What Do Therapy Dogs Actually Do? An Interview with Monica Callahan (10+ Years of Therapy Dog Work)

While most of us have heard the term ‘therapy dog’, what therapy dogs actually do remains a bit of a mystery to many!

In this episode, I’ll be interviewing Monica Callahan to help us all gain a true understanding of what therapy dogs really do and how they improve lives everywhere!

MEET MONICA CALLAHAN

Monica Callahan has been a professional dog trainer for over 10 years and graduated from the Karen Pryor Academy in 2012. She is currently serving on the Board of Directors for the Alliance of Therapy Dogs. She is a current rally judge for the C-WAGS organization. In 2021, she graduated from the prestigious licensing program, Family Paws. Family Paws is geared toward working with families who are welcoming babies into families with dogs or continuing to keep toddlers and children safe and dog aware.

Monica also runs her own dog training business, Family Fido Dog Training. Monica helped start the MYR Airport P.E.T.S. therapy dog program in December of 2021. On top of all of that, The Hero Dogs was started by Monica and her husband to showcase the therapy work they do for first responders and crisis response.

Learn more about Monica and her work here: https://familyfidotraining.com/

WHAT DOES THE THERAPY DOG CERTIFICATION PROCESS LOOK LIKE?

Monica stressed that one reason she loves and believes so strongly in the Alliance of Therapy Dogs is because of their testing and certification process!

Many other tests and certifications are strictly behavior based, but ATD’s certification process chooses to focus on handler and dog relationship and temperament.

Monica emphasized that this type of certification process helps to more effectively approve only the dogs that can truly handle therapy dog work.

Of course, there are behaviors your dog should have a solid understanding of to become a therapy dog. Here are some things your dog should be able to do:

-Loose leash walking

-Responsiveness to handler, even in distracting situations

-Not jumping when greeted

-Not jumping when greeting someone sitting down (as is common in a therapy work situation)

-Not being startled by people rushing by (ie, nurses down a busy hospital hall)

Monica recommends ensuring that your dog could pass the Canine Good Citizen test as part of their therapy dog training!

As part of the Alliance of Therapy Dogs’ certification process, dogs are required to go through three different on-site (ie, senior citizens home, hospital, etc.) observations to ensure their capabilities.

WHAT DOES A THERAPY DOG DO & WHAT ARE THE BENEFITS?

While there isn’t one specific task a therapy dog does, their general role is to provide affection, comfort, and support to people in need.

This can be done in a variety of ways and in a variety of scenarios.

Here are some places where therapy dogs often do their work. ⬇️

-Hospitals

-Schools

-Offices

-Nursing homes

-Disaster areas

-Police & fire stations (more on that later)

-Libraries and more

Here are some of the specific things a therapy dog might do during their work. ⏬

-Be pet by people

-Play simple games with people

-Snuggle & cuddle with people

-Be groomed by people (especially those in rehabilitative situations working to improve or re-learn motor skills)

-Simply, be near people needing support and comfort

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
This is the perfect pup podcast.Helping you build a better
relationship with your pup presented by pop furred.
Hello. Pop parents and welcome to
today's episode of the perfect pup podcast.
My name is Devon. I'm really excited for today's
episode for a couple reasons. Number one, we have Monica
Callahan on with us and she is probably one of the best people

(00:22):
to talk to about the topic that I am so excited about which is
therapy dogs and what they actually do and how they can If
it people around them. So thank you so much Monica for
joining us on the podcast. Thank you.
I'm excited. I am as well.
I was mentioning to Monica beforehand.
That I've always had an interestin therapy dogs and what they do

(00:44):
and I think generally there are some misconceptions and there
are some kind of question marks about you know you hear therapy
dog but you don't really know what it might mean.
So we're going to dive into that, we're going to give an
overview of not. Only what therapy therapy dogs
do but how Monica is working in that field to just kind of bring

(01:05):
more knowledge to Everyday, pup parents like me and like our
listeners. And I want to give a quick
overview of who Monica is. So you know who I'm talking to?
I'm going to do a little bit of reading here because I don't
want to miss anything. So Monica has been a
professional dog trainer for over 10 years and graduated from
the Karen prior Academy. She's currently serving on the

(01:26):
board of directors for the alliance of therapy dogs.
We will talk more about. She is a current rally judge,
for the see Wags organization, and in 2021, she graduated from
the prestigious licensing program family pause.
I wasn't familiar with family, pause, and she explained to me,
family pause is geared toward working with families who are
welcoming babies into families with dogs or continuing to keep

(01:50):
Toddlers and children's childrensafe and dog aware.
So, a very important program. And on top of all that, she also
runs her own dog training. In company family, Fido dog
training. She helped start the myr
airport, pets therapy, dog program, pretty recently.
And on top of all of that, she has Monica.

