May 12, 2023 • 55 mins
How is your fur-family balancing act going? Have you always had a pet or pets? The love and chaos can be rewarding and draining. It’s not easy, but it’s all in the family balancing act. Especially, when it comes to the goodbyes. When our pets have passed, either on their own or because their life had become so painful we make that decision, it's heart wrenching. We have all cried our eyes out during the goodbye, and for days, months, and sometimes years, as we reflect back on the beautiful memories we have. Our fur family is part of our family. We are loved unconditionally by our pets. Just being in their presence can lift us up and hold our hearts. In episode 130, we'll be diving into balancing the fur family and all that comes with it, because we have a lot to talk about today with my returning guest, Yup! Glenys Eldred - who continues to grow her fur family! Glenys is - Taosist Priest, healer, creator of Glenys Eldred Healing Hearts and Energy, Renegade Zen, and sustainability expert.I’m Maureen your host, board-certified Integrative holistic and functional medicine health coach, mom, grandmother, wife, and CEO of my family home operations. If you miss any of our episodes, you can find us on Apple, Spotify, google, podbean, pandora, iheartradio podcast, CTR - Radio Network, and more. I love what I do, holistic solutions for health and well-being for women, moms, and their families!Deep Breath ~ Exhale It starts with youRestoring the heart of motherhood one conversation at a time.
Maureen Huntley, MS TheFamilyBalancingAct
https://maureenhuntley.com/ https://www.facebook.com/maureen.huntley?mibextid=LQQJ4d https://www.facebook.com/TheFamilyBalancingAct?mibextid=LQQJ4dhttps://www.instagram.com/mohuntley/www.ctrnetwork.com/thefamilybalancingact
VIA Character Strengths *FREE assessment:http://maureenhuntley.pro.viasurvey.orghttp://vitalhealthforlife.pro.viasurvey.org
Glenys Eldred, MScHealing Hearts & Energies ~ Renegade Zen Systemhttp://www.Glenyseldred.comhttps://www.linkedin.com/in/glenys-eldred-msc-b7431726/
Maureen Huntley, MS TheFamilyBalancingAct
https://maureenhuntley.com/ https://www.facebook.com/maureen.huntley?mibextid=LQQJ4d https://www.facebook.com/TheFamilyBalancingAct?mibextid=LQQJ4dhttps://www.instagram.com/mohuntley/www.ctrnetwork.com/thefamilybalancingact
VIA Character Strengths *FREE assessment:http://maureenhuntley.pro.viasurvey.orghttp://vitalhealthforlife.pro.viasurvey.org
Glenys Eldred, MScHealing Hearts & Energies ~ Renegade Zen Systemhttp://www.Glenyseldred.comhttps://www.linkedin.com/in/glenys-eldred-msc-b7431726/
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Episode Transcript
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(00:04):
Welcome to where the screen door slamsand the coffee mug hits the table.
You're listening to The Family Balancing Actwith me Loureen Huntley, Mom, grandmother,
and board certified Holistic and Functional Medicinehealth coach. Each episode will explore
the realities of your day to dayfamily life in this modern era of NonStop
(00:26):
texts, means and technology. Afterall, how do we keep ourselves saying
and our family healthy. I'll haveamazing guests and thought provoking discussions, and
we'll take a holistic look at familyhealth emotional, physical, mental, and
spiritual. Whether it's a micro perspectiveof family involving healthy snacks, teenagers with
(00:50):
an attitude, stressed out, husband'spartners, adult children, potty training,
eldercare, grandchildren, college breath,or a macro perspective of world events including
blue earthquakes, the brainwashing, media, finances, and oh so much more.
We'll find a way together. Sotake a deep, rapt exhale and
(01:11):
know that you're not alone. Bringon the Family Balancing Act. Welcome to
(01:53):
the Family Balancing Act, where restoringthe heart and art of motherhood starts with
one conversation at a time. I'mMaureen Huntley, your host, board certified
integrative, holistic and Functional medicine,health coach, emotional freedom technique practitioner,
mom, grandmother, wife, andCEO of my family's home operations. So
(02:15):
how's your family balancing act going?If you're in charge of keeping all the
spinning plates and all the balls inthe air, God bless you. It's
nothing short of a miracle at times, well, some days flow a little
better than others. And if you'relike ninety nine point nine nine nine nine
(02:37):
percent of those who do it all, and you know who you are,
you also know it's not possible todo at all. We'll add in your
fur family and you've got joy,unconditional love, and stress all bundled into
your family balancing act, even withor without the husband, aldred, grandparents
(03:00):
and friends. Our pets are agift from God. But like everyone else
in the family, they need youand you need them. Okay, so
maybe they don't talk back to you, although I challenge that you can have
them out of the room or youcan keep it in a kennel, but
(03:22):
they feel the separation. How bigis your heart? Big? I would
bet firmly. Fur family as definedby Urban dictionary dot com. Are fur
pets that you consider family your furryfamily members dogs, cats, bunnies,
(03:46):
ferrets, chickens as opposed to yourhuman family members. I didn't know that
was a word, firmly, didyou. My family always had a pet
or pets actually, and it's sorewarding. It's this joy filled, total
(04:08):
loved journey. But it's not alwaysbeen easy, especially when it comes to
the goodbyes. When our pets havepassed, either on their own or because
their life had become so painful wehad to find a way to help them
pass. Was so heart wrenching.Our children, my husband and I have
(04:30):
cried our eyes out during the goodbyeand it would be a long goodbye sometimes
and for days, months and sometimesyears as we reflect back on the beautiful
memories we had. Our fur familyis part of our family and his family.
I've seen my children crying harder actuallyor the beloved pet than they did
(04:55):
for older relatives. We are justunconditioned only love buy our pets. Just
being in their presence can lift usup and hold our hearts, and especially
children children feel it. Humans canstand to learn so much more from their
fur friends. So today we'll bedoing a deep diving into the balancing act
(05:20):
and the balancing the fur family,or rather the firmly and all that comes
with it. So come on in, pull up a chair, gravi a
tea, coffee, water, ormaybe even a green juice because we have
a lot to talk about today withmy returning guests. Yep, Glennis Eldred
(05:40):
who continues to grow her fur family, and we're gonna hear all about it.
Glennis is a Daoist priest, healer, creator of Glennis Eldrid Healing Hearts
and Energy Renegade Zen and a sustainabilityexpert. I'm so excited to have Glennis
here once again and I can't weto hear all that you have to say.
(06:01):
Glennys. Welcome, Welcome, Welcome, Hello mo. Well thanks for
having me back. This is avery exciting topic, very exciting I know,
certainly for you for all because yougrew up having loads of pets and
I did my dad connection. Yeah, my dad was a vetermarian, so
(06:24):
we have had an array of oddanimals. A lot of them came to
us as that people abandoned them athis hospital. They just couldn't pay the
bill and they were just walked away, which I thought was kind of odd.
And so I've gotten this sort ofmixed bag of brokenness that turned into
(06:45):
full on loving, just unbelievable personalities, and all of us all remember them
as if they were members of thehousehold. Always. Oh wow, did
you have a particular one when youwere a child that was you were very
close to one of your pets.Yes, j D came. He was
a Golden Retriever and he was likethis award winning bloodline. But he had
(07:09):
a heart murmur, apparently the worstheart heart murmur that University of Pennsylvania had
ever heard, and they wanted torecord it for their students, and my
dad decided to keep him. Andso he had a lot of like health
issues, but because he was inthe care of a veterinarian twenty four to
seven, we were able to limphim along till he was like seventeen.
(07:31):
I mean, he lived longer thanmost dogs do. Now I've had two,
I'm like two Golden Retrievers we have, and I absolutely love them.
They just give heavy duty love NonStop. But both of them passed by the
(07:51):
time they were twelve, like giveor take a week. It was almost
to the exact date of their birth, So seventeen, that's incredible. Yeah,
And he had unbelievable Thank god hewas with us because his hair all
fell out. He had a thyroidproblem, he had a heart murmur,
so he couldn't run very far andum uh he his um. He smelled
(08:16):
bad. I mean like he neededto be a have a medicated bath almost
every day. So he was superclean. And he was a character,
a total, total character. Andhe used to I used to take him
on dates with me when I wasin high school because I couldn't leave him
at home because I had to walkhim. It was my dad. He
(08:37):
was like, he was like mymy, um, you know hall monitor.
He stayed on the floor when Iwas out of the house, and
if I came home the door asI was opening it, he was sliding
on the floor. And then hewas like, oh, now you're home,
Now we can go to bed.He was, he was, he
was unbelievable. Ride on the frontseat before seatbelts, that's all I am,
(09:00):
right on the seat. He flippedoff. He held a grudge for
days, if you like, ifhe stopped fast and he fell off the
seat, he told a grudge fordays. He was a character, total
character, and he was like thatwhiskey color, not the creamy, lovely
gold retriever color. And he that'swhen they crossed bread them many many years
back with bloodhounds, so he hadlike all this extra skin and he was
(09:26):
like he was. He was totallybizarre looking, especially when he was naked,
because his hair flat without his fur, and they golden retrievers have a
ton of hair. I mean itjust goes everywhere like a new pillow every
week. Yeah. Yeah. Mygrandmother knit him, or actually she crocheted
him when his hair fell out becausewe had to balance his thyroid medication.
(09:48):
She crocheted him. She said,oh, poor thing. And she crocheted
him a thing to put on histail that had like little things on it
to look like his tail feathers.Because he's you thought he felt diminished going
out because we lived in Philadelphia andI have to take him out on a
leash with three standard poodles and him, and they were all beautiful and you
know, gorgeous, and he's therenaked and he's got spots on him because
(10:11):
apparently it looks like a dalmatian underneathwhen all their hair falls out and it
was just it was embarrassing, buthe was he was a character. So
that's that's probably wasn't embarrassed in theleast. It's just it's the humans.
It's the humans. It's so it'sso crazy. So I, um,
I just think back to all thepets I've had and then all the pets
(10:33):
I've had with you know, we'vehad here and my family that my husband
and I have created, and therebe times I'd be like, why do
we have this dog? Why dowe have this cat? But that would
be just a brief moment because they'rejust full of like unconditional love and they
(10:54):
can settle everybody around them. Theyhave a way of just bringing people into
balance. And even when you're you'rehaving a you know, there's a family
discord, the animal, the doggets involved in that, it's over.
