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“Cody Bear, step up,” Lt. Col. Ty Edwards commands the golden retriever sitting beside his wheelchair.
The dog looks at the man, listens, and then steps front paws onto the wheelchair’s foot plate, tail wagging. “Good job!” Ty says, petting the dog’s head as his face splits into a big smile, the kind that moves all the muscles around his eyes.
He looks up at his wife, Anna, to see if she saw. She smiles, and beside them, Jeannie Bates, a Naples-based dog trainer, nods. They’ve been working on this task for awhile this morning and earlier Cody Bear was putting his paws in Ty’s lap. Now, Cody Bear’s got it down.
“He’s a pretty cool dog colonel,” Jeannie says and Ty agrees, still petting Cody Bear.
They’re in the living room of Ty and Anna Edwards’ Tampa home, and this is the day Cody Bear, a service dog trained by Jeannie, will be placed with the combat-wounded Marine after nearly two years of training, home visits, hospital visits and more.
For Ty and his family, it’s an exciting beginning. Cody Bear will help the 41-year-old Ty in hundreds of little ways, from opening cabinets and turning door handles to providing companionship and affection. For Jeannie, founder of the PAWS for Love Assistance Dogs program, it’s bittersweet: She’s saying goodbye to an animal who has been a constant companion, but she knows he’s going to be right at home.
Cody Bear takes the changes all in stride, just as he was trained to do.
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Ty’s wife jokingly calls him “Mayor” of the Veterans Administration hospital in Tampa. Walk down the hospital’s labyrinthine hallways beside Ty’s electric wheelchair and you’ll see what she means.
Everyone, from janitors to the head of the multiple trauma unit, stops to say hello. Younger men talk to him about their injuries. The barber in the basement asks for his help to get an autograph from a visiting general.
He’s a quiet man with an easy smile. The kind of person who connects people.
When the war in Iraq started in March 2003, Benjamin “Ty” Edwards was stationed in California. He remembers itching to be sent and then, he was, but both trips were fairly uneventful.
“I wasn’t in danger,” he says. “I wished I could have been in danger.”
“I wasn’t in danger,” Ty says. “I wished I could have been in danger.”
Lt. Col. Benjamin “Ty” Edwards works alongside Afghan National Army soldiers in May 2005. Provided photo.
When it was time to go to Afghanistan, he was excited. The military sent him to a province near the border with Pakistan in March 2008.
Ty and the Marines under his command worked with the Afghan National Army, and also built and maintained combat outposts and a border crossing site. When convoys came through, they’d set up to guard its passage, preventing ambushes.
“We were trying to get them to stand on their own two feet,” he explains. “… They were trying, but there was so much corruption and graft in the Afghan National Army that they couldn’t get their supplies on time.”
Ty clicks through photos on his computer, and in them, you see sweeping vistas of wooded hills and valleys, and big, jutting mountains.
When he gets to a photo of the sand-colored Humvee he was riding in the day he was shot, he pauses. Bullet holes riddle the windshield.
It was Oct. 18, 2008. They were en route to check voter registration sites when they were ambushed. Ty was commanding the mission from the passenger seat, a Navy medic was driving and Ty’s Afghani interpreter and another Marine were in the back. When the shooting started, he got out of the Humvee and ran to help the Afghan soldiers up ahead.
Bullets whipped over his head with loud cracks. There were more than you’d ever want to hear.
He doesn’t remember getting shot in the head. But he does remember opening his eyes and seeing blood running down the road and thinking, ‘Well, I’m going to die.’” He passed out.
Ty remembers seeing blood running down the road and thinking, ‘Well, I’m going to die.’
But the men in the Humvee weren’t about to leave him in the road. While the other Marine manned the Humvee turret gun, the interpreter and the doctor got out of the Humvee under fire and dragged Ty toward the vehicle.
“They did save my life,” he says. “I thank God everyday.”
Today, deep, white scars trace the lines of his temples from where the doctors had to open his skull.
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On a weekday afternoon in July 2010, Jeannie gets 13-month-old Cody Bear ready for public access training at a Naples Home Depot.
