'The Possibility Dogs' Author Talks Healing After PTSD

NEW YORK (WLNY) -- Service dog trainer and bestselling author Susannah Charles joined us to talk about her new book "The Possibility Dogs," which sheds light on the importance of the human-animal bond and her work training "unadoptable" animals into service dogs.

More: Therapy Dogs On The Couch

She was accompanied by service-dog-in-training Jake Piper, a German shepherd-pit bull-poodle mix.

In "The Possibility Dogs," Charleson chronicles her journey into the world of psychiatric service and therapy dogs trained to serve the human mind, a journey that began as a personal one. After a particularly grisly search led to a struggle with PTSD, Charleson credits healing to her partnership with her search dog Puzzle.

Inspired by that experience and having met dogs formally trained to assist in such crises, Charleson learns to identify abandoned dogs with service potential, often plucking them from shelters at the last minute, and train them for work beside hurting partners, to whom these second-chance dogs bring intelligence, comfort, and hope.