They don't tolerate that or you know, they they they might remember one animal
(11:15):
I had as a child. Um, we had a poodle, a small
poodle, like a miniature poodle.And I remember getting a my acceptance into
college and I went to pick thenotice out of the you know, the
mailbox. We didn't have internet then, and um, I pulled the you
know, the letter out and Iopened it up because it was a thick,
(11:37):
thick envelope, which meant that therewas like information in there I had
to fill out and get back andI don't think so. I you know,
when you when you get envelopes fromacceptances, college acceptance, you're not
always getting the thick envelope at thattime. But if you got a thick
when you knew you you got insomewhere. And so I got that one
and I opened it up and Istarted screaming, like the top of my
(12:00):
lungs. That poor dog ran overand like grabbed the back of my shirt
and I like nipped to my backbecause it was like trying to It was
like I was out of character andshe was like, no, no,
no, this doesn't go on here. And at the same time, I'm
like laughing, crying, going,oh, grabbing my just hugging. You
know. In the end, itwas like we were both on the floor,
(12:22):
laughing and hugging each other. Butthose moments are ingrained forever, those
special moments with our with our furfamily, our Fermily's. Had you ever
heard that before, Fermily, No, that's a new term, but you
know, hey, the seems tobe uh evolving all the time, so
I just kind of go along wellas a new one to add to my
(12:43):
vocabulary. I remember when JD whenwhen we had him, my cousin,
um, we were we were babysittingour baby, my baby cousin and uh,
and we put her in the andmy dad's office, which is off
our family room at the time,and he was in the family room and
she was crying and they were like, just let her, you know,
she'll settle. It's a different place, she'll settle. And she just didn't.
(13:07):
So he like, he got upand he looked at his shoulder.
He was always annoyed with us,but he loved us, but he was
always like, you know, youpeople. And he got up and he
pushed the door open, went backthere, and the next thing you hear
is her giggling and laughing. Andthen he comes out and he's like,
see, like, all you hadto do was just you know. We
(13:31):
were like, oh my god,it's magical. You're like, why didn't
we let him try that an hourago? But he decided on his own
because he listened to it for awhile and he's like, I gotta take
care of this an hour later.Yeah, yeah, right before we went
on air, and you know youwere experiencing it with me. I had
my daughter's um little dog who's likepert Chihuahua and just being completely restless around
(13:56):
me, and we both discussed,oh, I'll just leave. You know,
it's fine, it's all part oftoday's show. I'll have the doc.
She was so restless, and andI could see she was about ready
to start like yapping and yapping andyapping, and it would be an hour
worth of yapping and we'd all havea big headache and nobody listen. So
I had to exit her, herout the door, get her out of
(14:18):
it. But what was the mostunusual gift? A gift I mean pet
that this will have to be betweenus and your audience. Okay, my
dad, for my my mother's weddinganniversary, bought her an Amish mule.
(14:43):
And can I say that that actuallyfalls below buying a woman a vacuum cleaner?
Can I just say I have friendswho won vacuum cleaners and they're happy
with that, so, but buta mule might be kind of a comment
on either what they think of theperson. Yeah, I mean there was.
There was a lot of there's alot of Yeah, there's a lot
(15:07):
of baggage there. Now let mealso say she doesn't ride. It was
a draft horse sized mule, soit was huge. We had to order
separate like a special order um halterfor it, Like you couldn't just go
buy when you couldn't even get itclose to her head was like this.
(15:28):
Her ears on top of that,she was huge. Her feet were like
pie plates and um. She usedto pull um a plow and she didn't
like men because they were the onesthat made her pull a plow, and
so she only liked girls. Soshe would try to kick all the men
that would come near her. Andand my mother was could totally walk up
(15:50):
to her, but she was alittle afraid of her, and she was
never getting on her because she neverwas that kind of athletic person. She
was, you know, she wasa very cultured and into our antiques and
you know, things like that,not a mule. Like and when people
say what'd you get for your university, it's the silver wine or whatever,
She's like, my husband gave mea mule, and they're like, really,
(16:11):
why would he do that? Soit's creative yeah, so and so
you know, yes, yeah,so she she was. She was a
character that mule thought she was themost feminine thing there ever was. She
would she simpered, she was,but she didn't like men, and she
(16:33):
would try and sit on them ifthey came near her, or kicked them,
which the cow kick. Mules cancow kick where his horses can only
kick to the bat. And hethought he could muscle her. My dad,
so he was gonna, you know, tam yeah, because he's used
to doing that because he was aveterinarian. And she threw him. He
was holding onto the halter and sheflee flicked him like she wound up.
(16:56):
She sat down and he was horizontalwhen he went like thirty feet, Oh
my god. And he tucked androlled. He was still like young enough
to do that. I think atninety two now he's still alive. I
don't know that he could tuck androll as well as he did that,
but I saw it, and Iwas like, holy cow. So she
had this like obstreperous streak in herthat made her such a character, Like
(17:19):
she used to let all the horsesout because she knew how to use her
We call them finger lips. Opengate. She would like when you go
to close her in, she wouldgrab the gate with her lips and hold
on it. It was stronger thanme with both hands and my body weight.
She was. She was such acharacter and he's still and we all
(17:40):
our whole family tells stories about herall the time, like, and we
have pictures of her and pictures withher, and like, she is absolutely
a beloved character because she was acharacter. Which it's really great because as
a kid too. I mean,I don't know how old you were when
she showed up, but how funis that? Oh? Yeah, you
(18:03):
know, we trained her. Itrained her to jump. So I had
a jumping mule, which are right, they don't jump very high, no,
but she I trained her to jumpby it because I used to ride
um when I was a kid andI'd like to jump, And so I
put a saddle on her and wewent out in the woods. The only
thing is, and I didn't knowit right away, is that once she's
(18:26):
been over something in something along somethinglike a path or like a trail ride
or something, she doesn't want todo it again. So now she won't
go because she's a mule stubborn.Yeah, she's stubborn, but she'll go
backwards. So I did a lot. My dad used to take her.
I'm going to take her for atrail ride, and I was like,
(18:48):
okay, and she would go backwards, but she wouldn't go forwards. So
he did a lot of trail riding, riding her his mule backwards. I
don't know how she because they cansee out of the side. She would
just back up and back up,so you can see him going along the
ridge. And I'd be going alongon my horse forwards, and right behind
me was my dad on his mule. You know, I think that there's
(19:12):
something, as you say, deeperwith this and the fact that he gave
your your mother this gift for ananniversary and and um and the jokes on
him. Basically, yeah, Imean he loved that mule. He loved
that mule. That mule made storiesfor life. We have so many stories
about her. Brilliant but letting thehorses of my five horses out in the
(19:34):
middle of one night, I waslike, I heard them all run underneath
the bedroom window, and I said, the horses are out, and and
I said how did they get out? Wait? And and I was like,
oh, here comes the mule herebecause she was like yeah, and
I was like, oh my god. And she she let the horses out.
She lifted the gate right off thepins and dropped it and all the
(19:56):
horses jumped over it and ran away. I got them all back, but
it was at three in the morning. It was like, Okay, I
got to get to the barn,got to get the feet. Anyway,
my fur family was was a muck. Look it's and you still love them.
And you know, look teenagers youand I know you haven't had teenagers
or kids, but it's like,that's a teenager for you. They're running
(20:19):
amuck. I mean some are veryyou know, you know, very good,
but generally you have. My theoryas is that kids when they're very
little, if they're really well behaved, you know, and they're like just
perfect little child, they're gonna burstout at one point. They're going to
burst out at some point in theirchildhood. And this is what I found
with my own kids. And theones that were a little wild when they
(20:41):
were little weren't necessarily they were alittle wild growing up, but not as
as crazy. So what um youknow, with kids and living with animals
and taking responsibility it's not only aboutkids. When you bring animals into pets
into your home, I think that, you know. I know my parents
(21:04):
were all like, Okay, we'regonna get you a dog, but you're
gonna have to take the dog out, and you're gonna have to walk the
dog and fed the dog. Andof course my mother ended up being the
one who did it all. Andthen I did you know, we get
we get a dog. When myson is five years old, we surprised
him. He was a gift.She was a gift that the dog was
(21:26):
and um, you know you're goingto help and the whole bit. And
even as he got older, thatwasn't you know. They do a little
bit here and there, but it'sit always it lands on on the major
home runner person, you know Momusually yep, yeah, it does.
Um uh. And when you thinkyou've got it all taken care of and
(21:48):
you're doing the best that you canand you're feeding everybody, including the kids
and the animals, there um forme, Molly the mule um my name,
she was getting out. She wasjumping out of the pasture during the
day, going and visiting my neighbors, eating their grapes, their gardens,
(22:08):
their fresh grass whatever, and thenshe would go home on her own and
jump back in. So I wouldgo to work, and she was I
fed her, and I would goto work, and I would come home
and she was back in the pastureand fed her again and went to bed.
And I never knew that she wasvisiting the neighbors until like a year
(22:30):
later. Did the neighbors say anything. No, they just said she wouldn't
let them bring her back because shedidn't like men, and so um and
the and the women were afraid becauseshe's too big, Like unless you're a
horse person, you're not going towalk up to this, this monstrous thing.
And and she was, you know, being destructive. She was doing
mule stuff, you know. Shejust she just and she was just and
(22:56):
she and we found that she hadbent down a whole section of fence low
enough that she could jump it.There's a jumping mule, and she would
jump out and then go home,jump back in and be there with the
horses like a good girl. Nowthe horses didn't jump out, because they're
not as smart as the mule.The mule was she was a little she
was she was definitely um, alittle wildly like electric fence. She just
(23:22):
went to the handle where it wasinsulated, unhooked it let everybody out.
I mean it was it was constantlya struggle. She was like an escape
artist. Good grief dogs or catslike that. Oh yeah, no,
thank god. I haven't had anybodythat's been as wildly as that mule.
You really had to think about whatyou were doing, um, and and
(23:45):
then see where she would find herway to undo it. She she belly
crawled under. I had a wire, you know, to keep them separate.
She would belly crawl under and thenstand up on the other side.
Now, the horses didn't do thatbecause they don't have the hips to do
that, you know, they don'thave the ability. So like, I
haven't separated. She's over here byherself, so she doesn't kick these expensive
(24:08):
Arab horses that were on the otherside of the pastor that I was holding
for a friend of mine. AndI came back and she was in with
the Arabs and she was just oh, I mean with the arrows. So
yeah, she was to was somethingelse. But yeah, um, she
lived a good long time. Theydo, and they're supposed to be you
(24:30):
know, really really um workhorses,really really work better than a horse.
They don't get nieces and things.Yeah right, I mean, I know
in Ireland we'd have the you know, the donkeys, and that it's a
little different than a mule, butit's still you know, they're very um.
