We’re going through this right now, as our college-aged kid has moved out of the house.

Four out of five of our pets are fine with it. Our dog, Olive, is not.  Nobody consulted her about Rubin’s move.

Olive has suddenly forgot how to be house-trained, and she’s needy, needy, needy. She needs her blankie. She needs to sit between my sweetheart and I on the couch every evening. She needs lots of attention. Her boy is gone and she is needy.

Olive

Ugh. It breaks my heart.

So I’m going to take 5 posts to explain to you how I’m helping my pet, and how you can help yours through times of transition.

The Five Stages of Change

There are five stages of change that we all go through, whenever a change occurs. You have to go through them all. You don’t get to skip any. If you skip one of these steps, life will be difficult.

They are:

The Calm/Stuck
This is the stage before the change. Either you are in a lull in your life, or you are preparing for the change.

The Boom
This is the change.

Coming to Terms
This is where you bring all the parts back together from the change, and make sure that you’re okay. This is also the part where you say goodbye to the things that you are leaving behind.

Chaos/Creation
This is the craziness that ensues as you start living in your changed world

The New Thing
This is where you start to feel the rhythm of the new life that you are leading.

Change can be positive or negative, but it’s usually both

Change is emotional. The Boom can be positive (I won a million dollars!) or negative (my cat moved away!). It’s usually both. There are usually good and bad things about every change.

People and Pets are the Same

They feel very similar things at each point of the change.

Pets and humans react according to their natural logic with change. So, you might decide that you need a cocktail or to go for a run upon learning that your company is relocating you to Pittsburgh.

Your dog may need to eat the sofa to relieve the stress that he’s feeling. It’s the same thing.

They do the same things we do. Their logic may be different than ours.

For example, these days, Olive is pooping in the house. Who used to walk her? Rubin, the kid who moved out. Are other people walking her? Of course. With her logic, if she poops in the house, maybe Rubin will come home and walk her.

This logic is maddening! If your pet is stressing from a change and doing weird things, take a look at their logic. Compare it to how you react with a change. You’ll probably find some similarities.

We’re going to spend the next 10 days exploring each stage. I’m going to give you advice about how to handle each stage as it comes, for you and your pet, and also, for how to interact with your pet.

Stage One: The Prechange, the calm or the stuck

This is what happens before the change.
Maybe, you’ve planned the change, or maybe the change is unbidden.
If this isn’t a planned change, and if you pay attention, you can feel the air thicken. You might be able to tell that something is going to change, but you also might wonder what exactly is going to happen. This can feel scary.

Pets often know that something is going to happen long before we do. We’ve seen animals get crazy before a storm approaches. Change works the same way.

Or they know that something is going to happen before we show signs of it. I hear this from my clients a lot: How does my pet know that we’re going on vacation before I even get the suitcases out?

Pets are sensitive to changes in energy. They aren’t always so good at making a correlation between the energy they feel and a cognitive understanding of the change that is about to occur. That is, they know something is up, but they’re never quite sure what that something is…

So, for example, if you’re pregnant, they might understand that your lap is changing, and also that you are, ahem, emotional. They probably don’t get that you’re about to bring a new person into the world.

How to help your pet before the change

If you know about the change, this is a really important time!

You need to do four things:
1. Keep the same routine
Try to feed your pet at the same time. Or let them out the same way you usually do. Pets need normalcy. If you feel like you don’t have a routine, look to see what kind of routine you have before you go about implementing a routine. Odds are, you have a routine, you’re just not aware of it. Do that routine!
2. Talk to your pet about the change
Really. With words. From your mouth. Be reassuring. Let them know about how things will be the same and how they will be different. Repeat this often. Let it sink in.
3. Plan an easy transition for the change for your pet
If you’re having a baby, let the pet see the baby’s room. Bring home something from the hospital that smells like the baby. Plan how your pet is going to meet the baby. Plan, plan, plan!
4. Don’t worry
Relax. It’s going to be all right. Often, since our pets can pick up our energy, but aren’t so great about context, they will know that you are worried about something, but have no idea what exactly you are worried about. This is stressful.

If you don’t know about the change, but see a bit of a dip in your pet’s daily behavior, you need to do three things.
1. Keep the same routine
2. Add some extra nurturing
Play a little more ball. Give your pet a massage. Spend more time at home. This is a time to build them up.
3. Don’t worry.

You’ll notice that two of the things are the same for both lists. Easy, do-able, they just take some focus and effort.

How We Helped Olive Before the Change

Her boy, Rubin, just moved across town, so he comes over for dinner at least once a week. And she hasn’t really forgiven him yet.

