Chrissy 0:00
Welcome to The Dogs of our lives. Podcast with me. Chrissy Messick, this is where traditional training transforms into true connection and understanding with our dogs. As a certified dog trainer, behavior consultant and interspecies communicator with a background in high level sports medicine, I bring a unique functional approach to understanding our dogs by integrating body, mind, heart and soul, join us for insights, stories and practical wisdom that will help you prevent problems before they start and build a deeper bond with your animal companion. Before we get into today's episode, let me ask you a question, how well do you actually know your dog? Why not take my quiz to find out? You can find the link in the show notes. Now let's dig in. In today's episode, our first episode of season two, I talk with Dr Chris pol who's a veterinary behaviorist out of Portland, Oregon, but his reach is all over the world. Not only do we discuss how he's been influenced by dogs and what exactly a veterinary behaviorist is, but we talk about how a functional approach for caring for our dogs and humans is so important. And I thought that this would be a great episode to start with, because there's an overarching theme of physical, mental, emotional and spiritual well being of the humans, dogs and other animals that we work with. I love that we talk about the spiritual aspect, because it's an important element that needs to be discussed, but it's not discussed very much, and I think you will find it fascinating what we discussed in that topic. Hello, Dr, Chris buckle, thanks for being here, and I'm so glad you are here and able to be with us. I know you're super busy and you have a lot going on, so I really appreciate you taking the time.
Chris 1:41
You're absolutely welcome. Chrissy, it's a pleasure to be here. And you know, I know some of your other guests who were on season one, and so they spoke very highly of the experience. And so I said, Well, of course, of course, we'll put this on the calendar, and I'm looking forward to it.
Chrissy 1:57
Yay. I know Jenny. She's one of my clients, and I know a good friend of yours, and she she just loves you. But I said, Is there anything that I could give him a hard time about? She said, Ask him about his half marathons.
Chris 2:15
Yeah, my husband and I were just down in San Diego this past weekend to run a holiday half dressed as elves. It was a ton of fun. And also I thought that I was better trained. And so from about mile nine and a half onward, I wasn't smiling the entire time. Let's just put it that way. And gosh, we're almost a full week out, and my legs are still recovering. So you know what? It gets harder as we get older, but the joy is greater too. So I'll run with it. Oh
Chrissy 2:46
my gosh. So you weren't, you weren't a smiling elf at all then,
Chris 2:50
I mean, only when the cameras were out. I mean there, there was some digging deep and some grunting and some very compassionate questions from my husband, are you? Are you okay? Can you assure me you're not actually dying the way you look like you're dying right now? Please, please. That's hilarious.
Chrissy 3:08
Well, Jenny also said with that, that after you guys ran you went into a coffee shop and ran into Will Ferrell. We
Chris 3:17
were having breakfast the next morning, and the funniest part is the finish line had, you know, the elf, sort of the excited elf thing, as a backdrop for the half marathon. So we literally had taken a photo the day before, quote, unquote, with Will Ferrell. And so we're having breakfast at a at a restaurant, you know, just down the street the next morning. And we look over and there's, there's Will Ferrell having breakfast at the next table, I was like, Oh my God, you just, you just can't make this up. So that was, that was lovely.
Chrissy 3:48
That's hilarious. I love it. So can you just tell us a little bit about yourself and where you live and what you're doing, and if you have any dogs in your life,
Chris 3:57
sure, sure. So I am a board certified veterinary behaviorist, which means I'm a veterinarian first and foremost, and then clinical behaviorist after that. So most of my work life, at least when I'm here in Portland, in the in the clinic, in the facility, is working with families and caregivers with dogs and cats who have behavioral challenges in some way. Sometimes it's behavioral pathologies, sometimes it's behavior changes secondary to medical issues that may or may not be fully recognized. Yet. Some cases, it's even normal behavior, but that is a problem in that particular household or in that environment. And so we're we're kind of negotiating all of those factors to say, what can we understand? What can we change? How do we treat what needs to be treated? How do we honor what is there and unique to the animal? And how do we ideally find a greater sense of cohesiveness, and, you know, family unity in most cases. So we're doing a lot of that sort of work in the practice, of course, with you. Medical and medication interventions, but also leaning on my other team, which is instinct dog behavior and training. And I've got a team of I should know this number off the top of my head, nine, nine or 10, nine or 10 trainers who are working both in our facility helping dogs with day training programs, where they get dropped off in the morning, have a day of education and learning stuff all day long, and then go home with their people at night, and then an entire field team working with families, sort of out in the wild, so to speak. And so we're tackling it from all angles, from a really cohesive, veterinary, informed, behavior focused and kindness centered approach across all of those things, right? So that's what that's what I do here in Portland. I also speak a lot at international and national events, whether that's for veterinary students or at conferences or for training organizations or a variety of other platforms. So that keeps me busy on the road and allows me to earn some travel miles along the way. Yeah, uh oh. And you also asked about pets in the household. I, you know, I have to say in this moment, if for the first time in my adult life I am petless, that's a it's a weird thing to say, especially as someone who is so focused on sort of animals and families and all of that, but we lost our dog, Cornelius, somewhat unexpectedly and suddenly in August. You know, knowing what I know in my line of work, I know that adding a new animal, dog, cat or otherwise into the household, you want it to go smoothly, but it doesn't always right. And so both my husband and I right now are are running a little bit close to that sort of capacity point of what we would truly be able to tackle responsibly if we were to bring an animal in and it didn't go smoothly. So we're kind of just sitting with it for a hot minute here to say, Okay, let's, let's wait for the kind of the right opportunity, not necessarily the right dog we're willing to tackle challenging situations, but for the kind of the right moment to kind of evolve into something we sort of jokingly say we're waiting to be found, and we'll see what happens next.
Chrissy 7:13
Yeah, I mean, I think I was talking to Mark beckoff about this, and just because he doesn't have any dogs right now, either, and we're just talking about that so much awareness to setting yourself up for foundation for success, like having that awareness of knowing what your bandwidth is and knowing what your lifestyle is right now and what you can handle and whatnot. So I think that's super important getting getting off on the right foot with bringing a dog or, you know, cat into your home. So that's super important.
Chris 7:43
Yeah, it was, there was there was a moment about about, probably five or six weeks after we had lost Cornelius and my husband was traveling, which he normally doesn't do. So I'm rarely home alone. So here I am in the house, truly alone by myself. And I texted him, I said, if I were, sort of, if this were the scenario, like, I would be on pet finder right now. I would be looking through the local resources. I'm like, just being here alone. If this was what I needed to do, I would have figured out a way to make it work. Because, you know, if I didn't have my husband, it would be, it'd be really lonely existence. And so, yeah, it's just kind of a funny little thing. You you find, you find the way forward based on what your life
Chrissy 8:25
needs. Yeah, um, how old was Cornelius? Cornelius, when he passed,
Chris 8:30
the corn dog he was, he was such a hard dog, and I loved him to pieces. Cornelius was 10 and a half when he passed, he was a bull terrier mix, ended up developing some acute pain, which we initially thought was a cervical or a neck lesion of some sort, ended up being a tumor that was sort of in around under his shoulder area, in a way that we just couldn't address it. And we also, despite our best efforts, could not get his pain level under control, and that was spiraling into some pretty significant anxiety and quality of life concerns. And you know, when you've got a aborted behaviorist and aborted surgeon, which is my husband, looking at it from all the angles, and you say, I don't see a way forward, then you know it's, it's sort of the, the kind thing to do, to to say goodbye, as hard as it, as hard as it is.
