Monday, February 14, 2011

Gopher on His Second Visit to a Children's Hospital on 2/8/2010

I got to go back to a hospital for children again last week and it was extra special. This time Mom was my handler, Dad was there too, but Mom was in control. Being the pup I am I did have to try to get away with more with her than I would have even thought about with Dad. I was just showing her how challenging it is for him when Squirrel chooses not to listen to Dad.

Mom and I went out and we visited with about 20 people 11 of them were patients and the rest were the staff and family members. This visit was another group visit, but I was the biggest boy there and the kids loved me.
Mom and I showed them how to high five, roll over, give paw (shake), and just how good of a boy I can be during the show part of the visit.

Before and after the show we visited with the kids and their guests individually. I got to see a little boy and a little girl who were there last time I visited, but I was sad to see the special little girl that dad told you about was not there this time. After the show I talked with a mom and daughter, the mom has a therapy pup like me at home as well, and was very impressed with me. Then mom put me up in a chair so I could see a little girl who had to come to the show in her hospital bed, she was so happy to see me and looked so sad in the bed I thought I should go ahead and climb off the chair and into bed with her, Mom thought differently and quickly put a stop to my attempt.

We went afterwards to Keys to get our now infamous post visit pancakes (thank you Mr. Stein for writing the book so Dad would have me enjoy pancakes like Enzo). Since they were so hot Mom and Dad wouldn't let me have them until I went home and I sat on the edge of the seat casually sniffing the air and letting out mild whines to remind Mom and Dad I knew the pancakes were mine. Since I was sitting so close to Mom and Dad I was able to listen in on their conversations which are typically boring so I just ignore this talk this time though I thought my pancakes might be at stake so I focused in on what they were saying.

Dad asked Mom what she thought of being my handler in a real life situation, since this was her first time. She told him that she was so focused making sure she was doing her job, that she didn't have time to see what was going on around her. Then she said that it didn't really hit her until the last little boy we visited that night. Sorry I forgot to tell you about him, the last person we visited was a wonderful little boy who was in a wheelchair. I did my best golden lean against the wheelchair and he pet my head and scratched my ears with a big grin the entire time despite the surroundings, the wheelchair and medical equipment he was hooked up to the little boy still smiled especailly while petting me. Mom recounted this to Dad and said that was when it finally hit her what we were doing there. I thought I even saw a tear start to well up in her eye and I was going to climb up in her lap and wipe them away. I decided not to as I knew they would think I was just after my pancakes, which was only a little true. Thank you for reading and I will let you know of my new adventures soon.

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