Author: Chantelle Archambault

Each day, animal advocates encounter and stand up against suffering. This can take a major emotional toll.

In this month’s episode of The Informed Animal Ally, the Vancouver Humane Society’s Amy Morris and Chantelle Archambault are joined by Kimberly Carroll from Animal Justice. The episode will delve into strategies and tips for dealing with the compassion fatigue and burnout that many animal advocates experience.

Note: This written discussion has been edited for length.

Chantelle: Kimberly, you have such an impressive history speaking out for animals. I would love to hear more about how you became interested in animal advocacy.

Kimberly: My animal advocacy journey started when I was a kid. I was the one trying to save all the mice when my dad was burning the field, I’d be going in there and crying and trying to get them all out.

It had a little bit of a snag though, because as much as I was an animal lover, I was also a huge meat lover coming from the middle of the prairies. I was the one who loved the KFC and the steak and all that.

So the two loves kind of came head to head when I was a young adult with the help of some adorable twin calves. I became vegetarian 27 years ago.

That was before the days of internet, so it took me a few years later—ten to be exact; I wish it hadn’t taken me so long—to understand the damage that the dairy and the egg industry do.

And so in one week I watched the documentary Earthlings, which was narrated by Joaquin Phoenix. They called it the veganizer; I think there’s new veganizers these days. I also watched Peaceable Kingdom. It really hit home that I did not want to be responsible for dairy cows being torn away from their mothers.

I’d been dabbling a little bit in advocacy as a vegetarian. I was also a television host. So I’d been on some shows talking about why I was vegetarian. I’d been doing some gentle activism. But at that point 17 years ago, I was like straight ahead. This is it.

Because seeing those films, I was so struck by the vast numbers of beings this affected and the depth of the suffering. And so I decided at that point it wasn’t enough just to change my own habits, even though yes, I was going to, but I had to help change the world as all. And so that was the beginning of my animal advocacy journey in real earnest.

Amy: Thanks so much for sharing that, Kimberly. This month we’re talking about coping with burnout as an animal advocate, and this is a subject you’re very passionate about. Why does this topic speak to you? Why do you find it so important?

Kimberly: Well as well as being an animal advocate, as Chantelle mentioned, I’m also a coach for changemakers. So my job is to help activists, nonprofit leaders, and social entrepreneurs build those things into their lives that will make them resilient and effective in their important work.

I’ve been coaching for many years, but I sort of started to zero in on changemakers and activists about six or seven years ago. And the reason I moved to this particular form of coaching is because animal advocates and all sort of other social justice advocates, they’re the ones that are keeping us from tipping over into oblivion right now.

We are one step away, and they are this incredible line that is keeping us from going over the edge.

And I’m seeing too many people burn out. Changemakers are way too important to see them hit the ground. This is especially a huge problem in the animal advocacy movement.

The irony of it is that, as we just talked about, so many of us are drawn to animal advocacy because we care so much about animals. We have this sensitivity, this tuning in. But getting into animal advocacy then means that we get this front row seat 24/7 to all the suffering and the injustices, the worst things you could ever imagine animals going through.

And on top of that, we get pushback from 90 percent of the population, not even counting the other people that are in our movement that don’t necessarily align with us on our particular approaches.

And plus, because there’s so few of us, we’re dealing with overwhelm. We don’t know what to take on. And then inevitably we take on too much. Because we think, there’s just so few of us and there’s so many that are suffering. We need to take on all of this. This is the recipe for hitting the wall and burning out and for a lot of people dropping out.

It’s not as dramatic for everybody. Not everybody drops out, but they burn out in terms of patience or compassion or energy or creativity; and all of those we really need in order to be effective as advocates. Like I said, there’s so few of us; we need everybody firing on all cylinders. So that’s why this is such a place of passion for me.

Amy: Thank you so much for sharing that. I feel similarly. I actually come at it from a place of having experienced burnout.

I was working for many years in animal advocacy as my full time job, and I ended up having a breakdown. That was a really huge moment for me to realize I was pushed over the edge. I slowly realized, okay, there’s a lot behind this.

I’ve been working on recovering from it ever since. And I think it’s a permanent process. I don’t think you ever fully maybe recover from some specific things, but I’m really excited to talk about this today because I’ve been on the journey of healing.

How to stop feeling guilty about self care

Chantelle: It’s a really common thing for all of us to experience because like you said, we get into this because we care so much and then we have a front row seat to the worst suffering imaginable. So it’s absolutely so important to find healthy ways to process and cope with the emotions we’re feeling.

And at the same time, many people find it difficult to care for themselves when there are always more animals in need. Is there any advice you would give to people who feel guilty taking that time for themselves?

Kimberly: Yeah, this is a huge block, especially in the animal advocacy movement.

Because we’re not the direct victims, I think there is a real sense of, you know, We shouldn’t be hurting. We should be able to handle this. What are we complaining about? But the fact is, there are so many incidences of secondary PTSD or direct PTSD for those that are doing vigils or undercover investigations or walk ons or things like that.

But even for those that aren’t doing frontline work, we’re exposed to the kind of video and graphics that are worse than any horror movie you can imagine. And we’re seeing that on a regular basis.

And a lot of animal advocates don’t take it that seriously because they think, well, I should just buck up and I should just get stronger. So those that say, I feel too guilty. There’s too many. Every minute I take to myself is another minute there’s animals dying.