Chrissy 9:25
Well, I mean, quality of life is, I mean, you got to look at that, and we'll talk about that more later. But it's interesting how pain can affect behavior. And yes, so it sounds like his, he developed a lot of anxiety. Is that how his behavior changed?
Chris 9:41
It was so the the interesting thing about his pain episodes, especially when they were first sort of starting to really become a concern and And all told, from when these episodes started to when we said goodbye, was about two and a half weeks, Oh, wow. You know, going from a dog who's out there going for runs and hikes and, you know, doing all the things. Things as a healthy, metabolically sound 10 year old dog right to having these moments of acute pain that presumably were were, quote, unquote, coming out of nowhere, meaning it wasn't specifically tied to a particular movement or a particular action. And what we know about anxiety and now sort of shift, you know, taking me out of the caregiver brain and putting me into the clinical side of things. What we know about anxiety is when an animal, human or otherwise, is having an unpleasant or painful experience that they either can't understand, can't control, can't establish any degree of predictability around that's the recipe for anxiety. That anticipatory, you know, apprehensive, worry about, what if, what if it's going to happen now, or what can I do safely or not? And so what we were, we're really seeing for him, was that his, his world, because, because movements were unpredictable in terms of what was going to cause or not cause pain, he became very, very inhibited and and essentially, just stayed as still as possible, which was not at all the way he lived deep Life, right? So it just, it just wasn't it wasn't okay, it wasn't okay. Yeah,
Chrissy 11:24
yeah, that's hard. That's hard, and I'm sure many people can relate to that. So thanks for sharing that story. You're welcome. So can you tell us a little bit about your professional journey, which I'm sure is quite interesting, and why you started ABC and the training and behavior clinic,
Chris 11:43
yeah. So it has been a journey, and I love looking back over all those individual pieces that sort of inform kind of how and where I am today. I think it's super cool to be able to do that, yeah. And you know, I was one of those kids who was sort of sort of in love with animals. We didn't have a lot of animals growing up, but we always had one or two. I wouldn't say that I was the best caregiver of those animals as a kid. You kind of learn as you go, and I have some sadness around some of the some of the things that I wish I could go back and do better. But, you know, that's neither here nor there. But I was that kid who who really loved that. I loved reading about dogs. I loved the James Harriet stories and, you know, the Black Stallion series and all all of like that young adult fiction that involved dogs and wild animals. And I sort of got my hands on all of it. And so I had that sort of fascination with dogs and animals of all sorts. And essentially had, you know, that was my path. I was going to be a veterinarian. I don't actually ever remember having another option in mind, so I'm glad it worked, because I didn't have a plan B. But I went through veterinary school with the expectation and sort of the prediction, that I was going to be a general practitioner, that I was going to be sort of the family veterinarian, working with families over over the lifespans of their animals and multiple animals and and really doing that, and that's where I started. And then I had some some clients who, you know, I remember very, very fondly, who were struggling, who were facing situations they didn't know how to navigate, and they came to me as a trusted advisor, and I didn't know how to advise them, either, yeah, and so, out of necessity, started digging in and learning more about something that I was already curious about but didn't really expect as a career path, you know, that led me down the path of doing some additional continuing education events and some pretty deep, you know, week long, intensive courses and things of that nature. And I remember coming back from one of those courses phoning at that point my my boyfriend, partner, now, husband. I was like, I don't quite know what's going to happen next, but I think this is the beginning of the end of my general practice career. Yeah, and that put me back into residency where I met Dr Jenny Fick. And, you know, I got to work alongside of her while she was in her residency for surgery. And so, you know, it's one of those fun little turns of events. And so I went back into residency and just absolutely fell in love with it. And I've been working in the behavior space now full time since 2004 so over two decades as a veterinarian, practicing in that behavior world, both as initially a house call practitioner in the Minneapolis, Saint Paul area, until 2010 when I moved out to Portland and took over the animal behavior clinic from my mentor. And so now that's, you know, gosh, going on 15 years ago that that we moved to Portland and and really, really established roots here. So yes, I've had the opportunity to work at a university, in private practice, in homes, in, you know, in a clinic environment, and especially during COVID In the last couple of years, practicing a lot of telehealth. And what can we what can we gain? What do we give up, you know, practicing in that space as well. And so it's, yeah, it's. Been an incredible journey so far. And I'm grateful to say, you know, I'm 49 this year, and I'm like, Cool, so I'm 20 years in. I can do this for another 20 years. Oh, my God, I'm only halfway through. Oh, man, this is awesome. So many possibilities. Who knows what's coming next? I sure don't.
Chrissy 15:20
Yeah, no, well, that's kind of the fun part of it, right? Absolutely. So you have your instinct training behavior aspect as well. You pick who you refer to, like training behavior, people that you know, that you were, that you refer out to. Why do you do this?
Chris 15:38
It's complicated. Number one, there are so many amazing, amazing behavior professionals out there in the world, truly around the world, and I'm grateful to know a lot of them. You know, everybody has sort of a unique lens. You know, even as I'm describing my learning history, someone else is going to be coming out of from a completely different angle. And so I love being able to collaborate with individuals who are going to see things a little bit differently than I do you know, either from the practical mechanics of training or a particular skill set, or an affinity for working with a certain type of dog or a certain client type even, and so I love being able to really understand how I can collaborate with those individuals to form a team that complements one another. So all of that being said, I also love being able to work with the same people, yeah, over and over again, and to really dig deeper and deeper and deeper within those collaborative relationships. And so I've had trainers on on my teams, either at Animal Behavior clinic or now through instinct dog behavior and training. I've had trainers on my team since, gosh, I think probably 2015, or so that they've worked right there alongside of me, where I can come out of a diagnostic consultation and say, here's what's needed. What do you got? Stephanie, does this look like this one for you? How about you? Megan, what do we what are we doing, you know, or who, who am I assigning that to? Who's got the skill set that's going to do that? And that sort of lends itself to being able to, again, kind of fold more people into the team as you recognize a need within, within the team's skill set. Or, you know, again, a different lens. I'm now in my team at instinct. You know, while I've got multiple trainers who are certified behavior consultants with up to decades of experience, individually, I also have folks who really focus on service dog training and owner trained service dogs and working not only on actual certification, but also just in some of the the practical everyday skills that can be helpful for people, like turning lights on and off, or picking up dropped items. I've got a trainer who's a certified parkour instructor. I've worked with trainers on my team who are fitness coaches, and just all of those elements that we get to be able to pull in so that we can be really holistic in the way that we approach those issues. That still, you know, doesn't mean that I don't refer out to other trainers, and the fact that I see cases from truly all around the world in the in some capacity or another, I'm still working with trainers outside of my team, pretty much on a daily basis. And that's even cooler is to be able to do all of those things within the routine care for these animals,
Chrissy 18:23
right? What qualities are you looking for when you're working with a behaviorist or a trainer? Why don't you just you know how important is the kindness aspect of training to you?
