Jill Dudgeon, owner of “Fab Four Breeders” in Arvada, Colo., said she wanted to do something
special with her first litter of nine healthy purebred puppies. So, she decided to go big with her
English-Crème Golden Retrievers crew of puppies.
After delivering six to the homes of close friends, she reserved three to donate to charities that
specialize in providing service-dog training.
Each pup donated is special, Dudgeon said, but the male and female puppies to Soul Dogs, Inc.,
located in Westminster, Colo., hit closest to home for her.
The non-profit charity specializes in training service dogs to work with intellectual,
developmental, and physical disabilities, including autism and cerebral palsy. Jill’s son, Torey,
has lived with cerebral palsy his entire life.
Torey was nine months old when he was diagnosed with cerebral palsy, and he spent the first 20 days of life in Neonatal Intensive Care after being born prematurely. Doctors did not give
Jill’s son a great prognosis for his future at the time.

But Torey is a fighter.
Now 32 years old and confined to a wheelchair, Torey recently graduated from Northwest Tech
with a degree in sales and digital marketing.
“I’m so proud of him,” Jill said. “The idea of being able to help someone with a disability, in his
honor, really hit home because I know what it could have done for my son growing up. Once
the puppy is trained, we will contact a Cerebral Palsy organization with Soul Dogs and pick out a
child with CP to donate the puppy to. I’m excited because the pup is going to keep Torey’s
name in his honor. It’s a win-win for everybody.”
According to Chris Anderson, Clinical Director at Soul Dogs Inc., training a service animal is
neither easy nor cheap.

It takes an average of 18 months to two years to train service dogs to completion, depending
on the tasks needed to learn. Cost is anywhere from $10,000 to $60,000, depending on the
breed and difficulty of tasks. Should a person want to train a dog on his/her own -- buy the
puppy, hire a trainer, go to classes, feed and care for it -- the first-year cost is anywhere from
$4,000 to $30,000, again depending on the tasks and needs.
That is why the mission of Soul Dogs, Inc. is so important: It defrays the costs so that the people
who need the service animals most can get the help they need.
Dudgeon is targeting another litter in the spring and, possibly, more service dogs in the future.
“If all goes well, I’d love to give one to my son one,” Jill said. “It’s exciting to be able to work
with an organization like Soul Dogs that really does make a difference in somebody’s life.”