The Four-Legged Treatment for PTSD

Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) affects as much as 20% of veterans who have witnessed the horrors of combat. Left untreated, it can lead to the tragic statistic of 22 veteran suicides per day. Its spiral of self-destructive behavior can include panic attacks, depression, alcoholism and violent outbursts.

PTSD is triggered when a veteran returns to civilian life and does not have the coping skills for living in a peaceful environment, since fighting has taken up much of his or her life for an extended period. Often, civilians have no idea what these veterans have gone through. What they need, beyond therapy, is a source of unconditional love. And that is what the organization Pets for Vets offers.

Consider the story of Adam Renteria, as told to everydayhealth.com. Adam returned from six years in the Army to a world he could not assimilate himself into. Every place he went felt like a war zone, even if it was just a supermarket. For a time, he lived out of his car because his family could not endure his violent, dark moods. Then his mother remembered seeing something about Pets for Vets. The organization gave Adam a specially trained service dog, a white Korean Jindo named Rakassan.

The dog brought Adam a sense of safety he hadn’t known in years. (Pets for Vets carefully matched Rakassan to Adam’s particular needs.) They go everywhere together, and the dog’s affections are calming the veteran’s anxiety. As a service animal, Rakassan is welcomed in establishments such as restaurants and other normally restricted places. That constant companionship is at last bringing Adam a peace he has been searching for.

As Adam told everydayhealth.com, “He reduces my symptoms one lick at a time.”

Pets for Vets hosts numerous fundraising events in the Houston, Texas area. The schedule for upcoming events is shown below. If you are interested in participating in one or more of these events, please contact Deanne Goyer at deanne.goyer[@]gmail.com.