Not much longer!!!

 We are so excited! In less than a month, we will have our service dog! We have been busily preparing for his/her arrival for the past few weeks and I think we are ready. Atticus has been helping select the various items from the dog bed to the dog toys. Justin and I have also been very busy working on memorizing the dog commands (there are a lot!) as well as reading our manuals for training. Please remember us in your prayers as we travel to meet our new friend in a few weeks. We will definitely be posting on the blog/facebook as we go on this adventure.

We still don't know the name or gender of our new friend, this will be a surprise upon arriving at the training. I think we are excited about the surprise, honestly and will be happy with whomever we receive. We are so thankful to Wilderwood for this opportunity and for working so hard to train our dog.

The picture attached to this post is from this past Sunday morning. Atticus didn't sleep well Saturday night and was laying around Sunday morning. I found him curled up in the dog's bed... I asked if he was okay and he said "I need puppy." In less than a month, we will have "puppy."

As always, thank you all for the prayers, thoughts and kindness throughout our journey. 

WE HAVE EXCITING NEWS!!!!!

We have some VERY exciting news!!! We have the dates for our training camp!!! This is when we will go to Tennessee for a week long training with our service dog and then we get to bring him/her home!!! We are over the moon with excitement! We were in the car traveling when we got the news and I was able to take a photo of Atticus when we told him the news - this is the picture attached to this post. Can you see the excitement in his smile? He is a happy camper for sure!

The dates are in November and we will be updating closer to time as we prepare for camp and purchase our needed items for our new 4 legged helper! And of COURSE you can expect updates and pictures once we receive him/her. We will not know which dog will be ours until we arrive for training.

What a great Thanksgiving and Christmas present for Mr. Atticus. It will be quite the adjustment for all of us - but we are looking forward to every minute! Thank you all for your thoughts, prayers and love during this journey. We appreciate you all more than you could ever know!

Service Dog Update

Hello friends! It’s been quite a while since we updated and we have some news. We have some good news and some not as good news. We’ll start with the “not as good news” first. We received a call last week from Wilderwood, the non-profit that is training Atticus’ service dog. According to our contract, we should receive the dog by July 2015 (2 years after signing our contract). However, there is going to be approximately a 60 day delay and we will hopefully receive our dog in September, 2015. As we have explained in previous posts, the cost to train a service dog from birth is $20,000-$25,000. The non-profit asks the families to raise $12,500 and they come up with the rest through fundraising, donations and grants.

However, after the recent recession, their donations did not bounce back like they had hoped. In addition, they also lost 2 grants for 2015 (one expired all together and one changed their mission statement). Over the past month, they have had to make several cuts and lay off some of their trainers until they can restore their funding. They have 2 grants already secured for 2016 and they are currently trying to raise enough funds to make it through 2015. If you are able and want to help, they have a go fund me page where you can make a donation. These donations go directly to the non-profit to help train service dogs for families. 

They are still training dogs – things are just moving at a slower pace than they had planned. My heart goes out to other families and children that are further down the pipeline than we are… There are several families that have raised their funds and expected a 1 ½ year wait but now have a 3 year wait for their service dog. Please remember these families in your prayers as they wait for their helper to be trained. Also, please, please pray that Wilderwood is able to raise the funding they need for 2015 as quickly as possible so that they can rehire the trainers they lost and get back on track to get these dogs trained and to the families that need them so desperately.

Okay – onto the GOOD NEWS! The good news is that there are three dogs currently being trained for Mr. Atticus. They are all doing very well and should all graduate to be a service dog (there were 5 but 2 didn’t make the cut and will likely be adopted out as therapy dogs). One of these three dogs will be Atticus’ dog. Their names are Linus, Jonas, and Mosyus (pronounced moe-sy-us). Two of them are Golden Doodles and the third is a Lab Mix. They are all very smart and doing very well with their training. If all goes as planned we will be able to go in September for our training and bring home Linus, Jonas or Mosyus. He will be fully trained and ready to start his duties as a service dog. Atticus is so excited and he prays daily for his dog. 

As soon as we get a firm training date or any other news, we will update the blog. Again, please keep the nonprofit, families and dogs in your prayers. We have included the go fund me link below. Thank you all so much for your prayers, love, thoughts and support!  

Love, RaDonna, Justin and Atticus

Wilderwood Go Fund Me Link

Atticus is already making preparations...

Atticus is very excited about his dog even though it will probably be a year before we receive him/her. He isn't able to express himself like most children (ex. now when is my dog coming? when can I meet my dog? etc.). But he has shown us through other ways that he is excited.

Last week, Atticus and Dad made the weekly visit to Whole Foods in Birmingham for Atticus' groceries (with his many food allergies and sensitivities this is the best option for finding Atticus friendly food). While they were there, Atticus started putting dog food into the cart. Justin asked him what he was doing and he said "for dog."

The following week Atticus and Mom were at Wal-Mart looking at bird seed for our feathered friends in the back yard and Atticus wandered over to the dog section. He found a large dog brush that he wanted to get. And again when asked what it was for he said "for dog."

These may seem like small gestures but for Atticus these are a great demonstration to us that he understands what's going on and he's getting ready for his new furry pal.

