Today, I  resumed Gus’s training as a therapy dog, it was his fifth or sixth visit to the Mansion. He is calm and at ease in the building, easy around the people and the way they move. One problem Gus has as a small dog is that he is small, and many of the residents can’t reach down to pet him or hold him.

So I ask each resident if they want to hold him, and if so, I pick him up. At first, Gus squirms, not sure what he is supposed to do. I have to make sure his nails are clipped and that I am close to hold him, the skin of some of the residents is sensitive and can easily tear.

Someone – me or them – has to hold him firmly for a few seconds until he settles down, and then I praise him and reinforce the behavior. Connie had a good grasp of this, she wrapped her arm around him, and in a couple of minutes, he sat quietly in her lap, almost falling asleep.

More and more, his periods of calm and quiet are getting longer as his attention span grows, this is the time to really teach him. He was in three different laps today and stayed calm in all of them, I had to hold him firmly in place once when some noise attracted  him, but this was a quantum leap over the last visit.

He is realizing that this is work, and that he needs to be calm and still. I think he has the potential to be a great therapy dog. I think it will take more work and supervision and reinforcement but I am confident about it, he is a great and focused dog, he pays attention, is intelligent,  and loves people.

I’m going to step up the practice sessions, this is the  age, Gus is four months old. Connie is doing very well, she took several walks today, more on that later. She has at least 10 large plastic bags filled with books, gifts, food, yarn, letters and photographs sent to her at Saratoga Springs Hospital and the Wesley Rehab center. She was reading them all day, determine to get through them and answer as many as possible.

We were calling her the Queen Of The Mansion today.