Chris 18:36
Yeah, I would say the qualities, including kindness, would also be curiosity coach, ability, vulnerability. I want someone who's confident enough, in their view, to sort of fight for it okay, and also to be comfortable enough saying Nope, I misread that, which is a hard balance to find, right, but it's really important for me, because again, I'm going to see it one way. They're going to see it differently. I may get a different impression in the office than they get when they're working with the client in the home, or vice versa, depending on how the circumstances are coming together. And so I need to be able to trust those individuals that they're not just hearing what I'm saying and going out there as an implementer with a plan, right? Their insight, their knowledge, their skill, their expertise, is every bit as important as mine is differently depending on the case. So I look for all of those characteristics, and truthfully, someone that I want to work with, just from a personality standpoint, I want that to be a comfortable communication and that will allow us to do really hard work and support one another as we support these animals and their families through whatever it is that they're navigating. You
Chrissy 19:55
know, it's kind of ironic hearing you talk about behaviorists or trainers having. Are kind of niche. So my background is in Sports Medicine, Human sports medicine. I did that for 20 years. What I'm finding is like, I'm bringing that into a lot of my evaluations and assessments through gait like posture, gait analysis, dysfunction. So I'm starting to take more and more courses in integrating that. Yeah, I think that's cool. And everybody brings their own special, unique them into the work that they do,
Chris 20:25
absolutely, and it's so important to recognize that. And for each of us to recognize not only our assets, but also our limitations, you know, for me to recognize that is an animal who's behaving differently, and here's why I think it's happening. But if I think that's because of vision loss, or, you know, some sort of neurologic condition. You can be darn sure I'm going to be referring and working collaboratively with someone who knows that piece inside and out, Right
Chrissy 20:50
exactly. So let's go back a little bit in time. You told us a little bit about growing up in your childhood. But you know, is there a specific thing that brings you back to what you learned about, you know, animals and that created your values and beliefs and thoughts, feelings and attitudes towards them, and has that changed over the years at all?
Chris 21:09
That's such a good question. And, you know, and there are some early things, like, I remember one of my first dogs, truly that I that I really would consider my first dog was a spaniel Collie, something or other named Tyler. We lived at the time. Sorry. My parents still live in my hometown, but at Minnesota, which is up on the Canadian border of Minnesota, right near Lake of the Woods. And so literally, we're separated from Canada by a river. So we are a border town. I could see Canada from my bedroom window, right? So this is, this is the circumstance. We jokingly say, Tyler defected from Canada during the winter. He he came across to the ice and was, you know, hanging around town, and kind of found us, and we were able to kind of track down where he came from. But the one of the first things that stood out to me was we didn't go looking for him. For some reason, we were the place that he sparked. Started spending his time when he crossed over on the ice and and it reminds me, even thinking back on that, to to always as best we can, to to honor that autonomy and choice within the work that we're doing with animals, even when we are in control of their environment and we, out of necessity, take away some of those choices. I'm always trying to look at it from the standpoint of, what would you do if you had all of the freedom to make all your own decisions? What are your reinforcers? What would you do? How would How would you show up? Where would you go? What would that look like to inform how I'm trying to meet them, where they are, to then move them forward, or to blend that need with the needs of their environment or their people and caregivers. So I think some of that, I go all the way back to that early experience of he picked us for reasons that I don't really know enough about what was going on to even know why, but he but he did, and I'm grateful for it. So some of those things, I think you know that that's really important. I think the other thing that's really important for me, that goes back to childhood, and some of those early experiences, is the importance of family and the recognition of how family units function differently from one another, right? So I come from a family of eight children. I'm number four of eight. I've got five sisters, two brothers, both of my parents are from families of either eight or nine children, and so I've got, I say I've got 56 first cousins. I'm not actually sure that that's the right number, even, but it's something, something of that magnitude. 26 I think nieces and nephews at this point, nieces, nephews and nibblings. And, you know, I'd like, there's so many elements in the recognition that everybody lives their life differently. And so when I'm working with an animal, yeah, I can look at sort of how they function, physically and physiologically and all of that, but what that intersection looks like between that animal and who they live with and who's caring for them is unique, and I just can't walk in, despite 20 years of knowledge, I just can't walk in and say, Oh, I know all of the things, right? No, as I say to my clients every single time, you know like I'm just getting to know you and your dog. You know you and your life way better than I ever will. So if I say something that seems off track, or I make a recommendation that doesn't immediately feel like it meets a need in your family. I need you to send up a flare because I'm probably off track, or there's another way of navigating this that is actually a better fit for you. So this is going to be, this is going to be teamwork. Yeah,
Chrissy 24:32
yeah, that's awesome. I think a huge part you know of working with families and dogs is meeting people where they're at, listening, communicating the needs. And it's a combination of giving them what they want, but also giving them what they need as well. Yeah, and then bringing them along with that journey. They teach us so much as well. Yeah,
Chris 24:52
I often refer to my job, what I think my job is, at least in that sort of family unit. I think. My job as a GPS, it's not up to me to determine where they're going, right, but I need to kind of assess the environment and figure out where they are, listen to know where they want to go, and then give them all the possible routes to get there, you know. And, you know, establish a timeline. And, you know, even that little voice that you know of the GPS that says, hey, recalculating. We we skewed off a little bit on the left here. What do you want to do next? That's my job, more so than being the one who has the ownership of their outcomes right, which for me is a really important skill that I probably took me 15 years or so in my career to really learn and embrace. But once I did, I love it, because it actually gives me the ability to be a whole lot wiggly in the way that I show up. I don't have to know all the answers. It's not my responsibility. And again, I don't carry the weight of those outcomes, because a lot of it is happening in a way that's actually outside of my control, right? Yeah. So I'll show up as as best I can guide to the best of my ability, and let's see where it takes us on this, this collective journey. Yeah,
Chrissy 26:09
it takes a lot of the pressure off with, you know, that mindset and working in that way. Yes, you've talked about a couple dogs, but are there any dogs specifically that have influenced you, personally or professionally, that you want to talk about or change your approach to how you work.