They would always use them years andyears ago. In New Mexico and
(24:51):
South America. Definitely, they're they'reused to haul things, and but they're
smart and when they and they're stubbornand when they want to stop, they
stop. Nothing will move them.That's true. And I will attest to
that having been because you know,as you can tell, my mother didn't
keep the mule her gift. Sheyou know, handed it on to you.
(25:15):
Right, Yeah, I haven't aquestion for you. So with your
dad being a veterinarian, did didyou find that your family was more into
getting dogs or cats or even nowI know you're you're very fluid. Yeah,
uh, we kind of mostly dogs, uh, because that just seemed
(25:45):
to be what would come in andand it was interesting, like the pure
bred dog JD that we had afterso they couldn't sell him, they couldn't
not knowingly give him to somebody witha heart murmur. So that was kind
of how we got everybody. Itwas like, oh, there's something wrong
with it that needed required to expensivecare for their lifetime. So we would
(26:10):
end up they were always sort oflike you know, peg leg or selling.
I was like, we always somethingsomething, but you love them just
the same now like just you know, no ear, you know, because
somebody chewed it off, and soit just it was always something like that,
but mostly dogs. And then itwas interesting when I was a kid,
I was very allergic to cats.So we would have outside cats and
(26:32):
they all my dad had a colorthat we could only have kittens because he
had so many loads of kittens comingthrough, so that I wasn't always like
kittens kittens so adopting them or draggingthem home with me, which I was
wont to do it that when Iwas a little kid, um, I
was always finding cats. They hadto be the orange color. We couldn't
keep them. Yeah, we couldn'tkeep them if unless they were that orange
(26:56):
or peach color. And so thatkind of limited our adoption of cats.
But then once we had the farmapp State near the Blue Mountains in Pennsylvania.
When you have a farm, peopledrop them off and figure you want
them well or something. They allyeah, And so at one point I
(27:18):
had eighteen cats that got dropped off. Wow, and thank god my dad
was a vet, because eighteen catshad to be neutered, eighteen cats had
to be fed, eighteen cats hadto have shots. You know, it
was a lot. Well hence myreasoning for bringing you on again. Quite
um a large story around animals.So tell me about your journey with now
(27:45):
today with your animals right now,My latest ad is chickens. Um.
Now, my dad had chickens asa kid, and we had chickens.
We had those little band any hensthat laid a little tiny colored eggs,
so like you had to use likesix to make enough to eat. You
know, they were tiny, butthey were blue and green, and we
(28:07):
had those on the farm as Iwas growing up. But I was never
responsible for them. I just hadto pick up the eggs every day so
that we didn't have because we hadroosters, so I didn't have anybody hatch
or be giving eggs to people thatactually had a little chicken. You know
that people like when they're expecting alittle yellow yolk are not happy with us.
(28:30):
I wouldn't think so yeah yeah,so um uh that was my experience.
I just had to pick up theeggs. That's all I had to
do. I don't I didn't.I wasn't responsible because I was too young
to be doing it for watering themand feeding them. So I've decided that
I wanted to have raised chickens likehalf of the United States at this point,
(28:51):
and I went and I ordered them. I bought them at the mill.
I went and I got all myspecial food and it so free and
corn free and blah blah blah,you know, and they're medicated waters for
electrolytes. I mean, it's beena very big learning curve because I just
remember my dad thrown grain out andwatering them. I don't remember like all
(29:15):
the other stuff. And this islike a major science. Yeah, this
has been. It's been. It'sbeen a bit of an in depth study
for me and I and um,they you get them when they're like two
or three days old, so they'revery young and they haven't had anything to
drink or eat yet because they cansupport themselves for about three days without any
(29:37):
of that anyway. So I've beenlearning about chickens and one of the things
that is they're they're very fragile inthat chick state. I think people get
chicks for kids at Easter and theydie and and wait, are they fragile?
I mean I am doing everything I'veread or heard or no to do,
(29:57):
and I still have lost two.And there's this thing called um what
do they call it, uh,slimy button? What is it called mush?
But I'll call it sticky butt?Sticky butt where they're poop sticks and
then it kills them. So yougot to sit there with a Q tip
that's wet and this little tiny thingand you're clear in their butt to make
(30:19):
them live because if you don't,they're gonna die. And I don't want
that to happen. So, youknow, So it's been. It's been
so I had I had twelve.I started with fourteen and now I have
twelve. And uh, hopefully I'llget them up, you know, I'll
do better with the maintenance. Butit's been. I love them, even
(30:40):
though I hardly know them. I'veonly had them ten days or something.
But they are each have a littlepersonality. They are a bit of work,
but not too much. As babies, they're pretty easy. I just
have them in out. You know, there's plastic totes you have for We'll
post some photos of it. Butyea, yeah, yeah, I have
(31:00):
them in that with a screen overthe top, and you know, and
my water and the food and everything, and they they're in there and they
have their little brooder warmer, sothey sit in there warmer, and they
when they at night, they allget quiet and nap, you know,
they brood or they get they getquiet. But most of the time,
like right now, and they're inmy bathroom off of here, that's where
I have them housed, and theyare in their chirp and away I can
(31:23):
hear them. Now, how longwill you have to keep them in the
container? When do they get togo out to the coop? Um?
Well, if we would have awarm like spring day, I have I
have a child's playpen um that Iwill go outside and set up. I
(31:44):
have it and a small one,and I can take them out and put
them in the grass and they canall run around and have and see like
worms and bugs and things, youknow, and and then bring them in
when it gets colder at night,because right now they're very temperature sensitive.
And then as they as so,I'd say maybe if we'd have a warm
day. Maybe two weeks, threeweeks, maybe I'll be will start doing
(32:06):
that. And then um, thenin that same time frame, they're gonna
be getting too big for the mylittle tupperware that I have, my little
flex and I don't remember what's calledthis clear plastic with a plastic lid that
you put things in, and I'llhave to put I'll have to put them
(32:27):
in another kind of playpen in thehouse. So they're in the house for
eight weeks, solemn, my goodness. So it's gonna get a little gaming
in here. But I change theirtheir their bedding twice a day, sometimes
three times a day if they've beenmessy. But they the more they eat
and they just they expell. Yeahyeah, so they're just eating machines.
And then meanwhile, I just mydad. I got a new I got
(32:51):
a new adoptee. I've got aPersian cat, like this super pedigree persian
that was at my dad's office thatgot left because the bill for what he
had was so high that the ownerjust said, have him or whatever you
want to do. I'm not payingyou know, it's too much. And
it took eight months of care tobring him around. So he's I don't
(33:15):
know how many people could afford thatbill. That was eight months of in
office. Kids, that's astronomical,and it would have been astronom you know.
I don't know how much it isa day I went to college on
that, but I don't know.I you know, yeah, that's right.
Yes, So he gave me this, he uh, he might.
(33:38):
One of my cats had just died, and but she was twenty, so
I don't really think I can expecther to pull it through. But she
was pink. And then I wascrying about that, and then he I
said, well, I have thispersian I've had who I've been keeping,
you know, alive, and he'sfinally but he's a little stunted. So
(33:59):
he's supposed to be elve pounds,he's only six and um, and so
I was like, oh, I'lltake that kitten. And he goes,
oh, yeah, it's a kitten. He always tells me it's a kitten.
Oh yeah, it's a kitten.It was ten months old. It's
not a kitten, it's a cat. But his his demeanor is like a
kitten because he's been in a cagehis whole life, so he is into
(34:21):
everything everything, So can I askyou, speaking of getting into everything,
how about the chicks. Well,I'm safe with you know, like you're
talking about, I wouldn't Yeah,he would eat them. So that's why
we are m This is my groundfloor in my house, like my walkout
(34:43):
basement where I am, so Ihave a bathroom down here, so they're
in that bathroom and he has notbeen down here at all. So he
Sweter doesn't really know what this isdown here because he's not been down here.
And I'm going to keep it thatway until I get these chicks out
of here. But I'll probably getmore chicks next spring, so I'm thinking
maybe he just doesn't come down here. Yeah, yeah, in notion that
(35:07):
this is what because cats are amazing. Our cat up until recently he was
able to at night. What Iwould do is put the cat in the
laundry room, shut the door becausethat's where his litter box was and there
is and I have a pat onthe dryer, so then you put the
dryer on. He likes the heatfrom the dryer and it's jiggling around.
(35:29):
He gets his own little, youknow, motorized bed, and then there's
another little blanket for Malayan if heneeds it, and I keep it like
really clean because it's also where laundryis done, so I'm always in there
cleaning that. But that cat canactually had been able to jump up into
the counter and play with the doorknob, get the doorknob going and open the
(35:52):
door. Yeah, I know,aren't they Oh they're just and and then
in the morning I would find likea mess somewhere, you know, And
then I would look for the catand he'd be back in the laundry room
sitting on the dryer like I don'tknow, somebody must open the drawer,
you know, Like and I ittook me years, I really am my
(36:15):
years, but it took what feltlike forever. I didn't know what was
going on. Like. So they'revery very clever and and cats are wonderful.
But for me, I was alwaysa dog person, always, always,
always a dog person. And theonly way I ever got a cat
was to um. I went toa you know, a adoption you know,
(36:37):
or what do you call it wherethey're where there's just loads of cats
and shelter, shelter, thank you, And they were trying to you know,
they are all these cats in there, and and we had mice and
so here, we already had aGolden Retriever and I didn't really want to
necessarily bring in yet another animal.My husband was away on a business trip,
(36:59):
and well, he grew up witha cat, so maybe if I
could just get one for a littlewhile so I could get rid of the
mice, because I didn't want tobe spraying things around with the kids.
And I just thought, I'm goingto get this cat. So I went
to the shelter and I'm walking throughthis barn in actually a city. It
was a city. I had togo to that, and that was a
(37:20):
barn pack of somebody's old home,and it was stuffed with cats like in
cages and that. So I walkin and this woman is bringing me from
cage to cage to cage, andI was looking for a specific kind that
kind of looked like the one thatmy husband grew up with, so maybe
he'd have some sort of affinity towardsthat's a good idea. He wouldn't choke
me when he saw, you know, to lose his mind when he saw
(37:44):
the cat. But as I'm goingaround that particularly was like a calico is
what he grew up with. Butwhat I did is I find. She
goes, I have one. SoI went over there, but it's had
eye surgery. And I looked atit and it sneered at me, you
know, like that that that thathissing sound, and then turned its back
on me in the cage and liftedit. So I was, okay,
(38:05):
I'm out of here. I thought, well, that's not gonna work.
