After years of waiting, Hank Ford, a U.S. Marine Corps and Army veteran who retired from the military in 2009, applied for a service dog to help manage his post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

The pet parent to several hunting dogs, Ford, 54, decided to postpone committing his attention to a service animal until his current canines died. In early 2023, he reached out to Dogs Inc, a nonprofit based in Palmetto, Fla., that provides trained service dogs to people across the U.S.

Ford completed a phone interview and online classes with the organization before Amy Bernard, Dogs Inc’s service dog program manager, came to his Fort Lupton, Colo., home for an assessment and to learn what Ford wanted in a service dog.

“They’re an outstanding organization,” Ford said about the experience.

In Sept. 2023, Bernard found the match for Ford in a Labrador retriever named Tommy. She brought the dog to meet Ford, and he tells PEOPLE there was an “instant bond” between the pup and him.

Through intensive training, their trust grew. “I tell people that Tommy was training me. He knew what to do,” the veteran adds.

Ford’s experience with PTSD left him overwhelmed in public places and struggling to regulate his emotions, so he often isolated himself at home in bed.

“I was sleeping my life away,” says Ford of life before welcoming Tommy. “He gets me up in the morning and calms me down. He definitely pulled me out of a hole.”

During her six-day training session with Tommy and Ford, Bernard brought Ford and the pup to places that the veteran avoided due to his PTSD. At these locations, Ford and Tommy learned to build trust and to find comfort and strength together.

“They were an awesome match. They just kind of fell in together really nicely, bonded really quickly, and it was a great placement,” Bernard remembers of the training.

After Bernard departed, Ford and the Lab continued to train, staying leashed together for the first 90 days of their friendship except for when the man was cooking or in the shower.

“He’s a firecracker. He definitely pays attention to me all the time. I mean, we’re pretty much the same being now,” Ford says.

Today, with Tommy’s support, Ford feels comfortable in the spaces he used to avoid, works part-time at a golf course, and enjoys building large Lego projects with his wife, Mary Ford.

Tommy has given him new life, he says.

In February 2025, the dog changed Ford’s life again, waking him in the middle of the night with “out of character” pawing and barking.

“It was like he was panicking,” Ford remembers.

Worried the dog was about to experience a bathroom emergency, Ford opened the door outside, but Tommy stayed next to him, hopping up to nudge his owner on the chest repeatedly.

Ford started to realize it was he who felt ill, not Tommy. His heart was “pounding and fluttering,” and his blood pressure was dangerously low, so Ford took himself to the hospital.

Doctors said he was suffering from a severe AFib episode that caused irregular heartbeats. Without Tommy’s alert, which the dog was not trained to do, Ford “could have had a massive stroke” and not woken up, according to his doctors.

After recovering from the episode, Ford reached out to Bernard to let her know the dog she matched him with had “saved my life again. He’s my hero.”

Bernard hopes that Ford and Tommy’s unmistakable bond inspires other veterans to explore welcoming a PTSD service dog, especially since the Dogs Inc employee often encounters veterans living with PTSD who don’t believe they “deserve” a service dog.

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“There are plenty of dogs to go around. I don’t ever want someone to think that they can’t apply because someone else is worse off than they are,” Bernard says. We have dogs for every different type of person, and you’re not taking someone else’s dog because we might be waiting just for you for this specific dog. I hear that very often, and I just want people to know that they do deserve a dog.”

To learn more about Dogs Inc., including how to volunteer as a puppy raiser, visit the organization’s website.

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