I like to say to people, as advocates, as compassionate people, we want all beings to experience freedom and safety and love. That’s what we truly want in our hearts. Why should that exclude the animal who is you? You know, the animals who are us as animal advocates, as human animals. Why should we be the only ones excluded from that freedom, safety, and love?

It’s like freeing a pig from a factory farm and then when the pig’s trying to play, saying, No playing for you. Get to work. You need to get to work and free all of your brethren. Go! You don’t get any freedom. You don’t get any love. You don’t get a break or a rest.

It’s ridiculous. Every being needs rest. They need some safety. They need some love. So I just remind them that as beings, we need the fuel that will keep us connecting and aware and give us energy.

And when I tell people this and they’re just like, I’m still not there with you, I say, okay, well let’s take it more strategically. If you are not feeling nurtured, inspired, and connected, you will not be as effective. Okay? You’re just not going to have the juice to do the good creative work you want to do. You’re not going to have the patience to represent well as an animal advocate, and you’re not going to be able to take care of yourself in a way that you’re a light, that you inspire others to want to follow you and what you’re doing.

So if not for yourself, start at least for the animals. Start taking care of yourself at least for your cause.

Chantelle: That’s really, really great advice.

Kimberly: This comes from the process I had to do on myself. I was the hardest nut to crack because I had so much guilt about taking time and not just like being a puddle of suffering all the time. Somebody had to set me straight around that. So I come by this honestly.

Chantelle: That’s a really great point because we all have to do this work on ourselves before we can talk about it. So what’s your favorite tool for releasing that stress and tension and sadness that comes with advocacy work?

Pain processing tools

Kimberly: I feel very strongly about what I call pain processing tools, especially when you’re an animal advocate.

I mean, the figures are just astounding. 70 billion farmed animals are killed each year, and the ways that they’re tortured before they’re killed, how we treat animals that we’re raising for profit never stops shocking me. And then trillions of marine life a year. I mean, it’s, it’s just boggling to the mind.

So it makes sense that we’re going to feel rage. It makes sense that we’re going to feel incredible sorrow and hopelessness and frustration. But as I mentioned, if we stay stuck in that, if we let that drive our life, we will lose our ability to affect change.

Now, what some people try to do is they try to ignore pain and that’s not going to work either. So the trick is to find safe ways to feel the pain and to move through it. You can’t get rid of it. You can’t go above it, around it, over it. You have to go through it. I’ve tried every other way, believe me.

Pain processing can look like a lot of different things.

It can be as simple as breath work. When you’re feeling, that emotion well up, don’t just shelve it. Don’t just ignore it. Or don’t act out on it immediately. Just try to find where it is in your body. Is it in your heart? Is it in your throat? Has it grabbed your gut? And just to work on breathing into it, really feeling the pain, giving it space and then letting go.

That’s a really simple way to start dealing with pain in very small amounts, in the moment. And that is reflected in a meditation practice, a yoga practice, both of which I do.

Another really simple one is talking it out with a being who isn’t going to chide you for being negative, or isn’t going to say, well, just stop doing it. Or, you know, I don’t understand why you’re doing it that way. Somebody who’s actually going to hold space for you and hold you so you can feel that pain.

Another tool I really love, I call the mind dump. It’s just grabbing a pen and just writing everything you’re feeling and thinking in a stream of consciousness, no censoring, no worrying about grammar or spelling, no worrying about being nasty or weak, but just writing it out and getting everything out of you and onto that piece of paper. And at the end of it, you can even rip it up and get rid of it.

But my favourite tools for processing pain involve movement. Emotions take up residence in the body. They create physiological changes. So it’s not enough to think it out. Sometimes we need to shake up the chemistry of the body.

Sometimes when I don’t have a lot of time, maybe I’m at an event, I just scurry away to the washroom for a second and I breathe into whatever’s come up in me and on the exhale I just do a great big old shake out of the body. Just shaking out the whole body as much as possible. Feeling where it is in your body and then letting it express itself.

If you’ve been collecting some pain for a while, I love turning on some music that actually amplifies it. So if you’re feeling ragey, you know, you might grab some punk music, some Rage Against the Machine, something like that. Find yourself a safe space, close the door, tell people you might be loud for a minute if you live with them.

And for just three minutes, you just let yourself express that rage. You stomp, you punch, you, you scream, whatever you need to do in order to be able to feel it.

And you can do the same with something that feels sad or grief stricken music that amplifies it. It’s just this idea of giving a safe space for that emotion to work itself out naturally; for honouring it in a safe way that’s not going to hurt you or others.

I have lots of different tools and I love them and I could go on forever about this, but that gives a little brief outline.

Amy: I’ll share one of the tools that I learned from you. You did a webinar on going into the picture in your brain.

I’m a very visual person. I cannot let go of images. And so what Kimberly shared in that webinar is go into that picture and then change it. Go in and do the thing that you want to do. Whatever that is, whether it’s saving the animal, feeding the animal, or putting the person in handcuffs who’s hurting the animal.

I find that really healing. Because otherwise I just get these like flashes of images and it just hurts. And so it’s like, okay, that image came back again. What are we going to do about that? We’re going to go in there with a whole team of people and, in your head, if we were going to just make the world better.

