WUSEL

“I honestly say that he helped innumerable people and made them feel better for at least a little while.”

“Wusel was a rescue from a municipal shelter. We had finally decided to have another dog after we had lost our last GSD. As we walked by all those cages it was not easy to select one dog. I will never forget, all those poor dogs in the need of a loving home. Wusel was setting there in his cage and I realized that he was still a puppy. We took him out for a walk and we saw that he was a very sweet people-oriented dog and had the kind of temperament needed to be a therapy dog. His estimated age was six months. He went through the therapy dog test when he was just about a year old. At the time of 9/11 he was 1 1/2 years old. He did absolutely fabulous work, especially with the children. Since I am in charge of Therapy Dogs International I visited almost every second day for the times our dogs were scheduled. This was extremely hard and tiring for Wusel, yet he gave his all. So many people wanted to see him. He did make such a difference. So much so that one of the young America Corps workers wrote a poem a both the therapy dogs but dedicated it to her special friend Wusel and the other therapy dogs. I can honestly say that he helped innumerable people and made them feel better for at least a little while. He had the ability to make people laugh and subsequently they could cry. He was the kind of dog who interacted by sitting in front and totally concentrated on the person he was visiting with. This is something one cannot teach a dog this is the behavior of a therapy dog born, not made.”

– Ursula Kempe