History

This week is going to be mainly research because I am leaving Thursday morning for Ohio. Since the homework activity is a historic article I decided to research a few to get the most accurate history of this amazing practice. It turns out that animal companionship dates back to prehistoric times. When cave drawings demonstrate people sitting with wolves around a campfire. A 12,000 year old tomb was discovered in Israel with a human skeleton clutching to the remains of a puppy. The relationship with men and animal was truly strong. The first known use of therapy animals was in the 9th century in Gheel, Belgium. These animals were not the main focus of the program, but they were used to help the disabled learn to take care of animals for their daily living. In 1792, therapeutic animals were used in England to help treat insane people. This practice has been around since the beginning and animals are truly natural therapists. They provide a sense of feeling needed, love, they react to ones emotions, and even feel as if they are family. It is amazing what an animal can do for a human!

A Weeks Worth in 2 Days

So this upcoming week is going to be a bit hectic! I am leaving thursday morning for Ohio to visit Ohio State and MIami of Ohio and then over the weekend I will be in Chicago. So since we didn't have school Monday I only will be here Tuesday and Wednesday. This means I will need to do my noodletools, blogs, newsletter activity, and homework activity all by Wednesday. Wow, that is a lot! I also was planning on going into PetSmart tomorrow, but my mom just informed me that Rudi may have to be updated on her shots. If this is true than we definitely have to do that soon because we need to get moving. Also there is this doggy walk in March that is going on in Fort Lauderdale and I think that will be a fun thing to participate in. I keep hearing about it on 99.9 Kiss Country so I will definitely need to look more into it! I hope I can get everything done before I depart to snowy Ohio!

Therapy Dog Soldiers

So this week I found my most interesting and rewarding research yet. Just this month two therapy dogs were sent to Iraq for therapy purposes for our American Soldiers. This is what I did my government article on and I am so amazed by. These dogs were sent for the soldiers that aren't good with expresses their emotions to a therapist and the dogs can just sit and listen. I got chills when I watched the video that followed the article because I couldn't believe how fast this is growing. I am also so excited to be apart of something that truly can help in any area of society. If you go to this link you can watch the video and read the article, it is truly touching!  http://www.king5.com/video/featured-videos/Therapy-dogs-trained-for-duty-in-Iraq-115962394.html#

PetSmart

I finally made my first move towards getting Rudi in a training class. I called PetsMart today and talked to Stephanie, a training specialist. She basically told me that Rudi would need to be put into a beginners class. It is $109 for six weeks. I do have to put money into it, but i definitely believe it is worth it. The classes are guaranteed and I can always go back and refresh for no cost. I will need to show prof that Rudi is caught up on all her shots and rabies papers. If I wanted to do private lessons it would be $79 an hour, but we don't need that. Stephanie also told me that they have a special program for Therapy Dogs and that they put them on a faster track to do the beginner, intermediate, and advanced training in a shorter time. I don't know if I will need all that training, but it's great they provide that. She also mentioned almost all the trainers personal dogs are Therapy Dogs so they could tell me a lot about it. I am going to go in tomorrow to sign Rudi up and get a few more questions answered. I am really excited for this!

Senioritis

Senioritis is kicking in and it's not a good thing. I am getting behind on my blogs and homework/newsletter activities and I really need to step up my game! I found out I was accepted to The University of Florida last Friday, my last and final school I was waiting to hear from. So there's a lot of exciting things going on, but I really need to get a system down where I can keep on track with everything. Tomorrow I will have my mentor meeting; again on a Friday. Last week we had to meet Friday and when I went in on Tuesday(our normal meeting days) we didn't have too much to talk about, so we decided to meet on Friday again this week. Tomorrow I have made a deal with myself and my mentor that I have to find a class to enroll Rudi in. I talked to Holly from PetsMart already, but now I just need to sign her up. I need to get her in a good class that is about five weeks long which will be perfect for her to have an evaluation in mid April! I promise I will be more on top of things from now on, or at least I will try!

Contacts!