So I'm looking at all the cagesand she finally said stop and I was
like, well, she goes,you're not going to find the cat in
the cage. And I was like, oh, but I'm missing. I
didn't get to go. No,your cat found you, so let's go
and let you. And then Ilooked down and this cat was following me
(38:28):
around everywhere I went. But Iwas so busy looking in the cages I
didn't see that was right in frontof me. Yeah. It was a
little man named Mellow, and Mellowhas been a part of our lives for
like fourteen years. And he uhjust looked like like he's when he stands
(38:52):
up, he's he's black and white, but the he's white on the front,
but he's got a black heart.Like when he puts his us together,
it looks like a heart on hischest, and I was like,
and I was scared of him.I was scared of cats. The fact
that I was doing this was liketotally out of my comfort zone. But
I wanted to get The mice scaredme more than the cat. I remember
(39:13):
getting the cat home and I hada lady that would clean. She was
like an organizer lady that would helpme once in a while, and I
knew she had cats, so Imade her come to my house to teach
me how to get the cat,even out of the little cage the other
lady had put the cat in.And that's when it was like in the
laundry room and I wasn't gonna letit out yet because I had to have
(39:35):
my make sure. When my husbandgot home, I had him go to
the room and open up the doorand he was like a little shocked.
Were we've worked through. That's takensome time, years actually, but he
loves the cat and I do too, and and I'll tell more about that
as we closed the show. Butyou know, the cats and dogs,
(39:59):
although they're so different, their loveis so deep. They just take us
as we are, even if theother cats are kind of cool, like
stand back and you know, butwhen but when you're really feeling ill or
down or just you know, they'rethe ones that land in your laps.
(40:21):
They pick you, They pick you. Pick yeah, yeah, they pick
you. They pick you and theybut and what they do I've noticed over
time is when you have a largehousehold of cats, like I had the
eighteen and some of them were outsidepharaoh ones that I had just then,
and so I had all these eighteencats. But what they would do is
(40:43):
they would time share me by roomand by time of day. So when
I was in the kitchen, Ihad these three. When I was in
the outside in the garden, Ihad dozed four or all the pharaoh ones
would follow me wherever I went onthe property and they would time share me.
And that seemed to be the equilibriumthat they would have. They so
that there was no fighting, Therewas no discord at all. Well you
(41:07):
would think that they would, butthey didn't figured out of time like I
have her for this time and I'min this room and you cannot be in
the bed because that's my time,and they feared they figured it all out.
I just was moving through the timein space, and they they worked
it out amongst themselves. So Ihad I had loved time with all eighteen
(41:30):
depending on what I was doing grief, I don't know, God bless you.
I could not take that many ifthey're all outside, like one cat
inside for me has been they camein and out. They not the outside
the pharaohins didn't. They were barncats and they were taking care of the
mice and the things that are inbarnes um. But then there were ones
(41:51):
that were in the house that camein and out. And then there was
one that never and his name wasForbes, who never goes outside. Yeah,
he just he was. He wasjust that, his his space was
in the house. But the otherone used to come and go. And
and I could call them all inyeah, because I say dogs don't.
(42:13):
They don't timeshare. They just they'relike all in on it, all right,
boom, they're all in on it. And they're a little needy nellies.
But they also are like right withyou all the time. Ye.
So yeah, and I you weretalking about when you lose them and and
and um. I had an interestingthing because Lady Huffington, I took her
(42:37):
to a vet up here when shewas like a cat. Yeah, she's
a cat. I took her toa vet and she was so fat,
and I was feeding her all thespecial diet, and I know what to
do when that happened, and shejust got batter and fatter and fatter.
She was like this, my dad'slike that cat's fat, and I was
like, I know, but she'son the special diet for ash, so
(42:58):
she doesn't get a urinary and anyway, she just got fatter and fetter.
She was. She was always veryneedy, but that was because she was
trapped inside of a wall. Wehad to tear a wall down in our
barn to get her. The kittennest got her, the mother got hit
on the road. I never knewthis cat. It was just subody.
(43:19):
Dropped it off and had its littleright in my barn wall. And we
had to tear the wall down andget her out. And then I carried
her in my um against my heart. She was so tiny and I bottled
fetter and everything. I thought shewas going to be so cute. She
had little violet eyes, and thenshe turned out to be such a Hellian.
She'd smacked me. She bounced onme, showed me that she could
(43:39):
rip my achilles tendon at anytime shewanted. And I was like, this
cat is just like so so ungrateful. But she became like like I never
realized she she just ended up beingthe bane of my existence but also so
sweet. She never broke my skin, She never clawed me. She never
did anything, but she I couldif I wanted, I could fell you
(44:04):
like a tree and I'm gonna showyou, Sabbath. I should jump out
guerrilla warfare, grabbed me body theAchilles tendon and then be like, see
I could have. I could havejust you know, you could have fell
over. So anyway, she shejust passed after twenty years, So I
had her for twenty years. That'sa pretty good long time for a cat.
Yeah. And um, I wouldbe down here in the what is
(44:27):
that with the walkout basement part,and after her spirit left her body,
you know, if she was buriedout in the yard, I could hear
her running around up above me.And she was like twenty pounds. She
was a big cat. And uhand Saturday was sounded like there was a
you know, a stampede, andshe didn't have that kind of ability near
(44:51):
the end, but her spirit wasrunning around in the house and Um,
then my dad gave me this adoptedpersian who went upstairs, you know,
who was living in the house.And as soon as he came that stopped.
But then he started doing the thingsthat she had always done. And
now he's and he's doing all thethings she used to do. He plays
(45:15):
with her toys. He went intothe toy box for the dog or some
of the cat toys have fallen,and dug them all out, the ones
that she liked the best, theplace that she liked to be the best,
the places where she with her likeunique places she eats with the dog,
or he eats with the dog.She used to and the dog would
growl at her and still growls atthe new persian, but she he does
(45:37):
the exact same thing. And soI have always felt that when you have
animals, their spirit kind of staysaround you. And in the Daoist philosophy,
that's true. You have a soulgroup around which your animals will you
know, the constellation of all ofyour animals you've ever had, we'll all
(45:58):
stay close to your soul group.So all you have to do is give
them a chance to join you.So adopting a cat, even if it's
not related to your cat. We'llbring that piece of that soul into your
into your world. So he is. But he's as different as he could
(46:20):
be from her. She was abarn cat. He's a pure bred whoopedie
do Persian something something from Russia,no less. And he's totally her,
I mean, like fragments of herspirit of what she used to do.
He does and he never knew her. And then running around upstairs stopped.
Wow, now there's something running aroundup there right now. But it's him
(46:44):
that is so cool. I thinkthat that we're obviously we are all connected.
We're all connected to the Christ consciousness. We're all connected to you know,
we're a part of the animals area part of us, as our
the you know, the the plantsthat grow outside, the things. We're
(47:04):
all connected. Everything is a partof us, and we are a part
of it in so many ways.And as we were talking about my cat
mellow moment, you know, afew moments ago, I have to uh,
he's going to be put down tomorrowand by the time the show airs,
(47:25):
he will be in spirit world andhopefully, you know, I will
feel him around and and it's yeah, I'm very sad, and I've had
my tears, a lot of tears. And it's so funny because when I
think about, you know, theanimals at times, so go, well,
it's not like losing human. Imean, I'm so there's just so
(47:47):
many other you know, emotions andenergies attached to humans. But no,
it's a different, it's different,but it's so necessary to have and feel
those emotions. And I am verysad. I'm trying to keep it together
as I do this, but Idon't want to see him suffer. And
(48:09):
I've I've struggled with holding on nowfor like four months, and it gets
to be to a point where it'sjust not good for it for your pet,
and it's not good for you,it's not good for your family.
And as a friend of mine said, when her she took her dog to
(48:30):
the vet and the dog and shestruggled with putting the dog down, and
she anytime she'd see her dog tryto hide to actually let go, she
would be there to know, you'renot going, you're staying, you know
whatever. And so she took,you know, took the dog in and
(48:51):
and they're ready to go to putthe dog down, and she asked the
vet, or maybe this was overthe phone. She said, when do
you know? When? When shouldI, you know, like put him
down because you know, I justdon't know when. And the vet said,
(49:12):
four months ago, it's not goodto drag this out. The poor
animal needs to be set free.Now. I feel so differently about humans
in that way. I feel thatit's a god god divine experience our timing
of when we come and go.But we can also help to guide ourselves
(49:37):
in that direction by not doing certainmedications in that. But with with you
know, an animal, why arewe making them suffer? So yeah,
that's kind of the way. Itfeels kind of selfish. And I've had
death because I've had so many animals, of course I have, you know,
(49:58):
UM had a lot of things upin and sometimes they want to do
it themselves and they will they don'twant to help, and you know it,
you can feel it. Like um, Lady Huffington, she was only
sick for four days, she wasfine, and then four days she just
declined so fast it was crazy.She had she had a kidney failure and
(50:22):
it just boomed, it was done. And Um I tried to help her
transition because I can know how todo that because of my own practices.
And she kicked me so hard withher back legs, like she could barely
walk, and she like kicked itout of here. Yeah. Yeah,
She's like, I want to doit, and and I had the same
(50:43):
thing happened with a gold retriever.I tried to help her and I saw
her spirit peeling out like it wasgoing and she kicked me also their back
legs like they does. Bunny kickedme really hard, and I was like,
okay, okay, okay, I'llyou know. But it's it's always
it's always so hard. It's hardwhen they disappear to go die because then
(51:05):
you're looking for them, you know, every day, every day for months
and years, you know what youthink you might see them. It's never
easy. But the bottom line isis that you can sort of feel their
decision to choose it themselves. Youcan feel it. Just listen with your
heart. Do they want you tohelp them? Look in their eyes?
Do they want your you to helpthem or do they need you to because
(51:30):
sometimes they want to be away fromyou. They don't want you to see
it, and sometimes they do welland humans do that also, and as
we close. It's so it's sobrilliant to have the family, anyone who's
been around you're, you know,the pet who has a connection to it,
(51:52):
to be able to say their goodbyesin their way, or to be
able to come to terms with whythis is show growing up and why this
is happening, because all it isis the cycle. It's a cycle of
life, and it and their livesare meant to be celebrated, like like
our lives are meant to be celebrated. As we exit, we come,
(52:15):
we go, we come, wego, And it's just this rotation of
energy exactly. And the interesting thingnature gives you usually there is gonna be
right before they die. They looklike they're getting better, they have more
energy, they look like they're gettingbetter. That's when you do your thing
(52:39):
to make you tell them you lovethem, You show up for them.