Chris 26:25
There are, there are a few. One of them was a dog that is actually a family of dogs, three little Maltese dogs that I worked with, and I was a general practitioner relatively quick out of that school, and I remember their their owner came to me. I still have a photo, a framed photo of all three of the dogs that's at my work office. Anyways, she she reached out. She's like, Hey, I'm really, really struggling. You know, my dogs are fighting. I'm not, I'm not sure what, how to deal with this. I don't know what's going on. You know, I sat down with her, and we really tried to piece out the the details. And, you know, this idea of sort of meeting the dogs, where they were was actually the solution we were looking for she had one dog who was a bit more on the reserved, conflict avoidant, we might even say anxious or appeasing, or some might call it more submissive, and she was coming at it from the mindset of, I love you all, and I'm going to treat you all evenly, because that's what feels fair. And that actually was actually putting the dogs in conflict with one another based on how they were trying to work out their relationships with one another. And so I remember, you know, she came back a couple weeks later, after we put into place just a couple of simple recommendations, and she came back just in tears, saying, all of the dogs are happier, and as a result, I'm happier now too, yeah. And so that was one case that was an early an early success that that always stands out to me. Another one was during my residency where I had a client come in. They were struggling, and the details of the case are not terribly important, but But suffice to say, they were having some concerns with some fear based aggression, with this particular dog, and out of desperation, not knowing what else to do they were handling that in a way that probably wasn't helpful, was a bit more corrective. Was a certainly a lot more angry and frustrated, right than it was leading to solutions. And as we, as we went through the troubleshooting in that particular case and sort of found a way forward in approaching that with kindness and recognizing this, in fact, was a dog that was struggling in its environments, and what could we do to to manage that environment in a way that not just sidestep the conflicts, but actually supported that dog and allowed him to learn some new coping skills, and we were just getting started with this treatment. Unfortunately, this was a dog that passed away very, very suddenly. He was younger than Cornelius was even, you know, they reached out to say, you know, we're so sorry we can't continue forward. It's, it's, you know, we're devastated. But the thing that we're most grateful for is that we actually learned, even over these last couple of weeks and last couple of months, what it meant to actually be loving caregivers for him. And what we can hold on to is the relationship that we were building in this last, this last little segment that is everything. And had we not reached out, we would have never experienced that. So we just, you know, despite all of the sadness we want to say, thank you for being a part of that experience for us. And I, I think back on that particular moment when I, you know, read that email, when it came in, and it's, it's one of the ones that's saved in an inbox somewhere, when I, when I need to reconnect to why, why I do the work that I do, and the potential impact knowing that when I first met with those clients and they were telling me some of the things they were doing, I could have met them with judgment and criticism and, you know, wagged my finger at them and told them all the things they were doing wrong. And I don't think that would have been helpful for them, and I don't think that would have led to the experience that they had. And so I try to bring that back when I'm meeting with the client, or when I hear something from a client that maybe isn't in complete alignment, right? It's an opportunity, rather than a place to be judgmental or condescending,
Chrissy 30:12
yeah. And I think that takes so much personal work, though, on your part, you know, I think trainers and behavior consultants and behaviorists. I think there's a lot of personal growth and work that needs to be done with the work that we're doing. I literally just had, I got an email, the same email, a couple weeks ago that you're describing, and, yeah, going through multiple trainers before using methods that you know don't align and and completely changed the relationship, but to a point where they just, they're in a space where they can't continue to do some stuff because of life situations and that kind of thing. But, yeah, I know that feeling that you're talking about, and that process of trying to stay neutral and help them with where they are. I'm curious about, you know, the three dogs that you talked about before, what kind of, I guess, questions did you ask her to help her see that each of her dogs needs to be interacted differently with?
Chris 31:13
Yeah, it's such a great question. So I remember, I knew each of the dogs individually from the work we had been doing at a general practice health care standpoint, you know, we started out just by essentially asking her to describe some of the situations. So we know in the world of behavior that there's the behavior that we're focused on, the behavior of concern wherever our our sort of microscope is honed in on, but that happens within a given set of antecedents or conditions or environments. And we know that, you know, after the behavior, there are consequences in some way, just that. And I don't mean consequences in terms of corrections, but just and then what happens, right? So there's the whole ABC, antecedent behavior consequence unit. We know that professionally. And so one of the things that I'm asking my clients, in this case, asking this particular owner is walk me through what the conflict looks like. Who's involved, where are they, what does their body language look like? Do you happen to have any of those conflicts on video by chance that would give us that discrete, you know, hard evidence of what exactly is going on, and walk me through sort of when this happens. You know, these dogs are in conflict. When does that happen? Is it at meal times? Is it when you're coming home at the end of the day? Is it on a walk? Is it when visitors walk through the door? What are the antecedents, and again, who's where? What part are they playing in that story? One of the scenarios that was that stuck out to me, and as she was describing that, was the dog who was sort of the hanging back dog, the one who was not trying to insert himself within the interactions. She said a couple of times, oh, I always have to kind of encourage him to come forward. I have to kind of bring him into the mix. And I was like, oh, wait a minute, theme. What would happen if we actually just waited for him to be comfortable enough to engage with you, and then interacted with him in that level? So just taking the pressure off him to interact before he was ready made all the difference and completely smoothed out the communications between the dogs, even when she was not being involved. And so, you know, whereas she had been trying to do, you know, the even and fair approach, we weren't trying to play favorites, but again, meet them where they are, and that made all the difference for that particular household. Yeah,
Chrissy 33:34
that's awesome. Yeah, it's so important to see the context of when things are happening. Huge, huge part. Okay, so now we're going to move on to the range of education that veterinarians receive going through school. And I find it it's interesting that it's not like standard, you know, like every school has their different curriculum and what is taught, and that kind of stuff. And this is a funny little side note, but when I was going to college, I went to WSU, Washington State University, and I was like, am I going to go to veterinary school, or am I going to work with the humans? And I sat there, literally remember deciding which one I was going to do, and then I was like, I can't go to vet school because I can't stand to see the dogs in pain, and here I am working with behavior. It's ridiculous. So
Chris 34:22
it all comes first full circle, right? It does. It's
Chrissy 34:24
ridiculous. So can you just tell us a little bit about your role in teaching behavior at some of the schools I know you do it at CSU, which is top school in the country. So let's start with that.
Chris 34:36
So you're absolutely right. The educational process is, to some degree, it's at a very limited level, is standardized, right? There's certain metrics that need to be met, but beyond that sort of core foundation, how that's accomplished, or, you know, which ways that particular institution is, is checking off those boxes is highly variable, and so one of the. Challenges that we've had historically is that there's actually not that many people with my certification and credentials in the veterinary space. We're now as a as the American College of Veterinary behaviorists, we now have over 100 members who are boarded. But man, it's taken us a long, long time to get there. And so I boarded in 2010 and I think I was number 52 or something. I mean, it's crazy. It is crazy, right? And so historically, you had sort of the haves and the have nots, right? You had the universities that had aborted behaviorist who was there on faculty, who was integrated within the curriculum, and you had a lot of have nots. And you know, those places that didn't have somebody there. And so you, you kind of cobble it together. In some cases, you're leaning on dog trainers or other professionals. In some cases, you're you're asking someone who may be a general practitioner with, you know, even a passing interest in behavior, to provide that foundational education. And so what you end up with is a very varied sort of educational foundation. You know, that's incredibly different from one one school to the next, so I'm grateful to say that I've provided education for veterinary students. I used to teach at Virginia Tech. That was one of the first places that I started teaching. Well, technically, I taught at University of Minnesota first, which is my alma mater. I was doing some some coursework there, and then had a an annual gig that started at Virginia Tech somewhere around, gosh, I think it was 2009 maybe I started teaching there, 2000 9010, somewhere in there. And then now teach at Colorado State. And now I currently still teach annually at Colorado State and at University of Minnesota. The the advantage of that is that they have someone who is in clinical practice, who can come in and sort of walk them through what this process looks like to practice and to incorporate behavior into day practice, even if you're not going to be a behaviorist, right? And yet, even within that, because I'm not a part of their institution on a daily, weekly, monthly basis, I swoop in. I do 20 hours of education over five days. It's like, you know, they're drinking from the fire hose and just getting blasted with this information. Deep Dive. We go hard, we go fast, yeah, you know? And then I step out, right? So I'm typically working with those students who are typically in their third year of the their curriculum, trying to help them put those pieces together to understand where behavior fits, and then I have to lean on the rest of the faculty to carry that forward, which I'm grateful to say, those two institutions, I think, do a really good job of that. But there are still institutions out there who, for one reason or another, have not prioritized behavioral education, and even though there are folks like me who are willing to come in and teach and have a documented track record of that working, they've either not recognized or not placed enough of a priority on understanding of behavior to include it within the curriculum. And so, you know the challenge there is, you've got veterinarians who are graduating from incredible schools with a really strong deficit in their education in that particular area. And that's, it's a problem. It's a big problem.
