# Ninja in training.



## Vegetadog (Jun 3, 2015)

My nine week old gsd, Ninja, will be a service dog. I am training him myself due to budget reasons. So I was looking for some info on how to teach him a few things. We are doing basic obedience now, but I like to be prepared. 
How do I teach:
1. How to smell my blood sugar getting low and alert
2. How to fetch snack/medicine bag 
3. How to block (front , back, left, right) 
4. How to help me up and move to a safer spot?
5. Applied pressure or whatever its called (for anxiety)
6. How to fetch phone
7. How to find exit

And if there is a step needed prior to one of those tasks, what is it? 

Also, how do I teach no barking? He is a pup so he is chatty.


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## kburrow11 (Jan 31, 2014)

Unfortunately you can't train your dog to smell or sense blood sugar drops, that's something they either do or don't do. But for teaching them to get you things, that's just advanced fetch. Give the object a name "bag" "phone" etc. This has some good info for teaching: Train a Service Dog to Retrieve: Part One - Anything PawsableAnything Pawsable


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## lexiz (Apr 4, 2015)

It might be best to see if a trainer would give you some advice at a discounted rate. Training a puppy to do those things on your own, especially if you aren't experienced, will be very difficult.


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## ILGHAUS (Nov 25, 2002)

There has been very good success in training dogs as diabetic alert dogs. The ones that I have seen in training began with some basic nose work and then moved to learning to alert to the scent of low and/or high blood sugar levels.

_For migraines and seizures it is still not known what the dogs pick up on. With a dog that does a natural alert the manner in which the alert is given can be shaped and reinforced. _

For your dog once it is able to alert to your low blood sugar you will want it to follow through with a trained response action.


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