September 11, 2025 • 33 mins
What happens when a veteran ICU nurse combines her medical expertise with 30 years of dog training experience? Pauline Hoegler reveals the remarkable answer on this episode of Kindness Matters.
Pauline's organization, GOFIDog (Golden Opportunities for Independence), has developed innovative programs that harness the extraordinary capabilities of Golden Retrievers to serve communities in ways that transform lives daily. The stories she shares will leave you astonished at what these four-legged heroes accomplish.
Picture a police officer approaching a child in crisis—a situation that typically escalates to ambulance calls, emergency room visits, or even arrests. Now imagine that same scenario, but with a Golden Retriever by the officer's side. Pauline shares real examples where these Community Resource Dogs completely transformed outcomes, de-escalating volatile situations and creating connections where traditional approaches failed. "Within five minutes, he was back in class," she explains about one remarkable intervention with an autistic student.
Beyond community policing, Pauline's facility dogs support students from elementary school through college, while her service dogs assist people with disabilities, PTSD, and medical conditions like seizure disorders. The science behind these capabilities is fascinating—these dogs can literally smell biochemical changes that signal an oncoming seizure, allowing them to alert handlers before symptoms appear.
What makes Pauline's approach unique is her commitment to creating successful human-dog partnerships through comprehensive training that goes beyond basic commands. By focusing on problem-solving skills and building deep bonds, she's achieved success rates far beyond industry standards.
Want to experience some kindness in action? Listen now to discover how these golden-hearted heroes are changing communities one wet nose at a time. Then visit GOFIDog online to learn how you can support their mission through donations or their upcoming fundraising events.
This podcast is a proud member of the Mayday Media Network. If you have an idea for a podcast and need some production assistance or have a podcast and are looking for a supportive network to join, check out maydaymedianetwork.com.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello everyone and welcome to the Kindness Matters
podcast.
I'm your host, mike Rathbun.
On this podcast, we promotepositivity, empathy and
compassion because we believethat kindness is alive and well,
and there are people andorganizations that you may not
(00:21):
have heard of in the world,making their communities a
better place for everyone, andwe want you to hear their
stories.
On this podcast, we talk aboutmatters of kindness because
kindness matters.
Hey, welcome to the show,everybody.
I am so glad and so thankfulthat you chose to take 30
(00:48):
minutes out of your time, 30-ishminutes out of your day, to
listen to this podcast.
I appreciate it so much.
You have no idea and you knowwhat, if you're not already, go
ahead and subscribe whereveryou're listening to this podcast
, whether it's Spotify or Appleor YouTube or wherever.
(01:09):
Go ahead and subscribe becausewe appreciate that and that way
you can keep all up to date onany of our new episodes, like
this one.
I have such a great episodewith you guys today.
If you know me at all, you knowhow I love dogs, and this one
just kind of fell into my lap.
(01:30):
My guest today is PaulineHogler, and she is an RN and a
certified professional dogtrainer with over 30 years of
experience with competitiveobedience, agility, consulting
clients and group dog behavior.
(01:52):
She is also a critical carenurse, which makes her the
perfect candidate to lead Go-FiDogs.
And you're asking well, what'sGo-Fi Dogs?
Go-fi stands for goldenopportunities, for independence.
Welcome to the show, pauline.
Thank you so much for takingthe time to be on today thank
(02:14):
you for having me.
This is wonderful um, and thisis now in addition to all your
dog training experience you arealso a breeder, is that correct?
Speaker 2 (02:25):
Correct.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
And you breed exclusively Golden Retrievers.
Correct why.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
Golden Retrievers, I think because of my lifestyle.
When I first married my husband, I wanted German Shepherds.
Probably wanted GermanShepherds most of my life.
They're just the coolest dog.
But he was right when he saidwe have nieces and nephews
(02:58):
coming through the yard all thetime, people coming over and
that kind of thing, and wereally probably should focus
more on a family breed.
And so I got my first GoldenRetrieverver oh, I'd say, over
30 years ago and she became myfirst breeding dog.
My parents bred dogs growing up, so it's something that I
absolutely love, love, love.
I love puppies.
(03:19):
There's nothing better than alitter of puppies and puppy
breath Puppy breath is the best,so it's.
It really is in your blood isn'tit.
It really is.
My father was a farmer and sohe would tell me stories about
him raising the horses.
I can't talk, that's fine.
(03:51):
So he had all kinds of animalsand just the stories he would
always tell when we were kidsabout the horses and the pigs
and the cows and all of thatstuff.
I thought it was really cool.
So growing up my parents breddogs and when I became old
enough and had my own house thatI was able to do it myself, I
(04:14):
continued on with that.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
Yeah, and I love golden retrievers.
I grew up with Labradorretrievers, which I think is
probably about as close to aGolden Retriever,
temperamental-wise, as you canget, but Golden Retriever just
kind of another level, aren'tthey?
Speaker 2 (04:37):
They really are, just in the sense of their
intuitiveness, really for thetherapy dog work and the service
dog work.
A lot of what we do with peoplewith disabilities also comes
with nervousness, anxiousness,um, you know, the dogs really
need to be in tune to that andbe able to help the handlers
(04:59):
through things like that, and sothey fail.
The golden retrievers arebetter in that regard.
The you pair up a goldenretriever with someone with a
cane and they're going to slowdown their steps on their own.
You don't have to tell them alab's probably going to take
them down the street whether hewanted to go down the street or
not so they're both great dogs,but I like the goldens with a
(05:26):
little bit more of a.
I feel they have a little morebrain to them and a little bit
more intuitive to personalfeelings and that kind of thing.
Speaker 1 (05:37):
Yeah, I think labs are intuitive when it comes to
water.
Yeah, but that's about it.
Yes, yeah, yeah, but that'sabout it.
Yes, yeah, yeah.
And I know what you're sayingabout family dogs too, because
they really are.
Yeah, we've had several.
(05:59):
My wife and I have had severaldogs.
I've had several dogs and wehave an invisible fence for our
yard, which is great.
All of our dogs have learned itand respected it.
