We made our way over to where the dogs were to meet up with Terry, Kyria, and the other soldiers. When they let CAROLINE out, she came right to me. I just spent some time playing with her. There is this goofy ball that she loves. It makes these weird noises when you squeeze it and CAROLINE seemed to love that ball. I had a water bottle on the floor and she kept picking it up and looking for someone to take it too. When we left the unit, we went back to the hotel so I could spend some alone time with CAROLINE. Terry told me to talk with her, and let her lick me. I didn't realize that when he said to let her lick me just exactly what I was in for. She probably spent about 20 minutes just licking me, my face, my feet, my arms, my legs. I didn't think she was ever going to stop. She spent a good amount of time checking the room out, going back and forth between my room and my parents room. Mom said that when I went to the restroom that she just paced outside the door waiting for me. She and I got some rest, and when we were on the bed she always wanted to be touching me. She would lay on top of my legs or curl up right next to me.
A bunch of us went out to dinner that night, and that's when I got a migraine. There weren't any dogs with us in the restaurant, Terry had decided to keep them in the car. I had a pretty rough time at dinner, and ended up going outside with Terry and feeding the dogs while everyone else finished up eating. CAROLINE came back to the hotel with me, and we I just tried to relax.
Wednesday we went back to post, and I worked a little bit with CAROLINE on some basic commands. I had had enough at that point, and really just wanted to get out of there. My anxiety had gotten pretty bad, and I was struggling to try and keep it together. One thing that I did notice was that I didn't really think about my anxiety nearly as much as when I was with CAROLINE as when I was not with her. She really wants to please, and it's interesting the difference in my outlook when I am with her. It's pretty hard to think of negative things when she is around.
Overall the trip was great. It was a pretty big improvement over some of the other trips I had taken. I only had one migraine, and didn't slip back into a depression when I got back home. I am really looking forward to my next trip to Stewart.
