Courtesy photo

By BERNADETTE LAURITZEN
Executive Director
Champions of Youth Ambitions

I’m sure you thought this would be a nice story about the mother of my mom. Well, it is a nice story about someone, but her name is Mama and I’m her mom. More on that in just a minute.

As Mental Health Awareness Month ends, I thought I would reflect on the month and suggest a new idea for anyone that struggles in life. Thanks to the Women’s Christian Service Society of the United Church, Champions of Youth Ambitions has been teaching QPR (Question, Persuade Refer), a free one-hour suicide prevention presentation, in the community. We then received a grant from 100 Men Who Care and will continue under their umbrella through December. I will be certified to teach for two additional years, call anytime.

This month we gave an overview of suicide prevention to 31 health care providers under the umbrella of Los Alamos Medical Center. My deepest thanks to Lori Coffelt and Rachel Dunaway for the invitation and the many providers that asked that I return with the full training. Many already deal with situations where the knowledge would be helpful.

I’m excited to say that this week and next week, we will teach the staff of the EOC (Emergency Operations Center) for the Los Alamos Police Department. C’YA was happy to accommodate the different schedules to ensure everyone gets the training. We hope to do a similar one for a youth serving organization soon too.

Here’s a new idea. You see my husband Chad and I adopted a dog one year ago this month. They had named her Mama June, but we just called her Mama. She was left at the shelter with a box full of puppies in the middle of the night. We never changed her name to honor that fact.

We volunteer at the Santa Fe Shelter and have fostered a few dogs to give them a break from shelter life. According to on-line reports, a study of 2,000 dogs in 51 shelters found that fostering a dog can increase their chance at adoption by 14 times.

A running joke is that sometime volunteers “fail” by adopting the dog they foster. We considered ourselves “foster over achievers.” We have successfully fostered dogs 3 times, who later found forever homes. We brought Mama to Los Alamos with plans to meet two families after a foster lost her in the Santa Fe National Forest. She was out there 9 days and rescued by Michelle Lord who owns a business that finds lost dogs.

Mama was skittish, afraid when someone moved too fast and missed her former roommate (Camilla). She loves my husband and was always so happy to see him. While here, even if he walked out of sight for a few minutes, her tail enthusiastically thumped the floor so hard when he returned, I was worried she’d injure it. That happened EVERY time he left the house or a room and still does a year later.

You see, shelter dogs sometimes need more time to decompress, adjust, and see that life can be good again. When they know they are loved and safe, they change before your eyes. Dogs like people might feel broken or still have lessons to learn. A rescue dog can teach you how to love again, help you heal your woes, teach patience or that everything doesn’t always need to be perfect. Volunteering at a shelter can fill those voids for humans too.

We recently fostered Jolene, a bubbly, two-year old baby in a tall body. She needed a break from the shelter to learn how to be part of a family. She has some anxiety and is learning to be a member of a household and experience daily things. Think about the sounds of a washing machine, vacuum, or coffee grinder. While we were only able to keep her for a week due to a traveling conflict, we would have her stay again. You can learn more about volunteering, adopting or temporary fostering at www.sfhumanesociety.org. We are happy to transport, treats, toys, food or used towels, blankets in good condition for dogs or cats for donation.