Happy Belated New Year!

Well it has been quite a busy few months, we are very sorry for the delay in updating everyone.

A few weeks before Christmas we received word from the non-profit that our "official" window to be matched with our new four legged helper and friend is January - April of 2015. There is a very small chance that it could be sooner than this but if not - it will definitely be within that window.

I know it seems like such a long time but it will be here before we know it. In fact, it's almost been a year since we started the application process. I remember all of the emotions that went into filling out and completing the application and gathering all of the needed documents... praying we would be approved.... elation at being approved... the incredible anxiety and pressure we felt when we found out we had 9 months to raise $11,000. But then God gave us the most beautiful illustration of faith and answered prayer when the $11,000 was raised in only 5 weeks. And the emotions from that my friends still causes us to sob with joy and gratitude. We are so thankful for all of the amazing and generous individuals that helped us get there and incredibly grateful for such a loving God.

We have tried to keep track of each person that donated and we have sent a thank you to every one on our list. If we missed you, we want to know so we can thank you personally. If you helped out and did not receive a thank you note, please, please send an email to servicedogforatticus@yahoo.com and let us know. We also sent a Christmas card with a little update inside to those folks. Plus, we plan to send out picture cards once we are matched with our new furry pal. 

We will continue to post periodic updates and little tidbits about Atticus over the next few months on the blog. We will likely save our facebook posts for any big news. So, if you want, please check back here every few weeks for more frequent updates.

Our family wants to wish you and your family a very happy new year. We hope it is year filled with joy, blessings and good health.

Love, RaDonna, Justin & Atticus

More awesome ways the dog will help Atticus

So the dog will be trained to go anywhere and everywhere with us. In fact, we have to take a public access TEST before we are able to take him out in public. This shows that we are certified to handle the dog and that the dog has been fully trained to be in public. There will be lecture classes, hands on training and tests that we will take during our 7 days of training camp.

Legally a service dog is allowed in any location or place of business. The only places that can legally refuse entry are a personal residence or a religious organization. Our dog will be outfitted with a special jacket and harness showing he is a certified service dog. We are hoping we don't encounter any issues with taking him wherever Atticus goes.

Here are some more awesome ways the dog can help Atticus... In group situations Atticus gets overwhelmed sometimes and the dog will be there to comfort him. In just one command you can instruct the dog to ignore all other children. You can also instruct him to comfort and love on Atticus, give him hugs, shake his hand, anything that might put our little man at ease. In addition you can instruct the dog to play with other children, encouraging Atticus to interact with them as well.

Atticus also has a great deal of sensory issues and the dog can help comfort him when he becomes overloaded. His body can't handle all of the different sensory input (think sounds, touch, sights, etc.). This often happens at bedtime and our bedtimes can sometime  2 hours. And please believe me when I say we have tried everything. You name it we've tried it over the past 6 years. And i must say it has really gotten better and he has improved greatly when it comes to getting settled down. I remember times in the past where he would be awake from 1 a.m. - 5 a.m. and you couldn't leave him in his room to fall back asleep. He would climb and fall and get into trouble if left unattended for even a few minutes. Thankfully, now we are able to settle down him down and get him to sleep in less than two hours, usually 1 on a good night. My amazing and incredible husband usually takes bedtime duty. We're hoping that maybe the dog will help Atticus settle down and maybe we can slowly fade our presence out of the room and he will be able to go to sleep on his own.

There are many other ways the dog will be able to help, we will continue to post those as well as other tidbits of information about our special friend as they are made available to us.

As always - thank you for reading and God bless!

So when will we get the dog???

That has been our most frequently asked question to date. And believe you me, we are ready for him whenever he is ready for us!

The process to train a service dog can take up to 2 years. As soon as we sent in our contract in June, they started training a group a dogs, one of whom will hopefully become Atticus' dog. We had to fill out numerous personality assessments regarding Atticus as well as long questionnaires that will help the trainers know exactly how they need to train the dog in order to best help Atticus. In addition, we have to send videos periodically of Atticus doing things he enjoys as well as things he finds challenging. We also have to periodically keep a 3 day journal of every single activity and any behaviors/challenges/issues we experienced.

They require families to raise their money in 9 months because there is a chance that a dog in a previous group could be a match for your child. So the earliest we could get a dog would be March of 2014. However, the latest could be late spring of 2015. we are definitely hoping for the earlier date! Some of the specific things the dog will be trained on are: TRACKING. We have had some concerns about Atticus wandering off or running into a situation (traffic) without realizing the imminent danger. The dog would be trained to chase him and take him down in a careful manner. He also gets very curious and if he were to wander off and come into contact with dairy or egg (which cause an anaphylactic reaction for him) - it could be fatal. So if he were to wander off, we could give the dog a command and he could locate Atticus in a very short matter of time. Another helpful thing the dog will be trained to do with a simple command: take/knock something out of his hand that he is not supposed to eat. This will be really helpful in those times where we are across the room and he starts to eat something that isn't safe to eat (food allergies, etc.).


There are a million more wonderful ways the dog will help Atticus, I will touch on more next time.

Thank you for reading and as always -- thank you for helping us reach our goal!!! God bless you!!!