How Fender Changed My Life

Meet Fender, Michael Holtvluwer's service dog. Fender is a 70-pound labradoodle. He is a rescue dog who was donated to the Sterling, CO prison by a woman who couldn't afford to feed or pay the vet bills for him and his brother Bongo. She thought they were very smart and told the prison if they passed the qualification testing for a service dog they could have both dogs. They both qualified and were trained by prisoners for 3 months in the prison and then transferred to Freedom Service Dogs of America in Denver where Fender was trained for an additional 7 months.

Fender was assigned to Michael in Nov 2012 and Freedom Service Dogs trained Michael and his dad on Fender's skills for 3 weeks. At Fender and Michael's graduation there were 8 dogs. Four of the dogs went to Veteran's who suffered from Post-Traumatic Stress and the other four went to people with physical disabilities.

Michael has a physical disability called Dystonia, a central nervous system movement disorder characterized by persistent or intermittent muscle contractions. Michael loves to play golf, ride horses at HorsePower (a therapeutic riding class), watch sports and listen to music.

Michael had deep brain stimulation surgery (DBS) in Jan 2009 and it really helped stabilize his upper body, however, it had a negative effect on his walking. Fender wears a harness that Michael can hold onto in order to help his walking. Fender also picks up things for Michael, pushes the handicap button to open doors, acts as a brace for Michael to help him get up from the floor, closes doors, and if Michael needs a parent and they are upstairs he will say "Find Dad" or "Find Mom" and Fender will look in every room in the house until he finds one of them.

Fender also provides companionship and has greatly enhanced Michael's self-confidence. When Michael first got Fender and was asked how it changed his life he said "Dad, it used to be that when I went somewhere out in public people would stare at me because I walk different. Now, whenever I go somewhere in public, people look at me and Fender and they smile! My whole world has changed".

When Fender is wearing his service dog vest he is a working dog and it is not appropriate for anyone other than Michael to pet him or try to get his attention. The best thing to do is ignore Fender and focus on Michael. If you want to pet Fender you need to ask Michael and Michael will give Fender a command that temporarily releases Fender from being a service dog and then you may pet him. When Fender is not working he loves to chase a ball, take walks around the neighborhood and play with Mike.

Join the Dogs for Dystonia campaign at www.dystonia-foundation.org/virtualwalk.