Every child deserves to feel like a child, even in a hospital.

Healing isn't just physical. Sometimes it looks like a therapy dog walking into a hospital room and a kid's whole face changing. A moment of comfort that no medication can replicate.

On August 22, we’ll run 125km around the island of Montréal in support of the Pet Therapy program at the Montreal Children’s Hospital. In partnership with Zoothérapie Québec, the hospital brings specially trained therapy dogs to young patients across its wards, roughly 400 sessions every year. For a child who is scared, in pain, or in need of a distraction, that visit matters more than we can put into words. It improves feelings of isolation. It opens kids up. It reminds them, for a moment, that the world outside still exists and still loves them.

We’re raising $100,000 to fully fund that program for an entire year.

This isn’t a race. It’s the same open invitation as last year: run a stretch with us, cheer us on, or donate if you believe that a child going through something hard deserves a reason to smile.