I heard back from my first contact this week, Dennis Kalodish, the Davie advisor for Therapy Dogs International. It was a great email. He basically told me all the specifics I needed for Rudi to be ready to get evaluated and certified. "Therapy dogs have to have a very social temperament. They must love to be around children, senior citizens, other dogs and all people in general.They are not skittish around hospital equipment and load noises." These are great things I need to keep in mind for Rudi. He also informed me that the next evaluation was in April and If i wanted I could shadow him. Tomorrow I am going to schedule my obedient school training because Dennis did mention I needed basic training in a group style environment. I have not heard back from the Humane Society contact yet, so hopefully by the upcoming week I will. My mentor meeting on Friday went great. We had to reschedule it to Friday because I couldn't make it Tuesday, but it was no biggie. Hopefully more exciting news tomorrow!

Training

Today has been an extremely successful day. I did research for about two hours and I was able to email two different dog therapy organizations. The first organization I emailed was Therapy Dogs International. Dennis Kalodish is the director in Davie. I emailed him asking how to get started and to explain the process to me. Nancy Rovin referred him to me and she raved about her experience with TDI so I am interested to see what he writes back to me. I researched more and found that the Humane Society has their own Dog Therapy Program as well. I emailed the organization in Davie asking the same type of questions. Ms. Yuman also has a contact for me so I'm happy I have options and I can see which one best fits Rudi and me. While I've been reading over all these organizations, I don't think obedient school is apart of the dog therapy training. If I have to get Rudi trained with a different organization, PetSmart does training. Rudi has never previously been trained so we would need to be in the beginner education class; a six week course. When I hear back from the emails I think I will have a better idea of exactly what I need to do. Lets hope they respond fast!

Ideas! Ideas! Ideas!

Since Rudi is my entire families dog, everyone is super excited about her training. It could definitely become an entire family event in the future. I was visiting my Mentor today and we were talking about how she could possibly get one of her dogs trained as well. It would be so great if we were able to do it together! Even though I know this will not happen, but just incase, if Rudi gets kicked out of therapy dog training I have come up with a few ideas. Since my best friend and neighbor Sam Rovin's dog is trained as a therapy dog, I could definitely take her dog to hospitals to get the full experience that I will be working towards with Rudi. My cousin's two Labs are also trained so I have plenty of options. I have total faith in Rudi, but I am just preparing for the worst and hoping for the best. Yes, I watch a lot of The Weather Channel during hurricane season. I was also thinking of ideas to get community involvement with Therapy Dog International and maybe National Honor Society could get involved with it. Just brainstorming away!

Superdog Sunday

I love doing the research for my project! I definitely picked thd right topic. I could read stories all day about patients who have had dogs visit them and owners of therapy dogs. Every story I read is just amazing. So many people rave about the affects these dogs have on patients, especially the children. I learned from my research that there are so many fields of dog therapy I could go into. There's hospice, hospitals, children's hospitals, nursing homes, home visits, and even schools. It's really exciting to know that I have so many options to choose from and to explore. I just recently got hired as a hostess at El Mariachi so I am a bit concerned it will cut into my time with Rudi. I am definitely going to have to create a schedule so I can fit everything in. Hopefully I will get Rudi enrolled in this class about three times a week. I am going to try to do a video journal for next week so look forward to that! Now back to the super bowl, GO PACKERS!

Interview!!

This week has been a bit crazy! I found out I got accepted to my dream school, University of Maryland!:) Even though I've been super busy with my personal life, I managed to get my interview in and play with Rudi. I took Rudi to the dog park on Wednesday to try to teach her some tricks. She still doesn't know how to sit or roll over, but that is why I am going to enroll her in obedient school because it is required anyway. My interview this week went great! I learned so many important things that I'll need for my project! I was so excited. I think I know where I am going to bring Rudi for Dog Therapy Training so that is a relief as well. I am a bit nervous because Rudi is already eight years old so it is a bit late to try to get her trained. I truly hope it works out because it would mean so much to me! More to come in my next blogs!