Emotional component gets lost about guide dogs: client

The role of a guide dog for someone who is visually impaired plays a big part as the furry animal is recognized to be a mobility aid in helping them reach certain destinations without the use of a cane. However, a client with Canadian Guide Dogs for the Blind says her dog is much more than just her navigator.

“It does get you know there is that emotional component and when your dog has to retire it’s really a big deal because you know you think about getting attached to your pets, we get attached to our dogs as, as dogs, but as also because this who we’ve been sorta working with, this dog goes almost everywhere I go. I think sometimes that emotional component gets a little bit lost because people want to know what the dogs do and I totally understand that but when your dog has something happen to it, or it retires, or when it goes to dog heaven, I mean that’s one of the hardest things about having a guide dog is the fact that they don’t live forever,” said Jen Goulden, a client of Canadian Guide Dogs for the Blind.

Goulden says she used to be a cane user but decided to submit an application for a dog in 2006 and just a year later received her very first seeing eye dog.