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[Piano music]

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Judy: I've wasted weeks composing clever cover letters to you

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describing the many reasons I need a monkey helper,

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but you don't need to told how a trained monkey changes a life of an isolated wheelchair user.

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Oh, I remember thinking, Oh, I know what it was,

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I remembered thinking, sitting there in the office,

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well of course that's what its like for most people,

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but it won't be that bad for me.

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It can't be that bad for me.

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And it has been. Pretty much that bad.

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George: Before we even got married, Jude had had some funny neurological kind of symptoms.

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She had a numbness in her body that seemed odd.

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Judy: We went on a very long walk in the Caribbean,

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on Saint John, from the top of the mountain, all the way down to the beach.

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The next day, I couldn't feel my legs at all.

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I thought it was funny.

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I remember saying to George: Hey George, can you beat that?! I can't feel my feet!

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George: And... As everyone does when they're young

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and have a twitch, they go: "well I hope that goes away quickly."

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As it happened, very soon after we got married

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she officially got diagnosed as having progressive MS

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Judy: It was winter and George and I went out for a drive.

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We went way out...

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Way out into the field with black sky and a zillion stars

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And, now, I don't think I've talked about this since then,

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but I howled, because the doctor had made it sound like it turned out to be.

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And so I howled and, and then after a certain time

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I said, OK, that's enough. I can come home now.

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George: Jude went from being a busy realtor and a runner

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to slowly getting to the stage where she needed a cane.

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I'm learning to accept that when you pass these markers, you're not going to see them again.

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you've passed them forever.

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This is a one way street.

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And it's dawned on me in the last couple of years

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that this is a fight that I cannot win.

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Jude is gonna die of this disease

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and there's not anything I can do about it.

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I think the first time we heard about the monkey

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was in a magazine article.

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So in an idle moment she went on the internet

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and looked up monkeys, helpers and came up with these people in Boston.

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And the website said something about:

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if you would like a monkey, send us an e-mail.

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And I think in our minds we thought nothing would ever come of it.

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And about three days later we got an e-mail back

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Megan Talbert: Judy sent a letter initially that really did strike us as being really unique.

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Really from the heart.

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It made us laugh.

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It made us want to know more about her.

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Helping Hands has learned over the last 32 years what works

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and how we can build a relationship

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between a service animal and a recipient.

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We've taken the time and the energy to build this process

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because we know how important it is.

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Woman with Monkey: Can you go fetch? Atta girl, Daisy! Atta Girl!

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Megan Talbert: We all run around this world going a hundred miles an hour,

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but the people that we help are adults

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who have had that ability taken from them.

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And to be able to give that gift back,

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even if it's in the form of a six pound monkey helping,

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that partnership that we have seen again and again,

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that is what makes Helping Hands work.

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George: Jude is immobile in her chair

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and if she goes for the phone

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and it slips out of her hands

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and hits the floor, it's 18 inches away

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and it might as well be 18 miles away.

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So we went: "Wow, if this monkey could pick up the phone, that would be terrific.

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Megan Talbert: One of the things that Judy was looking for was a monkey

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that would be able to fetch objects off of the floor, off of a shelf.

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Really what the monkeys learn over time is to anticipate their recipient's needs.

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For example, something as simple as

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walking into a dark room and flipping on a light switch is impossible for Judy.

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Sophie's able to fill that void.

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Judy: I had kind of a not much life.

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And then Sophie came and it became,

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that's what I wanted to do was hang out with that monkey.

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I think I'm her prize person

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when I go in the room she makes more fuss over me

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and I love that!

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George: She was sitting in Jude's lap the other day

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and Jude was sort of mindlessly stroking her and stopped.

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And Sophie reached out her small black hand and grabbed Jude's hand

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and dragged it back because it was clear that she wasn't done being stroked.

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Everybody lit up.

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It was a great moment.

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As it happened she's been with us for a year today.

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It's her anniversary.

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And I don't know how I could have gotten through

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this year without her.

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Megan Talbert: One of the things that's very important

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to a lot of our recipients, is that their monkey doesn't see them as disabled.

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They don't recognize the things that they're unable to do.

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Their monkey sees their recipient as protector,

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As alpha. And that's really important.

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It's a really important gift the monkeys give to

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somebody who has had so much taken away from them.

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Judy: Some of my friends said "You got a monkey?!

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What did you get a monkey for...What are you gonna do with a monkey?!"

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I said: well, how have I lived so long without a monkey?

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Is really the question.

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I've come to find out I was right.

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She's really cool.

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[Guitar music]