(02:13):
And her husband started, what they call the hero dogs, to
showcase the therapy worked at their specific.
Dogs are doing for First Responders and crisis response.
So you sound like you're a very busy person.
You've got a lot going on a lot that you're doing, which I I
love to see that. Anything I missed on your inch
are anything. You want to add.

(02:34):
Now, that's pretty much it. I've been doing therapy work.
I believe, I certified with my first dog in 2011, and so we've
kind of been here and there. I also had my kids starting in
2012. So it's been interesting,
raising kids, and being in the dog world all at the same time,
so that's awesome. I have even more.

(02:57):
I'm even more appreciative of you taking the time to be on.
On the episode. So let's get right into it.
So, Hannah gave a quick story there that you've been doing
therapy work for over 10 years now.
How did you originally get started with therapy dogs and
why did you decide to get your dog to become a therapy, dog?
So, honestly, my first dog. I had, I got when I was 12 and

(03:21):
she would have been a phenomenaltherapy, dog.
But I knew nothing about it at that time.
Or really anything about dog training?
She was just kind of naturally that good dog.
We Is have growing up once. I went to college, I was going
for pre-vet and biology but I was also getting kind of into
dog, training at that same time.My local dog trainer.

(03:43):
I didn't necessarily agree with their training protocol.
So for my second dog, I got my wanted to find someone that I
lined with a little better. So I ended up going about an
hour away and she was big into therapy dogs.
And so she was a tester Observerfor We were then called therapy
dogs Incorporated. And so I took puppy class with

(04:05):
her and she's like, hey, we werekind of becoming friends at that
point you know? Your dog seems like they would
be a really awesome therapy, dog.
Have you ever considered it and I've had probably known about
therapy dogs but not really anything about getting into them
or anything like that. So we kind of just started
seeing how he would do. And I immediately fell in love

(04:27):
with the work. And now she is also on the Of
directors as am. I so it's very exciting.
That's awesome. I love that I have found that
most people that I have on the podcast, right?
Like it starts with just your own personal experience and it
turns into, you know, something where you just you fall in love
with it, you realize. Wow, this needs to be something

(04:48):
that more people can kind of be part of and take advantage of.
So yeah, on that note, you mentioned what used to be called
therapy? Dogs Incorporated.
Now is Alliance of Therapy dogs.What exactly is Alliance of
therapy dogs? And what is your role within
that group? So Alliance of therapy dogs.
We are over 30 years old. Now, we are a testing and

(05:13):
certifying organization. And the reason that you want to
test and certify with a legit organization is because we
provide liability insurance, when you're volunteering with
your dogs. So a lot of those places that we
go to visit either require or really appreciate that.
You have that Ability insurance.When you visit, that makes a lot

(05:33):
of sense. It's good to have your ever.
So we talked a little bit pre-recording.
What exactly does that look likethe testing and becoming
certified? You know, kind of in a nutshell
because you mentioned that it's not just you know, your
quote-unquote, obedience type tasks.

(05:54):
What does it entail for a dog topotentially become certified as
a therapy dog? So So our organization is a
little different in terms of testing, and it's actually why I
really love our organization because we really like to take
into account how our dogs are feeling about it.
So it's not like a obedience test where they have to sit and
stay and things like that are handling portion of our test is

(06:18):
very, can your dog walk nicely with you?
That is a big thing because you don't want to be tripping or
being pulled over or anything like that when you are visiting.
So a lot of it is Nice loose leash walking.
We actually run someone kind of by you like a nurse.
Would if you're running down thehall or something pretty
quickly, to get to an emergency and then kind of Walk You by

(06:40):
someone who's walking a little weird, just to see how your dogs
do around those things. We do put hands on the dogs to
make sure they're comfortable being touched everywhere and
then we do have them come up to be pet for someone who is seated
because that's something they'regoing to be doing a lot to after
that. We actually go.
On three therapy observations with you so your dogs get to go

(07:03):
on three visits and we record, you know, any comments
observations that we make there is an optional fourth one if we
see something that's like, hmm. I don't know how I felt about
that. Let's throw on an extra
observation just in case and then that we do put passing fail
on that, but we don't give you the official, go ahead until you

(07:26):
send it into the office, the office looks it over and then
they let you Well, congrats you've passed or yeah.
That's very interesting. I it sounds arrow and you know,
it sounds like you were saying, it's very Hands-On and
applicable which is, which is how it should be.
So that's kind of a nice segue into I guess, kind of the meat
of this this episode is what do therapy dogs actually do?