I find that a really amazing technique for all sorts of things, but particularly for the animals that you couldn’t do anything for.

Kimberly: I love that, Amy. That animal’s suffering is probably gone; that animal’s probably out of this place, gone from this world.

If they’re not, then you’re actively working for them, so that’s a little bit of a different thing. But it’s about changing this traumatic thought pattern that you have by introducing a different energy to it, by disrupting it.

Because that cycling, it’s absolutely not helping you. And it’s something that so many animal advocates have.

This moment is gone. The energy is still with you. So change that energy so that you can be a force for good and it doesn’t destroy you. It doesn’t take you down. So that it cultivates more love, more connection.

Amy: Yeah, so thank you so much for highlighting that before because it’s made a huge difference for me.

Chantelle: Those are all so helpful and I really appreciate both of you sharing your strategies and your personal experiences.

Chantelle: We’ve mentioned. stress, anger, hopelessness, a lot of really strong emotions that come up and I’d like to talk about some specific examples of scenarios that can come up from having those strong emotions.

Those feelings can come up when advocates see or hear about or discuss animals being harmed. It’s natural to have a strong reaction. But at the same time, practically speaking, we know the most effective ways to encourage people to make those compassionate choices involve making those people feel at ease and included in the conversation.

What are some ways that advocates can manage their own strong emotions about animal harm when speaking with friends or family?

Kimberly: Yeah, this is a good one because December is the time that there are a lot of family and friends gatherings. And sometimes you just want to scream, Don’t you understand? When friends and family can seem so unaware or sometimes purposely combative.

First of all, it’s really important to remember, we’re talking about people you really care about and people that really care about you. Ideally, you want to be able to be genuine with those you’re closest to about how much hurt animal harm causes you.

This will be much better absorbed if it’s not brought up at a time when they’re directly complicit in the animal harm. So for example, at the dinner table, when shame is triggered.

And that’s why it’s so important to try to be more skillful in the way we talk to those that we’re trying to get to understand our way of feeling and being. It’s really important to talk to them when they don’t have the shame wall erected.

And it’s super easy to get that shame. Sometimes just saying you’re vegan, it’s going to get that shame wall up, right? It’s really hard to do anything if that happens, but hopefully they’ve heard it enough times that you’re vegan or you’re an animal advocate that that shame wall isn’t necessarily going to be triggered just by that.

Shame is the feeling that almost none of us can deal with. It’s a message that you are bad. When you feel shame, the feeling is I am bad. And it’s not true. Nobody’s bad. Sometimes people do harmful things. And so it’s really important to try to keep shame out of the equation.

And a really important way to do that is choose to talk when they don’t have something to be ashamed of right in front of them.

It’s also about the way you talk, that it’s from your heart as opposed to a place of judgement or blame. And again, I totally understand that judgement and blame. It seems so easy to understand why this feels harmful and toxic, but I think these are some of the things that I’ve tried that have really helped.

When I’m going into this judging or blaming place, I ask myself, what ways have I exhibited similar behaviour or limits, or still do, as this person?

It’s very likely you’ve stood in similar shoes to the person you’re judging right now, that you’ve at some point in your life been resistant to a hard truth, or maybe you were seduced by convenience or security. Like I said, I was a voracious meat eater at one point. I had a hard time giving up my favourite mascara because it wasn’t cruelty free.

Or maybe you have been vegan since you were born, or an animal advocate since you were born, but maybe there’s still ways in different parts of your life where you might be doing some harm, even though you know you’re doing harm.

When I start to feel a little self righteous, I remind myself that I still fly, even though I know how bad it is for the environment and low income countries. I’m working on it, but I still go home to see my family, things like that. And I don’t remind myself of this to beat myself up, but just to get some perspective that none of us are perfect. It’s really hard to be perfect in this world.

I also remind myself, there’s an avalanche of problems with this world and my number one issue might not be their number one issue.

And the last thing I just want to say is that I really try to keep in mind when I’m talking to my close people, or people are less close, is that people are doing the best they can from what they know and are capable of right now.

Most bad behaviour comes from pain, from fear or lack of access to knowledge or the inability to get it. So for example, if somebody can’t show compassion towards animals, it was probably because they were never modeled that in a way that they could understand. Or they might not even be psychologically capable of compassion in that area, and that’s really sad.

It doesn’t mean not standing up strongly and consistently, and sometimes boldly, for what’s important to you, and sharing what your genuine feelings are, but letting it all come from a place of understanding and compassion as opposed to fear and anger. That’s how bridges are built. So just think of it as a bridge building exercise with your family and friends.

Amy: Kimberly, that’s such an amazing answer. I want to echo everything that Kimberly said.

And I think speaking from a place where the other person is curious is always going to get the best outcome. So being able to identify when someone is curious versus when they’re challenging you, I think is a really useful tool because when someone is challenging, you can kind of put a pause or say, This isn’t the time for this conversation, I’d love to have it at another point.

When someone’s curious, that’s when there’s a space for growth. And that’s when I try very much to speak from my own experience. I don’t speak to what people should do or what’s good for people or anything like that. I speak to what I’ve experienced, what I’ve witnessed, why I made the decisions that I’ve made, and I do storytelling.

Almost every time, I have at least one story to share. And what I find is there might be a moment of quiet, and then they might ask another question 20 minutes later. It shows that it’s something that stuck in their brain.

