Therapy Pony Visits Patients and Residents

Hi there, my name is Amanda. I'm blessed to have a pretty special miniature horse. We call her Jasmine, but sometimes she's known as Lucy or Jimmy - depending on the person we're visiting.

Jasmine has become a volunteer at the local continuing care and healthcare centres. She not only comes into the buildings to visit, but she also goes into patient rooms and even rides the elevator to make sure everyone who wants to meet her gets the opportunity.

Recently we've been getting more and more requests for pony visits to palliative residents in care and as a morale boost to staff. Although we're thrilled to be able to share our special little girl with so many who love her, the expense of bringing her to the site is becoming more than I can handle. I am a single mom; I work in health care full time. There is little more rewarding in the world than bringing joy to patients, residents, their families and staff that care for them. But there is little more heartbreaking than having to say no, I'm sorry, I can't afford the gas to bring her.

To bring Jasmine to Westlock, it takes me 3 hours of driving round trip, an hour to get her clean and ready for visiting, and another two hours to do rounds.

What I'd like to do is to be able to increase the number of visits to our local site, and be able to expand to neighbouring communities' sites as well. I want to be able to bring smiles to our parents, grandparents, family members, friends and neighbours and give a little bit of levity to the hard-working people who take care of them.

With your help, we can improve the quality of life for so many.