How to Register my Dog as an Emotional Support Animal?

For some people, a dog is not just a companion. People who have certain disabilities might need a dog as an emotional support animal. Getting an animal recognized as an emotional support animal can be important for a number of different reasons.

Training

It should be noted that there are no federal laws stating that emotional support animals have to have any specific training. It is also interesting to note that a wide range of different animals can be emotional support animals.

Dogs are probably the most common of all emotional support animals today. However, some people will get horses, birds, or cats as emotional support animals. Dogs are easier to train than all of these animals combined, which should give people an idea of the amount of training that emotional support animals really need.

However, it certainly helps if an emotional support animal does have training, especially when it comes to fulfilling the other requirements. Many specific animals that help people with specific disabilities will have more specialized training. However, even then, people often don’t have to worry about legal requirements in that way.

Behavior

One of the most important things for people to remember is that the behavior of emotional support animals must be favorable enough. These are animals that absolutely have to have the right personality characteristics. All emotional support animals have to be within the control of their owners at all times.

For the most part, if an animal does not have these traits, it won’t work very well as an emotional support animal in the first place. People also don’t have to worry about whether or not their dogs know any specific tricks. No one cares if they sleep in a dog house or not. The important thing is that the dogs need to be tame enough.

Most emotional support animals will enter areas that are normally off-limits to animals. People will bring them into business buildings, on airlines, into waiting rooms, and into a lot of other areas that will tend to have a lot of people present. The behavior of emotional support animals must be better than what people might encounter with a lot of other dogs.

Registration

The actual process of registering a service animal is easy. People just need to go to the Register My Service Animal, LLC website. There will be a simple button that people can click and that will allow them to get started with the registration process right away.

It is still possible to do this sort of thing through the mail as well, which might be ideal for the people who are interested in doing things the old-fashioned way. However, going online will give people a comparatively easy way to get a dog in the RMSA service animal database.

This process requires people to send the organization a photograph of the animal in question. People also have to include their own names. They have emotional support animal leashes available for the people who need them, and this includes everyone who has a dog.

After the process of registration, people will get two pet photo identification cards, a service animal access rights handout card, and a certificate of registration. These are documents that people will be able to use at a later date in many cases. The fact that the animal is in the database should help a lot of people when it comes to various situations where they will need to have their service animals with them.

Service Animal Supplies

People will usually need to supply the rest themselves. If they need a dog carrier backpack, they will need to get it independently. Often times, getting an animal recognized as an emotional support animal will require a note from a licensed medical professional, at least when it comes to specific situations with specific businesses. People will often need that when they are interacting with airlines, for instance.

However, from there, getting a dog recognized as an emotional support animal should not be more difficult than getting dog food. As long as the dog is in the database, people should be able to get the recognition for the animal that they need. They will have the documentation that is required.

Keep your dog always with you if you truly want it to be your emotional support animal. Get any good quality dog carrier backpack so that you can keep it with you when you go out for hiking or traveling abroad.