Upper Burrell fire company surprises girl with companion German shepherd puppy

Of all emergency calls for fires, car crashes, medical issues and general mayhem the Upper Burrell Volunteer Fire Company fields, the company had a new call Thursday: delivering a puppy to a young girl plagued by seizures.

With sirens blaring, two firetrucks pulled up to a yellow-­sided ranch home with toys in the front yard along Upper Burrell’s Hillview Drive.

Inside the home, Derica Carter, 10, was told something good was going to happen. Instead of the ambulances that have taken her to the hospital five times since February for what Derica calls “scary seizures,” this emergency visit was going to be a good surprise.

Firefighter Vivian Drane jumped from the firetruck with a black German shepherd puppy. Her name is Care Bear, because she looks like a little black bear and is super affectionate.

“Oh, they are bringing me a puppy to visit,” Derica first thought. “I didn’t think they were going to give it to me!”

Then her grandmother, Charlene Gregoire, told her the puppy would be with her when she has seizures.

Derica cried when she learned the puppy was hers to keep. Care Bear will be her companion dog.

That was the plan hatched by Vivian Drane and her father, James Drane, volunteer firefighters who lost their beloved mother and wife, Veronica, last year.

It was Care Bear’s parents, Luna and Bashful, who alerted James when he awoke from a nap and led him to the second-floor bedroom where his wife was napping.

“Each of those dogs took me by the hand and led me to that room; they knew something was wrong.” Drane found his wife unconscious; she later died of a brain bleed.

And the dogs still know, he said.

“When I miss my wife and I cry, Bashful will comfort me. He puts his front paws on the front of the couch and leans into my chest. And it makes me stop crying.”

Drane also credits a family dog of almost 18 years ago that helped his son, Nickolas, who died when he when he was 5 1/2. The family dog helped and shepherded over him when he had seizures.

“I believe dogs know when somebody is not feeling well,” Drane said. “They know how to comfort them, and they know how to alert somebody for help.”

The Dranes knew of the recent, frequent calls for emergency help for Derica to the fire company, which sometimes handles medical emergencies.

The Dranes had an extra puppy that was unusually affectionate from an unexpected litter from Luna.

“We thought the girl and the family can use a dog like that,” Drane said.

The gift of a puppy would be another way for the fire company to give back to the community, he added.

Vivian Drane named the puppy Care Bear, she said, “because she was a special puppy with a sweet heart, and she doesn’t leave your side.”

Derica’s mother, Holly Livingston, was overwhelmed by the gesture.

“My daughter has so much going on with her right now,” she said. “I feel helpless. Then this amazing man — who has been through so much loss himself — is so kind to do this for her.”

The Dranes’ generosity, Livingston said, gives her chills just thinking about it.

The single mother of three is working with doctors to get to the bottom of her daughter’s seizures, which render her unconscious. The most serious health threats have been ruled out, she said. However, the seizures remain concerning and numerous.

“The longest one was an hour and 20 minutes, and it scared the daylights out of me,” she said.

Of Care Bear, Livingston said: “We’re going to take her in with loving arms. I’m going to have the dog by Derica’s side to sense things when she has small daily seizures and to be, at the very least, a great companion dog.”