Maybe they have their last little mealthat they can eat because they can't eat
anymore, you know, they drinkeven for You're like, oh, maybe
it's gonna be okay. But it'salways this little flash of more energy,
more life. It gives you timeto make your peace with the transition that's
(53:02):
coming. And then that really neatpart is as I found with all the
cats and dogs I've had in mylife. I mean, gosh, I've
been so lucky to have so manysouls in my little soul group that are
staying attached to me like I They'rearound me all the time. Um that
when one passes, whatever I bringin the next thing I bring in,
(53:27):
some of that soul has attached tothe to the new animal. And so
it's not an end. And thisis what the dalloast believe. It's not
an end. It's like, um, another another lifetime gets to be lived,
and so they want to stay withmy soul and they do. And
I think that's an amazing gift becauseI have known so many sweet little hearts,
(53:52):
little fuzzy hearts. Yeah yeah,fr Malaise, Yeah, Adam,
I don't know she counts of thefirm. La was one man. I
love it well. Glenny's thank youonce again so much for joining me.
You're always such a joy. Ilove your energy and your stories and all
(54:15):
your knowledge. Um. Can youtell our listeners where they can find you?
Um? Yeah, just Glennis jU S T G l E.
Nys dot com is my main website, so you can reach me there fabulous,
So thank you, thank you,thank you so much. And if
(54:36):
we can all just take a closeyour eyes for a moment, not while
you're driving, and just take abig, deep breath in and hold it
for a moment and release. Andnow that you're not alone, you're on
the family balancing again. The blow
Welcome to where the screen door slamsand the coffee mug hits the table.
You're listening to The Family Balancing Actwith me Loureen Huntley, Mom, grandmother,
and board certified Holistic and Functional Medicinehealth coach. Each episode will explore
the realities of your day to dayfamily life in this modern era of NonStop
(00:26):
texts, means and technology. Afterall, how do we keep ourselves saying
and our family healthy. I'll haveamazing guests and thought provoking discussions, and
we'll take a holistic look at familyhealth emotional, physical, mental, and
spiritual. Whether it's a micro perspectiveof family involving healthy snacks, teenagers with
(00:50):
an attitude, stressed out, husband'spartners, adult children, potty training,
eldercare, grandchildren, college breath,or a macro perspective of world events including
blue earthquakes, the brainwashing, media, finances, and oh so much more.
We'll find a way together. Sotake a deep, rapt exhale and
(01:11):
know that you're not alone. Bringon the Family Balancing Act. Welcome to
(01:53):
the Family Balancing Act, where restoringthe heart and art of motherhood starts with
one conversation at a time. I'mMaureen Huntley, your host, board certified
integrative, holistic and Functional medicine,health coach, emotional freedom technique practitioner,
mom, grandmother, wife, andCEO of my family's home operations. So
(02:15):
how's your family balancing act going?If you're in charge of keeping all the
spinning plates and all the balls inthe air, God bless you. It's
nothing short of a miracle at times, well, some days flow a little
better than others. And if you'relike ninety nine point nine nine nine nine
(02:37):
percent of those who do it all, and you know who you are,
you also know it's not possible todo at all. We'll add in your
fur family and you've got joy,unconditional love, and stress all bundled into
your family balancing act, even withor without the husband, aldred, grandparents
(03:00):
and friends. Our pets are agift from God. But like everyone else
in the family, they need youand you need them. Okay, so
maybe they don't talk back to you, although I challenge that you can have
them out of the room or youcan keep it in a kennel, but
(03:22):
they feel the separation. How bigis your heart? Big? I would
bet firmly. Fur family as definedby Urban dictionary dot com. Are fur
pets that you consider family your furryfamily members dogs, cats, bunnies,
(03:46):
ferrets, chickens as opposed to yourhuman family members. I didn't know that
was a word, firmly, didyou. My family always had a pet
or pets actually, and it's sorewarding. It's this joy filled, total
(04:08):
loved journey. But it's not alwaysbeen easy, especially when it comes to
the goodbyes. When our pets havepassed, either on their own or because
their life had become so painful wehad to find a way to help them
pass. Was so heart wrenching.Our children, my husband and I have
(04:30):
cried our eyes out during the goodbyeand it would be a long goodbye sometimes
and for days, months and sometimesyears as we reflect back on the beautiful
memories we had. Our fur familyis part of our family and his family.
I've seen my children crying harder actuallyor the beloved pet than they did
(04:55):
for older relatives. We are justunconditioned only love buy our pets. Just
being in their presence can lift usup and hold our hearts, and especially
children children feel it. Humans canstand to learn so much more from their
fur friends. So today we'll bedoing a deep diving into the balancing act
(05:20):
and the balancing the fur family,or rather the firmly and all that comes
with it. So come on in, pull up a chair, gravi a
tea, coffee, water, ormaybe even a green juice because we have
a lot to talk about today withmy returning guests. Yep, Glennis Eldred
(05:40):
who continues to grow her fur family, and we're gonna hear all about it.
Glennis is a Daoist priest, healer, creator of Glennis Eldrid Healing Hearts
and Energy Renegade Zen and a sustainabilityexpert. I'm so excited to have Glennis
here once again and I can't weto hear all that you have to say.
(06:01):
Glennys. Welcome, Welcome, Welcome, Hello mo. Well thanks for
having me back. This is avery exciting topic, very exciting I know,
certainly for you for all because yougrew up having loads of pets and
I did my dad connection. Yeah, my dad was a vetermarian, so
(06:24):
we have had an array of oddanimals. A lot of them came to
us as that people abandoned them athis hospital. They just couldn't pay the
bill and they were just walked away, which I thought was kind of odd.
And so I've gotten this sort ofmixed bag of brokenness that turned into
(06:45):
full on loving, just unbelievable personalities, and all of us all remember them
as if they were members of thehousehold. Always. Oh wow, did
you have a particular one when youwere a child that was you were very
close to one of your pets.Yes, j D came. He was
a Golden Retriever and he was likethis award winning bloodline. But he had
(07:09):
a heart murmur, apparently the worstheart heart murmur that University of Pennsylvania had
ever heard, and they wanted torecord it for their students, and my
dad decided to keep him. Andso he had a lot of like health
issues, but because he was inthe care of a veterinarian twenty four to
seven, we were able to limphim along till he was like seventeen.
(07:31):
I mean, he lived longer thanmost dogs do. Now I've had two,
I'm like two Golden Retrievers we have, and I absolutely love them.
They just give heavy duty love NonStop. But both of them passed by the
(07:51):
time they were twelve, like giveor take a week. It was almost
to the exact date of their birth, So seventeen, that's incredible. Yeah,
And he had unbelievable Thank god hewas with us because his hair all
fell out. He had a thyroidproblem, he had a heart murmur,
so he couldn't run very far andum uh he his um. He smelled
(08:16):
bad. I mean like he neededto be a have a medicated bath almost
every day. So he was superclean. And he was a character,
a total, total character. Andhe used to I used to take him
on dates with me when I wasin high school because I couldn't leave him
at home because I had to walkhim. It was my dad. He
(08:37):
was like, he was like mymy, um, you know hall monitor.
He stayed on the floor when Iwas out of the house, and
if I came home the door asI was opening it, he was sliding
on the floor. And then hewas like, oh, now you're home,
Now we can go to bed.He was, he was, he
was unbelievable. Ride on the frontseat before seatbelts, that's all I am,
(09:00):
right on the seat. He flippedoff. He held a grudge for
days, if you like, ifhe stopped fast and he fell off the
seat, he told a grudge fordays. He was a character, total
character, and he was like thatwhiskey color, not the creamy, lovely
gold retriever color. And he that'swhen they crossed bread them many many years
back with bloodhounds, so he hadlike all this extra skin and he was
(09:26):
like he was. He was totallybizarre looking, especially when he was naked,
because his hair flat without his fur, and they golden retrievers have a
ton of hair. I mean itjust goes everywhere like a new pillow every
week. Yeah. Yeah. Mygrandmother knit him, or actually she crocheted
him when his hair fell out becausewe had to balance his thyroid medication.
(09:48):
She crocheted him. She said,oh, poor thing. And she crocheted
him a thing to put on histail that had like little things on it
to look like his tail feathers.Because he's you thought he felt diminished going
out because we lived in Philadelphia andI have to take him out on a
leash with three standard poodles and him, and they were all beautiful and you
know, gorgeous, and he's therenaked and he's got spots on him because
(10:11):
apparently it looks like a dalmatian underneathwhen all their hair falls out and it
was just it was embarrassing, buthe was he was a character. So
that's that's probably wasn't embarrassed in theleast. It's just it's the humans.
It's the humans. It's so it'sso crazy. So I, um,
I just think back to all thepets I've had and then all the pets
(10:33):
I've had with you know, we'vehad here and my family that my husband
and I have created, and therebe times I'd be like, why do
we have this dog? Why dowe have this cat? But that would
be just a brief moment because they'rejust full of like unconditional love and they
(10:54):
can settle everybody around them. Theyhave a way of just bringing people into
balance. And even when you're you'rehaving a you know, there's a family
discord, the animal, the doggets involved in that, it's over.
They don't tolerate that or you know, they they they might remember one animal
(11:15):
I had as a child. Um, we had a poodle, a small
poodle, like a miniature poodle.And I remember getting a my acceptance into
college and I went to pick thenotice out of the you know, the
mailbox. We didn't have internet then, and um, I pulled the you
know, the letter out and Iopened it up because it was a thick,
(11:37):
thick envelope, which meant that therewas like information in there I had
to fill out and get back andI don't think so. I you know,
when you when you get envelopes fromacceptances, college acceptance, you're not
always getting the thick envelope at thattime. But if you got a thick
when you knew you you got insomewhere. And so I got that one
and I opened it up and Istarted screaming, like the top of my
(12:00):
lungs. That poor dog ran overand like grabbed the back of my shirt
and I like nipped to my backbecause it was like trying to It was
like I was out of character andshe was like, no, no,
no, this doesn't go on here. And at the same time, I'm
like laughing, crying, going,oh, grabbing my just hugging. You
know. In the end, itwas like we were both on the floor,
(12:22):
laughing and hugging each other. Butthose moments are ingrained forever, those
special moments with our with our furfamily, our Fermily's. Had you ever
heard that before, Fermily, No, that's a new term, but you
know, hey, the seems tobe uh evolving all the time, so
I just kind of go along wellas a new one to add to my
(12:43):
vocabulary. I remember when JD whenwhen we had him, my cousin,
um, we were we were babysittingour baby, my baby cousin and uh,
and we put her in the andmy dad's office, which is off
our family room at the time,and he was in the family room and
she was crying and they were like, just let her, you know,
she'll settle. It's a different place, she'll settle. And she just didn't.