At 80 pounds, Cody looks like an adult dog, but he’s in the “big boy stage” between puppy and adult, Jeannie explains as she pushes a wire brush through his honey-colored coat. He looks into her eyes with his big brown ones.
“Down,” she says. Down he goes.
“Show me your belly,” she says, smiling and speaking in a singsong voice. He flips over, legs askew.
Photo by DAVID ALBERS
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Dog trainer Jeannie Bates works with Cody Bear, one of several service dogs she simultaneously trains for the PAWS for Love Assistance Dogs program, on July 30, 2010, in her East Naples training center. David Albers/Staff
She brushes his belly, legs and tail, and it’s clear that he loves it.
The trainers handle every part of the service dog’s body, pulling their tails and touching their faces, their ears, their legs. You never know when a child may come up and pull his tail, or poke him in the eye by accident, she says. Service dogs need to be calm in all situations.
Then she stands next to him and does nothing. She steps away a few steps. He twitches like he’s about to move.
“Wait,” she says, hand out and palm up, by his nose. She is firm, and always kind.
She’s training him to “autosit,” which means that every time Ty stops moving Cody Bear will sit automatically.
“These dogs have to have a high-level intelligence and they have to build exceptional impulse control,” Jeannie says. “High levels of thought and problem-solving and tons of patience.”
At the Home Depot, Jeannie pauses at the store’s entrance door, which wooshes open automatically and lets out a gust of air-conditioned coldness. They stand there a moment outside the door, and then Cody Bear gets a treat for waiting.
“These dogs have to have a high-level intelligence and they have to build exceptional impulse control,” Jeannie says.
For information about the PAWS for Love Assistance Dogs program or (239) 775-1660
Five steps inside, they pause again. Then walk around, Cody Bear on his leash, his bushy tail twitching back and forth and his eyes scanning the floor.
Through the paint aisle, Cody Bear breezes by towering rows of buckets without a second glance. But when she pauses a moment by the DampRid he sticks his nose by the packages and starts sniffing around.
“Uh uh,” she says, shaking her head. He backs off. Then she asks him to sit and wait as she stands and pretends to grab items off the shelves. She’s simulating a grocery store, she explains, where Cody Bear will have to sit and wait while Ty shops.
Next up, she hooks his leash to an orange plastic cart with a metal clip, gives him a treat, and starts rolling along, through lighting and into electrical. This teaches the dog to walk beside a wheeled, moving object she says. It’ll help when they work with Ty in his wheelchair.
For the last exercise, she speeds up and he trots along side her. She asks him to put his paws up on the cart handle and push it, and for awhile, he does. Then, that’s enough. Puppies can only work hard for about 15 minutes, she explains.
They’ve already done some public access training with Ty in Tampa, at Ikea and at a bookstore, she says. At the bookstore, Ty had trouble getting through the narrow aisles in his electric wheelchair, so she needs to teach Cody Bear to move in front of and behind his chair with ease.
It made her think twice about how much most people take mobility for granted, she says.
■ ■ ■
Jeannie’s sport utility vehicle pulls into Ty’s driveway, parking next to a blue, Toyota Sienna van with Marine stickers and an Auburn University plate on the front. It’s September 2010, a Sunday afternoon.
At the door of the house, she knocks and Anna, Ty’s wife, opens it. Alaina, his 7-year-old daughter, sits on a bench by the door. Jeannie pauses at the threshold, asking Cody Bear to exercise patience and wait, and then cues him into the house.
He goes immediately to Alaina, who rubs his head, nuzzles her head on his and smiles. Then they move into the living room, and Ty approaches.
Cody Bear immediately hones in on Ty, sitting beside his chair, head in Ty’s lap. As Ty greets Jeannie, he scratches Cody Bear’s head with his left hand, the one that he still can control. His right arm rests on the arm of his chair, fingers curled slightly in. When he was shot, he lost the ability to move most of the muscles on the right side of his body.
“How’s he been doing overall?” Ty asks Jeannie. His words come a little slowly, but if no one told you, you’d have little idea that speaking has been a struggle and he’s had to do therapy.
“He’s doing great with the obedience work,” Jeannie says, watching Cody Bear’s obvious pleasure as Ty pets him. “He’s still a little rusty on the retrieving.”