We had one dog his name wasSammy and he was a shepherd
(06:19):
yellow lab mix, and at his peakhe was like 110 pounds.
He was enormous and he saw arabbit in the neighbor's yard
and blew through the fence,yipped on the way out and then
stood there and looked at theneighbor's yard and looked back
at his yard, looked back at theneighbor's yard and went.
(06:40):
He came back in our yard,yipped on the way back in too,
but never, ever breached thatfence again.
So I mean, you know, oh, wow.
But that doesn't mean other dogscan't get into your yard right
and then pull them off, butwe've never had one that we were
(07:04):
afraid to have, like the kidshave their friends over, or what
have you.
Speaker 2 (07:10):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (07:11):
But there is that concern, of course, and that's
where Goldens come in, and youwere talking a little bit about
all of the different, becauseyou're dogs at Go-Fi Dog, you
have a lot of different programs.
Right, correct, you've got wehelp a lot of people.
(07:34):
Yes, okay, let's go throughthem one by one.
You have the community resourcedog.
Let's talk about that type ofdog.
Speaker 2 (07:43):
Okay, community resource dogs is a trademark
that we came up with when wewere working with the police
department in our town and he'sa community resource officer and
so it really fit in perfectlybecause his job is connecting
the community, bridging peopletogether, making police
departments a place to go tohelp, not a bad place that you
(08:07):
go when you're in trouble.
And so we were talking forquite a while and trying to
figure out what are we going tokind of call this dog.
It's not really a comfort dogin the sense of it's not just
kind of helping at the stationwith the people, it's not just
providing comfort, it actuallydoes.
It passes certain tests.
(08:28):
We go through rigorous trainingthroughout the dog's life and
so when the puppy turns sixmonths of age, that puppy goes
through a test, kind of coinedby the AKC, called the Puppy
Star Test and just making surethat the socialization is there,
the owners are knowledgeable,the handlers are knowledgeable
(08:50):
about what the dogs should have,their vaccines, their licenses
through the town, all of thatkind of stuff.
And then for the next sixmonths you work on the canine,
good citizen kind of things, andthat's really just your.
It's not so much basic obedience, it's basic obedience combined
(09:11):
with tolerance for differentsituations, different people.
Um, one of the test piece testitems is can somebody else come
up and brush your dog?
Can somebody else lean overthem and pat them on the head,
um, and those kind of things.
So it it takes the obedience.
You know you can your shepherdsand your malinois.
(09:32):
They can be the most obedientdog in the whole world, but
don't pat him um so um.
You know, knowing that most ofmy dogs that I breed are going
into homes, either family homesor someone with a disability or
a community engagement type ofsituation, that's why we've
(09:56):
really focused on the dogs thatwe do breed and I have to say
it's not even just so much thatthey're golden retrievers,
because within my bloodlines Ihave a very lab-like I call it
line bloodline.
where they're busy they mightrip things apart.
And then I have differentbloodlines that I would never
put into a social kind of thingbecause they're so shy and timid
(10:20):
that it's stressful for them.
So really kind of trying tofind, even within the dogs that
I breed, that special dog, thatspecial bloodline that can go
anywhere, do anything,generalize situations and be
confident in those situationsand still be able to be on task
(10:43):
for what they need to do, withdistractions and things like
that.
Speaker 1 (10:49):
Yeah, just going back to that community resource
because that's so huge, when yousee oftentimes cops, right or
wrong, have depending on theneighborhood.
Cops, right or wrong, havedepending on the neighborhood
might have.
There might be some hardfeelings there.
Speaker 2 (11:13):
Absolutely.
Speaker 1 (11:13):
But when you have a cop walk up with a golden
retriever, it really kind ofsmooths things out, doesn't it?
Speaker 2 (11:21):
100% and I can't even begin to tell you the amount of
stories that the officers tellus.
Literally on the very first dayI had one officer call and was
like Pauline, you wouldn'tbelieve what just happened.
And this kind of thing happensa lot with our dogs.
He said there was a child whowas having a tantrum and he
(11:45):
literally was in the bathroomand he ripped everything apart.
He ripped the toilet paperthing off of the wall.
He was having a really hardtime and we don't encourage when
people are in that kind ofstate to utilize the dog so much
because we don't want them toget hurt.
But he felt confident thatafter a conversation with him he
said it's officer chad.
(12:06):
It's like not right now,officer chad, not having a good
day.
And he said well, do you wantto just come out and talk to me
for a few minutes?
He's like no, not today.
And then he said oh, really, um, okay, maybe for a minute.
(12:31):
And he said he came out of thebathroom, he sat on the ground,
he pet the dog.
We do we train them task work.
So we train them to lie acrosslaps to do a weighted pressure,
which science shows that it'sreally beneficial in situations
like this and he said withinfive minutes he was back in
(12:52):
class.
And so a lot of these stories,especially the autistic
community.
We don't really know as asociety how to deal with people
that have autism, even any kindof mental health.
We don't really as a societyknow how to deal with that.
We haven't figured that out yetbut I feel like the dogs have.
(13:15):
We have made trips to thehospital in an ambulance.
That officer in my own hometownhere said a girl was in school,
got into a fight, was having atantrum, she was throwing um
things left and right.
(13:35):
And he said he showed up atscene and there were four
officers surrounding her in aresident front yard and, um, he
said nobody was getting anywherewith her and it was really
pretty much to the point wherethey would have to arrest her.
And that's the last thingofficers want, schools want.
You know, nobody wants that.
(13:56):
And so he said you know, let'sjust try and calm down a little
bit.
I gotta let my dog out realquick.
And he said as soon as he saidthe word dog, she honed in on
him and he's like do you likedogs?
And she said yeah, I like dogsa lot.
And so he's like if you want,you can come and Pat sit down,
(14:23):
take a breather, pat Rubble, andjust see how this goes.
Speaker 1 (14:26):
And once again, that kid went back to school let
alone instead of bail.