Chrissy 38:10
Yeah, the other aspect of that is, I feel the same way about nutrition. You know, the amount of nutrition education, I feel like there are so many GI and other internal, intrinsic issues that dogs have that are silent, that you wouldn't know, that would be causing, you know, behavior issues. So I feel like that's another aspect too, that where there's a deficit, yeah,
Chris 38:33
and it's and it's hard, when you look at you the the animals that we're working with, everything is connected. I know, right? You know, one of the, one of the reasons that I'm such a proponent of behavioral education in in sort of at the forefront, is not only because I'm a behaviorist and I'm biased, yeah, but everything that we ask clients to report is behavior, yeah, it's movement patterns and gate changes and activity adjustments and appetite, and you know, so whether we're talking about pain, musculoskeletal, vision or other sensory apparatus, like all of these things show up as normal or abnormal or typical versus atypical behavior patterns. And so if you don't actually understand the normal behavior of the species you're working with, and understand how to tease out the abnormalities or the problems you're going to be off track in your medical evaluation, because you're going to miss stuff. Yeah, and it's, it's just, it's so fundamental, even before we get to some of the other body systems, it's so fundamental to just understanding the dog or the cat or the horse or the parrot or the iguana or the guinea pig or whatever it is that's in front of you. Yeah, don't know normals. You're gonna miss stuff.
Chrissy 39:47
Yeah? And I find, as you know, when I'm working with clients and I I'm seeing something, I'm like, Oh, I think there's something going on here. Talk to your vet. What I found that I've had to do for vet and. Experience that, like you say, have that kind of a deficit in certain areas, is gather as much evidence as I can, videos, you know, just information, and bring it to them to help, kind of support the whole team, that kind of thing.
Chris 40:16
Absolutely, and I love that you're doing that, Chrissy, because it's so important. Clients are often sort of struggling with the problem. We've got a veterinarian who is there ready to help and wants to help, but if they didn't have the benefit of that education or knowing how to process that, there often needs to be a bit of a conduit of information, so somebody who's working with the family to help them document. This is what we're seeing. This is what we're trying. This is, you know, how the animal is responding, and this is where we're stuck, yeah, yeah. And being able to put, you know, Objective observations, and, you know, putting notes together or grabbing video clips to demonstrate that, then allows the veterinarian to go, oh, that's what you're dealing with. Okay, now I know what to do, right, you know. And even in that case, if they're not sure what to do, I'm grateful to say that, you know, as far as I know, all of my colleagues within the College of behaviorists are more than happy to be sort of that phone a friend, if you will, to be able to say, hey. You may not have had the benefit of this education, but we can help you with this patient, and help you to build your toolbox and your skill set so you can better help the rest of the patients in your practice as well. I know through the animal behavior clinic, we offer those vet to vet consults, truly, five days a week between myself and my colleagues who work with me at the practice, so that we are there as a lifeline for veterinarians truly around the world. I just want veterinarians, anybody who happens to be listening to this, or pet owners, if your veterinarian is one of those who's interested but just doesn't have the full breadth of knowledge, we have resources. They exist. You know, you don't need to struggle, right?
Chrissy 42:00
And I think that's just super important for people to work together, work together as a team, and collaborate. Yeah, it's super important well. And I know, speaking of that, like I work with Dr Fagan and Dr Jones, and I know they kind of how, how Dr Fagan has set up her clinic is, I think she has followed your setup that you do, yeah, mentoring and stuff, and
Chris 42:25
she's got a great team there as well. When Dr Fagan was going through her residence, she spent a little bit of time with us out here in Portland. I'm only going to take a baby share of the credit for how she's turned out as a practitioner, because she's amazing, but she is and as is her entire team. Yeah, it's something that's really important for those of us in the industry to say, you know, there is a there is a limit to how many patients that I can see, and so how do we share that knowledge? How do we train and grow the next generation of not only specialists, but informed general practitioners to really help them understand how to address these issues that come to them within the course of their day to day practice. And so you know, whether it's lecturing at conferences, whether it's doing these vet to vet calls, whether it's mentoring residents or general practitioners in our practices as a way of growing their skill set, there's so many opportunities that we have to really share that knowledge and build it as a profession. Yeah,
Chrissy 43:25
that's so important. Everybody's learning. But there's still so many trainers out there that focus on the behavior or the symptom of like aggression, fear, aggression, that kind of stuff, instead of getting to the root of the problem. So sometimes it's a underlying issue that needs to be addressed. Can you can speak to that a little bit more about some kind of hidden things that you've seen, but can you talk about the percentage of dogs that you've seen that truly have chemical imbalances versus something else that's hiding? It's
Chris 43:55
a hard number to nail down, right? Because some of this is invisible, right? So when we're thinking about it. So not only invisible, but also interrelated. So if I have an animal who perhaps was under socialized as a puppy, we know that socialization during that key phase of life between roughly three and 14, three and 16 weeks of age, it's not just about what they're learning, it's it's the fact that that experience actually changes and impacts the developmental trajectory of how their brain actually grows and how it communicates within itself, and how it interprets the information that it gathers from the outside world. So to say, Okay, are we talking about a physiologic imbalance? Was that because of a deficit in experience? Was that something that came through as a genetic influence, or is there some other medical issue that is impacting things, especially when we look at chronic inflammatory conditions, and how we actually see inflammation within brain structures that goes along, not only with things like autoimmune conditions, but even the chronic pain syndromes. Where we actually see inflammation, and we can document inflammation within brain structures themselves that can contribute or cause behavior changes in and of itself. And I love talking with neuroscientists like Dr Kathy Murphy about stuff like this as a way of saying, Okay, wait a minute. Blow my mind here. What are you saying here about inflammation in