Hindsight is 20/20, and that’s why I’m sharing this with you!

Okay, that’s today’s post. Stay tuned for Sunday when I talk about how to deal with your pet during The Boom!

Barn cats have a precarious existence.  Big Kitty lives in an area thick with coyotes.  I’m sure the gal who owns the barn, Linda, would love to have Big Kitty safe in her house.  Unfortunately, Big Kitty doesn’t much care for people.  It took Linda four years of feeding him before he touched her hand, and let himself be pet.

So, when Big Kitty disappeared, Linda was heartbroken.

Last night, I tuned into Big Kitty. He was alive.  He was injured.  He was in the woods by the barn.  He told me that he was very close, but he’s concerned about going in the barn because he did not want to go to the vet. I asked him to please move back into the barn where it’s safe. I told him that nobody was going to take him to the vet.

I emailed Linda with the news.  She wrote back:

I am just home from the farm and am overjoyed to report that I saw him twice tonight.  First, in searching the barn from top to bottom, a friend and I startled him from a hiding place in something like an attic above the tack room.  He ran down steps and down the main aisle and across the indoor arena to get away.  He was moving at top speed.  We didn’t pursue or continue our search because it was clear that although injured, he was alive, at home in the barn, close to food and water, and didn’t want us to approach.

My worst fear was that he had holed up somewhere and given up.   You are absolutely right that his spirit is strong.

This morning, I tuned into Big Kitty and he and I had a long conversation about his body, how his injury happened (he caught his leg in a door), and the vet. Big Kitty said, I don’t want to go to the vet. The vet smells bad. I don’t want to smell like the vet.

When I told Linda about the conversation, she gasped and laughed and told me about how the last time Big Kitty was at the vet, they had put him in the box they use to anesthetize animals for surgery, and Big Kitty had urinated all over himself.
When they went to clean him up, they used a dry shampoo that smelled like jasmine. Linda said that Big Kitty was very upset by the smell of it. She could just tell that he was saying that this was not how a Barn Cat should smell like!

Big Kitty wanted his food in one spot and no other, so as not to attract “predators”. By predators, he meant (Linda told me) feral cats that want to come into the barn and eat his food.

Big Kitty promised to stay in the barn to recover and Linda promised to not take him to the vet but to stay with him and talk with him. This was hard on Linda, because he’s not putting pressure on that leg. Still, she wants her friend to stay in the barn where it is safe, and not in the woods where the coyotes can get him.

I’m going to talk with Big Kitty again tomorrow, to try to get an understanding of the severity of his injury, and to see if he’d be willing to have a vet visit him at the barn, if they promise not to bring that stinky stuff.

God bless the folks who take in animals from difficult situations.   Tasha recently took in a horse from a couple who were evicted from their house.  They were going to send for her as soon as they were settled in their new home.

These folks were hoarders. They had as many as 28 horses on their little acre of land. That’s crazy.  The husband drank a lot, and had little patience.  They raised horses, but you know, they didn’t so much raise them as let them grow up like weeds.

Two months passed without a word, and finally, when she called to say, “Hey, what’s happening here?”  The couple said, “You can keep her.”

Which was a big relief to Tasha, because she loves this horse, and didn’t want to send it on to the dysfunction that is occurring in this couple’s life.

This is a picture of Shay on her first day at Tasha’s.

Everything was great during those first 2 months.  Tasha didn’t do much with her new horse friend, Shay.  She just fed her and gave her attention.  Then after she found out that she was keeping her, Tasha decided to try to work with her.

Now, Tasha is a sweet, gentle, horsewoman. She also takes no b.s. from her horses.  She’s not abusive. She is firm.

So when Shay started acting ugly during their first training session, Tasha said, “We don’t act that way.”  And Shay decided to throw a huge temper tantrum. She turned around and sent two feet into Tasha’s direction, narrowly missing her face.

Then she bucked and kicked and snorted and lost her little horsey mind.

And Tasha called me.

Shay and I talked for a long time.  We talked about how much she missed her old owners.  She didn’t know where they had gone. She didn’t understand why she was at Tasha’s.  She missed them. They were the only people she knew.  She thought that maybe she had done something to deserve this move.

I was surprised by this.  At the same time she was talking about missing them, she was telling me about how being worked with is painful because you get hit on the back and shoulders with a cane.

She said she was confused by what Tasha wanted.  I explained the give and take of a good horse relationship, and how Shay didn’t need to worry about being hit.

What is it like to be listened to?