Speaker 2 (14:29):
Yeah, the fire department was on scene, the
police were on scene and thisdog, out of all of those people,
was able to get this girl to goup, get up and go back to
school and calm down enough thatshe was rational thinking and
that kind of stuff.
So, even financially, the amountof money that they save
(14:51):
municipalities between nothaving to go to an emergency
department I work in anemergency department.
That's the last place that achild with autism should be.
It's the last place that peoplewith mental health should be.
It's not last place that peoplewith mental health should be.
It's not geared towards thatand unfortunately, with the
shortage of care that we havecurrently, they sit in an
(15:13):
emergency for days, and so to beable to not only save the
ambulance trip preventing themfrom going to an emergency room,
they're saving them fromsitting in an emergency room for
days upon days on end.
So it's really really.
It's blown my mind how reallybeneficial it is for communities
(15:35):
, for just your, each town thatgets one of these dogs cannot
say enough about the work thatthey do and that they never
imagined that they're able to dowhat they do in each town and
every chief calls me and saysPauline, you wouldn't believe.
And I say yes, I would.
Yep.
Speaker 1 (15:56):
I knew what I was doing when I created this
program.
Speaker 2 (15:59):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:01):
Okay, so that's community resource dogs.
You also have a program forfacility dogs.
Now, what type?
Of dog, would that be?
Speaker 2 (16:12):
So we do a lot of schools.
Many colleges BU, babson, curryCollege here in the area have
our dogs In colleges there.
It's a little different but thesame in the sense that students
going to schools there's a lotof stress when they're in
college, their first year incollege they're away from their
(16:34):
family and I want to sayprobably the most common comment
that people say is I can'tleave.
How much I miss my dog and it'sso nice to be able to pat this
dog because it's you know, it'sa yeah, it's not being away so
this is just for collegestudents then we do.
(16:55):
We do schools.
We have dogs in elementaryschools, which was my biggest
concern.
We really wanted to um, I thinkthe whole time she was talking
I was like it's not gonna work,it's not going to work, it's not
going to work, it's working.
And I have to say that dog isdoing amazing things in a
younger population, yeah, butalso we have middle school that
(17:18):
has them, high schools that havethem yeah, a lot of times the
guidance counselors will havethem, and then dogs can I mean
kids can sign up to see them,that kind of thing, yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:36):
And I know we have a lady up here who has put
together a program for kids.
Well, to bring dogs andhandlers, therapy dogs, into um
middle schools, becauseoftentimes when we know kids are
(17:57):
stressed to the max these days,right, and a lot of it begins I
think in middle school is whatshe found, and she brings the
dogs in and they calm right downand yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker 2 (18:10):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:12):
So that's a facility dog.
Speaker 2 (18:15):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (18:17):
And then the one I like the most service dogs.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
Service dogs are really cool.
When I first started thisprogram it was because I well,
when I was thinking about doingthis, I heard about cancer
sniffing dogs and, as a nurse,of course that's a nurse who
loves dogs Exactly, and you knowI did my share of research.
(18:45):
There were people doing it, butultimately it came back to as
much as they can do it, I think,ethically.
What are we going to do?
Put a bunch of dogs in cagesand have them sniff samples,
kind of thing?
So I did get off of that, butit did get me on the track.
My niece is paralyzed and so Ihad been spending some time with
(19:06):
her and we both.
I just kept on saying you needit, you need a service dog, you
need to get a service dog, justlike I don't want to have to
work oh yeah, I mean okay, theywould love it, they would love
to work for you.
Um, and then, shortly after wehad that discussion, a girl that
worked for me through highschool, helped them with the
(19:29):
dogs and the animals, came backand said I've been thinking of
starting a service dog program.
And so it was literally likethe next morning.
I'm like that is just thecraziest thing.
So clearly it's meant to happen.
Speaker 1 (19:44):
Well, yeah.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
And here we are, 10 years later.
Speaker 1 (19:48):
There are so many different categories of service,
Doc you have service cards forveterans for PTSD for disabled
people you do first respondersas well, I think, or no, we do
do first responders.
Speaker 2 (20:03):
Because and it's sort of the same thing as the
veterans, but maybe a differentkind- well, ptsd is ptsd and
they're all kind of out in theline of fire out there.
Speaker 1 (20:14):
So right um they're beneficial did I miss a category
of service dog?
Speaker 2 (20:21):
disabled people, ptsd um children, veterans, um
people with disabilities.
We really focus our servicedogs on who we can help the most
and we don't necessarily pick apopulation we go with.
Who can we do the most for whatwould the best scenario for our
(20:46):
dog be?
What's the best scenario forsomeone taking in one of our
dogs?
And we like to stay local,right in our own community.
We try and just focus 25 milesfrom um Walpole but um, we're
getting to the point where Ifeel confident that we can kind
of start to work outside ofthose lines.
(21:07):
But the primary reason for thatis that the majority of service
dogs that get trained fail andI thought that was just awful,
you know they fail they fail.
Um, the success rates forservice dogs is pretty bad, um,
(21:29):
and so I wanted to change that,and I feel the primary way to
change that is that people haveto know more.
The people have to be able totroubleshoot when things go
wrong.
They need to have a better bondwith their dog.
Most of the programs do acouple of weeks where they put
the dog and the human togetherand then they do training, they
(21:51):
learn I want to say the buttonsto push for the most part.
They do training, they learn.
I want to say the buttons topush for the most part, but they
don't learn.
One case in particular I was ata Dunkin' Donuts with one of the
dogs that I had in training andhe was right around a year.
So that's kind of a hormonalstage for them.
(22:12):
They go through fear, stages,stages and out of nowhere a
german shepherd popped up fromunder one of the tables and
lunged at him and of course weboth jumped and at the time they
had a huge statue, a cardboardstatue of grom, so we jumped
into that.
That fell down on top of thedog and it was a.
(22:32):
It was a nightmare, it was yourclassic nightmare, and from
that it took a long time to getthat dog to feel comfortable
going into Dunkin Donuts again,going into stores and without
having to look under undertables and chairs and things
like that, and so I feelstrongly that the people need to
(22:52):
be able to know how to helpyour dog through things like
that, because they happen.
