Absolutely. This absolutely needs to happen. For anyone who has been using Countable for a while now, for anyone who has read my endorsements on various Military or Terrorism or Veteran related issues, for any of my followers, will know that I am a Combat Veteran suffering with PTSD. Since February 26th 2012 I have been coping with, learning to live with, and manage, life with PTSD. After my deployment to Afghanistan I was sent to the Warrior Transition Unit in Fort Knox, KY for 13 months as I was screened, treated for, and diagnosed with this disability. During my time there, I had more Social Workers, Psychologists, Psychiatrists, than I can remember. At one point, I was prescribed 11 different medications. I was in group therapy with other Veterans who were diagnosed with PTSD and even hospitalized at one point. When it got to the point when no one knew what to do with me any longer, I was picked as one of ten Soldiers to have a service dog for eight weeks. For those eight weeks when it was me and my service dog, I felt on top of the world. All my issues and the problems that all these professionals had spent months trying to untangle, this dog was doing me more good than any treatment which had been attempted up to that point. Then, the eight weeks had passed, I said goodbye to my service dog, and all the progress I had made came undone. Since then, I have looked into getting a service dog and every time I get told the same thing. Forget it. Don’t even think about it. The wait list is too long. So life goes on and I learn to deal with it. The reason why I am sharing this with you is because I want to illustrate the point that yes, having a service dog for someone dealing with PTSD has tremendous benefits that no pill could ever hope to reproduce. Now, I will also say that yes, unfortunately, there are Veterans out there who have been falsely diagnosed with PTSD. I say this because I seen it firsthand. People that game the system, intentionally lie about their experiences, all for the intent of securing a disability rating and the benefits which come with it. More often than not, they are successful. So if this were to happen, there are measures that need to be implemented which ensures that only Veterans with a genuine need are provided with a service dog. What those checks might be, I don’t know. But they need to be developed, implemented, and followed. Otherwise this will fall on its face and the guy who never left the wire, sat in the USO every night watching movies or playing video games, but yet who claims PTSD will get a service dog over the guy who still cries at night because of the Soldiers he lost in a single afternoon and the burden of guilt which comes from feeling like he failed those men in a place on a map that doesn’t even matter anymore.

Dogs can be a wonderful tool to help. The veterans deserve all the help we can give them.

This would be a good initiative for the government to lead. However, I believe it is a must that we keep the involvement very minimal. The last thing we need is for our government paying for these animals. Maybe sponsoring a program such as and helping our veterans have access to the program, but that should be the farthest it should reach.