the hippocampus. What crazy talk and, you know? So, so I think about that, you know. So there's some of the stuff that's difficult to nail down, so I think we're always going to be kind of guessing a little bit in terms of the actual numbers, at least until we have more diagnostic testing that can that can inform us a bit better. But I also look at the population that we're seeing. And you alluded to this when you were mentioning the nutritional focus, I would conservatively say that when I look across my patient population and the dogs and the cats that we're seeing that are coming in, I would say somewhere between 20 and 40% have quote, unquote, sensitive stomachs. We have to be really careful about the food that they're eating. They have, you know, the sensitive stomach, from the standpoint of either having gi blowouts or frequent vomiting or picky eating, or, you know, IBD or IBS type patterns or chronic pancreatitis or some sort of ongoing issue within the GI tract that we absolutely have to be able to either work with or try to resolve to The best of our ability to allow that animal to be as successful, knowing that chronic pain and discomfort and gi Yuck, for lack of a better way of putting it, affects everything. So I look at those things. I also actually, while I was chatting with Jenny Fick, Dr Fick, when I was in Colorado earlier this month, she was talking about a dog that she was working with that has cervical pain, or neck pain, and so she had just diagnosed this dog with cervical pain, was doing a recheck, and the dog came in wearing a prong collar as a way of suppressing the behavior the dog was lunging or reacting, and So the trainer not recognizing what we're talking about here. Said, well, here is a tool that can be used for that, but when we talk about a device that specifically puts pain on the region of the body where the pain is coming from, it's a lose, lose situation. Not only are we going to be exacerbating the underlying medical issue, we are not getting to the root cause of why that animal is actually responding in the way that they are. And so, you know, when we think about that ABC unit, yes, there's the behavior. And yes, I can focus on the consequences of saying, Stop that, and I can suppress a lot of behavior through corrections or punishments, but unless I'm actually understanding the why, the antecedents and the emotional states. And I'm not trying to be sort of, you know, flowery and woo, woo. About this. I'm actually saying this matters, right? If I have an animal that's reacting aggressively because it feels vulnerable and unsafe, even if I have suppressed the lunge or the bark or the bite or or the kick, if we're talking about a horse, for example, even if I change the behavior, if I haven't addressed that underlying emotional state, it will come out somewhere else. It will, and it does. And so really being able to address that, yes, we need to manage the behavior, and there may be consequences that we can put into place, but we gotta get to the root of it if we're truly going to get beyond it? Yeah,
Chrissy 48:20
I was talking with someone, and we're like, let's just act like a three year old that always asks, Why? Why is the dog doing that? Why? Why? You know, just continue asking. And so many people get frustrated with behavior or they don't have the bandwidth. I just feel like it's so important to ask. Why? Why? Why are they acting like this? Get curious, ask questions and dig deeper. I feel like that's so important. And then like you were saying, like, if a dog is behaving a certain way because they are feeling a certain way, and then you just suppress the behavior. It's not fixing the problem. There's lots of fallout that we don't need to go into. But, yeah,
Chris 49:01
well said. Well,
Chrissy 49:04
so you do a lot of work in the legal system, like court cases and that type stuff, so you've been an expert witness in cases. So can you talk about just the themes that you have found in some of these cases between dogs and humans that just have been misunderstandings or seems interesting to me to see what, what you see in these cases. I
Chris 49:25
love doing legal work. It's not something I ever sort of set out to get involved in, but just through, you know, again, relatively small population of people who have my skill set and having court cases where information is helpful in trying to figure out, did someone have knowledge of a particular propensity and behavior that they, quote, unquote, should have managed a dog differently. Or if we're trying to understand in some cases, truthfully, a lot of the cases that I'm involved with are aggression cases where there's. Been an incident, and to some degree, we're trying to figure out either Why did the dog do what it did, or, to some degree, hate to say it this way, but whose fault was it right? Was Was there a failure of management, or did someone misunderstand and interact with the dog? You know, one of the first cases that I was involved with involved an individual who was at an outdoor party. Alcohol was involved, and in getting along with the dogs did sort of the thing that a lot of people do, and they sort of leaned over and grabbed the dog by the by the right and she sustained a disfiguring bite to the face, and whose quote, unquote fault is it? It's not really the right question, but how do we misunderstand, and how do we misread and misinterpret or or interact in a way that's going to be misunderstood by the animal, right? And can we hold some of the responsibility for our actions in that way? So as an expert witness within the legal system, I get the opportunity to provide a scientific lens to helping those individuals understand again, without judgment, without criticism. That's not my job, and I certainly don't have any involvement in how the legal cases are actually handled, right, but to be able to inform that system and to ideally inform some of the policies and precedents that are set to better care for the animals and to help us understand them as their caretakers.
Chrissy 51:22
Yeah, well, I mean, this is why I do the podcast, is to educate people. And I think you know that's continuing to grow with the work that you're doing and behaviors and so much education needs to be done on body language and how interacting with dogs and teaching people and educating people so that in that situation, a human is like, Okay, I know better than to grab a dog by its face and, you know, that kind of thing. So I we're slowly getting there.
Chris 51:51
Yeah, it's and it's hard, right? Like, I, you know, I have a lot of empathy for folk, you know, dogs in particular, are so generally tolerant of all the things we do to them and with them. Yes, that most of the people that I work with, even on the heels of an incident or or a difficult situation, I hear them say, but I've never, you know. I've had dogs my whole life. I've never needed to know this information. Why now you know, and oftentimes what comes out of that is, you know, on the heels, once we've onboarded that information, and they now understand, they now understand the pieces, one of the common phrases I hear, and I'm sure you've heard this too, Chrissy is okay, I never needed this information, but life with my dogs could have been so much better if I had known it.