Speaker 1 (23:00):
Yeah, absolutely.
You have no idea, and trying totrain for every possible
scenario must be impossible.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
Yeah, it is impossible.
Speaker 1 (23:11):
I am so impressed with these dogs and I'm sure
this must fit into yourcategories, like the ones who
know can sense a seizure, forexample, coming up and will
bring their person down to asitting position, I think.
Speaker 2 (23:34):
Yeah, one of our very first dogs was a seizure
detection dog, and so he wasBridget's sibling, and so
Bridget's pretty much the OG ofGoofy.
She's almost 12 now, but shedefinitely was the one dog who
(24:00):
was in tune.
If you walk in somewhere andBridget pulls you to somebody,
you know to let her go and staywith that person because she's
just so in tune.
But Buddy, her brother, was aseizure detection dog for a girl
who was 18 at the time and shehad lived a life of not having
really any privacy.
The parents couldn't really geta good night's sleep because
(24:22):
seizures happen at night time.
Um, that's the most, um, thehighest death rate is when
they're in bed and they seizeand you don't know about it.
So one we say that the onlything that we really can do or
can guarantee is not the rightword for it either, but we can't
(24:44):
really say that the dogs knowthat they're about to have a
seizure.
But I've seen it and it's trulyamazing.
Whether it's the chemistrywithin the human or body
language within the human, Idon't think we've quite figured
it out, but I am nearly certainit is scent, because that's what
we actually train them with onseizures.
(25:05):
If someone's having a seizure,you take the shirt that they
were wearing and you use that asa testing shirt and you do it
all through scent.
So I have to say this then likeI said in the beginning, the
cancer sniffing dogs scent workis amazing.
Dogs can smell through aconcrete wall.
Of course, they can smellinside of you, you know they.
(25:28):
There's a lot of studies thathave high specificity and high
sensitivity for urine cultures,sputum cultures, being able to
smell and detect certain things,even in COVID.
They trained them to detectCOVID on humans.
So that's just, it's an amazingsuperpower that they have.
Speaker 1 (25:53):
Like golden retrievers, needed another
superpower.
Exactly.
But yeah, I it isn't just art,it isn't just golden retrievers
that have that power.
Most dogs are some dogs too.
Speaker 2 (26:12):
Well, any dog can do it.
I feel the real key to um, thelabradors and the goldens is
that they want to please you,and so you have to have that
level of communication.
So every dog will be like, oh,I smell something different.
But if you train a dog of oneof these guys on that sweat
(26:38):
sample, that, this is what Iwant to do when this, when you
smell this, when you see thisexactly, and so being able them
to be smart enough to one beable to figure out that it's a
two-step process.
It's no longer just a I say sit, you say sit, you sit.
It's now.
(26:59):
I say sit, you sit, and thenyou jump on me when you smell
that, or you call me when yousmell things like that, and so
it's.
It requires a smart dog, um aswell, a dog as well as a dog.
That is very in tune to you.
I look at my dogs.
I don't care where I am or whatI'm doing at any given moment.
(27:21):
I look at them, they're lookingat me, and I think most people
would attest to that.
Yes, 100%.
When I look at my dog, they'relooking at me.
What are you looking at?
Speaker 1 (27:35):
All of this training.
It must be very expensive.
Speaker 2 (27:42):
It is very expensive, very expensive.
It is very expensive, um.
So we had a really rough yearlast year because we would have
one.
So the dogs would get droppedoff monday through thursday and
we have a trainer work with eachof the dogs, um, and that's
just not feasible.
But I want to say that theprice was probably up in the
(28:03):
$50,000 range.
But now we're actually startinga program where we have students
that want to learn how to traina dog, and so we're going to
provide them with our dogs.
So school costs money andschool you have to take time off
(28:24):
from everything else.
So if you want to really learnhow to train a dog, this is the
the best way to do it.
We have academic portion wherewe have modules, tests and all
of that stuff, but we also havethe hands-on and so two days a
week you come here three hoursat a time, you do your clinical
here and you learn how to do thehands-on portion, and so you
(28:48):
start.
Module zero is when the puppy'sborn, um.
Module one is three months tofive months and then just each
module is another couple ofmonths until the dog is two
years of age basically, what'sthat you're training?
Speaker 1 (29:04):
your trainers basically what's that?
You're training your trainers.
Speaker 2 (29:06):
Yeah, yes.
You're bringing in a wholegroup, and we're allowing them
hands-on with our dogs, but italso gets our dogs hands-on with
humans, and so it's a very goodmodel.
Speaker 1 (29:24):
How do you fund a nonprofit like this?
I mean, is it?
Speaker 2 (29:28):
cool.
We do a lot of just regularfundraisers.
We have a golf tournamentcoming up in September.
That's probably our biggestmoneymaker for the year.
We apply for grants.
Our DA was very generous withgrants for the police department
so he would give she would givethe police departments a grant
(29:51):
to purchase our dogs.
We have two district attorneyoffices that we work closely
with in my local area that havefound you know they.
They can't stop at one dog.
They're both on to at least 10apiece, so they see the benefit
(30:12):
of it.
Speaker 1 (30:14):
Well, this is.
You have such a cool programhere, pauline.
I really really reallyappreciate what you do.
Any thought of like, liketaking this nationally.
Speaker 2 (30:27):
Yeah, I think I'm not opposed to it.
Speaker 1 (30:33):
Perfect, I am going to have links to your website.
I think you have a donationpage on your website.
I'll do that separately.
Okay, and you guys are justmaking such a positive impact in
the world and in the lives ofother people and I think it's
(30:55):
fantastic, it's amazing.
Speaker 2 (30:57):
Thank you, it's pretty kind.
Speaker 1 (31:00):
It is pretty kind, you're right.
That's why you're here.
That's why we're here togetherthank you so much for your time
today, pauline.
I really appreciate it you aswell hey everybody.
I want to thank you for takingthis time to listen to this
episode with my guest, paulinehogler from GoFee Dogs.