(13:07):
So he like, he got upand he looked at his shoulder.
He was always annoyed with us,but he loved us, but he was
always like, you know, youpeople. And he got up and he
pushed the door open, went backthere, and the next thing you hear
is her giggling and laughing. Andthen he comes out and he's like,
see, like, all you hadto do was just you know. We
(13:31):
were like, oh my god,it's magical. You're like, why didn't
we let him try that an hourago? But he decided on his own
because he listened to it for awhile and he's like, I gotta take
care of this an hour later.Yeah, yeah, right before we went
on air, and you know youwere experiencing it with me. I had
my daughter's um little dog who's likepert Chihuahua and just being completely restless around
(13:56):
me, and we both discussed,oh, I'll just leave. You know,
it's fine, it's all part oftoday's show. I'll have the doc.
She was so restless, and andI could see she was about ready
to start like yapping and yapping andyapping, and it would be an hour
worth of yapping and we'd all havea big headache and nobody listen. So
I had to exit her, herout the door, get her out of
(14:18):
it. But what was the mostunusual gift? A gift I mean pet
that this will have to be betweenus and your audience. Okay, my
dad, for my my mother's weddinganniversary, bought her an Amish mule.
(14:43):
And can I say that that actuallyfalls below buying a woman a vacuum cleaner?
Can I just say I have friendswho won vacuum cleaners and they're happy
with that, so, but buta mule might be kind of a comment
on either what they think of theperson. Yeah, I mean there was.
There was a lot of there's alot of Yeah, there's a lot
(15:07):
of baggage there. Now let mealso say she doesn't ride. It was
a draft horse sized mule, soit was huge. We had to order
separate like a special order um halterfor it, Like you couldn't just go
buy when you couldn't even get itclose to her head was like this.
(15:28):
Her ears on top of that,she was huge. Her feet were like
pie plates and um. She usedto pull um a plow and she didn't
like men because they were the onesthat made her pull a plow, and
so she only liked girls. Soshe would try to kick all the men
that would come near her. Andand my mother was could totally walk up
(15:50):
to her, but she was alittle afraid of her, and she was
never getting on her because she neverwas that kind of athletic person. She
was, you know, she wasa very cultured and into our antiques and
you know, things like that,not a mule. Like and when people
say what'd you get for your university, it's the silver wine or whatever,
She's like, my husband gave mea mule, and they're like, really,
(16:11):
why would he do that? Soit's creative yeah, so and so
you know, yes, yeah,so she she was. She was a
character that mule thought she was themost feminine thing there ever was. She
would she simpered, she was,but she didn't like men, and she
(16:33):
would try and sit on them ifthey came near her, or kicked them,
which the cow kick. Mules cancow kick where his horses can only
kick to the bat. And hethought he could muscle her. My dad,
so he was gonna, you know, tam yeah, because he's used
to doing that because he was aveterinarian. And she threw him. He
was holding onto the halter and sheflee flicked him like she wound up.
(16:56):
She sat down and he was horizontalwhen he went like thirty feet, Oh
my god. And he tucked androlled. He was still like young enough
to do that. I think atninety two now he's still alive. I
don't know that he could tuck androll as well as he did that,
but I saw it, and Iwas like, holy cow. So she
had this like obstreperous streak in herthat made her such a character, Like
(17:19):
she used to let all the horsesout because she knew how to use her
We call them finger lips. Opengate. She would like when you go
to close her in, she wouldgrab the gate with her lips and hold
on it. It was stronger thanme with both hands and my body weight.
She was. She was such acharacter and he's still and we all
(17:40):
our whole family tells stories about herall the time, like, and we
have pictures of her and pictures withher, and like, she is absolutely
a beloved character because she was acharacter. Which it's really great because as
a kid too. I mean,I don't know how old you were when
she showed up, but how funis that? Oh? Yeah, you
(18:03):
know, we trained her. Itrained her to jump. So I had
a jumping mule, which are right, they don't jump very high, no,
but she I trained her to jumpby it because I used to ride
um when I was a kid andI'd like to jump, And so I
put a saddle on her and wewent out in the woods. The only
thing is, and I didn't knowit right away, is that once she's
(18:26):
been over something in something along somethinglike a path or like a trail ride
or something, she doesn't want todo it again. So now she won't
go because she's a mule stubborn.Yeah, she's stubborn, but she'll go
backwards. So I did a lot. My dad used to take her.
I'm going to take her for atrail ride, and I was like,
(18:48):
okay, and she would go backwards, but she wouldn't go forwards. So
he did a lot of trail riding, riding her his mule backwards. I
don't know how she because they cansee out of the side. She would
just back up and back up,so you can see him going along the
ridge. And I'd be going alongon my horse forwards, and right behind
me was my dad on his mule. You know, I think that there's
(19:12):
something, as you say, deeperwith this and the fact that he gave
your your mother this gift for ananniversary and and um and the jokes on
him. Basically, yeah, Imean he loved that mule. He loved
that mule. That mule made storiesfor life. We have so many stories
about her. Brilliant but letting thehorses of my five horses out in the
(19:34):
middle of one night, I waslike, I heard them all run underneath
the bedroom window, and I said, the horses are out, and and
I said how did they get out? Wait? And and I was like,
oh, here comes the mule herebecause she was like yeah, and
I was like, oh my god. And she she let the horses out.
She lifted the gate right off thepins and dropped it and all the
(19:56):
horses jumped over it and ran away. I got them all back, but
it was at three in the morning. It was like, Okay, I
got to get to the barn,got to get the feet. Anyway,
my fur family was was a muck. Look it's and you still love them.
And you know, look teenagers youand I know you haven't had teenagers
or kids, but it's like,that's a teenager for you. They're running
(20:19):
amuck. I mean some are veryyou know, you know, very good,
but generally you have. My theoryas is that kids when they're very
little, if they're really well behaved, you know, and they're like just
perfect little child, they're gonna burstout at one point. They're going to
burst out at some point in theirchildhood. And this is what I found
with my own kids. And theones that were a little wild when they
(20:41):
were little weren't necessarily they were alittle wild growing up, but not as
as crazy. So what um youknow, with kids and living with animals
and taking responsibility it's not only aboutkids. When you bring animals into pets
into your home, I think that, you know. I know my parents
(21:04):
were all like, Okay, we'regonna get you a dog, but you're
gonna have to take the dog out, and you're gonna have to walk the
dog and fed the dog. Andof course my mother ended up being the
one who did it all. Andthen I did you know, we get
we get a dog. When myson is five years old, we surprised
him. He was a gift.She was a gift that the dog was
(21:26):
and um, you know you're goingto help and the whole bit. And
even as he got older, thatwasn't you know. They do a little
bit here and there, but it'sit always it lands on on the major
home runner person, you know Momusually yep, yeah, it does.
Um uh. And when you thinkyou've got it all taken care of and
(21:48):
you're doing the best that you canand you're feeding everybody, including the kids
and the animals, there um forme, Molly the mule um my name,
she was getting out. She wasjumping out of the pasture during the
day, going and visiting my neighbors, eating their grapes, their gardens,
(22:08):
their fresh grass whatever, and thenshe would go home on her own and
jump back in. So I wouldgo to work, and she was I
fed her, and I would goto work, and I would come home
and she was back in the pastureand fed her again and went to bed.
And I never knew that she wasvisiting the neighbors until like a year
(22:30):
later. Did the neighbors say anything. No, they just said she wouldn't
let them bring her back because shedidn't like men, and so um and
the and the women were afraid becauseshe's too big, Like unless you're a
horse person, you're not going towalk up to this, this monstrous thing.
And and she was, you know, being destructive. She was doing
mule stuff, you know. Shejust she just and she was just and
(22:56):
she and we found that she hadbent down a whole section of fence low
enough that she could jump it.There's a jumping mule, and she would
jump out and then go home,jump back in and be there with the
horses like a good girl. Nowthe horses didn't jump out, because they're
not as smart as the mule.The mule was she was a little she
was she was definitely um, alittle wildly like electric fence. She just
(23:22):
went to the handle where it wasinsulated, unhooked it let everybody out.
I mean it was it was constantlya struggle. She was like an escape
artist. Good grief dogs or catslike that. Oh yeah, no,
thank god. I haven't had anybodythat's been as wildly as that mule.
You really had to think about whatyou were doing, um, and and
(23:45):
then see where she would find herway to undo it. She she belly
crawled under. I had a wire, you know, to keep them separate.
She would belly crawl under and thenstand up on the other side.
Now, the horses didn't do thatbecause they don't have the hips to do
that, you know, they don'thave the ability. So like, I
haven't separated. She's over here byherself, so she doesn't kick these expensive
(24:08):
Arab horses that were on the otherside of the pastor that I was holding
for a friend of mine. AndI came back and she was in with
the Arabs and she was just oh, I mean with the arrows. So
yeah, she was to was somethingelse. But yeah, um, she
lived a good long time. Theydo, and they're supposed to be you
(24:30):
know, really really um workhorses,really really work better than a horse.
They don't get nieces and things.Yeah right, I mean, I know
in Ireland we'd have the you know, the donkeys, and that it's a
little different than a mule, butit's still you know, they're very um.
They would always use them years andyears ago. In New Mexico and
(24:51):
South America. Definitely, they're they'reused to haul things, and but they're
smart and when they and they're stubbornand when they want to stop, they
stop. Nothing will move them.That's true. And I will attest to
that having been because you know,as you can tell, my mother didn't
keep the mule her gift. Sheyou know, handed it on to you.
(25:15):
Right, Yeah, I haven't aquestion for you. So with your
dad being a veterinarian, did didyou find that your family was more into
getting dogs or cats or even nowI know you're you're very fluid. Yeah,
uh, we kind of mostly dogs, uh, because that just seemed
(25:45):
to be what would come in andand it was interesting, like the pure
bred dog JD that we had afterso they couldn't sell him, they couldn't
not knowingly give him to somebody witha heart murmur. So that was kind
of how we got everybody. Itwas like, oh, there's something wrong
with it that needed required to expensivecare for their lifetime. So we would
(26:10):
end up they were always sort oflike you know, peg leg or selling.
I was like, we always somethingsomething, but you love them just
the same now like just you know, no ear, you know, because
somebody chewed it off, and soit just it was always something like that,
but mostly dogs. And then itwas interesting when I was a kid,
I was very allergic to cats.So we would have outside cats and
(26:32):
they all my dad had a colorthat we could only have kittens because he
had so many loads of kittens comingthrough, so that I wasn't always like
kittens kittens so adopting them or draggingthem home with me, which I was
wont to do it that when Iwas a little kid, um, I
was always finding cats. They hadto be the orange color. We couldn't
keep them. Yeah, we couldn'tkeep them if unless they were that orange
(26:56):
or peach color. And so thatkind of limited our adoption of cats.
