Veteran Patrick Leahy has been labeled by college students on campus because the “dog guy,” as he might be discovered round campus with an enormous American Akita named Kono. He has shortly discovered a way of group and belonging amongst college students and college members.
“It was just such a blessing having the campus here because it turned into a big stress relief. Coming here and chatting with students is like the best medicine I could obtain free of charge,” Leahy mentioned.
Born in Jamaica, N.Y., Leahy was raised in a household of three brothers and three sisters who have been typically in comparison with the sitcom “The Brady Bunch.”
Leahy and his spouse, Elke Leahy, purchased a home proper behind the Tabler Community after Hurricane Sandy in 2012. This makes it simpler for Leahy to walk, cycle or curler skate by means of campus with Kono by his facet.
“It’s very enjoyable to come here and see the enjoyment students have with him just getting to pet [Kono] or students that have never touched a dog before,” Leahy mentioned.
Although each Kono and the Stony Brook campus are an enormous a part of Leahy’s life, many occasions took place in Leahy’s life that introduced him to the place he’s now. A breakup is definitely what acquired him began on the journey he’s had.
Unlike many who enlist recent out of highschool, Leahy joined the army in 1987 on the age of twenty-two after his girlfriend on the time broke up with him and he felt that he wanted to go away.
Leahy approached his army profession with dedication and dedication.
“I went through all of those competency tests so I became proficient in whatever the military felt I needed to know at the time. I always tried to do my best,” he mentioned. “I never want to be the one that says I don’t know how that works. I want to know how that works. I want to know how it came apart and how to fix it. So, I became more valuable than the average soldier [and] I think that’s what helped my career move as well as it did.”
Leahy earned three talent badges: an Expert Field Medical Badge, an Air Assault Badge and a Crew Member Wing. However, Leahy defined that he was missed for a promotion as a result of he didn’t have a great deal of training.
In his army profession, Leahy was stationed in lots of locations, together with South Korea, Germany, Upstate New York and Alabama. Many of his jobs have been within the medical subject, working as a fight medic in his medical platoon, a rear echelon to MediCal and being answerable for the Soldier Replacement Center in Upstate N.Y. — amongst the various different jobs he took on whereas within the army.
But, changing into answerable for the Soldier Replacement Center was not simple.
During a snowy winter in Upstate N.Y., Leahy was on his manner home from work when robust winds brought about his truck to veer into the dry snow and in the end overturned his automobile. While Leahy was capable of slip out of his seatbelt, a Jeep, additionally uncontrolled, crashed about two ft into the cap of his truck, leaving Leahy unconscious.
“The strike was so harsh, and when I [awoke I saw] a big fireman in his bunker gear … and he’s got me on the ground with a blanket over me and my head between his thighs and he goes, ‘Looks like you’re breathing, your trucks pretty wasted, but [an] ambulance is on the way. Don’t move, you were unconscious [and] there’s some blood in your ear,’” he mentioned.
Leahy’s accidents from that accident lasted nicely previous that day.
“A year later there was such an injury that I opted to have a fusion of two vertebrae in my neck to reduce the problems that it caused,” he mentioned. “That’s where I thought my career would end. [The doctor] was like, ‘No no no it won’t end your career it would just give you this physical limitation. You can still soldier.’ I wasn’t even done healing [when] three months later, our unit came down on orders to deploy [to Iraq].”
Leahy’s first sergeant wished him to get on a airplane along with his unit to go to Iraq, regardless that he wasn’t fully healed and his bones weren’t fused but.
“I’ve never deployed [for] 17 years of military service, and this guy’s got an attitude that I’ve had something to do with that,” Leahy mentioned.
That is when Leahy’s buddies acquired him out of the state of affairs and allowed him to take cost of the Soldier Replacement Center.
From there, Leahy took a job within the Fort Hamilton Army Base in Brooklyn, N.Y. the place he labored as a top quality assurance officer for the Director of Public Works for eight years earlier than transferring to Northport VA Medical Center in East Northport, N.Y. for almost two years earlier than being robbed out of working there.
“The facility used my health condition as an administrati[ve] condition to fire me. It was really disappointing,” Leahy defined. “They pulled it off because they tricked me into signing a document that literally gave my rights away and then when I tried to get a lawyer and they saw that document, [they said,] ‘Oh our hands are tied.’ I don’t tell [this to] very many people I tell very little people, I tell them ‘I’m retired.’”
Leahy suffers from sleep apnea, which stops him from respiration whereas he sleeps. His well being situation is taken into account extreme as a result of it requires him to make use of a CPAP or BiPAP machine to assist ship air stress.
“My friend just gifted me [a new CPAP machine] because I had borrowed one from him when he saw a post that I put on Facebook bad mouthing the VA politely: ‘Can’t believe this I’ve just accidentally broke my BiPAP machine and they told me it’s three to six months before I get a new one, what are they, manufacturing it there at the VA?’” he mentioned.
Now, at age 59, Leahy is choosing up new abilities and hobbies.
“My unexpected early retirement falls in my lap. I have all this time on my hands so I just started doing projects around the house,” he mentioned. “I got a little more into cycling, a little more into swimming, started collecting and fixing up bikes and donating them to people. I still teach a little bit of clinic at the Shoreham BMX track which is my second most favorite hobby, second to roller skating.”
