Editor’s Note: Healing4Heroes has provided training or service dogs for three members of the same family: Ty Bathurst, a retired Navy SEAL, and Ollie; Ty’s brother-in-law, Kevin Weintraub, a retired Marine, and Mera; and Ty’s brother, Micah Bathurst, a civilian with a neurological disease, and Liberty. This is part two of a series following these extraordinary service dogs and their families.
Kevin & Mera
When Kevin Weintraub met his new service dog, Mera, it was love at first scent. Well, at least for Mera.
“She immediately knew me,” Kevin said, recalling the day he picked up Mera, a half black lab, half blue heeler mix, at 11 weeks old. “She rolled all over me and was excited to see me, even though she’d never met me.”
Mera is a diabetic alert dog, trained to sense when Kevin’s blood sugar rises or falls. A Type 1 diabetic since 2010, Kevin takes insulin to control his blood sugar. Kevin’s wife, Brie, works with Healing4Heroes, an organization dedicated to connecting wounded military veterans with service dogs. The organization had been looking to train a dog to sense blood sugar levels, and Kevin and Brie decided to give it a try.
In order to train Mera, her trainers had to get the pup adjusted to Kevin’s unique scent.
“I started saving saliva samples when my sugar was high,” he said. “I’d correct it with insulin, freeze the cotton balls, and write down the blood sugar levels. I sent all the samples to them before I met Mera.”
Mera’s trainers with H4H began introducing the cotton balls with Kevin’s scent to the dog. She is trained to sniff Kevin’s mouth when she senses his sugar levels are not where they should be.
Kevin headed to Georgia to pick up his new service dog the week of June 14. They spent a week in a hotel together while both man and mutt trained — along with the rest of Mera’s “class” — for 8-12 hours a day at a local farm. Of the 19 dogs in the class, Mera was the only diabetic alert dog.
Most H4H dogs go to military service veterans coping with issues like PTSD. Kevin retired in 2016 after 20 years in the Marine Corps, including four tours in Iraq, and currently works with marines as a civilian. While Kevin said he doesn’t suffer from PTSD, he has no doubt Mera would be a great help if he had those issues, too.
“She trained just like them, but I’ve had no episodes like that,” he said. “She just knows when my sugar is high or low, which is usually caused by stress.”
Kevin said when Mera detects his stress, she won’t follow her basic commands because she will be in his face, sniffing his mouth and licking his beard.
After living with diabetes for more than 10 years, Kevin said he’s usually aware of his sugar levels and how to control it. But distractions happen, such as when he’s writing papers for his job as an intelligence system engineer, and Mera will quickly bring it to his attention.
“There have been times I’ve let it get too high or low, and she lets me know pretty quick,” he said. “Sometimes if I work out harder than I thought I was going to, it can drop, and stress always brings it up high. If it gets too high or too low, she’s all over me.”
Just having Mera around has lessened his stress level, Kevin said, which he attributes to her constant presence and the fact that he pets her all day. Studies have shown that petting a cat or dog for 10 minutes a day can relieve stress.
Of course, at 7 months old, Mera still has quite a bit of puppy in her. Kevin said she has a lot of energy but is very sweet and adores his wife, Brie, and their four kids, in addition to their other dog, an all-white German Shepherd named Shady.
“She had to get used to Mera, but they’ve both done just amazing,” he said.
Kevin also has nothing but praise for the H4H trainers and the veterans that trained alongside he and Mera.
“The group of us couldn’t have been more diverse; there was every race, religion, gender, athletic build. Everyone was different. It was the most unique group ever,” he said. “The trainers themselves, every single one of them, have dealt with PTSD, and they are ridiculously passionate about what they do. They are a great staff.”