The Humane Society of Naples’ dog-training center put out a call for donations of old cell phones, glasses, eyeglass cases, wallets — anything they could use to practice retrieving, Jeannie says.
The other day, Cody Bear ate a credit card, she says.
They all laugh.
The Humane Society of Naples’ dog-training center put out a call for donations of old cell phones, glasses, eyeglass cases, wallets — anything they could use to practice retrieving, she says. The other day, Cody Bear ate a credit card, she says. They all laugh.
Anna, Ty’s wife, sits on the edge of the fireplace, her long legs folded up. She’s 6-foot, just three inches shorter than her husband’s 6-foot-3-inch frame. She has an easy smile, and, like him, a twang in her voice.
They both grew up in Blountstown, a small town in the Florida Panhandle, and although they went to the same high school, it wasn’t until later that they met and married.
Mason, their 9-year-old son, comes, and when he approaches Cody Bear, the dog turns toward him and gets excited, pushing the boy onto his back and climbing on his chest. Mason laughs and pets him.
Jeannie matched Ty with Cody Bear in November 2009, when Cody Bear was just 7 months old. Many organizations train dogs first, and then pair them with people, but Jeannie prefers to make the match early on, so the dog’s future owners are involved every step of the way.
■ ■ ■
It’s all about independence.
Service dogs provide soldiers with the intangible things a hospital can’t give them, says Dr. Steven Scott, head of the multiple trauma unit at the James A. Haley Veterans Hospital in Tampa.
Dogs give company, obedience, love, compassion — and then there are the practical things, like picking up objects for the person who can’t.
“It adds to independence, it helps with quality of life … it offers a way of community reintegration,” he says. “There’s a reason why we call dogs mankind’s best friend. It’s a form of therapy … It offers rehabilitation and it offers a way to recover and get back on with his life.”
Service dogs are more common these days in the multiple trauma unit, Scott says.
Photo by DAVID ALBERS
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Dog trainer Jeannie Bates arrives at the James A. Haley Veterans Hospital in Tampa in September 2010 for a day of training Cody Bear alongside his future owner, Lt. Col. Benjamin “Ty” Edwards. During several such visits to Tampa, Bates trained Cody Bear during physical therapy sessions and in other future working environments. David Albers/Staff
“More and more patients are asking for these dogs and more and more we see the benefits they get,” he says.
It’s 9:30 a.m. on this September 2010 day. Jeannie and another dog trainer wait in the hospital’s entrance for Ty with Cody Bear and another service dog in training. When Ty arrives, they head upstairs for his occupational and physical therapy sessions.
There are people everywhere, many of them using walkers or sitting in wheelchairs. The doors of the elevators open and close, dinging each time they spill groups of people into the hallway. It’s chaotic, but the dogs remain calm.
“Hi Cody, oh you get more handsome every time I see you,” says Sue Smith, Ty’s occupational therapist, as they arrive in her room. She’s sitting down at her desk and Cody Bear, still on his leash, puts his head in her lap for petting.
Sue and Ty have been working on his right arm, which is the one that he can barely move, she explains, and also his trunk balance, which will help him when he’s walking.
As Sue works with Ty, Cody Bear rests beside the wheelchair. Every once in awhile he fidgets or gets up and each time, Jeannie approaches and gives him a command to stay in place.
“(Ty) has excellent endurance and he knows he’s here for a purpose,” Sue says. “Not everybody is like that. Some people are here maybe because their families want them to be here, but not him. He’s here because it’s his job.”
“I want to get better,” Ty says. “I think it’s good for me to stay fit. I’m not just saying that. That’s the reason I’m doing it.”
“I want to get better,” Ty says. “I think it’s good for me to stay fit. I’m not just saying that. That’s the reason I’m doing it.”
Next is physical therapy. Ty’s biggest challenge is moving his right leg forward. To do it, he has to use every single muscle in his body.
He meets two therapists in the hallway, and they get ready to help him walk.
“Ty, let me know when you are ready,” says Sue Barber, a physical therapy assistant. On his cue, she and another therapist help him stand. He pushes off with his left arm, the one that’s still strong, and as he rises to his full height, he grimaces, face red with the effort. Veins pop on his forehead.
