A mother bursts into tears seeing her autistic son with his assistance dog: "I've never seen him so peaceful"

Dogs have hidden abilities that we often cannot even imagine.

A properly trained dog is able to recognize contraband goods, perceive a change in a person's health conditions and contribute, in general, to significantly helping to reduce the level of stress in the daily life of many people.

Thanks to specific training, different types of dogs can become "assistance dogs", namely, dogs trained to help or assist a person with disabilities.

An association called 4 Paws For Abilities trains skilled and competent dogs to help people who need assistance due to a variety of health conditions, in particular, to assist and enrich the lives of disabled children.

Furthermore, the association wants to inform ordinary citizens about the use of assistance dogs in public places, in order to increase the general awareness of the general public.

via Inside Edition

Having an assistance dog was definitely helpful for Kai, a young autistic boy who had a hard time connecting and socializing with other children.

Kai's mother, Shanna Niehaus, had been waiting for the moment when her young son would finally meet the assistance dog from 4 Paws For Abilities, called Tornado. Despite living in Japan, for Kai's sake, the whole family had traveled to Ohio to meet the members of the association and, above all, Tornado.

Not knowing how Kai would react in the presence of the assistance dog, Shanna had been afraid but, at the same time, she felt hopeful. In any case, from the photo, you can easily see that the meeting went very well, even beyond all expectations.

The tears you see on the face of Kai's mother are due to having seen her son experience countless social interactions with other children and fail in all his attempts to make friends. Not even one friend.

However, those tears that we see now, are tears of joy. The immense joy of seeing her young son finally able to embrace and cuddle another living being.

Initially, Shanna did not want to publish this photo because of her "ugly face full of tears" but then she decided that the positive message regarding her son was too important not to be shared.

This is a story that gives courage and hope to many other parents who live in similar situations and would like to help their child be able to interact with others and live more peacefully.