Jordan Wallace Markham is a Golden Retriever that I adopted after he was retired from service. Jordan was a Helping Paws service dog and worked for eight years for a woman with Cerebral Palsy.

Jordan was originally trained by my friends, Jay and Dianne. He was one of several service dogs they have trained for Helping Paws over the years. Very often, when a Helping Paws service dog is retired, they are offered to the family that originally trained them. In Jordan’s case, extenuating circumstances kept Jay and Dianne from taking him back at the time he needed a new home. I had heard he was in need of a place to stay so I volunteered to take him until a permanent home could be found. It didn’t take long before I decided his permanent home should be with me!

Jordan lived the longest of all of the “big” dogs I’ve ever had. He lived well past age 15. His last couple of years were punctuated with an interesting array of “old age” problems. He had some arthritis in his back which made his back legs weak and caused him to stumble around a lot. Towards the end of his days we tried different combinations of pain medicines to help him function better, but ultimately none of them brought him much relief. He also had quite a bit of hearing loss, although I sometimes think that it was “selective” hearing loss.

Jodan died on January 25, 2013. We had him euthanized and he died with his family surrounding him.

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