The idea for DID came to our founder, Suzanne Brean, in 2008 when she started using a Service Dog herself. She was fortunate enough to be able to send the dog she selected to a private training program in Southern California.
She realized that most people who need a Service Dog could not afford to pay for training, even sending a dog off to finish training. A program trained dog cost between $40,000 and $60,0000. There were very few Owner-Trainer programs for invisible disabilities at the time and they still were very expensive - $10,000 to $20,000.
Her goal was to make it affordable to everyone who was willing to put in the time and effort to train their own dog. That is why Dogs for Invisible Disabilities was formed in 2011, when Ms. Brean retired for medical issues.
With COVID-19 in 2019, we ended up having to postpone starting a new cohort of dogs. Prior to that we were starting two cohorts a year of approximately 5 to 10 teams and graduating approximately 5 teams each year.
