ANIMAL-THERAPY

The joy and privilege of 40 years combining both
counseling-psychology for humans (individuals, couples, families, group conflict mediation)
along with the rescue-rehabilitation of animals (orphaned, injured, abused),
has revealed amazing truths about the vital connection
between humans, sentient animals, and nature.
And now finally, modern scientific research supports these important findings.

Since I’ve just started rebuilding this “ANIMAL-THERAPY” webpage from scratch using WordPress, I’ll be adding many new articles and media about this fun and fascinating subject. So, keep returning from time to time to see more photos & videos of our 100’s of personal animals friends – wild, exotic, and domestic (past, present, future). In addition, I’ll be including new links to amazing discoveries about the depth and breadth of animal emotions, intelligence, and capacity for healing human hearts that have been hurt by other humans.
(see my PDF Recommended Resources, on the Resources webpage for a section on animal-related books, etc.)

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More Animal-Focused Writings coming from Sid . . .
I “IDENTIFY” AS AN ANIMAL & AM BURDENED TO SPEAK FOR THEM BECAUSE THEY’RE
THE MOST VULNERABLE AND OFTEN ABUSED SENTIENT BEINGS ON EARTH.
(also see the ABOUT page for more on Sid’s animal background)

(A New Short Book coming) AMAZING ANIMAL-SOULS WE’VE SERVED, KNOWN, & LOVE: Who Have Helped Heal 100’s of Hearts Through Animal Assisted Therapy (AAT) – including my own!

– including lions, tigers, bears, wolves, hyenas, … elephants, dogs, otters, raccoons, owls, ducks, & many more ….
– to me they were friends: Bratar, Rani, Akela, Rakshi, Banu, Byomi, Jean, Panya, Bartley, Scotty, Ollie, Panya, …..
– each of these animal friends were personal therapists to me from childhood, throughout adulthood, and now ….
– Here below are some SAMPLE CHAPTERS coming in this little book (booklet) . . . . . . .

(ARTICLE 5 -pages) THE DAY COMPASSION FACED A 500-POUND LION:
My True Story of Overcoming Fear Through Love
(DOWNLOADABLE PDF) –

(7-pages) MANDY, MY COMPASSIONATE LEOPARD FRIEND:
How One Soft as a Cloud Leopard Saved My Life and Even Helped Me Find My Wife
(DOWNLOADABLE PDF) –

(4-pages) HOW RORY THE RACCOON GOT “SAVED”
(DOWNLOADABLE PDF) –

(3-pages) ALI, MY FRIEND THE BITTER BLACK LEOPARD: Transformed From Violent PTSD To Trusting In Love.
(DOWNLOADABLE PDF) –

(4-pages) BANU, MY FRIEND THE GENIUS COMEDIAN SUN BEAR who loved to play pranks on his human caregiver friends and on the other bears –
(DOWNLOADABLE PDF) –

*** CLICK HERE FOR A LONG PDF LIST OF MANY MORE – SOON TO COME – PERSONAL ANIMAL STORIES

* A STATEMENT ON ZOOS & CAPTIVE ANIMALS —  Have you had negative feelings about zoos and captive animals? I empathize with you! If you research carefully, you will find that good, bad, and very ugly exists across the wide range of facilities and activities. When it’s bad and ugly, it’s sadly easy to see — while the good and wonderful is often more subtle and behind the scenes. The best of facilities are motivated and designed around compassion, conservation, and education. Their animals are loved and protected by their caregiver keepers, and enjoy far better lives than those in the “wild” who must struggle and suffer violent competitive survival of the fittest, coolest, and cruelest, against predators, disease, drought, floods, fires, etc. Without captive animals, many species would otherwise go extinct. And the educational impact of new generations seeing, hearing, and caring about their local captive animal “friends” motivates actions to preserve and protect the world’s natural habitats and inhabitants. For more, see: American Zoo: A Sociological Safari, by sociologist David Grazian; and Zoo Story: Life in the Garden of Captives, by Thomas French.

Arthur Schopenhauer PhD  German Philosopher (1841 book – On the Basis of Morality) 
“Compassion for animals is intimately associated with goodness of character,
and it may be confidently asserted that he who is cruel to animals cannot be a good man.”

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(A New Long Booklet coming) JESUS AND ANIMAL COMPASSION: His Teaching on Animal Emotion & Intelligence Should Convict Us All Over the Ways We Humans Support the Use & Abuse of Them for Our Own Convenience & Pleasure

This “book/booklet” is about the many animals mentioned in the Bible, along with the numerous nature-animal metaphors, parables, and stories. The particular stories, parables, and metaphors directly involving Jesus’s personal life and teaching will serve as the foundation and spring-board in the booklet for a look at what the whole Bible has to say about sentient (nephesh) animals. When I was in seminary completing my master’s degree and working on a PhD (not completed – see my ABOUT webpage), my papers caused many of my professors to express surprise about how much Jesus and the Bible said about animals and our relational responsibility to them. Even though the professors were respected experts in the Bible, ancient languages, and ANE culture, their personal interest of study had not been “animals”. So, they told me they had simply overlooked the depth and breadth of rich knowledge regarding animals there was throughout the Judeo-Christian Scriptures. In fact, in many ways this subject of animals (sentient, thinking, feeling creatures) is foundational to a Judeo-Christian cosmological, philosophical, and theological worldview.

WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A SERVICE-DOG, THERAPY-DOG, & EMOTIONAL-SUPPORT DOG?
https://www.akc.org/expert-advice/training/service-working-therapy-emotional-support-dogs/

WHAT IS AAT – ANIMAL ASSISTED THERAPY (AAI – Animal Assisted Interventions)?
– AVMA (An overview article from the American Veterinary Medical Association)
– Simran Myadas, Counselor LPC, Healing with Paws: The Emotional Benefits of Therapy Dogs
* Simran is among our favorite new Texas friends, and one of the most compassionate people we know.

Above are the past three service-dogs I trained to work with me in counseling (from left to right):
SCOTTY (passed) – SUZY (passed) – BUDDY (currently serving)

BELOW is Linda, my wife, learning about human-owl bonding.
The Elephant photo is my old conservation zoo friend PANYA providing AAT for my students in the elephant barn.

I’ll be adding many more stories, articles, photos, videos, & links . . . .

Dr. Marc Bekoff PhD, University of Colorado, Professor of Animal Behavior. The Emotional Lives of Animals: A Leading Scientist Explores Animal Joy, Sorrow, and Empathy, and Why They Matter“.
“I like to say that the plural of anecdote is data. Anecdotes are central to the study of animal behavior and animal emotions, as they are to much of science, and rightfully so. Emotions don’t occur in a vacuum. They occur in context; there are events that cause them, and consequences that follow, and to properly describe them means telling a story.” p. 121