Profiles

Assistance dogs - Fully Accredited
Name: Scruffy
Breed: Chihuahua x Maltese
Owner: Paul Doble

In memory of Mr Paul Doble who sadly passed away early this year. 

In about mid 2000 I was in my Garage in Muchea when one of my customers came in to get a couple of small repairs and a service done to her car. She told me that she was moving to Sydney, and now the car was taken care of all she had left to do was find a home for her little dog.
Something told me that I wanted this dog, so I said "I'l take it, she replied  "have you ever seen it?' I said "no but I want it" she then said "I will bring him down to meet you, but after my ex-husband he's not keen on men".
The next morning she brought Scruffy to see me, he came straight up to me and allowed me to pick him up, and proceeded to give me heaps of kisses. Pat (the ladies name) said "I have never seen him act like that with anyone before" I said "I just know this little fellow and I are going to be real good mates".
Pat told me that Scruffy was booked for the snip the next day and that she would like to keep him until she was leaving and I agreed to this, However that afternoon Scruffy walks into my office and jumps onto my lap. I phoned Pat and asked her if she knew where Scruffy was, she said yes in the back yard I said no he's in my office. A little while later Pat came in and said "I have filled the hole he dug under the fence" and took him home. A couple of days later Pat phoned to say that Scruffy was unhappy and was trying constantly to get out, and if it was Ok she was going to let him out and see what he did (she only lived just down the street), a few minutes later Scruffy was in my office looking very pleased with himself. A short time later Pat phoned and said she was bringing all his bits and pieces down because he obviously had decided where he wanted to be.
This started what has proved to be one of the highlights of my life, the bond between Scruffy and I is amazing, I don't go anywhere without my mate. The first example of Scruffy's ability and loyalty was when on a very hot day, I had skipped lunch and gone for a ride around the fire breaks on my gopher, I started to feel a bit woozy and the next thing I remember was waking up with the next door neighbours and a couple of others trying to get me to drink water. I asked what happened and was told that I had passed out and fallen off the gopher and that Scruffy had gone and got them.
My diabetes that I was not the best at managing was leading me to regular Hypo's and then quite often my BSL's would go to the other extreme. I became aware that there were times when Scruffy would become very agitated and start pawing me and licking me and I thought that it was just my imagination that this corresponded with my BSL's being to low or too high, I mentioned it to my doctor who told me that dogs were doing this and also for epilepsy and that if I learnt to take notice of scruffy I might find my diabetes management would improve. When we found this to be the case my doctor gave me a letter to carry stating that Scruffy was an alerting companion and also notified Medic Alert to record Scruffy's details on my file and on my card.
Up to this point I had never heard of a dog doing this and I think if anyone had told me I would have been very sceptical. For the next six years I took this for granted as the bond between Scruffy and I just got stronger and then I heard of "Paws for Diabetics" and it got me thinking that there was nothing PFD could do for me because I had no problems with Scruffy and he is always accepted wherever we go BUT what about all those others who could benefit from an alerting dog, so I joined PFD not for what it could do for me, but for what I might be able to do for PFD.


 

< BACK TO INDEX

© Paws for Diabetics Inc, 2006 - 2007. ABN 26 994 694 733

Site Map | Contact Us

Website generously hosted by Flexihostings | DHTML Menu generously provided by Milonic.com