There is something about children and animals that always makes me smile.

Perhaps its because both pets and children have an innocence and lack of expectation about how a relationship will unfold.

C'mon, admit it, we adult humans make relationships so complicated.

Yesterday Mary's grand niece came and visited. Sydney is 5 years old and Chloe is now 5 months old.  They both enjoy playing. I watched Sydney test different playthings on Chloe. A stick, a string, her dress, my dog's tail, the laser pointer. Turns out hands down the stick won.

I've shared the Jeannie Story because she  inspired me to become a veterinarian.  Yesterday Sydney wanted to be a veterinarian.

 But she is 5, and you can't get into vet school until you are much older. I kind of hope that she sticks with it though.

Her day with Chloe reminded me of another little girl and her hamster.....

She came to me with a shoe box with punched holes to let in air. I had seen this arrangement before, usually holding a pocket pet...mouse, rat, gerbil, guinea pig. In this case, contained in her modified Nike box was a hamster.

Her Dutch Boy haircut bobbed as she announced "Mr Hamsser broke his leg".

Actually, her mother clarified, Mr Hamsser's name was Cinderella. Cinderella was in the cage when Taylor noticed that she was stuck. Misser Hamser/Cinderella's foot had become wedged in the cage bottom, which was made of wire.

 At 4 years old, Taylor didn't exactly understand the principles of physics as she pulled her pet from the cage. The direction of the leg gave me all the information I needed-the foot was pointing backwards. She handed me her hamster and looked at me with her stern eyes. "Don't hurt Mr Hamsser!!"

My technician Kelli and I went to work. First I injected a local anesthetic to provide pain relief and allow us to manipulate the leg. She held her back from gnawing my finger off. The role of the veterinary technician is often not appreciated. If you ever look at your veterinarian, and he or she has all 10 fingers, I can guarantee that there is a veterinary technician to thank for that.

So Kelli allowed me to get closer to the fractured extremity. "You are hurting Mr Hamsser!!" Taylor shouted at Kelli. I explained that Kelli was restraining her pet and that she wouldn't hurt him at all. I smiled as I wasn't sure whether to refer to Cinderella in the gender assigned by nature or by Taylor.

Cinderella was clearly a female.

As I inspected the fracture an obvious problem came to mind. None of the splinting devices that I had would fit a teeny hamster. The fracture was a clean one of the tibia, fortunately not compound or open, meaning there was no bone protruding from the wound.

We finally settled on the shaft of a wooden cotton swab, broken into two segments to support each side of the fractured tibia. I tore adhesive tape into thin widths to fashion an external fixator. I looked at Taylor and blurted out "Dr McGyver to the rescue"

"Who is Doctor McGyver? "

 she didn't get it....

I put Cinderella back in her modified Nike travel case. We saw her every week for the next month to change the splint and monitor the healing process. Considering that my orthopedics professor would hardly have published my work on Cinderella, I thought she healed very well. Her leg had a slight bend outward. Its hard to tell if a hamster is limping, but I would venture to say she did have a bit of an asymmetric waddle in the final analysis...the smile on Taylor's face was all that really mattered.

Take a moment this week to watch a child with an animal and encourage the bond that develops.

Check out this weeks kid/pet video