Puppies, Prozac and Carl Rogers
I was doing some Christmas shopping online at Amazon this morning (free shipping AND free gift wrapping? I’m sold.) and I ran across this book: “Puppy Chow is Better Than Prozac”
I’ve read plenty of books on the healing power of pets (and I completely believe in pet therapy) but never a book on pets and Bipolar disorder. Now I haven’t purchased this yet (I assure you that it IS in my shopping cart, though), so I can’t review the book… but it did get me thinking about pets and recovery.
I remember two girls who were inpatient with me getting puppies as soon as they were discharged. At the time I was thinking,
- Was this some kind of reward for completing treatment?
- Are the puppies supposed to keep the girls happy & therefore less likely to relapse (some kind of logic that family/friends would use)
- Or, were their families planning on getting dogs, anyway?
Or… maybe I was just jealous and trying to invent a way to convince my parents to get a puppy.
Anyway, after my junior year in college I decided to get a puppy. My roommates were gone for the summer, my boyfriend was a resident and scheduled to work in the ICU for the next three months, and my summer internship only was only in the mornings. So, for all of these reasons (maybe I should also mention that I was supposed to be studying for the MCAT and thought a pet would be a good study buddy — ha!), I decided to get a puppy. While I thought just having the companionship would be helpful, there were a couple of other things that hit me after a couple of weeks with him:
- He needed to eat & go outside every couple of hours (he’s a yorkie and you have to be careful of hypoglycemia when they are little). This means I had to stop what I was doing every couple of hours and feed/walk him. At the time I was often, “too busy to sit down and eat,” so this was a bit of an unanticipated shock. It was important to stop and take care of him. What does that mean re: making time to take care of myself?
- I am his mom (well, you know what I mean). No one else in the world is going to take care of him. I am the only one that he has to rely on. If he’s hungry, lonely, tired, whatever–I am the only one who knows that. This little tiny puppy is trusting me to take care of him. He NEEDS me. I am needed!
- He loves me unconditionally. I don’t have to be afraid of screwing up the relationship — which is good, because I can’t run away from it if I do think I’ve ruined it. He doesn’t care about my weight, my job, my reputation, etc. He loves me because I am me, and just wants me to be there.
I know these are all such basic ideas, but everyday life and relationships with others can be so complicated. I had all of these excuses for each of these points…
“Taking care of myself is not important to the rest of the world — it’s not an excuse for not living up to expectations.”
“I am replaceable — No one really needs ME.”
“I am not enough and I ask for too much… there is always the risk that I could ask for something that I don’t deserve, and then I will wreck the relationship.”
So, in summary: What is it about the relationship with my dog that helps me question my distorted beliefs? Well maybe it’s positive regard. Really, this whole relationship seems a little Carl Rogers to me. The incongruence between the “real self” (who I genuinely am) and “ideal self” (who I think I should be) which is the result of my quest for positive regard. My construction of inadequate defense mechanisms in an attempt to feel less threatened or vulnerable. The ensuing neuroses 
If only I had realized earlier that a PET would give me positive regard and allow me to realize my genuine, authentic self!
Excusing some of the sarcasm in that last statement, I do think that there is something to be said for positive regard and the unconditional love that you get from your pet.
What a great post. On my worst of worst days my dog Sam’s big brown eyes are what keep me wanting to be in this world. He somehow knows those days and won’t leave my side. He also sits outside the bathroom crying when I purge (ordinarily he’s not a whiner). He just knows that his mama is fighting something dark and scary and he just wants to be with me through it all. He’s come to therapy with me when anxiety is at a peak. I saw a thing on the news about an Iraq war vet with horrible PTSD who got a service dog to be with him all the time for anxiety reduction. Can we have ED dogs??
Haha, a big YES to ED service dogs. Can you just see that as part of your treatment plan? “Patient must be accompanied by dog on all trips to the bathroom or the grocery store.”
There is an organization for psychiatric service dogs. Sounds like it would be hard to get a Psychiatric Service Dog (PSD), but not too hard to get an Emotional Support Animal.
When my dog was really little, I brought him into Target a couple of times. No one ever said anything to me, but I decided it was only a matter of time. I would love to legally be allowed to let him come and sit in the cart.
I am a firm believer in the power of animals and healing. I don’t know if I mentioned on my blog about when I decided to get Baxter. It was my sophomore year of college. I moved out of the dorms into my own apt. I was VERY depressed and really wanted some living fur creature for companionship, and so I decided to get a puppy. I happened to get him like two weeks before the start of my semester which wasn’t necessarily wise, but it all worked out.
At that time, he really did help me move past the horrible depression. Years later, I also took all three of my dogs to therapy which was very comforting. Hank, my Aussie cross, was originally trained as a psychiatric service dog for someone with dissociative identity disorder. It did not work out, and eventually, I took him as my own.
Anyway, there is a big difference between a service dog of any type (and there are many) and an emotional support animal which is similar to a therapy dog, therapy cat, therapy bird, etc. Sometimes people do get confused about service dogs versus therapy dogs, and it’s important to remember the distinctions, as there are different rules and requirements applied. Now, I have heard some doctors literally “prescribe” getting an animal to help someone.
Also, you are seeing dogs being utilized in many different ways. Service dogs for autism is big right now as well as anxiety, PTSD, and social phobia. Animal-assisted therapy is being implemented in a variety of programs. I think you’re seeing a shift with people using animals, because it works. People feel calmed by the presence of animals (as long as they are not afraid of them), and there are lots of good feeling hormones released as well. Plus, with those of us who need something to take care of, it helps to remind ourselves to take care of ourselves as well.