My clever pooch kept my dream alive
Hobbling around the children’s ward, I plastered on a smile for my little patients. ‘Hi, nurse Chloe,’ they grinned back.
It was summer 2017 and I’d been working in children’s hospitals since I qualified four years earlier. I’d always wanted to be a nurse and loved kids.
Helping them when they were sick and needed comfort was so rewarding. Especially as I knew what it was like.
At 15, I’d been diagnosed with a string of painful and debilitating conditions.
Chronic fatigue syndrome, fibromyalgia, Behçet’s disease, Raynaud’s and Ehlers-Danlos syndrome.
Suffered hypermobility and pain in my joints. It was devastating. But it won’t hold me back, I’d vowed.
At university, I used crutches to get to my classes. Battled fatigue as I studied for my nursing exams.
I qualified in 2013, and played down my illnesses.
Smiled through the pain so colleagues wouldn’t suspect that I was struggling.
Only, now, four years on, it was getting harder.
And by April 2018, I needed a wheelchair most of the time.
So, I became a nurse in care homes, then a community nurse instead.
It was easier, visiting people at home, working to my own schedule.
But I still needed extra help.
‘If only I had an assistant,’ I told my mum Jackie.
I loved my work, but these days even getting dressed left me in agony.
I needed someone loyal, with their nose to the ground.
Plenty of enthusiasm. And then it clicked. I needed a dog!
I’d seen other disabled people have pet pooches that were trained to assist them in daily life.
So, in March 2021, I picked up Ocho, an adorable golden Labrador puppy, from a local breeder.
Over two years, with help from the charity Dog A.I.D., I trained him to be the perfect assistant.
Taught him to carry my laptop bag, pick up pens from the floor.
Help me get dressed and undressed.
Even load the washing machine!
Little things that many people took for granted but I found