I don’t try to say, here’s everything. I try to give one little story and then give it some time. If another question comes up, another little story and pace it that way.

If there’s no curiosity, I don’t think there’s space for change. And so it’s not necessarily worth it, to put your energy out there when you’re going to be hit with a battery of blowback, ego, or whatever it is.

Kimberly: Something else I just want to add around this is that maybe you can even take your advocate hat off with close family and friends.

And a lot of people go, What? But it all depends. If you are getting a lot of pushback and it’s just not going anywhere, you need to remember that there’s millions of people out there that are ready to hear your message and putting constant energy into changing the minds of one or a handful of people is not very strategic.

I have some really close friends in my life who aren’t vegan. Do I wish they were? Sure. Do I drop some stories here and there? Sure. But I don’t push it too hard because these are friends that love me well, and they’re really good people in other ways. And a long time ago I just decided to drop the preaching or the guilt of not preaching and just soak in some of the love and fun and rest of being with them.

Some would say I’m selfish to not always be speaking up for my cause with my close family and friends. But I think one of the ways that we have longevity is if we let ourselves relax with people who care for us and help recharge our batteries. If we don’t have that, we burn out and that will really hurt our cause.

So I do think in some situations sometimes it’s just better to let it go with your close people.

Chantelle: Those are all really amazing points. I mean, I’ve been both of those people. You said that there are some people who have been vegan and animal advocates for their entire lives, but I think most of us have been at some point, the person who was friends with people who were in those circles or been the people who were curious about those things. Most of us at some point have been future animal advocates.

But then there’s also the people who are very adamantly opposed to any form of animal advocacy, or any moving away from activities that cause animal suffering. We post plant-based recipes online, and we’ll see people who get offended even by just us sharing plant-based recipes.

How would you advise that advocates respond to conflicts that can arise from that sort of difference in beliefs?

Kimberly: This is a good continuation really, because some of the same things apply, but we’re dealing with people that you’re not invested in as much, and people who are maybe even more adamant.

The first thing I say is choose your battles wisely. I have seen so many people waste their time arguing with a troll for a week when they could have been writing 20 letters to the editor, and probably gotten a couple published. And so if somebody is just trying to stir up trouble, you’ve got to learn to spot that and you’ve got to honour yourself and your precious time and energy and just go past it.

But if it seems to be somebody, either online or in person, that you’re like, You know what? This is an opportunity. They’re very adamant right now, but I like to think of everyone as a potential ally. That’s one of my mantras. So I assume that it may not be in this conversation, but if given enough of those sort of like little seeds planted that, that they could bloom.

And I think the problem that people have as animal advocates is we want to convert people right there and then. Very early in my advocacy work, I heard the figure, I’m not sure about the number, but I think it was, it takes a person hearing a message 21 times. Sometimes you’re not going to be the number 21. You might be number 14 or you might be a message number three or God forbid your message number one. You’re really going to get it.

But you’re one of those; you’re a building block and that’s all you have to be. You don’t have to change somebody’s mind on the spot.

I think it’s super important when you are dealing with somebody who’s digging in their heels to just stop and invoke the power of curiosity and of listening. So what if instead of trying to explain your point in 20 different ways, you ask clarifying questions to this person to truly understand where they’re coming from and what’s blocking them.

There’s probably nobody you’re going to meet that’s going to say, I hate animals, I wish they were all dead, and I’d like to torture them before that point. There are hopefully very few of those in the world.

And so, we have a common ground. And if you actually listen, you can respond in a way that could actually reach them, that could actually move the needle on things. Or at the very least, you might learn something useful for your approach in the future.

So listening and then finding common ground. Instead of making it your goal to prove how wrong someone is, look for where your values or experiences intersect.

You might have your coworker who’s always making bacon jokes, but he loves his dog. And so, you could say, Hey, Joel, I saw the sweetest video the other day. There was this rescue pig from a factory farm and the dog at the sanctuary and they bonded and they both came when their name was called and they played fetch and they both dreamed and twitched when they slept. You know, that’s the kind of thing you bring to the table, right?

You find the common ground. He loves dogs. This pig is just like a dog.

It’s not about banging somebody over the head when they’re not listening already. It’s about easing into relationship with somebody. Not looking at them as a target, something to conquer, but as a being to connect with, to find some common ground with.

Chantelle: That’s really great advice. It’s about conserving your energy and using it strategically. I really love that. Thank you.

We all have a certain amount of energy to use to make as much impact as possible. But energy is a finite resource. And there’s a huge range of ways that animals suffer from human activities, habitat destruction that harms wildlife, and systemic issues with factory farming, and individual cruelty cases.

It can be overwhelming deciding how to manage your time and energy as an animal advocate to make the most impact that you can on those issues. What advice would you give to someone who’s feeling overwhelmed about seeing all this happening?

Kimberly: Overwhelm is probably the number one complaint of the change makers I work with.

We’re all advocates cause we want to make a difference. We’re all advocates cause we care so deeply, but we’re all advocates too because there’s just so much that needs fixing. And so one of the first things that I’d like for folks to really hear is you don’t need to change the whole world. You just need to change your little corner of it.

