Army wife trains service dog for injured husband
Published: March 14, 2007
It won’t be crutches, canes, or a wheelchair for one injured Clearfield soldier. Army Reserve Sergeant First Class Cory Chartier will come home to a newly trained serviced dog. The family’s bull-mastiff puppy will help Chartier with his mobility.
Sergeant Chartier is on his second tour of duty in Iraq, and suffered his second injury last month. His wife Carie is preparing for his return home by training Roxie as his service dog. She says they chose a bull-mastiff because Sgt. Chartier “kinda has a macho type attitude and it’s a lot better to have a macho looking dog around with you than to rely on a cane or another person.”
Roxie knows the basics and is now learning more specific tasks like turning off lights – something they’re working on at home. Chartier also trains the puppy in public places like Home Depot, Wal-Mart, and PetSmart. Carie Chartier told ABC 4 News, “That’s another thing we’re working on — that she can’t play with every animal.”
When they’re out in public, Roxie dons a “service dog in training” harness and will occasionally miss a command. But she’s well on her way, and Chartier says she understands how beneficial service dogs like Roxie can be to wounded soldiers. “A lot of the soldiers have the mentality that they don’t want to rely on anything else. But it’s pretty cool to have a dog that can do all these neat things for you.”
Chartier hopes that Roxie will be the start of her career training service dogs for disabled veterans.
If you enjoyed this good news Subscribe to Good News Blog
If you like this, you'll love Good Animal News:
Share this
To share this simply copy and paste one of the below URL's: