VANCOUVER, B.C. — While Daniel Brown waits to see the doctor, he introduces us to the patient. “I think he’s about 115 years old,” Daniel says before showing a picture of a well-worn stuffed animal on his phone named Big Teddy. Daniel’s grandfather bought the bear for his children around 1910. Since then, Big Teddy has been passed down through five generations of his family. “I remember he was big and reassuring,” Daniel says before showing a black and white photo of him posing with the bear. Daniel’s daughter befriended the bear too. And now Big Teddy attends tea parties with Daniel’s granddaughter. “He’s been adored by a lot of people,” Daniel smiles. But all that love had taken its toll. Big Teddy was falling apart. So, Daniel brought him to a stuffie specialist. “I’m Dr. Ruth!,” Ruth Hasman introduces herself at her home turned Teddy Bear and Stuffy Hospital. Ruth grew up being the doll-loving daughter of a human doctor, who considered nursing before embarking on a career crafting bears, which led to this retirement job rehabilitating all sorts of stuffed animals. “Now I’m a surgeon,” Dr. Ruth laughs. Now Dr. Ruth’s dining room has been transformed into an operating room, where’s she’s performed more than a thousand surgeries. “I do fur grafts. I do cataracts. I give new joints. Face lifts,” Dr. Ruth laughs. “A lot of clients will say, ‘Gee! I’d like to have a facelift. Can you do that too?’” Dr. Ruths’s home is filled with all sorts of plushie parts. She can refurbish stuffies of all ages. At 115 years old, Big Teddy is her oldest patient ever. “I never know what I’m going to find until I open them up,” Dr. Ruth says before taking a pair of scissors and cutting through the seam of a stuffed animal and pulling out its stuffing. “It’s an excitement and a challenge.” While Big Teddy’s diagnosis was dire, Dr. Ruth was determined. She performed a long list of procedures that included constructing new joints, replacing old straw stuffing, and refurbishing a broken voice box. But the best part of the process is sewing the stuffy up and presenting them to their person. “Wow! My heavens!” Daniel says he’s impressed by Dr. Ruth’s transformative work, before embracing the refurbished Big Teddy. “I bet you feel a lot better old boy.” And because no matter how old we get, our inner child never stops benefiting from an unconditional cuddle, Dr. Ruth has no plans to retire — despite being almost 83. “I love it!” Dr. Ruth smiles. “It’s something good that I can give back to a person.” And in this case, give back to Daniel’s granddaughter. So, in another 115 years from now, Big Teddy will be able to give her great granddaughter a hug too.