Chrissy 52:32
Yeah, interesting. And it's, you
Chris 52:35
know, yeah, I needed it for this incident. But, man, I actually had a greyhound client, an owner of a Greyhound, that well meaning individual. They had recently adopted this dog. The owner got up in the middle of the night, saw that the dog was worried or fearful in some way, moved forward in the dark to comfort the dog and was bitten as a result. To them, was very unpredictable. It was unprovoked. It was unexpected, right? And when we started to, you know, peeling back the layers and teasing that out and building a really strong foundation of trust and, you know, consent within those interactions, you know, not only did they learn to understand that dog and his needs, but they actually expressed some some sadness around not having had the opportunity to do that with the other dogs. They're like, Oh, we've always had greyhounds. We missed so much. We just didn't know what we didn't know. And so it's, it's fun to be able to be a part of that educational process for them. Yeah, I
Chrissy 53:33
find that even with myself, my previous dogs getting into this profession, like you just learn so much. And then you look back on the dogs that you had, and you're like, oh, you know, and same thing with clients. And when they start to develop awareness of, you know, so many things about understanding dogs, then they look back and they're like, Oh, I wish I would have known this, or I didn't even see this or notice this, and it's just developing that awareness and that and that growth,
Chris 54:05
and that is one of the reasons for me, both personally and professionally. You know, you mentioned before, sort of the work that we have to do to be able to do this. And, you know, borrowing from from some of the phrasing of Brene Brown, you know, one of the things that I use as one of my sort of foundational mantras is I choose to believe that each and every person, including me, is doing the best they can with the tools they have available to them in that moment, sort of really adopting that and embracing that. When I first heard her say sort of a version of that that I've expanded on for my own personal usage. It was something where I literally picked that apart word by word to be able to tease out why every single word in that phrase, I can repeat it verbatim, because I do probably it's multiple times per day. In any moment of struggle, it's that awareness of we're doing the best we can. Can they are I am, and even when I have better skills, they're not always available because of stress or lifestyle or limitations in other ways, like we're doing the best we can. And even, as she says in some of the recordings that she's done, I don't know what, quote, unquote, the best would look like for them in their world, but my life is a whole lot easier to navigate and deal with when I when I use that as the default assumption, I'm going to choose to believe that they're doing the best they can with the tools they have available to them in that moment. And it's amazing how much easier things are to navigate. Yeah,
Chrissy 55:36
yeah. If you're open to this, we're going to go talk about something a little different, the topic of spirituality and soul work. You know what this means to you and how you integrate this into your work. So for me, I do animal communication, and I know there's a lot of skepticism, and it's unregulated, just like dog training and all these things. And some people hear that, and they're like, whoa, stay away. I have done many years of training, and I have certifications in animal communication, so I think there's a proper way to go about it and an ethical way to go about it, same way with dog training. So what are your What are your thoughts on that? I
Chris 56:15
have a lot of thoughts on this. I do and and the first thing I will say is I do not claim in any capacity whatsoever to have animal communication skills or abilities. It's not something I've ever, you know, really even dove into to see maybe I do, I don't know, right? I've not done any training in that area. And so the reason I say that first and foremost is to say there's a lot of things out in this world that I don't have any knowledge of training about. That doesn't mean they don't exist, right, right? So I first come into it with that level of sort of, yeah, yep. That is true of most things I know an infinitesimally small fraction of knowledge compared to the world and the universe. So you know what I that's the first place I come into it. The other thing that I sort of think about, and I and I appreciate that you bring in, sort of the lack of regulation, or the variable degrees of skill and knowledge and all of those sorts of things. And I would say that, you know, the the varying degrees of ethical responsibility comes into that within communication just as much as it does within dog training, or even in veterinary practice, sort of understanding or limitations or acknowledging where the information is or is not coming from. And, you know, especially with things that are, I'm going to say, harder to prove right. It's really easy to bend the picture right, yeah, you know, in a way, you know, or you can be a you could be a really good interviewer. You could be really observant in what you're seeing in the body language, and you're interpreting that in certain ways. It doesn't make that information wrong or invalid, right? But it's also not what it was billed at in some cases. If that makes sense, exactly
Chrissy 57:57
No. It's not like how you're getting that information is not what you're doing.
Chris 58:02
Yes, yeah. And so yeah, trying to be mindful of of that and helping clients to make educated decisions. All of which to say, you know, anything that we can use to better understand the the needs, the desires, the the decision making process, even of the animals that we're working with, I'm always curious about that. The toolbox that I'm reaching for is typically, you know, again, more based on body language and understanding of physiology, and then we make some adjustments, and we see how the animal responds. But that's not the only that's not the only lens, right? You know? And I certainly have had cases in my practice where someone has says, Oh, I don't know how you feel about this, but we talked to this animal communicator, you know, and they say, you know, like, Well, cool. What? What did they share? Like, what? What information did they add? And I've had cases as well where they said, You know, I don't know. They said something about the dog's left shoulder, you know, or something of that nature. There's something going on there. I'm like, Cool. Got nothing to lose by taking a look, right? Maybe we'll find something. And there are cases we do and there's something that wasn't on our radar that ended up being an important part of treatment. So, you know, I have those examples as well as saying, yes, somebody else has a different skill set than I do. Cool. Let's use that to the best of our ability. Yeah,
Chrissy 59:18
it seems like you've done a lot of personal growth, and you do a lot of personal growth work. I call that soul work, or spiritual work. How do you integrate that into the work that you do? Think
Chris 59:28
it comes in in a lot of different places. And yeah, I love the idea of sort of saying, what are we doing for ourselves, sort of personally, to develop this? And I will say just as a little sort of side, not a plug necessarily, but I'm a part of an organization, a community called Lima beings, which so Lima, l, I m, a is a play on Lima, which is a behavioral principle of you know, what is the least intrusive, minimally aversive way to approach whatever it is that we're navigating, and it's often used as a framework for. Choosing between training techniques or behavioral interventions. And so this is a community of folks, myself, along with Kathy sadeo, Barry finger and Lynn Unger, have been actively doing for, gosh, almost four years now, where we do these monthly community calls, where the founders will discuss a topic early in the month, and then we open it up to the community, and we have these really lively discussions about, how does that show up for us, or, you know, around these individual topics. And it's an important way of again, as coming back to the idea of, how do we incorporate some of this soul work into the what we're doing, it has absolutely improved my ability to embrace curiosity and to be wiggly and to the best of my ability, honor the individuals that I'm working with, while also being mindful of when am I sort of prioritizing my needs or the needs of my clients over or differently than the needs of the animal, you know, and I look at that truly As a way to try to bring advocacy into the conversation, advocating for my clients, advocating for my needs as a practitioner, advocating for the needs of my trainers and behavior consultants and veterinarians, and, of course, for the animal themselves. You know, I think in some cases, especially with a more traditional training mindset, there was such a strong focus on sort of do, as I say, Because I said so, right? Which to me, you know, again, maybe there's a time and a place where that's relevant, and certainly there are places where we do put some restrictions or management onto an animal from a safety standpoint. And I acknowledge that to be true, right? But I always want to be mindful of just how much restriction I'm putting on, what the potential consequences of that would be, not because I'm not going to do it, but because I never want to forget that I'm doing it, and I always want to look at that from the animal's perspective too. And if I do have to take away their freedoms in some way, shape or form, cool, how do I compensate? How do I provide different experiences? How do I? How do I show up in a way that truly honors where, where they're coming from and and so for me, that that is sort of a pervasive mindset that is within everything we do, even our understanding of their medical needs. And how do we, how do we incorporate that into treatment as well?
Chrissy 1:02:17
Yeah, I love that. It's so funny, because when I first got into learning about dog training and animal communication at the same time, they were kind of linear pathways. And when I first got into animal communication, I was like, What am I doing? Like, this is ridiculous. So skeptical. And I was like, whatever. I'm open minded. I can just see what it's about. And the more I did it, the more I learned, the lower, the more I grew personally. And I had to have so much validation from my mentors. And so they're like, Okay, Chrissy, come on. Here's some more validation for you. And I'm like, okay, okay, I see that. So doing it in a way that's ethical and getting validation. I want to know is the information I'm getting correct. How can I measure it? And so that's kind of how I do it. When I'm working with clients, some clients want communication and training. Some clients just want animal communication. Some just want training. And so when I'm working with clients that want both, what I'll do is I'll do a communications before I even learn anything about the dog, before I even meet the dog. That way, I'm starting with a blank slate. I'm not having any preconceived notions about anything, and so the information I get always coincides with what they're needing help with. I get validation from the client, the human client. And then a lot of times, if it's like medical intuitive stuff, I will say, go talk to your vet and see what they say, you know, and I can't believe some of the information that is like validated back to me. So I think there are ethical ways to do both. You know, the training behavior in the animal communication. There's research that's happening with that that, you know, I'm a big part of, of measuring that, you know, I'm glad for people that are open to learning, and, you know, people like you who are open to talking about it. So thank you.