But then once we had the farmapp State near the Blue Mountains in Pennsylvania.
When you have a farm, peopledrop them off and figure you want
them well or something. They allyeah, And so at one point I
(27:18):
had eighteen cats that got dropped off. Wow, and thank god my dad
was a vet, because eighteen catshad to be neutered, eighteen cats had
to be fed, eighteen cats hadto have shots. You know, it
was a lot. Well hence myreasoning for bringing you on again. Quite
um a large story around animals.So tell me about your journey with now
(27:45):
today with your animals right now,My latest ad is chickens. Um.
Now, my dad had chickens asa kid, and we had chickens.
We had those little band any hensthat laid a little tiny colored eggs,
so like you had to use likesix to make enough to eat. You
know, they were tiny, butthey were blue and green, and we
(28:07):
had those on the farm as Iwas growing up. But I was never
responsible for them. I just hadto pick up the eggs every day so
that we didn't have because we hadroosters, so I didn't have anybody hatch
or be giving eggs to people thatactually had a little chicken. You know
that people like when they're expecting alittle yellow yolk are not happy with us.
(28:30):
I wouldn't think so yeah yeah,so um uh that was my experience.
I just had to pick up theeggs. That's all I had to
do. I don't I didn't.I wasn't responsible because I was too young
to be doing it for watering themand feeding them. So I've decided that
I wanted to have raised chickens likehalf of the United States at this point,
(28:51):
and I went and I ordered them. I bought them at the mill.
I went and I got all myspecial food and it so free and
corn free and blah blah blah,you know, and they're medicated waters for
electrolytes. I mean, it's beena very big learning curve because I just
remember my dad thrown grain out andwatering them. I don't remember like all
(29:15):
the other stuff. And this islike a major science. Yeah, this
has been. It's been. It'sbeen a bit of an in depth study
for me and I and um,they you get them when they're like two
or three days old, so they'revery young and they haven't had anything to
drink or eat yet because they cansupport themselves for about three days without any
(29:37):
of that anyway. So I've beenlearning about chickens and one of the things
that is they're they're very fragile inthat chick state. I think people get
chicks for kids at Easter and theydie and and wait, are they fragile?
I mean I am doing everything I'veread or heard or no to do,
(29:57):
and I still have lost two.And there's this thing called um what
do they call it, uh,slimy button? What is it called mush?
But I'll call it sticky butt?Sticky butt where they're poop sticks and
then it kills them. So yougot to sit there with a Q tip
that's wet and this little tiny thingand you're clear in their butt to make
(30:19):
them live because if you don't,they're gonna die. And I don't want
that to happen. So, youknow, So it's been. It's been
so I had I had twelve.I started with fourteen and now I have
twelve. And uh, hopefully I'llget them up, you know, I'll
do better with the maintenance. Butit's been. I love them, even
(30:40):
though I hardly know them. I'veonly had them ten days or something.
But they are each have a littlepersonality. They are a bit of work,
but not too much. As babies, they're pretty easy. I just
have them in out. You know, there's plastic totes you have for We'll
post some photos of it. Butyea, yeah, yeah, I have
(31:00):
them in that with a screen overthe top, and you know, and
my water and the food and everything, and they they're in there and they
have their little brooder warmer, sothey sit in there warmer, and they
when they at night, they allget quiet and nap, you know,
they brood or they get they getquiet. But most of the time,
like right now, and they're inmy bathroom off of here, that's where
I have them housed, and theyare in their chirp and away I can
(31:23):
hear them. Now, how longwill you have to keep them in the
container? When do they get togo out to the coop? Um?
Well, if we would have awarm like spring day, I have I
have a child's playpen um that Iwill go outside and set up. I
(31:44):
have it and a small one,and I can take them out and put
them in the grass and they canall run around and have and see like
worms and bugs and things, youknow, and and then bring them in
when it gets colder at night,because right now they're very temperature sensitive.
And then as they as so,I'd say maybe if we'd have a warm
day. Maybe two weeks, threeweeks, maybe I'll be will start doing
(32:06):
that. And then um, thenin that same time frame, they're gonna
be getting too big for the mylittle tupperware that I have, my little
flex and I don't remember what's calledthis clear plastic with a plastic lid that
you put things in, and I'llhave to put I'll have to put them
(32:27):
in another kind of playpen in thehouse. So they're in the house for
eight weeks, solemn, my goodness. So it's gonna get a little gaming
in here. But I change theirtheir their bedding twice a day, sometimes
three times a day if they've beenmessy. But they the more they eat
and they just they expell. Yeahyeah, so they're just eating machines.
And then meanwhile, I just mydad. I got a new I got
(32:51):
a new adoptee. I've got aPersian cat, like this super pedigree persian
that was at my dad's office thatgot left because the bill for what he
had was so high that the ownerjust said, have him or whatever you
want to do. I'm not payingyou know, it's too much. And
it took eight months of care tobring him around. So he's I don't
(33:15):
know how many people could afford thatbill. That was eight months of in
office. Kids, that's astronomical,and it would have been astronom you know.
I don't know how much it isa day I went to college on
that, but I don't know.I you know, yeah, that's right.
Yes, So he gave me this, he uh, he might.
(33:38):
One of my cats had just died, and but she was twenty, so
I don't really think I can expecther to pull it through. But she
was pink. And then I wascrying about that, and then he I
said, well, I have thispersian I've had who I've been keeping,
you know, alive, and he'sfinally but he's a little stunted. So
(33:59):
he's supposed to be elve pounds,he's only six and um, and so
I was like, oh, I'lltake that kitten. And he goes,
oh, yeah, it's a kitten. He always tells me it's a kitten.
Oh yeah, it's a kitten.It was ten months old. It's
not a kitten, it's a cat. But his his demeanor is like a
kitten because he's been in a cagehis whole life, so he is into
(34:21):
everything everything, So can I askyou, speaking of getting into everything,
how about the chicks. Well,I'm safe with you know, like you're
talking about, I wouldn't Yeah,he would eat them. So that's why
we are m This is my groundfloor in my house, like my walkout
(34:43):
basement where I am, so Ihave a bathroom down here, so they're
in that bathroom and he has notbeen down here at all. So he
Sweter doesn't really know what this isdown here because he's not been down here.
And I'm going to keep it thatway until I get these chicks out
of here. But I'll probably getmore chicks next spring, so I'm thinking
maybe he just doesn't come down here. Yeah, yeah, in notion that
(35:07):
this is what because cats are amazing. Our cat up until recently he was
able to at night. What Iwould do is put the cat in the
laundry room, shut the door becausethat's where his litter box was and there
is and I have a pat onthe dryer, so then you put the
dryer on. He likes the heatfrom the dryer and it's jiggling around.
(35:29):
He gets his own little, youknow, motorized bed, and then there's
another little blanket for Malayan if heneeds it, and I keep it like
really clean because it's also where laundryis done, so I'm always in there
cleaning that. But that cat canactually had been able to jump up into
the counter and play with the doorknob, get the doorknob going and open the
(35:52):
door. Yeah, I know,aren't they Oh they're just and and then
in the morning I would find likea mess somewhere, you know, And
then I would look for the catand he'd be back in the laundry room
sitting on the dryer like I don'tknow, somebody must open the drawer,
you know, Like and I ittook me years, I really am my
(36:15):
years, but it took what feltlike forever. I didn't know what was
going on. Like. So they'revery very clever and and cats are wonderful.
But for me, I was alwaysa dog person, always, always,
always a dog person. And theonly way I ever got a cat
was to um. I went toa you know, a adoption you know,
(36:37):
or what do you call it wherethey're where there's just loads of cats
and shelter, shelter, thank you, And they were trying to you know,
they are all these cats in there, and and we had mice and
so here, we already had aGolden Retriever and I didn't really want to
necessarily bring in yet another animal.My husband was away on a business trip,
(36:59):
and well, he grew up witha cat, so maybe if I
could just get one for a littlewhile so I could get rid of the
mice, because I didn't want tobe spraying things around with the kids.
And I just thought, I'm goingto get this cat. So I went
to the shelter and I'm walking throughthis barn in actually a city. It
was a city. I had togo to that, and that was a
(37:20):
barn pack of somebody's old home,and it was stuffed with cats like in
cages and that. So I walkin and this woman is bringing me from
cage to cage to cage, andI was looking for a specific kind that
kind of looked like the one thatmy husband grew up with, so maybe
he'd have some sort of affinity towardsthat's a good idea. He wouldn't choke
me when he saw, you know, to lose his mind when he saw
(37:44):
the cat. But as I'm goingaround that particularly was like a calico is
what he grew up with. Butwhat I did is I find. She
goes, I have one. SoI went over there, but it's had
eye surgery. And I looked atit and it sneered at me, you
know, like that that that thathissing sound, and then turned its back
on me in the cage and liftedit. So I was, okay,
(38:05):
I'm out of here. I thought, well, that's not gonna work.
So I'm looking at all the cagesand she finally said stop and I was
like, well, she goes,you're not going to find the cat in
the cage. And I was like, oh, but I'm missing. I
didn't get to go. No,your cat found you, so let's go
and let you. And then Ilooked down and this cat was following me
(38:28):
around everywhere I went. But Iwas so busy looking in the cages I
didn't see that was right in frontof me. Yeah. It was a
little man named Mellow, and Mellowhas been a part of our lives for
like fourteen years. And he uhjust looked like like he's when he stands
(38:52):
up, he's he's black and white, but the he's white on the front,
but he's got a black heart.Like when he puts his us together,
it looks like a heart on hischest, and I was like,
and I was scared of him.I was scared of cats. The fact
that I was doing this was liketotally out of my comfort zone. But
I wanted to get The mice scaredme more than the cat. I remember
(39:13):
getting the cat home and I hada lady that would clean. She was
like an organizer lady that would helpme once in a while, and I
knew she had cats, so Imade her come to my house to teach
me how to get the cat,even out of the little cage the other
lady had put the cat in.And that's when it was like in the
laundry room and I wasn't gonna letit out yet because I had to have
(39:35):
my make sure. When my husbandgot home, I had him go to
the room and open up the doorand he was like a little shocked.
Were we've worked through. That's takensome time, years actually, but he
loves the cat and I do too, and and I'll tell more about that
as we closed the show. Butyou know, the cats and dogs,
(39:59):
although they're so different, their loveis so deep. They just take us
as we are, even if theother cats are kind of cool, like
stand back and you know, butwhen but when you're really feeling ill or
down or just you know, they'rethe ones that land in your laps.