Now that sometimes takes a little bit of weight off of one’s shoulders. Because again, I understand it. Sometimes we feel so alone in this. We feel like we’re just one animal advocate in a sea of apathetic people. But it’s not true.

First of all, by my last count, there’s hundreds of thousands of animal advocates out there in the world. Still not a lot compared to the, you know, 8 billion, but that’s hundreds of thousands. And if we all just pick a little corner and do it really well, we’re going to make huge change.

Find your niche

Kimberly: And if you’re wondering, okay, well, what’s my corner? Well, I like to use a little formula. My recommendation would be to do just a little exercise where you just take a paper and pen.

First of all, you write down your passions in animal advocacy. What are the issues you’re most passionate about? Who are the animals you’re most passionate about? What are the mediums you’re most passionate to work with, most drawn to work with?

I care about all animals and I don’t want to see any of them suffer. But a long time ago, I decided farmed animals is where I would really focus on because of the number and the degree of suffering. And then I particularly decided, you know, I really love working with people to become more effective. So that narrowed my corner a little bit.

So your list of passions. It might be, I love working around captivity; I really like working at sanctuaries or helping sanctuaries. It might be, I really like to teach or I really like to lobby, things like that. So really all of the areas that you’re interested in. I like to cook vegan food to bring to people. That is an incredible form of animal advocacy, bringing vegan food to friends, events, all of that sort of thing.

You don’t need to be standing with a sign all the time to be an animal advocate. I think that’s something everybody needs to understand. Yes, we need street protests, we need street activism, but there are a thousand other things we need.

The second thing that I would want you to make a list about is assets. What do you have to offer? What are the specific skills that you could bring to this movement? What are the talents? What’s some of the education or training you have? What are some of the best qualities you bring to the table help to touch or influence others? Or what are some valuable life experiences or circumstances or viewpoints? What are resources you have access to?

That’s going to really affect it. If you’re an accountant and you’re out there leafleting, I’m going to say, get in there and do some accounting work for some of these organizations. We really need it. Or if you’re a graphic designer, don’t you dare, you know, be licking envelopes.

And then the last piece that I think is really important. The questions to ask here, are there any areas or projects that could use more attention? Are there more high impact things? Are there potential projects that are currently underserved? Are there any connections that I have that could create a special opportunity and fulfill a need? What’s our cause missing? What does our cause need more of? Things like that.

And if you do those three lists, you’re going to start to find some places where your corners lie.

And I’d say get really inventive. And if you’re not part of Animal Justice Academy’s free course, our whole second week is about how, wherever you are, whoever you are, in whatever background you are, different ways you can become an animal advocate and practice animal advocacy.

Amy: Kimberly, that is another great couple pieces of advice there that I think we can all take something away from. Certainly I’ve struggled with this and it’s amazing to hear that it’s possible to feel less overwhelmed and to kind of narrow the scope. You know, we do get into these places of overwhelm and burnout, even when we try not to.

So what are some of the ways that you find you care for your own wellbeing so that you can carry on doing this work?

Kimberly: I would really like to hit home, it’s not that I don’t feel overwhelmed. I feel it on a regular basis, but I have a lot of practices to reel me back in and calm me down and I owe a lot to my daily practices.

I do a morning practice. It’s almost every day. If I’ve missed my morning practice, you know something has gone majorly wrong with that day.

My morning practice consists of, I like to either read a book for a bit or I’ll have a particular talk or podcast that is just about nurturing me. It’s usually like Tara Brach is one of my favorite teachers. She’s a Buddhist teacher. She’s also vegan! Pema Chödrön is one of my favorite authors. And so I’ll just give 15 minutes for me to get inspired, to feel nourished.

I then do meditation. It took me many years to finally make meditation a daily practice, but I’m happy to say for the last few years it has, and it’s been nice. It doesn’t have to be long. You can do a guided meditation, you can do just a silent meditation, but I recommend a guided meditation if you’re just getting started. I actually have a bunch of meditations on my website, just so you can go through and for free at KimberlyCarroll.com.

And I also then do a mind dump, like I talked about. I basically do a mind dump every day, and I end with an appreciation list. So I connect to the things that are good, that feel good, that are beautiful, that are loving, that are delightful, because when we’re facing this barrage of what is wrong with the world, it’s really important to have something to offset that, to remind us of what we’re fighting for. This world wouldn’t be worth fighting for if there wasn’t a lot of love and beauty and connection and possibility.

So that’s my morning practice.

I also make sure I’m working out on a regular basis. And part of that is that cathartic, moving my system, changing the chemistry in my system.

I make sure I have lots of community.

And one little tip is I do something I call my sacred Sundays. So many of us are, are plugged in all the time and we’re kind of working half working a lot. And I know I could because I work from home, as many of us do. And so on Sundays I endeavor to not pick up an ounce of work, to not look at my computer, to not be on my computer. I generally try to be unplugged as well.

You don’t have to go that far, but I don’t do anything on Sundays that is a duty. I only do things that I want to do. So I try not to set an alarm. I try to follow the rhythms of my own body. I try not to do anything that I have to do. And for one day I allow myself to do the things I want to do. Just some space.

I worked up to a full day. It took me a while. You can start with a morning or an afternoon and then you can expand from there. But just to have a day where you aren’t whipped around by the forces of the world outside of you is really important. A day for you to feel safe, a day of sanctuary is really important.