I showed Tasha and Shay having a back-and-forth conversation, through body language, through the natural intuitive communication we all do everyday (though most of us are not aware of it).

Shay said, “What is it like to be listened to?”

She was very serious.  She had no idea.  I told her that when somebody listens to you, they take your thoughts and ideas in.  And part of being listened to is being a good listener.

She was thrown by this whole idea.  She was a little overwhelmed by the responsibility.

We talked about horses. Shay knows how horses behave. And horses are great listeners.  I said, “People can be the same way.”

Shay asked for two things.  She asked that Tasha never use a lunge whip near her.  That she never ever have in her hand that Shay could be hit with.  She also asked that Tasha approach her the way horses approach one another,  in a circular fashion, not in the straight line of a predator.

Tasha also owns Shay’s sister, Izzy. She’s owned Izzy for years.  When I mentioned the lunge whip to Tasha, she said, “Oh yeah, Izzy trained me about the lunge whip years ago.  Whenever I have anything like that in my hand, Izzy grabs it from me and throws it on the ground and stomps on it!”

Tasha readily agreed to no lunge whip and also to walking in circles.  I think they are going to build a great relationship together.

When new animals come into our care, they can have very complex emotions about the people they are leaving. No person is all good or all bad.  Grief is part of the process.  It doesn’t mean the animal is bad or damaged. It just means that the animal is hurting.  As new owners of these pets, it’s our job and our honor to support them in this process, and where necessary, to teach them how to have relationships.

It is. It is a gift  you are born with.

A gift that we are ALL born with.

The other day, I was doing a consult with a client whose pet had died.  I reached out to him, and he hadn’t passed over yet.  He refused to pass over.

So I contacted her and she said, “Oh yeah, I know. The night he died, I woke up and he was standing in the doorway to the bedroom.  He still had only 3 legs, so I figured he hadn’t crossed over yet. He asked me where my husband was and so I told him that he was down the hall. So he just left without saying a word. ”

“It was freaky,” she said. “Because I just talked to him with my mind.”

This client of mine has never taken my class or any other communication workshop, it just happened.

When an intuitive experience happens to you,  life changes.  And when one intuitive door opens, like you hear an animal talk, other intuitive doors open too.

You’ll find your intuitive senses heightened, which can be a truly amazing experience.  At least, it’s been that way for me.

It can change your life in ways you can’t imagine.

I hope you’ll consider taking my next workshop. It starts on February 1st.  It’s a teleclass that you can take from anywhere.

So, when a mutual acquaintance introduced me to Jane Wiedlin, I was a little starstruck.

I told my friend, Woods, about it.  He said, “Tell Jane that she’s always been my favorite Go-Go!”

I said, “I bet she gets that A LOT.”

“Yeah,” he said.

I’ve had famous clients before, and I think it’s important to respect the privacy of these clients, but Jane is so kind, she told me that I could her dogs’ experience and also, I think they have an interesting story to tell beyond the fact that they are Jane’s dogs.

Meet Malcolm and Angus

That’s Malcolm on the Left and Angus on the Right.

They are brothers and they had several homes before Jane adopted them.

Jane calls them her “two-headed hydra” because they go to the dog park and sometimes they terrorize other dogs.  Also, they were upset when they had to meet new people. Could we work something out?

I talked with Malcolm first. He was interesting.  He shared with me that he didn’t like people that “weren’t cool”.  He showed me someone that he thought was cool. He showed me a man with reddish brown hair and black framed glasses.  I wondered if the glasses were as prominent in real life as they seemed to Malcolm.  Malcolm said that this was Jane’s friend.

When I told Jane, she sent me this picture of her boyfriend Travis.  She thought it was funny that Malcom referred to Travis as her friend.

See! See the glasses?  Yeah, they are pretty awesome.

Little Dogs and Aggression

Malcolm told me that he didn’t like it when people treated him like “My Little Pony”.  He found that “emasculating”.  So, he didn’t like that.  Little dogs tend to be perceived as cute and sweet, and not as small but intelligent dogs.  When dogs have been treated this way, they start to act out.

Also, they are small, so being around big feet and being manhandled is stressful.

The Window

Angus told me that he “likes to express himself aggressively”.   He enjoys picking on smaller dogs.

I said, “Hey, those dogs have feelings. What do you think about that?”

Angus said, “Well they aren’t my feelings, so I guess I’m okay with it.”

Angus and Malcolm are not bad dogs.  They are dogs that lived in situations where they weren’t treated with respect. They didn’t learn about the feelings of others because their own feelings weren’t respected.

