Sometimes healing from trauma and addiction begins with four paws, a wagging tail and a warrior's heart.
Warriors Heart is on a mission to help those it serves to get training and adopt a service dog.
“Our mission is to serve the warrior class, that is going to be active duty military, veterans and all the different types of first responders,” K9 Manager Michelle Axmaker said. “We’re here to help them start their healing journey and work through the traumas that led them there in the first place.”
Warriors Heart is a 42-day in-patient treatment center located on a more than 540-acre ranch in Texas that offers a K9 program as an elective option to its clients.
“There’s lots of places here where you can feel at peace, maybe sitting with God,” she said. “You can get back to nature and absorb it all. That’s important when you are healing from severe trauma.”
Warriors Heart trains two types of service canines – emotional support dogs and service dogs – in that idyllic setting.
Axmaker said emotional support dogs make humans feel better because they are with them.
“They are not trained to do anything specific,” she said. “They are not trained to do anything specific. They are a dog that makes us feel good.”
A mental health provider must provide a letter to make emotional support dogs “official,” said Axmaker.
Service dogs are trained to mitigate or assist with disabilities, including nightmares triggered by post-traumatic stress and anxiety.
Axmaker said Warriors Heart teaches its clients to “ground” when they feel anxious by taking a deep breath and touching their dog. Science has proven that simply touching a dog can lower stress.
“There’s a chemical reaction that happens in the brain,” she said. “It’s going to release the love hormone, which is the same hormone that we feel when we are falling in love and mamas feel when they are breastfeeding their babies,” she said. “It’s a natural anxiety reducer.”
That’s also why those who sleep with their dog get a higher quality of sleep, Axmaker said.
“They are touching their dog all night, creating that chemical reaction all night long, not just for the human but the dog as well,” she said.
Warriors Heart offers two options to its inpatients – the K9 experience where they spend quality time with dogs during their treatment, but don't train a dog to take it home.
“Some of our clients notice after spending a few days with the dogs they are feeling better, they are feeling more confident and relaxed,” Axmaker said. “And that leads to that step of I think I want to add a dog to my life full-time.”
The K9 Academy option offers specialized handler training and adoption for those who want to take a dog home. Warriors Heart dogs are custom-trained based on the individual’s needs to mitigate PTS symptoms, panic attacks, Tourette Syndrome ticks, seizures, nightmares, social anxieties, dissociation, lower-level anxieties and more.
“It’s very specific between the dog and the human and they get to pick the dog they feel the best around,” she said.
Twelve to 20 dogs are in residence at Warriors Heart at any time, with nearly 80 percent coming from local shelters and rescues, Axmaker said.
“We’re rescuing these dogs, but really these dogs are rescuing that warrior,” she said.
Axmaker has personal experience with how valuable a service dog can be. She credits her Boston Terrier, Otis, with helping her manage her PTS. She was working with the Military Working Dog Program at Lackland Air Force Base in Texas when she began noticing how service dogs were impacting the lives of her friends who had on.
“Many of my close friends had service dogs and I saw a huge difference in them over time, a reduction in medication, they were functioning better, feeling better and being more social.”
Axmaker said she knew what she was doing to manage her PTS was not working fast enough. An animal trainer, she trained Otis to wake her up from nightmares.
“Because of Otis, I’ve been able to eliminate sleeping medications and anti-anxiety medications out of my life completely,” she said.
Warriors Heart’s 24-hour hotline is 866-955-4035 and is answered by military, veterans and first responders. You can also learn more here.
Reach Julia LeDoux at Julia@connectingvets.com.