Chantelle: That’s such good advice. I love that you have a daily routine and a weekly routine to handle this.

I feel like we’re all in different places in our journey on dealing with burnout, but I’ve absolutely gotten into places where I’m just thinking about the work all the time. And it’s not productive for me to be in that state because A, my brain doesn’t have a chance to recharge; and B, I can start to lose perspective of all the progress that’s being made and I can only see the negative.

So I’ve found it really helpful to make sure that I’m not only stepping away, but when I’m stepping away doing things that really replenish my energy so I can come back refreshed and motivated and hopeful.

So for me, that’s getting outdoors and going for hikes, moving my body and really connecting with nature, listening to the birds.

Getting in touch with my support network really helps me. Talking with my friends and family is really replenishing.

And I have my little one next to me right now. I share my home with a cat named Callie and spending time with her is really helpful, of course.

Kimberly: That’s so important. Having moments with animals that aren’t in pain and suffering is huge for animal advocates.

And if it’s not about having a family member who is an animal, it could be making regular trips to the farm sanctuary, things like that.

Amy: Thanks so much for sharing that, both of you. I know I very easily get overstimulated. I’m quite a sensitive person. And so I’ve come up with a lot of body techniques, maybe on top of some of the things that you mentioned.

So I do a lot of self soothing; hand on the chest, wrapping myself in blankets really tight, turning up the heat really high for a minute. I just find it’s very easy for me to get tense.

I’m resilient, but my body holds on to that. So I’m trying to soothe more often to try to be more conscious of soothing. We all do it naturally. Watch people who are nervous. They’ve got their hands near their face. They’re tapping things, they’re moving, right? But trying to be more conscious about those things.

I also try to dance at least once a week, like really dance, jump around and shake my body. Some mornings I put on like drum and bass and I start the day just jumping around the kitchen at seven in the morning because that’s what I need to reset. So yeah, I would say on top of all the mind things, do those body resets.

Kimberly: I love that. And I love that you said, I’m resilient. I know that you and most people that are listening could go for a long time. They could have knock after knock after knock, but does that mean you should? That’s the thing. You can until you can’t. That’s what happens with burnout is like, okay, no, I can handle it. I can handle it. And then one day, without warning, you can no longer handle it.

My advice is don’t be pushing yourself beyond the limits constantly. Even if you feel like you can, don’t do it. It is not the recipe for an enduring animal advocate. And we need you in this for as long as possible.

Amy: Absolutely.

Chantelle: That was all such good advice. I am really glad we had this discussion. It’s been really helpful to talk about dealing with and preventing overwhelm and burnout.

One last topic I’d like to touch on before we leave is for people who may already feel burnt out, well past the point of overwhelm.

Do you think it’s possible to truly heal from burnout, or do you think you just shift what you work on?

Kimberly: Well, one definitely needs to change the situation that led to the burnout. I do absolutely feel like you can heal from burnout, but it requires a total break, it requires rest. It requires some very deliberate nurturing and building back up again.

There’s a woman named Tricia Hersey. She runs something called The Nap Ministry and it’s aimed at folks in racial injustice, especially black women, but it’s something we can all learn from. And it’s an organization that promotes the liberating power of rest.

The motto is, rest is resistance. It’s the resistance to the damaging hustle culture framework. So rest has to happen; and not half rest, but full, permission-given rest.

And that’s the problem. Sometimes we have time off, but we haven’t given ourself permission. We’re not allowing it. So it doesn’t have that deeply restorative feeling.

That’s why I have my sacred Sundays. I have given myself full permission to rest. Not that kind of guilty, I’ll watch a show and then I feel guilty about it. That doesn’t restore you.

It’s very important if you’re dealing with burnout to get support, you need to have a counsellor or a peer healing community, you know, more time with friends and family. It can make you feel more held.

It’s important when you have burnout to feel held, but I think it is really important to work with some skilled help as far as that goes, not only in helping you to heal the burnout, but to help heal the patterns and the wounds that lead to burnout.

It’s not just that there’s so much to do. It’s also this place that we come from, in some of our society, but also that a lot of activists especially come from, that we need to earn our keep at every turn.

We’re not good enough. We’re not enough. We need to do more. We need to do more. We need to do more. We need to make ourselves worthy of being here. It’s the sort of limiting pattern that really needs to be healed in order for you to not completely dishonour yourself to do the work that we need to do.

And having a regular practice of processing pain, finding some space and stillness, getting more deliberate about moving through your life as an advocate.

Those should be non negotiables for every animal advocate.

Amy: Yeah. Thanks for sharing that. This is one that I puzzle over still. And personally, I know that the amount that it would take for me to, let’s say, work a full time advocacy specific job is maybe more healing time than I have in a lifetime.

But I still work in the movement. I’m still guiding strategy. What I’m doing now is I’m coaching an amazing team of animal advocates and I love that and I’m inspired by it and I’m excited every day to go to work.

And so I think that is also part of it is really letting go sometimes of the identities we have for ourselves and shaping something new ahead.

I struggled a lot with burnout this year, not from animal advocacy necessarily, although that was one piece, but from lots of personal life things.

And some of what I found is that burnout is almost like grieving where it’s not linear in any way. There’s no sense of time. It can take you years. You have to go through a process of acceptance that that’s the state you’re in, and then charting out a path and having acceptance for yourself each time you get off that path; and you get back on your path.

