Healing Children with the Power of Animal Life Stories

By Kate Nicoll, MSW,LCSW

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Isaac Dinsen once said: “All sorrows can be borne if we put them in a story or tell a story about them”. In today’s world, many at-risk children have tales of sorrow, loss and pain with no one to listen – and often no one to see the possibility and provide an opportunity to re-author their lives in the present moment in a positive experience. Through interactions with an animal, the child becomes not the child with autism, depression, obsessive compulsive disorder or personality disorder; they simply become in the present moment – John who taught Bear a new trick and was successful.

The seed of hope and strength is within all of us. Oftentimes, in our own pain and sorrow, we cannot see this hope, but animals can. Heeling Hearts is an eight-session psychotherapy group for at-risk children that explores the healing power of the human-animal bond. The animal’s life story provides these children with a safe sounding board to discuss old pains, while also providing an invitation to practice a positive new skill and to re-author their lives in the present moment. These stories, explore such issues as the impact of trauma on the body, the power of nonverbal communication, the healing ability to living in the positive NOW and the power of resilience to live through loss, pain and suffering.

A Story of Connection

Many of the children in our groups have suffered the impact of poor positive connections from years of abuse and/or neglect. In their life, the story has been depleted, with limited support to pursue creativity or explore their own uniqueness. In a survival mode, uniqueness and even emotions are in a complete shut down. In treatment, children are often encouraged and expected to participate, to trust and connect; many have never had their basic needs met to be successful. Recent research discusses the impact of trauma on the body, and the sensory experiences of living. Kids may hear this, but cannot make it real for them. Then, comes Noah.

Noah is an almost three-year-old chocolate lab, a puppy mill rescue. He was in residence in a large glass enclosure at a local pet store. Over several months, our family made a few visits to purchase food and watched his emotional and physical state deteriorate. In his fifth month of being there, he would lie on the ground, motionless, with up to six other puppies pulling at his ear, his mouth, his tail. This was a chocolate lab, meant to be swimming, running and playing. The pet store vet informed me that he was full of a parasite, giardia,, that seemed rather treatment resistant. I strongly felt in this setting, he would never improve. We purchased him for a very large reduction in price, and his vet care over the next four months, which was substantial, was covered by the store at my insistence.

He came home, weak with stool full of blood. His only annoying habit initially was the demand bark; but there were many more bad habits to come later including scratching and jumping. Over the course of six months, he slowly came out of his shell. Now almost three years later, he has begun to actually step in puddles and run through meadows. For several years, he was the awkward, under-confident and socially isolated dog in our pack at home. Today he is a sometimes irritating adolescent with bad habits, but a kind sensitive heart.

Many children can relate to his story of deprivation and how it impacts the ability to trust and connect in human relationships. To help build on social connections and confidence, in spite of life trauma; we practice the look command with the dogs. Look captures the moment of connection; often with a clicker the moment is etched in time. Many traumatized children have a dis-connect in their look in human relationships, either an angry glare or downward cast of eyes. Practicing look with dogs provides a new opportunity to connect, receive positive feedback and strengthen social skills.

A Story of Invitation

After living through trauma, it is difficult to let someone back into your heart. In many ways the invitation to connect brings up fears of smothering and self-annihilation. It is hard to accept clear boundaries; at the same time trauma survivors may absolutely crave them to feel safe. Muffin helps teach children that in spite of abuse, she can open her heart and roll over.

Muffin is an approximately two-year-old bearded collie mix rescued from New Orleans as part of golden Retriever rescue. At the time, I was looking for a small dog (which is often hard to find in shelter in the North) for either my mother or also for a young boy who was slowly going blind and wanted a companion animal. I clicked on her picture on petfinder and was immediately sickened by the sense of dread in how she cowered and held her body. Though anthromorphic, her body seemed to tell me she knew she was not safe and did not have much time left. I took a chance and rescued her.