(31:23):
I want to acknowledge right nowI said it wrong the entire
episode.
I said GoFi, it's GoFee Dogsgolden opportunities for
independence.
I hope you were able to takesomething positive from the time
that you spent here with us.
Maybe you'll be inspired, Maybeyou'll be motivated, Maybe
(31:44):
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You've been listening to theKindness Matters Podcast.
I'm your host, Mike Rathbun.
Have a fantastic week.
Hello everyone and welcome to the Kindness Matters
podcast.
I'm your host, mike Rathbun.
On this podcast, we promotepositivity, empathy and
compassion because we believethat kindness is alive and well,
and there are people andorganizations that you may not
(00:21):
have heard of in the world,making their communities a
better place for everyone, andwe want you to hear their
stories.
On this podcast, we talk aboutmatters of kindness because
kindness matters.
Hey, welcome to the show,everybody.
I am so glad and so thankfulthat you chose to take 30
(00:48):
minutes out of your time, 30-ishminutes out of your day, to
listen to this podcast.
I appreciate it so much.
You have no idea and you knowwhat, if you're not already, go
ahead and subscribe whereveryou're listening to this podcast
, whether it's Spotify or Appleor YouTube or wherever.
(01:09):
Go ahead and subscribe becausewe appreciate that and that way
you can keep all up to date onany of our new episodes, like
this one.
I have such a great episodewith you guys today.
If you know me at all, you knowhow I love dogs, and this one
just kind of fell into my lap.
(01:30):
My guest today is PaulineHogler, and she is an RN and a
certified professional dogtrainer with over 30 years of
experience with competitiveobedience, agility, consulting
clients and group dog behavior.
(01:52):
She is also a critical carenurse, which makes her the
perfect candidate to lead Go-FiDogs.
And you're asking well, what'sGo-Fi Dogs?
Go-fi stands for goldenopportunities, for independence.
Welcome to the show, pauline.
Thank you so much for takingthe time to be on today thank
(02:14):
you for having me.
This is wonderful um, and thisis now in addition to all your
dog training experience you arealso a breeder, is that correct?
Speaker 2 (02:25):
Correct.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
And you breed exclusively Golden Retrievers.
Correct why.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
Golden Retrievers, I think because of my lifestyle.
When I first married my husband, I wanted German Shepherds.
Probably wanted GermanShepherds most of my life.
They're just the coolest dog.
But he was right when he saidwe have nieces and nephews
(02:58):
coming through the yard all thetime, people coming over and
that kind of thing, and wereally probably should focus
more on a family breed.
And so I got my first GoldenRetrieverver oh, I'd say, over
30 years ago and she became myfirst breeding dog.
My parents bred dogs growing up, so it's something that I
absolutely love, love, love.
I love puppies.
(03:19):
There's nothing better than alitter of puppies and puppy
breath Puppy breath is the best,so it's.
It really is in your blood isn'tit.
It really is.
My father was a farmer and sohe would tell me stories about
him raising the horses.
I can't talk, that's fine.
(03:51):
So he had all kinds of animalsand just the stories he would
always tell when we were kidsabout the horses and the pigs
and the cows and all of thatstuff.
I thought it was really cool.
So growing up my parents breddogs and when I became old
enough and had my own house thatI was able to do it myself, I
(04:14):
continued on with that.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
Yeah, and I love golden retrievers.
I grew up with Labradorretrievers, which I think is
probably about as close to aGolden Retriever,
temperamental-wise, as you canget, but Golden Retriever just
kind of another level, aren'tthey?
Speaker 2 (04:37):
They really are, just in the sense of their
intuitiveness, really for thetherapy dog work and the service
dog work.
A lot of what we do with peoplewith disabilities also comes
with nervousness, anxiousness,um, you know, the dogs really
need to be in tune to that andbe able to help the handlers
(04:59):
through things like that, and sothey fail.
The golden retrievers arebetter in that regard.
The you pair up a goldenretriever with someone with a
cane and they're going to slowdown their steps on their own.
You don't have to tell them alab's probably going to take
them down the street whether hewanted to go down the street or
not so they're both great dogs,but I like the goldens with a
(05:26):
little bit more of a.
I feel they have a little morebrain to them and a little bit
more intuitive to personalfeelings and that kind of thing.
Speaker 1 (05:37):
Yeah, I think labs are intuitive when it comes to
water.
Yeah, but that's about it.
Yes, yeah, yeah, but that'sabout it.
Yes, yeah, yeah.
And I know what you're sayingabout family dogs too, because
they really are.
Yeah, we've had several.
(05:59):
My wife and I have had severaldogs.
I've had several dogs and wehave an invisible fence for our
yard, which is great.
All of our dogs have learned itand respected it.
We had one dog his name wasSammy and he was a shepherd
(06:19):
yellow lab mix, and at his peakhe was like 110 pounds.
He was enormous and he saw arabbit in the neighbor's yard
and blew through the fence,yipped on the way out and then
stood there and looked at theneighbor's yard and looked back
at his yard, looked back at theneighbor's yard and went.
(06:40):
He came back in our yard,yipped on the way back in too,
but never, ever breached thatfence again.
So I mean, you know, oh, wow.
But that doesn't mean other dogscan't get into your yard right
and then pull them off, butwe've never had one that we were
(07:04):
afraid to have, like the kidshave their friends over, or what
have you.
Speaker 2 (07:10):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (07:11):
But there is that concern, of course, and that's
where Goldens come in, and youwere talking a little bit about
all of the different, becauseyou're dogs at Go-Fi Dog, you
have a lot of different programs.
Right, correct, you've got wehelp a lot of people.
(07:34):
Yes, okay, let's go throughthem one by one.
You have the community resourcedog.
Let's talk about that type ofdog.
Speaker 2 (07:43):
Okay, community resource dogs is a trademark
that we came up with when wewere working with the police
department in our town and he'sa community resource officer and
so it really fit in perfectlybecause his job is connecting
the community, bridging peopletogether, making police
departments a place to go tohelp, not a bad place that you
(08:07):
go when you're in trouble.