It’s just this wild adventure, but certainly finding rest is essential. And that can be through doing activities, that can be through being active, but a rest from outside pressure. Because I find it’s the pressure that puts me back into a state of burnout.

And so having friends who you can be like, Hey, I might cancel on you. I’d love to do something with you, but I might cancel. Those kinds of relationships are important where there is a freedom to be yourself as much as you can.

And I think the other piece that I want to mention is genuinely considering medication. I think there’s a lot of taboo around medication. And I see it in others, I see it in myself, you know, some challenges of like, what does this mean? What does it look to onboard this and that?

But speaking personally, I have had a lot of success in being consistently better because of medication. I think it plays a big role in not burning out and healing from burnout.

Kimberly: Yeah. Once you have burnt out, your system is all out of whack, your chemical levels. If getting on some medication is going to give you just a leg up for all of these other things that we’re talking about to take hold, because sometimes you’re so dysregulated that all of these tools, they can’t take hold.

I am absolutely 100 percent behind if taking medication is going to give you that boost that you need to be able to get regulated enough for all the other tools and all the other possibilities to take root. I’m all for it. Absolutely.

Learn more about coping with burnout and compassion fatigue

1. Watch the Animal Justice Academy lunchtime live with Kimberly Carroll:

Dealing with the Challenges of Being an Animal Advocate – Kimberly Carroll

No Description

2. Take the Vancouver Humane Society’s free training program:

3. Check out these resources from KimberlyCarroll.com:

Next episode

Please join us next month as we discuss what your relationship with your pet says about you.

People of all income levels love and care for their animal family members.

In this month’s episode of The Informed Animal Ally, the Vancouver Humane Society’s Amy Morris and Chantelle Archambault are joined by Brooklyn Fowler-Moros, the manager of companion animal programs to discuss the challenges low-income pet guardians face, and the systems in place to help them.

Note: This written discussion has been edited for length.

Amy: I’d love to start this episode with a little story. I grew up with dogs in my life. Some of you might relate to this idea that they were there for me, even when my parents and friends and siblings were not. At my loneliest moments, my dog was by my side. When I left home at 18, there was a natural emptiness that came from not having a dog to spend my study time with and to give me healthy breaks in my day.

As many people do, I headed to the local SPCA and fell in love with a jailed little scruffy pup. Not long after, I was caring for him. I learned all about trauma and dog behaviour. A few years went by and I discovered that he had a medical condition, bladder crystals that could not be dissolved naturally.

A full-time student, I scrapped together the funds for one surgery, and then another a year later.

When I finished school, I had difficulty finding well-paying work. I was living right at the low-income poverty cut off level, where I could not get any government assistance, but was also just scraping by.

Then there was a freak accident at the dog park. After the emergency veterinarian, I had to go to a Canada West bone specialist for a $6,000 surgery. I went into debt, maxing out my credit card, worried about the future and paying my bills.

Luckily, I had a support network that I knew could help me, and credit card support. I came from a privileged upbringing and knew that if I really didn’t have the funds, my parents would likely help me. So, in the face of a deeply emotionally challenging situation, I had peace of mind that I could do what was best for my pup.

The people we assist at Vancouver Humane Society have the same feelings as me. Their pet is their mental health lifeline, keeping them feeling connected and sane; healing from trauma and feeling less alone. They live below the poverty cut off level; often having just enough money to have some kind of housing, feed themselves and their pet.

The big difference, though, is that when their pet is in crisis, they don’t have the same support networks. They might have no access to credit, and no friends or family that can offer support.

I think people often think that people in that kind of situation got there through some kind of ‘fault’ or ‘decision’ that they made, but the reality is that the majority of people in this situation started off with far less resources than I did, and certainly through no fault of their own. They might have been taken from their families and put into foster care as a child, or had a long medical illness that drained their finances. Everyone’s story is different about how they got to where they were, but the universal reality is the love and connection they have with their pets.

Chantelle: In December of 2020, the Vancouver Humane Society released a report on addressing animal neglect through the provision of veterinary outreach services.

Even the language ‘animal neglect’ we used is problematic, because it implies a fault, a ‘failure to care’ for an animal ‘properly’. While this title language was used to make the paper more accessible and more likely to be read within the animal welfare sector, it doesn’t convey the reality of a legacy of intergenerational trauma that perpetuates people not being able to get the care they need, let along the care their pet needs.

That said, the report highlights the importance of supporting structural vulnerable people with caring for their pets.

We know that animals offer companionship and have a mutual bond, they are part of the family.

Interestingly, in a qualitative study co-authored by the VHS, one of the participants noted that low-income people take in animals in need when no one else can because they have compassion for their situation. Speaking with people with pets in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside at the VHS’s Because They Matter event I’ve heard stories like that, where people will take in animals from family or neighbours who can’t care for them anymore. As Amy mentioned, we also know that people’s circumstances can change when they already have a companion animal.

Chantelle: Brooklyn, what is it like to administer a program where everyone presents an urgent need for support?

Brooklyn: I would say, my first thought is it can be challenging. It can also be profoundly rewarding.

I think you’ve both done a really good job of highlighting a lot of the structural issues that I see on a daily basis from application to application.