She was a smelly, matted mess and came up North in a moving van with 40 other dogs, all goldens. By the time she got home, it was 1:30 am and she did let us give her two baths and put her to bed in her crate. She was very submissive, went the bathroom all over the house and cowered at every quick movement. I knew, however, we were going to be okay when on the second day she let me daughter dress her up. At work, she has been somewhat boring for the children because she only knows a few commands. Yet, always, each and every time she rolls over and soaks about love and attention – someone in group comments: “how can she trust after having been beat”. And the story begins and continues. The children can practice the “rolling over” and helps them learn the power of surrender, not of giving up. “The roll over trick can provide a child with an opportunity to explore a multitude of feelings including expressing vulnerability, demonstrating perseverance, and obtaining a different worldview being upside down” (Nicoll, 2005). Each step of the trick provides a child with an opportunity to work through old injuries and losses, for each movement can be a metaphor for letting go, survival and surrender.

A Story of Resilience
Bear, a three-year-old corgi-shepard mix is a survivor. In a recent group at a juvenile training center, Bear was described as a “soldier”. Bear was adopted from the North Shore Animal League and was expected to be perhaps part mastiff. What Bear lacks in stature as a definite corgi mix, he makes up in spirit, fortitude and perseverance. When Bear was about six months, he ran after our chocolate lab puppy heading to the road, he was hit by a large pickup truck. My husband saw his stocky body knocked under the carriage of the truck. He lie quite and still in the road, blood coming from his ears and he was totally unresponsive. At the emergency vet hospital, they thought he might not come out of it. He had a clear head injury, his left pupil was totally blown. As I first saw him, cowering in the corner of the cage I challenged him “don’t you dare die, you have much work to do”. He crawled over; his pelvis smashed, and laid his sweet head in my lap.

His story of trauma continues, he survived the crash, but then in the course of the next year was attacked by two other dogs – one in a dog training class and once by a deaf pit bull I was considering for adoption. Bear gives off a “don’t mess with me attitude” and other dogs often respond to this. Many of the kids love this part of the story. They say: “Bear is a soldier. Bear don’t want anyone messing with him. Bear is tough as nails”. As they listen to Bear’s life they begin to reflect on their own: “ I don’t want no one to touch me. I like my space. My life makes it hard to let people close. That Bear, he is hard on the outside but soft on the inside – just like me”. These are stories of survivors.

Trauma survivors are always anticipating the next moment. Current research is showing an insurgence of hormones, and changes in neurotransmitters at the return of stressful and scary moments. Our brain and body believes and it is as if, the same past moment has come again. Whether living through a car accident, watching a loved one die after a long illness, or observing a violent, sudden death – the body holds onto this always ready. Our historical relationship with dogs as scavengers can be a helpful tool to us in coping with the physical impact of trauma. For instance, “the scavenger has many strengths: the ability to read an environment, the capacity to change set in response to the environment, and the ability to find use in rejected items” (Nicoll, 2005). The dog command, leave it, can become a metaphor to work on issues of self-control, self-preservation and self-reliance.

The story of Bear demonstrates as suggested by Oliver Sacks the power of narratives to “recollect” ourselves (Sacks, 1987). Though a label of “solider” may seem similar to others labels such as depressed, disabled; it in fact, was described by this child in a juvenile detention center as a badge of honor and a metaphor for survivorship against all odds – a way of capturing the process of Bear’s life. This young man also described himself as a “soldier on the streets”; he hoped that he could use the “leave it” command in his return to the streets and all the peer pressure. Bear, the soldier’s story, is a living story full of tragedy, loss, hope, love, partnership and resilience.

References:
Nicoll, Kate (2005). Soul Friends: Finding Healing with Animals. Dogear Publishing: Indianapolis, IN.

Sacks, Oliver. (1987). The Man who Mistook His wife for a Hat: And other Clinical Tales. New York NY : Harper & Row Publishers.

White, Michael and Epston, D. (1990). Narrative Means to a Therapeutic Ends. Adelaide, South Australia : Dulwich Centre.

Contact: Kate Nicoll, MSW,LCSW, Soul Friends, Inc., 401 Center St, Wallingford, CT
06492, 203-679-0849, www.soul-friends.org, kate@soul-friends.org