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With Carol Mola's Help, This Dog's Going to Be a Leader

A love of dogs translates into year-long training sessions with some very hard working pups.

Carol Mola already knows she’ll be crying on Nov. 28. That’s when she’ll have to take  Robbie, her floppy eared, sweet-faced, easygoing yellow lab, back to the Leader Dog campus in Rochester Hills, Mich., to continue his training to assist the blind. For over a decade, Mola and her husband, William, have trained leader dogs, fostering them in their home for the first 12 months of training.

“I’ll hate giving him up,” says Mola from her Elmhurst home. “Some people are better at it than others. I cry and cry. My kids know. They say, ‘OK, it’s a week before. Here we go.' ”

But for now, Mola, a special education teacher at Glenbard South High School, will try to put that day out of her mind and tend to the work at hand. Robbie is Mola’s fifth dog. The first two were canine companions, learning to assist dog owners with physical disabilities.

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When Mola’s father lost his eyesight a few years ago, she became more familiar with Leader Dogs.

“During his treatments I would visit the Blind Center, and when he was (learning) how to get to work and mobility training, I became exposed to all these dogs," she says. "I thought, ‘I just have to raise one of these.’ ” 

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The Leader Dog program was founded and is sponsored by the Lions Club. The dogs are bred and trained at the facility in Rochester Hills, socialized and trained for 12 months with people like Mola, then returned to Michigan for further training. After a rigorous process, dogs are matched with their permanent owners, who attend a 26-day program to learn to work with their dog. Because of generous donations, all of this is made available at no charge to the dog owner.

Mola says the puppy-raiser’s role in the long process to becoming a Leader Dog is crucial.

“We do all the socialization, which is really important,” she says. “There are developmental milestones they have to reach.”

If a dog is not socialized correctly, they can develop fears, she says. Much of what Mola does with Robbie is reinforce good, basic training. She and Robbie attend two hours of training on Tuesdays and three hours on Saturdays.

“That’s more than is required, but it seems to really work for us," she says, laughing.

Another important part of the training is exposing the dog to all kinds of experiences so that they, effectively, are not afraid of anything. 

That means you might see Robbie the Future Leader Dog in some unusual places.

“Today he went to church,” says Mola. “And tonight he’s going to the movies, to see ‘The King’s Speech.’ ”

Mola says she often takes him to the library, because of the slippery floors in the lobby.

Leader dogs are also exposed to a wide variety of sounds, textures and experiences. Since Mola’s daughter Lauren, a senior in high school, is a percussionist, Robbie has already attended a percussion concert.

“He has to be able to sleep through those,” says Mola. “You just don’t realize what he’ll need to do (as a leader dog). He needs to be like a person. The only way people learn is just through doing, so he has to be exposed to everything.”

Once a month, Mola meets with her regional puppy counselor for a special outing. The group might go on an airplane ride (donated by American Airlines), a dolphin show or to a mall with glass elevators.

When Robbie was just seven weeks old, Mola took him to a mall in Joliet, specifically to ride the big glass elevators and to navigate the carpeted stairs. Mola was terrified that the young pup Robbie would make a mess on the lush carpeting.

“The manager, this really well-dressed lady, comes up to me and she says, ‘I don’t care. The dog can pee anywhere he wants. We’ll clean up, don’t worry.' ” Mola breathed a sigh of relief. “They’re just so nice,” she says. “Everywhere I go with him, people are so nice.”

Bred for Perfection

There is a science to the breed of the dog. Most Leader Dogs are either labradors, golden retrievers, German shepherds, poodles or some mixes of those breeds. 

“The breeding part is really interesting,” says Mola.

While she says that in most cases, adopting strays is a wonderful thing, Leader Dogs must be bred specifically for the work they must do.

“There’s a lot to the temperament of a dog with breeding," she says. "Guide dogs have to have drive. Not every dog is cut out to be a service dog.”

Even with the best breeding, something still can go wrong. After the 12 months with a puppy raiser, the dog is then examined and evaluated again to make sure it doesn’t have allergies, hip dysplasia or any behavior quirks. If the dog isn’t perfect, it can’t go on to become a service dog. In that case, the puppy raiser gets first dibs to take the dog home. Otherwise, there is a long waiting list of people waiting to adopt rejected guide dogs.

It's Hard Work Being a Dog

If Robbie is fortunate to make it through all the Leader Dog training, he will be matched with a dog owner and will work for six to eight years. After that, a Leader Dog can retire.

“It’s very stressful,” says Mola of the work guide dogs do. “If I take Robbie to work with me, and he’s just sitting in a meeting all day, he comes home and he’s exhausted. He’s stressed. Even though he’s not actively moving, he’s paying attention and having to behave.”

Mola will receive updates about Robbie’s whereabouts, and once he retires, Mola could have the chance to get him back to live out the rest of his years. But, Mola knows that isn’t likely.

“That usually doesn’t happen. Usually someone in the family wants it, because it’s become part of their family.”

Despite the heartbreak of saying good-bye to the puppies she trains, Mola wouldn’t have it any other way.

“The best part is just knowing that you totally change someone’s life,” she says. “It’s life-changing to be able to have independence and mobility.”

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