He stands with a walker and their help. They tape fake fur to the bottom of his right sneaker to help his foot slide along the floor, and tie a therapy band from that foot to the walker.
Then the long, painstaking process of walking down the hallway begins. Jeannie stands with Cody Bear at the end of the hallway and watches. This exercise is for Ty alone.
One of the therapists moves on a scooter low to the floor in front of him and the other stands behind, supporting him at his hips. First he moves the right leg forward, slowly, grimacing. The leg trembles as his sneaker slides. He bites his bottom lip.
He relaxes, visibly, and moves the left leg forward. That one is easy.
And then he starts again. Slides the walker, strains his entire body to bring the right leg forward. He’s helped a little by one of the therapists pulling on the therapy band. Ty grimaces. Moves it slowly, ever so slowly. Steps with his left leg.
Again and again and again.
Ty doesn’t speak while he does this. He concentrates. It’s quiet in the hallway, just the murmurs of the therapists saying “Remember to stand up straight,” and “Slide your foot just a little farther.” The walker wheels squeak softly on the tile floor.
Twenty minutes pass and he’s walked about 15 feet.
Today, he walks about 75 feet in 45 minutes. Farther in a shorter period of time than his last session.
Two men round the corner at the end of the hallway and walk past. They’re janitors, on their way to or from work.
“That’s Ty,” one says, as he walks by.
The other cranes his neck and meets Ty’s eyes. “Good job brother!” he says. Ty smiles.
Today, he walks about 75 feet in 45 minutes. Farther in a shorter period of time than his last session.
Two years ago, he couldn’t stand up for 5 minutes.
“You don’t see the progress day by day, you see it over the course of weeks or months,” he says. “Either you’re working to get better every day or you get worse.”
■ ■ ■
Six months later, it’s time for Jeannie to bring Cody Bear to Tampa for the last time. She’ll stay for about a week, but Cody Bear will start staying at Ty’s house instead of at a hotel with Jeannie, the way he usually does.
On a Friday morning in March, veterans gather in a sunny courtyard at the hospital to attend a Purple Heart ceremony. Anna sits with other family members, and Ty watches with the other veterans, lined up in rows of wheelchairs.
As they wait for the ceremony to begin, Cody Bear gets a little anxious, circling around a few times on his short leash, which is attached to Ty’s chair. Jeannie approaches, gives him a treat, and calms him. He sits through the rest of the ceremony without trouble.
Afterward, Ty and Anna mingle with the other veterans and their families. A toddler pets Cody Bear as Ty watches, and Anna chats with his mom. Jeannie stands back and snaps pictures with her digital camera.
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Lt. Col. Ty Edwards sits with Cody Bear on the back porch of his Tampa home after a day of training and physical therapy in September 2010. David Albers/Staff
“At this point, I’m almost a distraction for Cody, unless there’s a problem,” she says, her eyes sad. “I cried for two days. I’m still crying.”
The next day, Jeannie visits Cody Bear to say goodbye. She’ll see him again when she returns to continue Cody Bear’s training, but it’s time to go home to Naples and leave Cody Bear with Ty.
At first, it’s like any other training day: Jeannie shows the kids how to groom Cody and they try out some new leashes that Jeannie bought to connect Cody Bear to Ty’s chair. Then they work on tying a rope to different cabinet doors and asking Cody to open them. Cody is still a novice, even after nearly two years of training, so he still has a lot to learn, she explains. She’ll be back to work with them some more.
“I wish I could stay longer,” she says as Ty, Anna, the kids and Cody Bear gather around. “But I’m confident you guys are going to be a great working team.”
She hugs them all, turns to pet Cody Bear and starts to cry. They leave her alone with him in the kitchen, moving toward the front door. She kisses his nose quickly, and follows them.
Final hugs, and Ty gives her a Marine challenge coin to say thank you. After the door shuts, Cody Bear walks over to Ty’s chair and puts his nose in Ty’s lap, tail wagging, asking for love.
On her way home to Naples, Jeannie makes a scheduled stop to pick up new golden retriever puppies for the service dog program.
Much of her work with Cody Bear is done, but her work with new puppies in her command has just begun.
