This goat isn't the slightest bit gruff

Therapy goat a comforting presence

By Ellen Spitaleri

The Clackamas Review, Mar 10, 2009, Updated Oct 30, 2009

Gracie, a mini-Nubian goat, with her owner, Sandy Amos.

Ellen Spitaleri / Clackamas Review

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Gracie has been to Lloyd Center, retirement facilities, Oregon City Healthcare and to the state penitentiary — which is somewhat surprising, given that Gracie is indisputably a goat.

Then again, Gracie is no ordinary goat. The registered mini-Nubian is a certified therapy goat.

Gracie, who will be 6 years old this month, is the only goat ever to be certified by the Dove Lewis Animal Assisted Therapy and Education organization, noted owner Sandy Amos, an Oregon City resident.

Another first for Gracie is coming up this Friday, when she walks the runway at Boutiques Unleashed, an event to benefit the Dove Lewis Pet Loss Support Program.

Although Gracie has not been a “supermodel” before, she is used to attracting attention wherever she goes, Amos said.

Her usual venue is a retirement community where she offers unconditional love to residents, but she definitely turned heads during her trip to Lloyd Center’s Barnes and Noble for a Christmas event.

Amos took Gracie into the restroom at the bookstore, in order to empty her “pellet bag,” and said she wondered what people thought when they saw goat hooves in the stall.

“It was just hilarious — we got a lot of weird looks, and as we walked through the mall camera phones were going off,” she said.

Jim Amos, Sandy’s husband, said one person even asked him what kind of dog Gracie was.

Favorite with seniors

The goat has a following in local retirement communities, Sandy Amos said.

“She seems to instinctively know that people in wheelchairs are her target. She goes right up to them and nuzzles their leg. If they bend over, she gives them a kiss. She seems to sense they really need her.”

One of Gracie’s favorite people is a man named Bill, who lives at Marquis Care in Oregon City, Amos said.

“He loves Gracie; he’s been moved to the Alzheimer’s wing, and he’s fading fast. He doesn’t [recognize] too many people now, and sits in his chair almost asleep. Gracie goes in and finds him and starts nuzzling his hands, and he wakes up and says, ‘It’s the little goat.’

“He doesn’t know anyone else, but he knows the goat,” she said.

A new resident recently moved to the same facility and caregivers told Amos that she had not spoken very much. When Amos asked her if she wanted to pet the goat, the woman nodded, and began to pet Gracie.

“Then she started telling a story about her own goat as she petted Gracie, and [the caregivers] said that was the first time she had talked,” Amos said, adding, “There is something magical about therapy animals — they bring out the smiles.”