So, now, there is this window of appropriate behavior that Jane must find them in.  The window is when they aren’t acting out of fear and also when they aren’t acting out of a desire to “express themselves aggressively”.

I think, in time, they will learn to respect the feelings of others.  They’ll also learn that they are safe with Jane and Travis and the people in their home.

I suggested a positive training technique to lower their anxiety around new dogs and people.  It involves giving treats to Malcolm and Angus when they are in the presence of new dogs, but not so close to them that Jane can’t keep their attention.

I really enjoyed talking with these two.

Mellie had a son seven months ago, and Sherman was very hostile towards the baby. Mellie felt like she had no choice but to put her to sleep.

These choices are very hard.  Putting Sherman to sleep was not an easy decision. It was not made without much soul-searching.

Still, Mellie was not at peace.  Mellie felt horribly guilty and sad. She was in a deep state of grief.

Mellie hired an animal communicator to talk with Sherman on the other side.

Here’s what she wrote me:

I spoke to another animal communicator that I’d used in the past, soon after my dog passed. I was devastated by her communication. Sherman told me through her that I had made a grave mistake, that I misheard all the cues, that I wasn’t acting from my heart, and that I had betrayed her and was therefore now at a dead-end in my life. The trauma from that reading has added to my pain.

I’m hoping that perhaps we can mediate some of my dog’s pain and anger and I can gain some less tormenting insight and closure. I really do feel I did all I could before and after my son’s birth, and after he was 6 months old, Sherman was still becoming increasingly worse in her attempts to attack him – even though I could tell she didn’t “mean to” – it was like some switch was flipped towards only him. No other people aggression.

I felt so bad for her. To put a dog down, a beloved friend who was turning on her baby, and then to hear from an animal communicator that she wasn’t at peace.   I couldn’t tell if the animal communicator was just wrong, or if this dog was just in a really bad place.

It turns out that Sherman hadn’t crossed over.  She was angry and confused.

Here’s the email I sent back to Mellie:

The problem is not that you did the wrong thing.  The problem is that Sherman did not cross over.  So, you’ve got a confused and angry dog in a confused state. That’s why you got such an angry message and also why you haven’t had any peace.   Ugh. That’s terrible.

I just talked with Sherman and we got her crossed over.  She needed to understand that her bond with you was not in question or going away, but that her anger and pain needed to be handled by a higher source.

When I first contacted her, I found her in an old rail yard. She said, “I want Mellie here with me.” I said, “Mellie can’t come here. It wouldn’t be a safe place for her or the baby.”  Then Sherman got very upset and told me that nobody took care of her when she was a baby the way that Mellie takes care of  her baby.   So lots of jealousy and anger.

I located her light, and showed it to her, and it was a field of flowers, bright orange and yellow daisies.  She didn’t want to go into it. At first it was because she didn’t want to leave you. I let her know that once she was whole, she was going to be able to visit in spirit, and perhaps come back in another body. Then she had issues about her not being “good enough” for healing. I let her know that God makes little tenacious dogs for a reason, and that she was precious in her own way of being.

After she heard this, she stepped into the field, and made her way towards the light.

I  contacted Sherman a few days later. She shared with me that she was in a better place. She wanted to walk around with Mellie. I showed her how to follow her heart down to Mellie. It was good to see her at peace.  It turns out that she and Mellie have had several lifetimes together. They are kindred spirits.

If you have a deceased pet that’s angry, that’s spitting mad at you, you probably have a deceased pet who hasn’t crossed over.  It makes your grieving very difficult as you resonate their fear and anger in your emotional system.

I’m really happy that Mellie kept going, looking for a way to bring peace to a really difficult situation for her and for her dear friend.

As an intuitive animal communicator, I talk with pets of all kinds, and wild animals too. I work with people and their pets to solve behavioral issues and improve their relationships.

Olive and Bridget Pilloud

When I talk with an animal, it’s a multi-media experience.

I hear words.

I see pictures and movies.

Animals send me smells.

They send me tastes (lucky me! I know what fresh mouse tastes like. It is nothing like chicken).

I feel the emotions of animals.

I feel their physical sensations.

It’s always interesting!

Animals tell me about their lives with previous owners. They tell me what they like and don’t like. They tell me how much they love their owners. They tell me the details that matter to them.

Communication Wherever You Live

I’ve got clients from Singapore to Seattle…From Washington D.C. to Wales to Finland.  I can talk with with animals anywhere.  I use phone and Skype primarily to talk with owners.  If you live local to Portland, I work in-person as well.

Hire Me!

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