A Dental Therapy Dog · Shoot the Dog, Volume Four, page 12
Dogtor Bruce, the Labrador who goes to work at the dentist
If you are nervous about the dentist, you may wish Bruce worked at yours.
Bruce, "also known as Dogtor Bruce to his friends", is a Labrador who "heads to work every day as a Dental Therapy Dog". His page in Shoot the Dog, Volume Four lays out his day, and it is a good one.
The morning shift
Bruce lives in the country, on a farm, and the day starts with a round of inspection:
his morning routine includes checking on the chickens before heading into work.
At work, the page says, he gets "lots of love and cuddles from the dental team and patients". The serious part of the job is the patients who would rather be anywhere else:
He is particularly good at calming nervous patients and distracting them with his cute cheeky grin and paw shakes…
The honest part
Then his family add the line that made us laugh out loud:
Although he mostly just sleeps and snores at work, which makes everyone giggle.
Which, if you think about it, is also therapy. A Labrador snoring in the corner of a dental surgery is hard to be frightened next to.
After hours
After a hard day of sleeping at work, Bruce likes to "say hi to the cows or play chasey with a pair of socks". He visits his best friend Charlie the Australian Shepherd, and on weekends he is down at the creek with his mum and dad, "who love him very much!"
The portrait above is Bruce off duty: rope toy in his mouth, one paw up, ears flying, and not a hint of the calm professional the patients see.
Rescue at the heart of it
Every family photographed for Shoot the Dog paid a $100 participation fee, and all of it went directly to an animal rescue group. Where the $100 went tells that story, and names the five rescues.