And so we were talking forquite a while and trying to
figure out what are we going tokind of call this dog.
It's not really a comfort dogin the sense of it's not just
kind of helping at the stationwith the people, it's not just
providing comfort, it actuallydoes.
It passes certain tests.
(08:28):
We go through rigorous trainingthroughout the dog's life and
so when the puppy turns sixmonths of age, that puppy goes
through a test, kind of coinedby the AKC, called the Puppy
Star Test and just making surethat the socialization is there,
the owners are knowledgeable,the handlers are knowledgeable
(08:50):
about what the dogs should have,their vaccines, their licenses
through the town, all of thatkind of stuff.
And then for the next sixmonths you work on the canine,
good citizen kind of things, andthat's really just your.
It's not so much basic obedience, it's basic obedience combined
(09:11):
with tolerance for differentsituations, different people.
Um, one of the test piece testitems is can somebody else come
up and brush your dog?
Can somebody else lean overthem and pat them on the head,
um, and those kind of things.
So it it takes the obedience.
You know you can your shepherdsand your malinois.
(09:32):
They can be the most obedientdog in the whole world, but
don't pat him um so um.
You know, knowing that most ofmy dogs that I breed are going
into homes, either family homesor someone with a disability or
a community engagement type ofsituation, that's why we've
(09:56):
really focused on the dogs thatwe do breed and I have to say
it's not even just so much thatthey're golden retrievers,
because within my bloodlines Ihave a very lab-like I call it
line bloodline.
where they're busy they mightrip things apart.
And then I have differentbloodlines that I would never
put into a social kind of thingbecause they're so shy and timid
(10:20):
that it's stressful for them.
So really kind of trying tofind, even within the dogs that
I breed, that special dog, thatspecial bloodline that can go
anywhere, do anything,generalize situations and be
confident in those situationsand still be able to be on task
(10:43):
for what they need to do, withdistractions and things like
that.
Speaker 1 (10:49):
Yeah, just going back to that community resource
because that's so huge, when yousee oftentimes cops, right or
wrong, have depending on theneighborhood.
Cops, right or wrong, havedepending on the neighborhood
might have.
There might be some hardfeelings there.
Speaker 2 (11:13):
Absolutely.
Speaker 1 (11:13):
But when you have a cop walk up with a golden
retriever, it really kind ofsmooths things out, doesn't it?
Speaker 2 (11:21):
100% and I can't even begin to tell you the amount of
stories that the officers tellus.
Literally on the very first dayI had one officer call and was
like Pauline, you wouldn'tbelieve what just happened.
And this kind of thing happensa lot with our dogs.
He said there was a child whowas having a tantrum and he
(11:45):
literally was in the bathroomand he ripped everything apart.
He ripped the toilet paperthing off of the wall.
He was having a really hardtime and we don't encourage when
people are in that kind ofstate to utilize the dog so much
because we don't want them toget hurt.
But he felt confident thatafter a conversation with him he
said it's officer chad.
(12:06):
It's like not right now,officer chad, not having a good
day.
And he said well, do you wantto just come out and talk to me
for a few minutes?
He's like no, not today.
And then he said oh, really, um, okay, maybe for a minute.
(12:31):
And he said he came out of thebathroom, he sat on the ground,
he pet the dog.
We do we train them task work.
So we train them to lie acrosslaps to do a weighted pressure,
which science shows that it'sreally beneficial in situations
like this and he said withinfive minutes he was back in
(12:52):
class.
And so a lot of these stories,especially the autistic
community.
We don't really know as asociety how to deal with people
that have autism, even any kindof mental health.
We don't really as a societyknow how to deal with that.
We haven't figured that out yetbut I feel like the dogs have.
(13:15):
We have made trips to thehospital in an ambulance.
That officer in my own hometownhere said a girl was in school,
got into a fight, was having atantrum, she was throwing um
things left and right.
(13:35):
And he said he showed up atscene and there were four
officers surrounding her in aresident front yard and, um, he
said nobody was getting anywherewith her and it was really
pretty much to the point wherethey would have to arrest her.
And that's the last thingofficers want, schools want.
You know, nobody wants that.
(13:56):
And so he said you know, let'sjust try and calm down a little
bit.
I gotta let my dog out realquick.
And he said as soon as he saidthe word dog, she honed in on
him and he's like do you likedogs?
And she said yeah, I like dogsa lot.
And so he's like if you want,you can come and Pat sit down,
(14:23):
take a breather, pat Rubble, andjust see how this goes.
Speaker 1 (14:26):
And once again, that kid went back to school let
alone instead of bail.
Speaker 2 (14:29):
Yeah, the fire department was on scene, the
police were on scene and thisdog, out of all of those people,
was able to get this girl to goup, get up and go back to
school and calm down enough thatshe was rational thinking and
that kind of stuff.
So, even financially, the amountof money that they save
(14:51):
municipalities between nothaving to go to an emergency
department I work in anemergency department.
That's the last place that achild with autism should be.
It's the last place that peoplewith mental health should be.
It's not last place that peoplewith mental health should be.
It's not geared towards thatand unfortunately, with the
shortage of care that we havecurrently, they sit in an
(15:13):
emergency for days, and so to beable to not only save the
ambulance trip preventing themfrom going to an emergency room,
they're saving them fromsitting in an emergency room for
days upon days on end.
So it's really really.
It's blown my mind how reallybeneficial it is for communities
(15:35):
, for just your, each town thatgets one of these dogs cannot
say enough about the work thatthey do and that they never
imagined that they're able to dowhat they do in each town and
every chief calls me and saysPauline, you wouldn't believe.
And I say yes, I would.
Yep.
Speaker 1 (15:56):
I knew what I was doing when I created this
program.
Speaker 2 (15:59):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:01):
Okay, so that's community resource dogs.
You also have a program forfacility dogs.
Now, what type?
Of dog, would that be?
Speaker 2 (16:12):
So we do a lot of schools.
Many colleges BU, babson, curryCollege here in the area have
our dogs In colleges there.
