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Permalink Reply by brandi on March 2, 2011 at 7:24am

At the beginning of the school year, my history teacher apparently "forgot" I'm diabetic (probly wasn't paying attention when they told him). My alert dog Shyla started alerting me and he says "Is everything ok?" and without thinking, I say "I'm just a bit high." the whole class busted out laughing because they all understood, but the teacher stood dumbfounded. "umm....I appreciate you honesty?" he says. lol!

Permalink Reply by Kristin on March 17, 2011 at 8:19pm

That's funny!
You have an alert dog?? Is that literally a dog?

Permalink Reply by brandi on March 17, 2011 at 8:29pm

yup, she's a german shepherd/collie mix. she's amazing :)

Permalink Reply by Kristin on March 19, 2011 at 11:58am

That's cool! :D How does that work?

Permalink Reply by brandi on March 19, 2011 at 12:14pm

Shyla was trained to recognize and alert to the scent my body emits when my blood sugar goes high or low.
Her trainer, Ann, lets the dogs choose how they alert. If they're trained to alert a certain way, (such as a bringsel stick) and the owner doesn't pick up on the alert, then the dog generally won't know what to do after that. When the dog chooses how it alerts, then that keeps the dog thinking. If their original alert doesn't work, they'll find another way to alert.
Shyla will sniff up and down my leg. If that doesn't work, then she'll start whining. If I still don't do anything, she'll go get my mom, dad, or brother.
I did have to switch schools after getting her, though. My old school had NO respect for animals. The kids kept trying to call Shyla away from me, barked and growled at her trying to get her to bark back, jumping at her to scare her, and even hitting her as they walked by in the hallway. The principal, vice principal, and teachers knew what was going on. And they never did a thing to stop it. One girl even said "I'm going to keep hitting your dog every day until it bites me. Then you won't be allowed to bring her back here." If I didn't know that girls parents, I'd totally report her for violation of the ADA.

Permalink Reply by Kristin on March 20, 2011 at 8:53pm

Man that's cool. I didn't know they even had such a thing!

But that's horrible! I'm sorry that you had to switch schools because of those kids. They're just a bunch of rude, disrespectful idiots. :/ And no offense, if the principal and everyone didn't even do anything, that's not a very good school. Why would people even have such a problem with a dog?! It's not like she was hurting them in any way.

Permalink Reply by brandi on March 22, 2011 at 7:02am

It's because they were bullying me to begin with. After I got Shyla, my bullies became her bullies. And they multiplied. It became the "cool thing" to pick on us.

Permalink Reply by Kristin on April 8, 2011 at 3:39pm

I'm sorry. :(

Permalink Reply by Dana23 on August 18, 2011 at 10:31am

Awwwwwe that's so sad. I'm sorry.

Permalink Reply by brandi on April 9, 2011 at 7:50am

its ok :) she just needs some re-training to help her get over her fear of people hitting her.

Permalink Reply by Julia on April 20, 2011 at 6:37pm

Today I said "Yeah, I'm a little high right now" and my friend was like "What?!?!" and I was like "No, my sugar!". They didnt know if I was drug high or sugar high because I was kind of acting crazy today(: Lol! They know I would never be drug high!

Permalink Reply by Julia on April 20, 2011 at 6:38pm

I'm sorry to hear about your alert dog. Are there others reasons why you have an alert dog?

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