Taking Care of Yourself: Reaching Back

Happy Thursday, Positive Animal Caregivers! ♡🐾

I stayed in Vancouver for a few days after the Humane Canada conference. Coffee, the ocean, and time with a very good dog. A slower pace, after a few days that weren’t.

How was your week? Did you find a moment to step away from it?

For the next few minutes, this can be that moment.

Animal caregiving has a way of compressing everything — the good moments, the hard ones — into the same day. Before moving on, let’s pause and check in —

Add a note if you want (I read them all)

On a short walk into Stanley Park, three strangers crossed the street to pet my friend's dog.

They didn't hesitate: they saw Dal, smiled, and changed course mid-stride. I couldn't resist either. Later, I lay down beside him in the grass and gave him a long, slow butt scratch. He leaned into it, as if I was doing him a favour. I'd just come out of a three-day conference. The air was cool. Dal was warm. It was the best I'd felt in days.

We reach. It's the most human thing.

There's actual biology behind it: petting an animal releases oxytocin, the same hormone that floods through us when we hold someone we love. It also explains something I've noticed in myself: even when I know I shouldn't pet a dog — fresh flea treatment, a nervous rescue who needs space — I still struggle to stop my hand.

We even built entire systems to take advantage of that impulse. Therapy dogs move through hospitals, schools, and care homes now, offering something medicine can’t. They sit with children learning to read, with students before exams, with people on some of their hardest days. Bryan, a volunteer handler at a mental health charity, once told me he's always the most popular person in the room when he arrives with his dog. He said it like a joke. He meant it as a fact.

But there's a question that anyone who has spent real time with animals eventually has to sit with: what is it like for them?

Most of us assumed, at first, that they loved it — that the warmth goes both ways, that a therapy dog is simply doing what it was born to do. Research published this week by Sandra C. Haven-Pross puts language to what many caregivers have quietly known. Observing dogs in animal-assisted interactions, her team found that some appeared genuinely engaged, even playful. Others showed clear signs of stress, particularly in more intense settings. What looked like calm cooperation was sometimes closer to endurance. The factors weren't dramatic: handler familiarity, the temperament of the dog, the emotional weight of the room. Small things. The things you learn to read. 

Even for animal caregivers, it takes time to understand a dog’s non-verbal cues. I’m still learning — to watch not just for what a dog tolerates, but what it seeks out. The distinction matters. An animal that chooses connection is different from one that endures it.

None of this makes our impulse wrong. 

The feeling itself — that pull toward warmth, toward fur, toward something alive and uncomplicated — is real and hard to replicate. We just owe it to them to notice when it isn't mutual. Most people can't tell the difference. It takes time and practice.

You can. That's the whole thing.

Minutes of interaction with a dog can lower cortisol (stress) levels in people.

Add a note if you want (I read them all)

Mark your calendars for these upcoming opportunities to connect with others:

Here are the ways to recharge this week. Pick ONE small thing that makes you smile. You’ve earned it. 

Listen: “Human Nature,” before watching the movie Michael which came out this past week.  

Watch: A Day in the Life of a 102-Year-Old French Yogi. Her smile was contagious.  

Write: A few lines in your gratitude journal. This week’s prompt: Touching A Pet. 

Appreciate: A beautiful piece of art. This week’s artwork: Robert Havel and John James Audubon’s Great blue heron, a bird you might recognize if you’ve spent time around Stanley Park.

Try: A guided nature hike in your local park.

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Thanks for spending part of your day with me and the rest of the Positive Animal Caregivers Club. Take care of yourself this week. Remember - even superheroes need naps. 

– Philip