(07:48):
Because I think a lot of us put parents have seen stories like,
you know, a therapy dog. Going into senior citizens home
or, you know, therapy dogs, I'veseen Seen articles about them
being set up outside of college campuses during finals or things
like that. But what is their role?
What are they actually doing? When, you know, you say I have

(08:11):
my therapy dog, I'm going to go work with them.
What does that entail? I think it varies on where you
are visiting and they're realizing that you can use them
in so many different places now compared to just nursing homes
or hospitals. Like it was back in the day.
Like could think that you know we we have research saying that

(08:34):
even just petting a dog for 10 minutes can really help lower
your cortisol levels, your heartrate, things like that.
So we know that that stuff is working how we can apply that to
different people berries. So you might see dogs you know,
like we go to the airport weekly.
People always ask us what do thedogs do at the airport?
A big thing? I think honestly is the workers

(08:57):
they are dealing with high stress.
Between people that are flying or delays in the flights and it
puts a lot of stress on them. And so, just seeing like the
security officer in the front ofour airport all the time, just
her face lights up. She just you can see or just
take a big deep breath because she's dealing with people that
she has to tell to keep moving all the time.

(09:19):
And some of them give them attitude and so just seeing her
be able to, like, okay, I get five seconds to just sit here
and pet a dog and not worry about anything else.
It's a really Breather. I had walked by someone else in
the airport the other day who just came over and said, oh my
gosh, I started crying. As soon as I saw the dog, and
she came over and Pat and apparently had just lost a

(09:41):
child. So you really never know what
you're going to run into and these situations.
We have dogs who are doing prosecutions to help children be
able to testify because just having that dog, there gives
them something to do with their hands helps.
Them feel a little bit more comfortable.

(10:02):
They can be anywhere from funeral homes.
Just helping people that are grieving to our First Responders
who deal with high stress every day and just getting that five
minutes to be able to sit there and pet a dog and focus on that
just really helps lower those blood levels, you know,
cholesterol. Wow, that it's honestly really

(10:26):
powerful because I, you know, you look at the everyday
stresses that we have as human beings.
And I think for those of us withdogs in our own home, I think we
sometimes kind of take it for granted and to hear that, you
know, you're going up to these people and their workplace and
being able to just provide that kind of stress relief for them.

(10:46):
I'm sure. That's so so powerful for them.
I-i'm curious. I didn't really Plan for this
but I know you mentioned First Responders.
And I know that's more along thelines of what your dog
specifically are doing. So, can you tell me a little
more outside of the airport sideof things?
How your therapy dogs are working with First Responders?

(11:09):
Sure. So my husband's actually a first
responder he was a veteran and went overseas.
A couple times, he was a police officer for seven years and now
he's a firefighter paramedic we've always enjoyed working
with them. Because they are different
crowd. They're not very expressive, you

(11:30):
know, even just looking at my husband, they don't like to show
those emotions a lot. And so seeing them take that
five minutes to be like oh a puppy like hello you know it's
very touching that you know my dogs can help them feel a little
bit of relief. We moved down here about a year
and a half ago but before that, we were doing a lot of just Kind

(11:53):
of going to any training that they had just to kind of give
them some down time with the dogs we have not specifically
done any crisis response, work down here with them but we do
have dogs who you know, if they have a traumatic situation
they're bringing dogs in to helpthe guys just kind of relax take

(12:15):
a few minutes to just, you know,chill out.
So there's a lot of different ways that they can help.
We do have actually a lot of Programs in South Carolina right
now that are really trying to focus on post-traumatic stress
disorder in our First Responders.
And so they are setting up different speeches and things
like that, that they're bringingdogs into or even kind of a

(12:38):
response team for guys that are struggling.
You know, and the dogs are a part of that too.
I love that. I, it gives me like a little bit
of like, the warm fuzzy feeling,you know, he's like, I love, I
love dogs. Her.
All you do like everyone. Here, listening, they love God.
But it's so powerful to rememberthat, like, they're more than

(13:00):
just these animals in our homes,right?
Like, they are living breathing creatures that have feelings and
emotions and not only that, but they can tap into those feelings
and emotions of the people around them.
It's just, it's such an amazing work that you're a part of and
that, you know, we're getting tolearn about right now, so I'm

(13:20):
sure there are a lot of people. Listening or watching who are
going to think, okay, this sounds awesome.
What do I do? How I want to become involved?
You know, they might be thinking, well, I don't know if
my dog could walk super calmly next to a nurse wrestling action
by or I don't know if I could handle this or do.