(40:21):
They pick you, They pick you. Pick yeah, yeah, they pick
you. They pick you and theybut and what they do I've noticed over
time is when you have a largehousehold of cats, like I had the
eighteen and some of them were outsidepharaoh ones that I had just then,
and so I had all these eighteencats. But what they would do is
(40:43):
they would time share me by roomand by time of day. So when
I was in the kitchen, Ihad these three. When I was in
the outside in the garden, Ihad dozed four or all the pharaoh ones
would follow me wherever I went onthe property and they would time share me.
And that seemed to be the equilibriumthat they would have. They so
that there was no fighting, Therewas no discord at all. Well you
(41:07):
would think that they would, butthey didn't figured out of time like I
have her for this time and I'min this room and you cannot be in
the bed because that's my time,and they feared they figured it all out.
I just was moving through the timein space, and they they worked
it out amongst themselves. So Ihad I had loved time with all eighteen
(41:30):
depending on what I was doing grief, I don't know, God bless you.
I could not take that many ifthey're all outside, like one cat
inside for me has been they camein and out. They not the outside
the pharaohins didn't. They were barncats and they were taking care of the
mice and the things that are inbarnes um. But then there were ones
(41:51):
that were in the house that camein and out. And then there was
one that never and his name wasForbes, who never goes outside. Yeah,
he just he was. He wasjust that, his his space was
in the house. But the otherone used to come and go. And
and I could call them all inyeah, because I say dogs don't.
(42:13):
They don't timeshare. They just they'relike all in on it, all right,
boom, they're all in on it. And they're a little needy nellies.
But they also are like right withyou all the time. Ye.
So yeah, and I you weretalking about when you lose them and and
and um. I had an interestingthing because Lady Huffington, I took her
(42:37):
to a vet up here when shewas like a cat. Yeah, she's
a cat. I took her toa vet and she was so fat,
and I was feeding her all thespecial diet, and I know what to
do when that happened, and shejust got batter and fatter and fatter.
She was like this, my dad'slike that cat's fat, and I was
like, I know, but she'son the special diet for ash, so
(42:58):
she doesn't get a urinary and anyway, she just got fatter and fetter.
She was. She was always veryneedy, but that was because she was
trapped inside of a wall. Wehad to tear a wall down in our
barn to get her. The kittennest got her, the mother got hit
on the road. I never knewthis cat. It was just subody.
(43:19):
Dropped it off and had its littleright in my barn wall. And we
had to tear the wall down andget her out. And then I carried
her in my um against my heart. She was so tiny and I bottled
fetter and everything. I thought shewas going to be so cute. She
had little violet eyes, and thenshe turned out to be such a Hellian.
She'd smacked me. She bounced onme, showed me that she could
(43:39):
rip my achilles tendon at anytime shewanted. And I was like, this
cat is just like so so ungrateful. But she became like like I never
realized she she just ended up beingthe bane of my existence but also so
sweet. She never broke my skin, She never clawed me. She never
did anything, but she I couldif I wanted, I could fell you
(44:04):
like a tree and I'm gonna showyou, Sabbath. I should jump out
guerrilla warfare, grabbed me body theAchilles tendon and then be like, see
I could have. I could havejust you know, you could have fell
over. So anyway, she shejust passed after twenty years, So I
had her for twenty years. That'sa pretty good long time for a cat.
Yeah. And um, I wouldbe down here in the what is
(44:27):
that with the walkout basement part,and after her spirit left her body,
you know, if she was buriedout in the yard, I could hear
her running around up above me.And she was like twenty pounds. She
was a big cat. And uhand Saturday was sounded like there was a
you know, a stampede, andshe didn't have that kind of ability near
(44:51):
the end, but her spirit wasrunning around in the house and Um,
then my dad gave me this adoptedpersian who went upstairs, you know,
who was living in the house.And as soon as he came that stopped.
But then he started doing the thingsthat she had always done. And
now he's and he's doing all thethings she used to do. He plays
(45:15):
with her toys. He went intothe toy box for the dog or some
of the cat toys have fallen,and dug them all out, the ones
that she liked the best, theplace that she liked to be the best,
the places where she with her likeunique places she eats with the dog,
or he eats with the dog.She used to and the dog would
growl at her and still growls atthe new persian, but she he does
(45:37):
the exact same thing. And soI have always felt that when you have
animals, their spirit kind of staysaround you. And in the Daoist philosophy,
that's true. You have a soulgroup around which your animals will you
know, the constellation of all ofyour animals you've ever had, we'll all
(45:58):
stay close to your soul group.So all you have to do is give
them a chance to join you.So adopting a cat, even if it's
not related to your cat. We'llbring that piece of that soul into your
into your world. So he is. But he's as different as he could
(46:20):
be from her. She was abarn cat. He's a pure bred whoopedie
do Persian something something from Russia,no less. And he's totally her,
I mean, like fragments of herspirit of what she used to do.
He does and he never knew her. And then running around upstairs stopped.
Wow, now there's something running aroundup there right now. But it's him
(46:44):
that is so cool. I thinkthat that we're obviously we are all connected.
We're all connected to the Christ consciousness. We're all connected to you know,
we're a part of the animals area part of us, as our
the you know, the the plantsthat grow outside, the things. We're
(47:04):
all connected. Everything is a partof us, and we are a part
of it in so many ways.And as we were talking about my cat
mellow moment, you know, afew moments ago, I have to uh,
he's going to be put down tomorrowand by the time the show airs,
(47:25):
he will be in spirit world andhopefully, you know, I will
feel him around and and it's yeah, I'm very sad, and I've had
my tears, a lot of tears. And it's so funny because when I
think about, you know, theanimals at times, so go, well,
it's not like losing human. Imean, I'm so there's just so
(47:47):
many other you know, emotions andenergies attached to humans. But no,
it's a different, it's different,but it's so necessary to have and feel
those emotions. And I am verysad. I'm trying to keep it together
as I do this, but Idon't want to see him suffer. And
(48:09):
I've I've struggled with holding on nowfor like four months, and it gets
to be to a point where it'sjust not good for it for your pet,
and it's not good for you,it's not good for your family.
And as a friend of mine said, when her she took her dog to
(48:30):
the vet and the dog and shestruggled with putting the dog down, and
she anytime she'd see her dog tryto hide to actually let go, she
would be there to know, you'renot going, you're staying, you know
whatever. And so she took,you know, took the dog in and
(48:51):
and they're ready to go to putthe dog down, and she asked the
vet, or maybe this was overthe phone. She said, when do
you know? When? When shouldI, you know, like put him
down because you know, I justdon't know when. And the vet said,
(49:12):
four months ago, it's not goodto drag this out. The poor
animal needs to be set free.Now. I feel so differently about humans
in that way. I feel thatit's a god god divine experience our timing
of when we come and go.But we can also help to guide ourselves
(49:37):
in that direction by not doing certainmedications in that. But with with you
know, an animal, why arewe making them suffer? So yeah,
that's kind of the way. Itfeels kind of selfish. And I've had
death because I've had so many animals, of course I have, you know,
(49:58):
UM had a lot of things upin and sometimes they want to do
it themselves and they will they don'twant to help, and you know it,
you can feel it. Like um, Lady Huffington, she was only
sick for four days, she wasfine, and then four days she just
declined so fast it was crazy.She had she had a kidney failure and
(50:22):
it just boomed, it was done. And Um I tried to help her
transition because I can know how todo that because of my own practices.
And she kicked me so hard withher back legs, like she could barely
walk, and she like kicked itout of here. Yeah. Yeah,
She's like, I want to doit, and and I had the same
(50:43):
thing happened with a gold retriever.I tried to help her and I saw
her spirit peeling out like it wasgoing and she kicked me also their back
legs like they does. Bunny kickedme really hard, and I was like,
okay, okay, okay, I'llyou know. But it's it's always
it's always so hard. It's hardwhen they disappear to go die because then
(51:05):
you're looking for them, you know, every day, every day for months
and years, you know what youthink you might see them. It's never
easy. But the bottom line isis that you can sort of feel their
decision to choose it themselves. Youcan feel it. Just listen with your
heart. Do they want you tohelp them? Look in their eyes?
Do they want your you to helpthem or do they need you to because
(51:30):
sometimes they want to be away fromyou. They don't want you to see
it, and sometimes they do welland humans do that also, and as
we close. It's so it's sobrilliant to have the family, anyone who's
been around you're, you know,the pet who has a connection to it,
(51:52):
to be able to say their goodbyesin their way, or to be
able to come to terms with whythis is show growing up and why this
is happening, because all it isis the cycle. It's a cycle of
life, and it and their livesare meant to be celebrated, like like
our lives are meant to be celebrated. As we exit, we come,
(52:15):
we go, we come, wego, And it's just this rotation of
energy exactly. And the interesting thingnature gives you usually there is gonna be
right before they die. They looklike they're getting better, they have more
energy, they look like they're gettingbetter. That's when you do your thing
(52:39):
to make you tell them you lovethem, You show up for them.
Maybe they have their last little mealthat they can eat because they can't eat
anymore, you know, they drinkeven for You're like, oh, maybe
it's gonna be okay. But it'salways this little flash of more energy,
more life. It gives you timeto make your peace with the transition that's
(53:02):
coming. And then that really neatpart is as I found with all the
cats and dogs I've had in mylife. I mean, gosh, I've
been so lucky to have so manysouls in my little soul group that are
staying attached to me like I They'rearound me all the time. Um that
when one passes, whatever I bringin the next thing I bring in,
(53:27):
some of that soul has attached tothe to the new animal. And so
it's not an end. And thisis what the dalloast believe. It's not
an end. It's like, um, another another lifetime gets to be lived,
and so they want to stay withmy soul and they do. And
I think that's an amazing gift becauseI have known so many sweet little hearts,
(53:52):
little fuzzy hearts. Yeah yeah,fr Malaise, Yeah, Adam,
I don't know she counts of thefirm. La was one man. I
love it well. Glenny's thank youonce again so much for joining me.
You're always such a joy. Ilove your energy and your stories and all
(54:15):
your knowledge. Um. Can youtell our listeners where they can find you?
Um? Yeah, just Glennis jU S T G l E.
Nys dot com is my main website, so you can reach me there fabulous,
So thank you, thank you,thank you so much. And if
(54:36):
we can all just take a closeyour eyes for a moment, not while
you're driving, and just take abig, deep breath in and hold it
for a moment and release. Andnow that you're not alone, you're on
the family balancing again. The blow
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