Chris 1:04:15
You're absolutely welcome. And I love what you said, too, about sort of always questioning, yeah, right? And, you know, and speaking of sort of the work and the personal growth, like there's a sweet spot in there, right? I want, I want people to question our assumptions, and I want people to question our knowledge. And yet, if we question everything to the point of not actually having any confidence in what we're doing, it's actually detrimental to our ability to truly do and then assess how it worked. You know, there is this sort of balance and, you know, and and I find folks on either side of that, myself included, right where there are things I'm probably more confident than I should be about, the trust that I place in certain pieces of knowledge and other places where I don't trust in. Enough that what I know or what I believe to be true is probably what's going on. It's constant, which, again, I think is why I come back to that whole curiosity piece, as we were saying before, is sure this is what I believe I know. This is what I think I know. This is what I'm very clear I know nothing about. Where does this piece of the puzzle fit in this particular scenario, right?
Chrissy 1:05:20
Yeah, yeah. Awesome. So is there anything that's weighing on your mind, or any negative wisdom that you would like to share with our audience? The
Chris 1:05:28
piece that I always come back to, certainly as a member of the veterinary profession, and I know this has come up in some of your other podcast recordings with some other folks as well, is, you know, truly just the weight of the work that we do, and I'm sort of broadening that out in this conversation too, to include the weight that is on caregivers and the weight that's on the animal behavior professionals and on the veterinary team or the staff at the shelter, or whoever is involved when we're navigating difficult things. It's heavy. It's a really, really heavy thing. And I go back to one of my early experiences working with a veterinary social worker back in Minnesota, early in my residency, I was so incredibly fortunate enough to work alongside a woman by the name of Janene Moga, and she is continues to be a great friend for me, 20 some years later, and I remember her asking me, as she was trying to understand some of the veterinary profession and kind of where, where some of our difficulties lie, she said, well, so tell me, how many active clients do you have at any point in time? And I said, Well, I don't understand your question. All of them, like I work with all of them. And she was like, no, no, but how many? I'm like, yeah, all of them, everybody who calls, we help them. That's just what we do. And they're with us forever, as long as they need help, right? And she was like, so organizationally, there's no like, Oh, okay. And I still remember the look on her face. And so then she says, Okay, well, second, second question, how many sort of hours can you log doing your work before you yourself need to have some form of therapy, some conversation with a professional to offload some of what you've taken in and again, Jane, I don't understand your Question. Nonsense. You're talking nonsense. What do you mean required therapy for veterinarians and behavior? No, that's, that's nonsense. That's wackadoo. And she's like, Okay, well, let me tell you how it works in other professions where we recognize the weight of the work and secondary trauma and all of these, all of these elements that directly impact our ability to continue showing up, doing the difficult work. And I've never forgotten that conversation. I remember exactly where I was seated in that building, in her office when that realization hit, if we ourselves as practitioners or caregivers, if we're not at least doing some version of the work to continue to understand and and develop a set of coping skills around the work that we're doing. What I find happens within our profession is that we oscillate between sort of overwhelm and tagging out. Yeah, there's only so many times that we can oscillate back and forth between those two extremes before we hit that burnout point, and it reminds me so much of the work that we do, thinking about dogs with behavioral concerns, and take the classic sort of fear based aggression, right, growing them into the deep end of the pool and just hoping they learn from it. Is that overwhelm, and yet, if we just put them in a back bedroom in the house and never expose them to the world, they've tagged out, but they're not learning from it, and we've got to be able to find that edge work. We've got to be able to find that growth edge, that growth mindset, where we can say, Okay, can I experience something that's just ever so slightly stretching my level of awareness or understanding that I can practice there, and then I may need to tag out for a bit, and there are going to be times where I'm overwhelmed, but can I spot those moments right on the edge where I can ever so slowly expand those edges in terms of knowledge or practice or skills or even practicing the coping strategies that we need to be able to do this? And so for me, one of the sort of the life missions of of my work is to help people doing hard things understand how to do hard things. I don't need to know about your industry, and I'm certainly not a mental health professional myself, right? But how do we function? How do we actually show up as humans? And you know, and that is, again, something from the Lima beings community. Is something that we're actively practicing within, that within communication strategies and troubleshooting that wiggliness, and how do we show up within the world? What does that look like, even for one or two hours a month, to be able to practice that skill set in a way that I can then go back out into the world and and try so that's probably the most important thing, especially as a veterinary profession, knowing that we have what seems like an ever increasing rate of. Suicide in the profession, you know. And even beyond suicide, the number of folks who tag out of the profession, and I say this, of animal professionals as well, and behavior professionals as well, the number of folks who are incredibly skilled, knowledgeable, passionate individuals, who don't have the skill set to do the work because of the challenge of the work, right? That for me is a place where I think we all, myself included, have so much more to learn. Yeah,
Chrissy 1:10:26
totally. You could address this towards, you know, the professionals working in this industry, but also our clients too. Like you said, the caregiver. Caregivers are human clients going through the same thing, you know, and our dogs teach us so much anyway. What? What can I learn from you today?
Chris 1:10:44
Ah, every day is a school day, right? If I didn't learn something, I wasn't paying attention. And some days that's okay. Sometimes we're just head down survival mode. And yeah, too. But there's something to be learned. There's some something to be curious about, something that should rattle my perspective a little bit, because it's different than the picture I already had in my brain. And that's okay,
Chrissy 1:11:04
yeah, I love it. So if anybody wants to reach out to you, what's the best way they can connect with you? Yeah,
Chris 1:11:10
so they can certainly find me on socials. But I'm a little bit hard to track down that way, the easiest way to find out sort of what I'm up to, including podcast recordings like this one, is to go to Dr paco.com, so D, R, P, A, C, H, E, l.com, that will give you sort of a landing page that you can link to podcasts and webinars and the Lima beings community and the animal behavior clinic and instinct dog training and all the free resources we have out there for animal professionals and for pet owners and caregivers, all of that, I think It should be all linked from that page, so that's kind of a hub of where everything is found, and there's some contact me information there too, if you need to reach out personally for some reason, by all means, you can do that right from that same web page. Okay, perfect.
Chrissy 1:11:53
All right. Well, thank you so much for being on it was so fun to talk with you
Chris 1:11:58
same. Thank you so much for hosting and I I truly appreciate podcasters like yourself who are doing the work to get information out there to individuals. I really appreciate that I do not have the bandwidth, the skill set or the patience to do what you're doing. So I am so grateful for those people out there like yourself who are doing that work for all of us to do this together. Thank you
Chrissy 1:12:21
awesome. Thank you amazing. Thank you for joining us today. I hope you discovered a valuable nugget you can implement right away with your dog. If you enjoyed the episode, please follow rate and share with fellow dog lovers who might benefit. Don't forget to take our How well do you know your dog quiz? You'll find the link in the show notes until next week. Happy tales. Bye.
