Ridealong companions bring mental and physical well-being, security and more to haulers’ on-road lives
Roady, a handsome trucking Rottweiler, wasn’t getting much sleep.
Every night he stood guard over his owner, Tim Blevins, waiting for him to stop breathing. Blevins, a trucker from Cleveland, Okla., didn’t know he had severe sleep apnea, but several times a night Roady jammed his wet nose into Blevins’ face, startling the breath back into his lungs. When Blevins finally told his doctor about the nightly episodes, the doctor diagnosed sleep apnea and said Roady probably saved his life. “I had no idea what was going on, but Roady knew it wasn’t right,” Blevins says.
He got fitted with a CPAP machine and Roady finally got some rest. Today, Roady is mostly retired from the road, but Blevins still calls home just to talk to his companion. They are planning one last road trip this summer and Blevins can hardly bear to think about it as a final chapter in their trucking days. “It’s hard to explain, but Roady, he’s not really a dog. Not to me anyways,” says Blevins.
