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Many of you know just what having a highly trained service dog means in my life and in maintaining my independence while living with an ever-changing disease like Multiple Sclerosis. And you know how devastated I was when I suddenly lost Ginger to cancer, almost 3 years ago. It was one of the worst times of my life and it has been a long, difficult road.

But it is finally starting to look up and on October 19th I will be meeting my newest partner to join me on a journey of training and adventure to become my next service dog and complete my life once again!

I really need your help for this to happen. Living on a disability income means I must fundraise to be able to get this pup, train it, support it and become an amazing team again.

Funds will be used for purchasing the pup, training costs for both class training and personal training over the next two years, and travel, both to get the pup in Tennessee and numerous trips to Maine where the service dog school is located. I will be traveling frequently to Maine for continued training and then for final testing to graduate from an accredited school for working dogs. There will be many veterinary expenses along the way for vaccines, spaying and for service dog health testing, as well as some expenses for training and service dog equipment.

If I have never had the pleasure to meet you and you have never met my amazing service dogs Dakota or Ginger, let me share my life with you.

As a lifelong athlete and lover of the outdoors, I can’t begin to explain how I felt upon hearing my diagnosis of multiple sclerosis in 1990. But as I know from being a competitive athlete, a positive attitude is a huge part of success, so I forged ahead. Thank goodness for adaptive sports and for service dogs, both of which afforded me the opportunity to live my life to the fullest.

Alongside me every day were my best friends, my service dogs. Their support allowed me to travel the world, as a top ranked US wheelchair tennis player, adaptive skier, long distance handcycle racer, and one of my greatest achievements as the starting goalie and co-captain of the gold medal US Women’s Sled Hockey Team. Yes, these were incredible achievements, but I could have never attempted them without my partners to assist me.

I also worked in the field of emergency veterinary medicine for 40 years. Now that I am retired, whenever my health allows it, I continue to work in animal rescue in many capacities. My hope is to be able to continue to help animals and to live as active a life as possible.

Living with MS changes every day. Do my legs work today? My arms? Can I see clearly with both eyes today? Those of us living with MS lose our balance easily, especially when bending down. Falls can be disastrous. Service dogs are trained to pick up items from the floor and to be there literally as a leaning post. Sudden bouts of muscle weakness can render us unable to do the simplest of tasks. At times, we suffer from “fatigue episodes” when it becomes difficult to even get up to walk to another room. Service dogs are also trained to do things such as turn lights on and off, open doors, get a bottle of water out of the refrigerator, and reach things we cannot. Most important of all, these incredible, intuitive animals are trained to bark when their partner falls and to go for help. Every person living with Multiple Sclerosis works each day to maintain as much independence as possible, but that goal suddenly became extremely difficult with the unexpected passing of my beloved highly trained Golden Retriever, Ginger.

Many of you were touched by sharing Ginger's and Dakota’s lives with me and it thrilled me to share them with you. But if you were never lucky enough to meet them, I hope you get to meet my new partner and hope you can help be a part of this new adventure in completing my "team".

Thank you so very much!