It's a little different but thesame in the sense that students
going to schools there's a lotof stress when they're in
college, their first year incollege they're away from their
(16:34):
family and I want to sayprobably the most common comment
that people say is I can'tleave.
How much I miss my dog and it'sso nice to be able to pat this
dog because it's you know, it'sa yeah, it's not being away so
this is just for collegestudents then we do.
(16:55):
We do schools.
We have dogs in elementaryschools, which was my biggest
concern.
We really wanted to um, I thinkthe whole time she was talking
I was like it's not gonna work,it's not going to work, it's not
going to work, it's working.
And I have to say that dog isdoing amazing things in a
younger population, yeah, butalso we have middle school that
(17:18):
has them, high schools that havethem yeah, a lot of times the
guidance counselors will havethem, and then dogs can I mean
kids can sign up to see them,that kind of thing, yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:36):
And I know we have a lady up here who has put
together a program for kids.
Well, to bring dogs andhandlers, therapy dogs, into um
middle schools, becauseoftentimes when we know kids are
(17:57):
stressed to the max these days,right, and a lot of it begins I
think in middle school is whatshe found, and she brings the
dogs in and they calm right downand yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker 2 (18:10):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:12):
So that's a facility dog.
Speaker 2 (18:15):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (18:17):
And then the one I like the most service dogs.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
Service dogs are really cool.
When I first started thisprogram it was because I well,
when I was thinking about doingthis, I heard about cancer
sniffing dogs and, as a nurse,of course that's a nurse who
loves dogs Exactly, and you knowI did my share of research.
(18:45):
There were people doing it, butultimately it came back to as
much as they can do it, I think,ethically.
What are we going to do?
Put a bunch of dogs in cagesand have them sniff samples,
kind of thing?
So I did get off of that, butit did get me on the track.
My niece is paralyzed and so Ihad been spending some time with
(19:06):
her and we both.
I just kept on saying you needit, you need a service dog, you
need to get a service dog, justlike I don't want to have to
work oh yeah, I mean okay, theywould love it, they would love
to work for you.
Um, and then, shortly after wehad that discussion, a girl that
worked for me through highschool, helped them with the
(19:29):
dogs and the animals, came backand said I've been thinking of
starting a service dog program.
And so it was literally likethe next morning.
I'm like that is just thecraziest thing.
So clearly it's meant to happen.
Speaker 1 (19:44):
Well, yeah.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
And here we are, 10 years later.
Speaker 1 (19:48):
There are so many different categories of service,
Doc you have service cards forveterans for PTSD for disabled
people you do first respondersas well, I think, or no, we do
do first responders.
Speaker 2 (20:03):
Because and it's sort of the same thing as the
veterans, but maybe a differentkind- well, ptsd is ptsd and
they're all kind of out in theline of fire out there.
Speaker 1 (20:14):
So right um they're beneficial did I miss a category
of service dog?
Speaker 2 (20:21):
disabled people, ptsd um children, veterans, um
people with disabilities.
We really focus our servicedogs on who we can help the most
and we don't necessarily pick apopulation we go with.
Who can we do the most for whatwould the best scenario for our
(20:46):
dog be?
What's the best scenario forsomeone taking in one of our
dogs?
And we like to stay local,right in our own community.
We try and just focus 25 milesfrom um Walpole but um, we're
getting to the point where Ifeel confident that we can kind
of start to work outside ofthose lines.
(21:07):
But the primary reason for thatis that the majority of service
dogs that get trained fail andI thought that was just awful,
you know they fail they fail.
Um, the success rates forservice dogs is pretty bad, um,
(21:29):
and so I wanted to change that,and I feel the primary way to
change that is that people haveto know more.
The people have to be able totroubleshoot when things go
wrong.
They need to have a better bondwith their dog.
Most of the programs do acouple of weeks where they put
the dog and the human togetherand then they do training, they
(21:51):
learn I want to say the buttonsto push for the most part.
They do training, they learn.
I want to say the buttons topush for the most part, but they
don't learn.
One case in particular I was ata Dunkin' Donuts with one of the
dogs that I had in training andhe was right around a year.
So that's kind of a hormonalstage for them.
(22:12):
They go through fear, stages,stages and out of nowhere a
german shepherd popped up fromunder one of the tables and
lunged at him and of course weboth jumped and at the time they
had a huge statue, a cardboardstatue of grom, so we jumped
into that.
That fell down on top of thedog and it was a.
(22:32):
It was a nightmare, it was yourclassic nightmare, and from
that it took a long time to getthat dog to feel comfortable
going into Dunkin Donuts again,going into stores and without
having to look under undertables and chairs and things
like that, and so I feelstrongly that the people need to
(22:52):
be able to know how to helpyour dog through things like
that, because they happen.
Speaker 1 (23:00):
Yeah, absolutely.
You have no idea, and trying totrain for every possible
scenario must be impossible.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
Yeah, it is impossible.
Speaker 1 (23:11):
I am so impressed with these dogs and I'm sure
this must fit into yourcategories, like the ones who
know can sense a seizure, forexample, coming up and will
bring their person down to asitting position, I think.
Speaker 2 (23:34):
Yeah, one of our very first dogs was a seizure
detection dog, and so he wasBridget's sibling, and so
Bridget's pretty much the OG ofGoofy.
She's almost 12 now, but shedefinitely was the one dog who
(24:00):
was in tune.
If you walk in somewhere andBridget pulls you to somebody,
you know to let her go and staywith that person because she's
just so in tune.
But Buddy, her brother, was aseizure detection dog for a girl
who was 18 at the time and shehad lived a life of not having
really any privacy.
The parents couldn't really geta good night's sleep because
(24:22):
seizures happen at night time.
Um, that's the most, um, thehighest death rate is when
they're in bed and they seizeand you don't know about it.
So one we say that the onlything that we really can do or
can guarantee is not the rightword for it either, but we can't
(24:44):
really say that the dogs knowthat they're about to have a
seizure.
But I've seen it and it's trulyamazing.