(13:41):
It does my dog have the temperament like what do you
recommend or what do you kind ofguide?
People to think about her? Look at when they're considering
having their dog become a therapy, dog.
I tell people obviously want to do it safely and positively, but
to get your dogs out there to see if they actually enjoy
visiting. A lot of people think that, you

(14:03):
know, my dog likes to be pet by me or my family members, but
when you get them out into public, they're not comfortable
with it. I actually had someone bring me
in to say, I want to do this work with my dog's.
I want to do it, I want to do itand I came inside and the dog
was terrified and I'm like, I does your dog really want to do?
I understand you? I totally get that feeling

(14:24):
because I want to do it but doesyour dog really want to do it?
And so I really stress like don't Porsche your dogs into
this because it's only going to make them more afraid or more
uncomfortable. And that's when we start to see
issues of our dogs being uncomfortable because people
want to do it so bad. But yeah.
I mean, just getting your dogs out there comfortably and making

(14:47):
sure that they're comfortable visiting with people and
obviously you want to work on, you know?
No, the nice greetings and the not jumping, and the nice
walking. But for a TD with, that's why we
call ourselves Alliance of therapy dogs.
You don't need any prior classesor anything like that, so your
dogs can be just self-trained. You don't need to you're not

(15:08):
required any classes. So you know if you feel like
you're ready then you are more than welcome to head to the
website and you know search up that tester Observer who can
help you test but yeah otherwisethen maybe if you are more
comfortable with classes than Now, get into just kind of like
a cgc is not required but it's not a bad class to kind of say,

(15:28):
oh okay does my dog kind of havesome of the things that it needs
to go through? Yeah I love that.
That's great advice. I'm just going to tell for those
who don't know cgc is Canine Good Citizen which is a kind of
probably one of the more common test that you might have for
general. Just training for house dog.

(15:49):
So I love that that's great advice.
I always think it's so important.
So yeah, not I just did an episode about, you know, not
putting our dogs into situationsthat are just not built for not
ready for and that's totally. Okay, so one kind of last
question to wrap things up. I know in, especially the age of
social media. There's a lot of different

(16:09):
conversations about therapy and service and emotional support
and you know, those types of things.
So, if you could have people walk away with maybe one kind of
clarifying point about therapy dogs or something that you maybe
wish, People understood about therapy dogs, what might that
be. So and that's a big thing that I
spend a lot of time at the airport.

(16:30):
Everyone's asking, does she fly?Where you guys going service
dogs? They help mitigate this
abilities for their owners. And so if I had a, you know,
disability in my dog helped me with the tasks that they do then
that would be a service dog. And I would have those access
rights to be able to go anywhereto fly, things like that therapy
dogs, just help other people feel better.

(16:51):
So I go places and they don't doanything in particular, they
just get pet and help other people feel better.
So they do not have those access, right?
So we have to be invited. So I started the program at the
airport, so we were invited in so I don't just get to take my
dogs anywhere that I want to go just because their therapy dogs.

(17:12):
Emotional support animals are a little bit different.
They don't have any specific training.
They don't do anything other than just making their owners
feel better. Kind of like a therapy dog.
But just for their owners and sothey only get that housing rate
so if the they live in an apartment that doesn't allow
dogs, they are allowed to bring their dog in or their animal.

(17:32):
So it could be a cat or a bunny or anything.
They do not anymore, get flight access.
So they used to be able to fly but they no longer do anymore.
So they kind of our their own separate little thing that just
kind of gets those housing rights but they're not allowed
to go anywhere special like a service dog would eat.
Either got it, very important clarifying points.

(17:55):
I appreciate learning that out. Well, thank you so much.
Monica, I have learned a lot. I have felt like a greater love
and passion for like, what the dogs are doing and I think it's
so so awesome. So thank you so much for joining
us on this episode. Thank you for having me.
Of course, and I'm going to in the show notes, I will put links

(18:16):
to all the different places where you can get in touch with
with Monica, you can learn more about Alliance of therapy dogs.
You can more learn more about Monica's training in particular
if you're in the area that she'sin all that good stuff.
It'll all be in the show notes and if you enjoyed this episode
please share it with other parents because you know they

(18:39):
there are certainly more people who want to learn about therapy
dogs and what they do. So please share it, leave a
review on Apple podcasts and other than that we will catch
you on the next episode.