Entrant's First Name
Nina

I am a Therapy Animal

Tell us a story about how pet therapy touched your life.
We are a new therapy team and have only completed our visits for our evaluations. During one of our initial visits to a rehabilitation center although we visited with many residents, one woman still comes to mind. She spoke of her pets while she petted ZuZu and just had such a peaceful smile as she told me and ZuZu the story of her pets. She then asked ZuZu's name and when we had to leave she asked me to please visit with ZuZu again. We will go back and hope to see her again. That moment reinforced the reason we became a therapy team and the smiles we can bring to people. ZuZu loves people - normal for most dogs - yes, but she really sees people and knows how to connect with people the way they most need. We are very much looking forward to this smile making journey!

Give us an example of a special interaction between your therapy animal and the person they were visiting.
In training for our evaluations and knowing we want to also participate in the READ program, we visited a park one afternoon. Immediately a little girl came up to us and asked my dogs name. I told her it was ZuZu and asked if she wanted to pet her. She answered "Yes!" We ended up sitting on a bench, ZuZu between us and the little girl petted and petted her talking all the while. She asked why we were at the park and I told her we were training to visit hospitals and libraries. She immediately said "go to the hospitals, you will make people smile - the people there need you!" This smart little girl was so open, so honest and so right. I've told this story several times already and guess I will continue to tell it too - without knowing she summed up why we became a therapy team perfectly!!