Whether it's the chemistrywithin the human or body
language within the human, Idon't think we've quite figured
it out, but I am nearly certainit is scent, because that's what
we actually train them with onseizures.
(25:05):
If someone's having a seizure,you take the shirt that they
were wearing and you use that asa testing shirt and you do it
all through scent.
So I have to say this then likeI said in the beginning, the
cancer sniffing dogs scent workis amazing.
Dogs can smell through aconcrete wall.
Of course, they can smellinside of you, you know they.
(25:28):
There's a lot of studies thathave high specificity and high
sensitivity for urine cultures,sputum cultures, being able to
smell and detect certain things,even in COVID.
They trained them to detectCOVID on humans.
So that's just, it's an amazingsuperpower that they have.
Speaker 1 (25:53):
Like golden retrievers, needed another
superpower.
Exactly.
But yeah, I it isn't just art,it isn't just golden retrievers
that have that power.
Most dogs are some dogs too.
Speaker 2 (26:12):
Well, any dog can do it.
I feel the real key to um, thelabradors and the goldens is
that they want to please you,and so you have to have that
level of communication.
So every dog will be like, oh,I smell something different.
But if you train a dog of oneof these guys on that sweat
(26:38):
sample, that, this is what Iwant to do when this, when you
smell this, when you see thisexactly, and so being able them
to be smart enough to one beable to figure out that it's a
two-step process.
It's no longer just a I say sit, you say sit, you sit.
It's now.
(26:59):
I say sit, you sit, and thenyou jump on me when you smell
that, or you call me when yousmell things like that, and so
it's.
It requires a smart dog, um aswell, a dog as well as a dog.
That is very in tune to you.
I look at my dogs.
I don't care where I am or whatI'm doing at any given moment.
(27:21):
I look at them, they're lookingat me, and I think most people
would attest to that.
Yes, 100%.
When I look at my dog, they'relooking at me.
What are you looking at?
Speaker 1 (27:35):
All of this training.
It must be very expensive.
Speaker 2 (27:42):
It is very expensive, very expensive.
It is very expensive, um.
So we had a really rough yearlast year because we would have
one.
So the dogs would get droppedoff monday through thursday and
we have a trainer work with eachof the dogs, um, and that's
just not feasible.
But I want to say that theprice was probably up in the
(28:03):
$50,000 range.
But now we're actually startinga program where we have students
that want to learn how to traina dog, and so we're going to
provide them with our dogs.
So school costs money andschool you have to take time off
(28:24):
from everything else.
So if you want to really learnhow to train a dog, this is the
the best way to do it.
We have academic portion wherewe have modules, tests and all
of that stuff, but we also havethe hands-on and so two days a
week you come here three hoursat a time, you do your clinical
here and you learn how to do thehands-on portion, and so you
(28:48):
start.
Module zero is when the puppy'sborn, um.
Module one is three months tofive months and then just each
module is another couple ofmonths until the dog is two
years of age basically, what'sthat you're training?
Speaker 1 (29:04):
your trainers basically what's that?
You're training your trainers.
Speaker 2 (29:06):
Yeah, yes.
You're bringing in a wholegroup, and we're allowing them
hands-on with our dogs, but italso gets our dogs hands-on with
humans, and so it's a very goodmodel.
Speaker 1 (29:24):
How do you fund a nonprofit like this?
I mean, is it?
Speaker 2 (29:28):
cool.
We do a lot of just regularfundraisers.
We have a golf tournamentcoming up in September.
That's probably our biggestmoneymaker for the year.
We apply for grants.
Our DA was very generous withgrants for the police department
so he would give she would givethe police departments a grant
(29:51):
to purchase our dogs.
We have two district attorneyoffices that we work closely
with in my local area that havefound you know they.
They can't stop at one dog.
They're both on to at least 10apiece, so they see the benefit
(30:12):
of it.
Speaker 1 (30:14):
Well, this is.
You have such a cool programhere, pauline.
I really really reallyappreciate what you do.
Any thought of like, liketaking this nationally.
Speaker 2 (30:27):
Yeah, I think I'm not opposed to it.
Speaker 1 (30:33):
Perfect, I am going to have links to your website.
I think you have a donationpage on your website.
I'll do that separately.
Okay, and you guys are justmaking such a positive impact in
the world and in the lives ofother people and I think it's
(30:55):
fantastic, it's amazing.
Speaker 2 (30:57):
Thank you, it's pretty kind.
Speaker 1 (31:00):
It is pretty kind, you're right.
That's why you're here.
That's why we're here togetherthank you so much for your time
today, pauline.
I really appreciate it you aswell hey everybody.
I want to thank you for takingthis time to listen to this
episode with my guest, paulinehogler from GoFee Dogs.
(31:23):
I want to acknowledge right nowI said it wrong the entire
episode.
I said GoFi, it's GoFee Dogsgolden opportunities for
independence.
I hope you were able to takesomething positive from the time
that you spent here with us.
Maybe you'll be inspired, Maybeyou'll be motivated, Maybe
(31:44):
you'll be motivated, Maybeyou'll be moved.
If you experienced any of thosepositive feelings, please
consider sharing this podcastwith your friends and family and
the butcher at the grocerystore.
Whatever the case may be, itwould mean the world to me and
I'm always striving to offer youa better podcast.
(32:06):
So, you know, give me somefeedback, Let me know how you
think I'm doing, Email me, Leaveme a message on our socials.
It would mean the world to us.
This podcast is part of theMayday Media Network.
If you have an idea for apodcast, let's say, and you need
(32:29):
some production assistance.
Or maybe you already have apodcast and are looking for a
supportive network to join.
Check out maydaymedianetworkcomand check out the many
different shows they have, likeAfrocentric Spoiled, my Movie
Generation Mixtape In a Pickleradio show, Wake Up and Dream
(32:51):
with D'Anthony Palin, Staxo, Paxand the Time Pals.
We'll be back again next weekwith a brand new episode and we
would be honored if you wouldjoin us.
You've been listening to theKindness Matters Podcast.
I'm your host, Mike Rathbun.
Have a fantastic week.
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