Woman Shares Wholesome Moments Parents Teach Kids About Service Dog: 'Pure'

A service dog owner has taken to social media to show the wholesome interactions she encounters in public when parents use dog Jake as an opportunity to educate their children.

Unsurprisingly, children are often eager to pet Jake when spotting him on duty with his service dog vest on, but surprisingly not all parents do the right thing and stop them.

Haylee has postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome, which means her heart beats faster than it should and sometimes leaves her with episodes of dizziness and even passing out, anywhere and everywhere.

Dog Jake is a cardiac and medical alert service dog and he is able to recognize a medical episode coming before Haylee even knows it. He's also able to perform tasks such as deep pressure therapy to bring her heart rate down.

Haylee has racked up millions of views after capturing various occasions when parents have stopped their little ones from petting the dog without permission, often using it as a chance to teach them about service animals. Her TikTok account, @jakethes.d, has over 500,000 followers.

On January 1, Haylee shared the moment a mom stopped her daughter from petting Jake in public while he was working. After the young girl attempted to approach the dog, her mother stepped in and apologized, before telling her exactly why she shouldn't.

"Okay, remember when they have the vest on, he's working, he's a working animal, and then second, you always ask to pet an animal," she warned.

"You don't know how he is, animals have teeth and teeth bite."

In less than a month, the video has gained over 403,000 likes but is still far from her most viewed interaction of the kind. In July 2021, a similar moment earned Haylee over three million likes with what she described as "parenting done right."

When Jake caught the eye of a young girl, she made it known she was eager to pet him. "Okay, well we don't wanna, well we can say hi to the puppy from here but that's it," said the mom.

"You not not pet the puppy, it's a service dog, we don't pet service doggys while they're working, okay?" she added, after the daughter persisted.

"Surprisingly, my interactions with children go better then adults," Haylee told Newsweek. "Most children know how to react around a service dog, whereas adults don't! Just yesterday standing in the checkout line I had an older man just walk up to us and reach his hand out in front of Jake's face to pet him. Jake, knowing better, backed up a few steps and I kindly just asked the man to not pet him as he is a working service dog. Thankfully he apologized and said okay, but that's not always the case. People sometimes will get mad at us when we don't allow them to pet Jake."

Videos on her account prove her point, with one showing a child approaching alone, making sure to ask before stroking. Another video shows an adult doing the opposite—sticking his hand in Jake's face.

These types of interactions aren't always the case though, as explained by Haylee.

"Parents are normally good with their kids, however I wish more parents would be more alert of what their kids are doing, like I said I don't have too many issues with children they're normally pretty smart, but there are times where parents are not paying attention to their kids and they come up and pet him I have had a few kids pull his tail and get in his face, and the parents don't say anything," she said.

"I always approach any situation with compassion, thinking some people just do not know about service animals and that's okay, we are here to help teach. However we have to remember that people with real task trained service animals are disabled and struggle too.

"Sometimes on bad health days or when I'm in a rush it can be hard to be stopped constantly while I'm just trying to get my grocery shopping done and give education lessons for people, but I do my best because I know it will better the service dog community and help other disabled people as well for the next time."

Such wholesome and considerate interactions between moms and their kids when it comes to service dogs melted hearts online, with users rushing to comment their thoughts.

"This is an amazing interaction. I love how her mom handled it and I love how her mom educated her daughter," wrote one user.

"It was so pure and I love hearing parents educate their little ones on service dogs," wrote back Haylee.

One viewer noted: "I love that mom not only stopped the kiddo but also calmly educated them! That's amazing, what a great mom."

"I love how respectful she was to not only you and your dog, but also her daughter. Wonderful interaction," added another.

Update 1/31/22 at 10:27 a.m. ET: This article was updated to include comments from Haylee.