Leahy shared how a lot of an influence curler skating had on him all through his life.
“When I was 17 … my go-to sport [was] roller skating. There was a roller rink that opened in the next town over … called United Skates of America USA,” he mentioned. “I grew up there, I worked there, I serviced that floor dozens of times. I’ve repaired the sound system in the building. I’ve worked with the managers and maintenance. The few girlfriends I had were roller skaters … if you weren’t roller skating, I didn’t know you.”
Leahy defined how he constructed up his confidence and speaking abilities.
“I wasn’t very talkative, I wasn’t very outgoing. My charisma was the talent I had in my roller skates … that’s where my persona was present versus talking,” he mentioned. “The confidence grew during my military service because of the abilities I had when I went in with my EMT experience and my interest in the medical field.”
That will not be the case in the present day; the interview with Leahy took about 5 hours to finish.
“I tend to not shut up, my wife laughs at me [and says] ‘Make sure you let the interviewer interview you’ because I can sometimes ramble,” he mentioned.
Growing up curler skating, Leahy met his spouse in a curler skating rink in Germany when he was stationed there for the army they usually have been married for almost 35 years.
Their love story was not picturesque, nevertheless. Leahy and Elke had met at a curler rink however didn’t see one another for months after. So, Leahy began a relationship with somebody known as Sylvia. The two went skating one night time in Germany wherein Leahy noticed Elke once more months after they’d first met.
“I saw her, I [went] to say hi, she said, ‘Oh you’re with someone.’ [I said,] ‘Oh that’s not serious.’ I wanted to say to her, ‘I want to get serious with you,’ and I said to her, ‘Oh she’s much older than me oh well- I- uh didn’t mean it in I want to skate with you,’ [and she goes] ‘But you’re with her,’ [I go] ‘I’m not with her,’” Leahy mentioned.
After courting for a few years, Leahy was ordered by the army to go away Germany.
“[Her parents] were inquisitive as to what our relationship might be doing, and right then and there I said, ‘Well if Elke marries me, she can come with me,’ and my wife’s like, ‘That’s how you’re proposing to me?’” He defined. “I said, ‘Well, your parents gotta know about it too so yes.’ She goes, ‘Forget it, forget it. Yeah, I’ll marry you; gimme the ring.’ Before I knew it, her family and a close friend of hers helped us do the whole wedding and … nearly my whole medical platoon showed up at the house because the wedding was done at the home.”
After getting married, Leahy began bringing home pets. He defined, “We don’t have kids of our own because we couldn’t, so we have pets.”
The Leahy household has had a complete of 11 pets: 4 dogs and 7 cats. The 4 dogs embrace Bo, Rayek, Charlie and Kono. The six cats embrace Kia, Karmen, Krissy, Marley, Joey, Scruffy and a white kitten. Currently, Leahy nonetheless has Kono, Joey and Marley.
“I’m a dog person but they’re all great for me because they all do funny things,” Leahy mentioned.
Rayek, who was the Leahys’ first canine, died at 10 years old after his abdomen knotted on itself. Although Rayek was well-behaved, he by chance lower Elke’s higher lip after excitingly bumping his head with hers and having his tooth and hers between her higher lip.
“The plastic surgeon that was flown into the hospital air at Fort Rucker was saying how lucky she was that both have good straight teeth that aren’t crooked because it caused a nice straight line,” Leahy mentioned. “My wife had the prettiest cubital lips when I met her and then she had this little tiny scar that was there for a bit.”
Scruffy was the Leahys’ first kitten. They had discovered her operating by means of the street whereas stopped in visitors on Leahy’s motorbike in Alabama.
Kono was additionally discovered unexpectedly when Leahy and his spouse stopped at an animal shelter to heat up.
“We didn’t stop in there to look for a dog, we stopped in there to warm up and the dog just happened to be waiting. He was in there a month and the shelter employee said nobody would sit with him,” Leahy mentioned.
Kono’s breed is taken into account to be harmful due to its origin as a looking canine for the royal household in Japan. Although Kono’s breed can take down a bear, Leahy assures that Kono received’t hurt anybody.
“He will not hurt you, the worst he’ll do is step on your foot by accident, or he might lean into you wanting more attention,” he mentioned.
Kono is a service animal; nevertheless, Leahy defined that he doesn’t put the badge on Kono as a result of he doesn’t need to scare individuals off from having the ability to pet him.
“Technically he’s my comfort at night, which is when my mind sometimes runs about whatever health issues I’m dealing with or something I’m trying to take care of in the house and if I’m having a rough night he’ll notice it and he’ll wake me up, which is just something he picked up himself because he’s right next to me all the time,” Leahy mentioned.
Kono is aware of German and a few of Kono’s favourite locations to go other than campus are Long Island State Veterans Home, Smith Haven Mall and Schnitzels.
Now, Leahy is engaged on repairing his Volkswagen Beetle to get it operating once more and on the street to attend automotive reveals along with his spouse and Kono to spend time and do one thing along with his spouse.
“It is enjoyable as hell to come on campus [and] stop for anybody, faculty and students alike, so I think [moving here] was a good choice considering what I like to do and how much of a talkative individual I am,” Leahy mentioned.
Leahy will not be solely described as talkative however humorous as nicely.
“I try to crack jokes and make [my wife] laugh. I love hearing her laugh, [it’s the] best music,” Leahy mentioned.
