there is an important difference between Service Dogs and pets or even Emotional Support Animals.  

A great visual on the difference between a Service Dog, Therapy Dog or ESA.