To Kenny, a dachshund-Italian greyhound mix, all that matters in the world are bubbles, his favorite treat and, most importantly, his owner Tricia Melland, or as she likes to be referred to as, his “hu-mom.”
It’s a bond that transcends the normal relationship between dog and owner, because not only is Kenny her pet – he’s her service dog.
Melland, a freshman biochemistry major at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, said she’s known something’s been wrong with her since 2005, but neither she nor doctors knew what the problem was. Then in May 2011, she was and diagnosed with Mitochondrial disease. The genetic mutation which prohibits the mitochondria in her cells from producing enough energy for her organs to function properly. This can result in side effects such as low blood sugar.
That’s where Kenny comes in.When they adopted him in 2013, the family initially saw Kenny as a therapy dog. However, he began showing promising signs of having the skill set to become a service dog to Melland.
“We got him at eight weeks,” Melland said. “After having him for a couple months, he naturally started alerting to my low blood sugar.”
There is a certain scent in humans’ breath that only dogs can sense when they have low blood sugar, and while it’s incredibly difficult for some dogs to discern this scent, Kenny did it with ease.
“When he knows, he’ll paw at me, or if I’m asleep he’ll nudge his head under mine,” Melland said. “If I don’t wake up, he’ll start making noises and whine and keep pawing at me.”
In addition to lowering blood sugar, the disease affects all parts of her body including vision, the stomach and intestines.
“I’m in complete intestinal failure, so I haven’t been able to actually eat since August of 2010,” Melland said.
To combat that, she must carry around a special backpack that delivers nutrients to her body.
“It’s IV nutrition and goes through this line and straight to my heart so that’s why I carry this. It’s not like I’m overly attached to my backpack,” she said.
Because the disease is progressive, it gets worse as time goes on. It also means Melland’s immune system is weaker than others. Melland was in the hospital from May 31, 2014 to Dec. 22, 2014 because of a simple cold.
“It was a solid eight months that I was in the hospital,” Melland said. “It started with a cold, and then I got more and more infections from being in the hospital. And eventually it affected me to the point where I have chronic headaches.”
Melland also has an extremely high-resting heart rate. This means when she walks a long distance, her heart begins to race, thus causing a spike in her headaches. She then got a scooter creating a more visible disease for her.
“Sometimes I feel like the way people perceive me is worse than the actual disability of being in the scooter,” Melland said. “People tend to associate physical disability with mental disability. I feel like when I’m in my scooter I have to be more vocal or outgoing to say, ‘Hey! I’m a human being, I’m just sitting down!’”
However, in class Melland is a role model for other students, according to her Psychology 181 professor, Carolyn Brown-Kramer.“She is extremely dedicated, I wish I had a hundred more students who were just as dedicated as she is,” Brown-Kramer said. “She works really, really hard and tries to keep open communication because she can’t be in class all the time due to medical issues.”
When it comes to classes, Kenny is just as good at paying attention as Melland.
“If I tell him to focus, he knows he needs to settle down,” she said.
It’s a quality that pairs well with the usual traits of a pet, but Kenny brings more to the table than the usual tricks like sit, lay down, roll over and shake.
“The best compliment you could ever get is when you get up from class and someone goes, ‘There’s a dog in here?’ That is the goal,” she said.
