"Dogs and Angels are not very far apart"- Charles Bukowski
When I began searching for a service dog 6 years ago, I didn’t have many routes available to me; as someone with PTSD and TBI who is not a veteran, there were only two organizations I found in the entire country that trained non combat psychiatric service dogs.
I went through the application process with Little Angels Service Dogs, which involved a screening, a questionnaire, and a 90 minute conversation with the founder of the organization and my cousin who was acting as my advocate. She walked me through all of my options: if I went with LASD, if I went with her competitor, or if I trained a service dog on my own.
Both programs required a significant amount of fundraising, at least 10k out of the est 40-60k involved in the breeding, training, and raising of the dog. Reaching your fundraising goal got you on the wait list, which could take anywhere from 2 years to 6 years to actually get the dog.
That number, more than the 40k, stood out to me. Where would I be in six years?
I don’t think I could have predicted I would be sitting at a cafe in Philadelphia, Ellie sitting at my feet
nomming on a bone, outfitted in her service vest that I designed, quietly working in tandem with one of my best friends (who I didn’t even know back then).
Back then, I was scared. I was 28, and rapidly approaching the 30th birthday that had loomed ahead of me like the ghost of Christmas future. When the concussions started getting bad, 7 years or so prior, the parade of doctors and therapists I was seeing were all insistent.
If you keep getting head injuries, you’ll be a vegetable by the time you’re 30.
Recently, it’s been suggested to me that this was just a scare tactic they used and not an actual diagnostic possibility. Regardless, it f*cked up my outlook on life in ways that caused damage like ripples.
Because I couldn’t stop getting head injuries, even as I adapted my life to a n*w n*rmal (a phrase I came to hate), I would take two steps forward only to take five steps back. I stopped playing sports, I avoided triggers and potentially hazardous scenarios. I move much slower through the world now. Rollercoasters, bumper cars, paintball, dancing… not necessarily things I was passionate about in my life, but anything with the possibility of whiplash or head injury just ceased to be a possibility.
The great news is I’m on the other side of thirty and I am not a vegetable! I’m not well, but I’m trying to thrive within the lemony parameters I’ve been handed. Even so, my short term memory is declining rapidly, especially after the hospital visit the other week. Ditto with my attention span, my executive functioning, decision making and a smattering of other issues.
Even if I couldn’t have foreseen exactly this scenario 6 years ago, I knew neurocognitive decline was not just possible, it was probable. So when the director of LASD said it could take up to 6 years, my very real fear was that I wouldn’t be able to incorporate a service dog into my life at this point.
My cousin Shanley was on the phone with me for the whole conversation. It helped that I was helping to train her puppy as well as my roommate's puppy at the time. After we ended the call, she and I chatted about the risks the director had mentioned. There was a higher risk of the dog not working out, which could have been devastating.
But by the end of that conversation, Shanley gave me the confidence to begin the process of rescuing and training my own service dog. Maybe six months later, Southern Comfort Animal Rescue called and said they had a dog who might be a great match for what I was looking for, and that I might be a great human for her.
Let me be SUPER CLEAR: This was a massive risk, and we are incredibly lucky it worked.
I absolutely do not recommend anyone else take this route. The reasons it worked for me were that I had experience training dogs, I had a relationship with a rescue who kept an eye out for the right dog for a whole year before they texted me about Ellie, and I had an incredible support system there to help if and when things got difficult. Between Shanley and my parents, I was confident if something happened to me, even temporarily, that Ellie would have a place to go where she would be loved and cared for. (Which we never had to test until the hospital the other week, so once in 5 years isn’t a bad rate).
The road has not always been easy. We’ve had challenges, and days where Ellie and I get into loud arguments (sometimes it's mostly just us hoodling at each other, and other times I swear she's close to English words). We’re not a perfect Service Dog team. But we are perfect for each other.
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On Tuesday September 29, 2026, it will be the 5 year anniversary of my signing Ellie’s adoption papers. We’ll be at Tav for folks to stop by and give Ellie all the loves and pets. I’m also selling super soft tshirts with this design below, and giving a portion of the profits to Southern Comfort Animal Rescue. (Unfortunately, they’re unlikely to get here by Tuesday, but I’ve only just gotten the website up and running. Please let me know if you run into any issues!) If you want to donate to SoCo or Little Angels Service Dogs directly, I’ve linked those below.
The back of the shirt thanks the places that have been essential to our journey, SoCo obviously, but also Aftermath NYC and Fairmount Tavern. But that’s a whole ‘nother post :)
All our love,
Dewi & Ellie
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