How the first therapy dog got into the ICU

The phone rang in my office and a voice I had never heard asked if I knew someone named Lauren. I said yes and heard a big sigh. “Well, she has been very agitated and screaming for her dog. We finally realized she meant YOUR dog, Coco.”

Lauren was someone we visited with every Sunday. At first she wanted nothing to do with Coco. She waved her arms at her and told everyone she did not need a dog to feel better.

She would wheel out of any room we were in, and make it known we were in her way.

After several months of this, however, one day everything changed. When we arrived, Lauren was sitting in the lobby. She had been sitting in the lobby all day waiting for her family to visit. I did not know this but she went though this disappointment every week. She waited, they never came.

This one Sunday however, we arrived as she was just deciding to go back to her room and our eyes met. A slight tear caressed her beautiful face and I understood more fully where her anger sprang from. I lifted Coco into her lap and they rode together to the elevator, silently.

From that day forward Coco was Lauren’s dog. Lauren now sat in the lobby waiting for us. No longer disappointed week after week, her spirits lifted and she had someone to dress up for, to put makeup on for, to smile for, to wait for.

The day I got that call was a Thursday. Lauren had been admitted to the hospital with pneumonia and was in intensive care. Her HIV status complicated matters and she was going to have a tough time regaining her strength.

No therapy dog had ever been permitted into ICU. The call came from the hospital director of volunteers asking if I could bring Coco because Lauren could not be calmed down and kept screaming “I need my dog.” Perhaps having “her” dog with her might help stem her agitation.

So Coco the Love Dog was the first therapy dog to visit in the ICU.

When people ask what therapy dogs really contribute to those they visit, I tell them about Lauren and how one small white fluffy dog was the best medicine for a woman who needed a reason to live.