Living with Blind Dogs

Your best friend has just lost his eyesight. You are devastated. Your dog is depressed and confused. Your primary care vet hands you off to an opthalmologist. The opthalmologist speaks in a strange tongue, medical-ese, and gives you treatment options you don't understand. You are worried about quality of life and may even be considering euthanasia.Sit! Stay! Read this book.Caroline Levin explains SARDS, cataracts, glaucoma, progressive retinal atrophy, dry eye, and many more conditions which lead to blindness or reduced vision. And she does it in plain English. You will learn new training techniques and commands which will help you and your best friend get back to the most important part of your relationship - LIVING! There's a good reason Caroline put that word in the title of her book. Blind dogs can, and DO, live happy, useful, rewarding lives!!

When our dog Annabel went blind, we didn't know how to help her. She was severely depressed and unable to cope, bumping into things, getting disoriented, going to the toilet inside, sleeping a lot, moping, etc.I followed the advice in this book, and within two weeks, Annabel was able to negotiate her way around the house, find her bowl and water, get up and down the stairs and go to the toilet outside.Within two more, I was walking with her in the park, and within another month, I could take her pretty much anywhere.I simply added some extra commands when out walking: "up" for a little step, "ready, up" for a big step; "down" for a little step down, "drop" for a big step down; "turn" with a lead tug to indicate direction. Together with commands she already knew, "stop", "cross the road" (which means trot quickly), "OK", which means go, it gave us all the tools we needed. We'd be out in the streets, crossing busy roads, sitting in cafes, negotiating crowds and she was fine (as long as the crowds weren't too thick). We'd also take her into the country, along beaches, bush tracks, up hills etc. People often couldn't tell that she was blind because she looked as though she was doing everything herself. Ocassionally she'd need a little reassurance, a bit of a pat, and then off she'd go again.The key to this was making sure that she got the command *before* she was expected to do it, so that she didn't find the drop or step before I gave her the instruction. That way she learned to trust my commands, and to relax enough so that she wasn't always worried about tripping or bumping into things. As soon as she could go on long walks again, her enjoyment of life increased, her depression lifted and life was worth living again for her.She even got to the point where I could let her off the lead in a safe place, because she trusted me enough to keep her safe. She'd wander about, sniffing things, doing dog stuff, and I'd just watch to make sure she was OK. She loved this so much! A little taste of freedom.It made all the difference to her final two years of life. I strongly recommend this book for anyone with a blind dog.

My Samantha died recently at the age of 18-1/2. Because of this book her last years were happy and comfortable. When I realized she was losing her sight, I began to look for ways to help her adjust. I found this book and it gave us tips on how to help her live a good life in spite of her handicap. When she could no longer see at all, we had prepared the way and she still went on her walks, enjoyed her home and yard and lived a happy old doggie life. A MUST IF YOU HAVE A DOG WITH ANY KIND OF VISION DIFFICULTIES

I don't have a great way with words, but I want to give praise to Caroline Levin for writing this book. When our dog "Cotton" was diagnosed with SARDS and then Cushings Disease, we were devastated. This all happened in a period of just a few weeks. With a sick dog, from too much Lysodren (the medication for Cushings), a blind dog (who could not distinguish between light and dark), and a depressed dog (who now could not navigate stairs, find the door, food, toys or distinguish sounds), we felt we had nowhere to turn. On the Internet we found this book and its author. We did order the book directly from the publisher and thank God for being able to do that. Cotton is doing great and we are all benefiting from this book. Everyone who has a dog with low vision or blindnes should have it. Every veternarian should have copies of this for their patients to read. Caroline Levin gives such indepth information about the causes for blindness and such well explained instructions for retraining your dog in ways that work. Cotton, in less than two weeks, finds her bowl, is entertaining herself, wags her tail, and feels secure again about going down and up the stairs. We have a long way to go and with the help from this book, we will improve every day.If your dog is blind, please read this book. It saved us from continuing to let our "Cotton" suffer from the depression she was feeling. We feel we have our dog back. Oh, and this is not a young dog, our "Cotton" is 13 years and 9 months. And we thought she was too old to learn new tricks!

This book covers 3 main areas: medical problems that cause blindness, logical things to do that will make your environment safer for your dog, and things you can do for yourself to make the developing events go more smoothly. It covers the psychological issues that you and your dog will face including depression, anger and confusion. It suggests reasonable solutions to problems that you and your dog will face and has sensible, easy to understand instructions that employ items that you would normally have around your house. One of the areas that I found most beneficial was the specialized training strategies and commands to prepare your blind dog for the challenge of being in an unfamiliar environment.This is not an easy book to read if you are still dealing with the grief of your pet loosing their sight, but there are also stories of how other people have overcome the difficulties and developed an even stronger bond with their pet. It includes different games that you can play with your blind dog and has many suggestions on special things you can do to make their transition/new life easier and less confusing to them.I highly recommend this book.