The Shank Family of San Rafael was recently named “Volunteer Family of the Year” by APPLE FamilyWorks. Marin Humane Society volunteers Gordon and Marilyn Shank, their 15-year-old daughter Hannah, and the family’s 6-year-old English Springer Spaniel Abby, were honored earlier this month for their tremendous contribution in animal-assisted therapy.

Animal-Assisted Therapy (AAT) is part of the Marin Humane Society’s award-winning SHARE (Special Human-Animal Relationships) program. For more than 20 years, AAT volunteers and their pets have been visiting senior communities, retirement homes and hospitals in Marin. Additionally, over the past three years AAT volunteers and their dogs have been working with local teachers, reading specialists and librarians through the Society’s SHARE A Book program to help children improve literacy skills.
 
“The love, support and companionship pets have to offer is invaluable, especially to someone who is ill, isolated or struggling with a learning disability,” says SHARE program coordinator Darlene Blackman. “Gordon, Marilyn, Hannah and Abby are very deserving of this award – they make a wonderful family volunteer team!”

For the past four years, the Shank Family has been making weekly visits to the skilled nursing unit of Villa Marin in San Rafael. Though many residents suffer from varying degrees of dementia, the family reports that everyone “reacts and brightens” when Abby and the family arrive.

“Community service has always been an integral component of our family’s values,” says Marilyn. “It is important for my husband and I to have Hannah understand that volunteering is something that you do, not because your school requires you to fulfill a specified number of hours each year, but because it is critical to the fabric of the community – and because it is tremendously fulfilling on a personal level.”

The Shanks recall a particularly memorable experience involving Hazel, a 98-year-old resident at Villa Marin. For three years Hazel never said a word, only to look up one day and remark that Abby was ‘particularly rambunctious’ that morning. “It was pretty remarkable,” says Marilyn.

SHARE’s reach is not limited to animal-assisted therapy. When diminished income or health challenges get in the way of caring for a beloved companion, SHARE is there to help via a variety of community programs. The SHARE program provides assistance to more than 200 senior and disabled clients. Over 60 volunteers provide a lifeline for seniors and their pets in times of need.

Assistance is tailored to each client’s needs. It can take the form of delivery of pet food and supplies, grooming, home visits, transportation to the veterinarian, dog walks, litter box maintenance, and emergency boarding for pets in the event of hospitalization of the client. SHARE also places gentle, mature animals with home-bound individuals through a special adoption program.

Whenever the quiet companionship of an animal will help a hospital patient, a nursing home resident, an isolated individual in a mental health program, or a child struggling with learning disabilities, SHARE arranges for volunteers to visit. Whatever is needed, SHARE volunteers are there to help.

Carrie Harrington is the communications manager at the Marin Humane Society, which contributes Tails of Marin articles. Write to Tails of Marin, 171 Bel Marin Keys Blvd. Novato, CA 94949. For more information, call 883-4621 or visit MarinHumaneSociety.org.

Tails of Marin appears every Saturday in the Home & Garden section of the Marin Independent Journal