You made an excellent point that every case is truly, genuinely so different from another, but the themes are consistently true.

The cases that I see most often can be described as there’s an acute emergency. The pet is dealing with something that is a life threatening emergency, which even just hearing the term life threatening can bring tension into the chest. It’s very stressful for any of us, even in the best of circumstances to imagine a loved one, a human family member, a pet family member, to be going through a life threatening state of distress.

So when someone’s contacting us, and when I’m speaking with them, they’re going through something that has them in a profoundly difficult headspace.

And you add to that some of these structural issues, where you’ve got someone who maybe has been living off of $80 since their last paycheck, which could be a week ago, it could be two, it could be three weeks ago, and they’ve been trying to stretch $80 to buy a bag of cat food, and also to get, you know, enough Mr. Noodles, or enough this, enough that, to just get through.

You’ve got people who I talk with who have had housing for most of their lives, and who, when they became a senior, got priced out. And they had one eviction and they can’t pay a thousand dollars more a month for rent. I’ve talked to seniors who have lost their housing in their elderly years.

These are the circumstances that these emergencies are popping up into.

So when I came into this role and I hear the words, you operate from a trauma-informed perspective, that’s really what I try to hold in my heart in every single one of these conversations; that yes, everyone I talk to is dealing with an acute emergency with their pet, but not everyone is dealing with it from the same starting point.

I might have the same emergency and have the same emotional reaction and the same mental health impacts from when my own cat has needed life saving surgery, but I had a credit card I could put it on, I had pet insurance I could lean on to get a lot of it covered, I had, like Amy said, friends, family, a support system I could lean on, so the starting point that I’m coming into this emergency with is so much more substantial than what a lot of these people are dealing with with.

They’ve lost family members, they’ve maybe lost kids, they’ve lost parents, they’ve lost loved ones, their own health is compromised. They’re, just trying to get through the day, the week, the month, the year.

So it can be challenging, absolutely, but as I started off saying, the level of reward is phenomenal when you get to talk to these folks and hear their commitment to their pet’s well-being. It genuinely brings tears to my eyes.

Sometimes when people say, I was addicted for X amount of years and when I came into contact with my dog, someone once said, he saved me. My dog saved me. We rescued each other.

It just blows my mind, the level of dedication that people have to their pets. The people who say, I’ve had that $80 to live off of for the last two or three weeks. And the first step was to buy that big bag of cat food. And the second step was to figure out how am I now going to stretch that last $35 to get through?

It’s just incredible to me.

Chantelle: We’ve all spoken about how everyone’s situation is so different, but you’ve started to talk about some patterns that everyone loves and cares for their pets. I also imagine you must start to notice some other types of patterns when you’re dealing with people in a similar state of financial crisis. So are there any commonalities that tend to be similar amongst people who are accessing the program? Is there anything that makes every case truly unique?

Brooklyn: I mean, from a literal level, of course, they’re really every case is literally unique. It’s a different human being. It’s a different pet. It’s slightly, slightly different medical situation, or sometimes very different medical situations.

I try to keep that in mind as well, because in terms of approach, you know, there might be one person who wants to just have this conversation as fast as possible and get off the phone and go back to solving the problem themselves. And I completely appreciate that. I’ve felt that way many conversations in my life when I’m going through stress.

And there are some people who really need to talk and they might need referrals. They might be in an acute mental health crisis. Sometimes we find ourselves giving out crisis line phone numbers or resources for mental health support, a food bank, shelters.

Three groups make up the majority of program applications

Brooklyn: So those are the things that make each case different, but in terms of patterns, I would say the overwhelming majority of cases cite either:

• being a senior, or
• being someone with a disability or multiple disabilities, or
• being a single parent.

Many people will cite multiple of the above.

People face barriers to meeting their needs

Brooklyn: So these are folks who are often dealing with very substantial systemic barriers to the level of success that they’re perfectly capable of.

It’s hard for someone to make the kind of income that might be easily accessible or easily attainable for many people if you are able to get a master’s degree, if you had the financial and the structural support to go through something so difficult as that level of education.

It’s very challenging when you’re dealing with multiple disabilities and in a system where it’s very hard to get social supports for mental health disabilities, physical disabilities, mobility disabilities.

It’s very difficult to get the basic support that you need.

I hope that these are out of date criticisms, but I grew up hearing, get a job. Well, people often have jobs, and these jobs don’t pay enough to get by. They’re working very hard, sometimes 40 hours a week, sometimes 60, 80 hours a week. People are working to figure their budgets out, to raise their kids, to do the best that they can on an income that is not feasible to live or thrive on.

For people with multiple complex disabilities, it’s very difficult when it’s physically impossible or very close to impossible to get a lot of jobs that you could possibly make a good living off of.

It’s very hard when jobs aren’t set up a lot of the time for people with physical disabilities, mental health challenges, neurodiversity, things like that. I hope that most of us have retired the idea of, you know, get a job because like I said, people have one.

And for a lot of people, getting through today is a full time gig and it takes a lot of work.

Chantelle: We talk about the systemic overlap between animal welfare and social issues a lot.

I’m glad you mentioned the point about work because the reality is those jobs that are very low paying exist. Those jobs are going to be filled by somebody. And there’s always going to be someone more vulnerable that the system will find to take those jobs and those people are going to be placed in a situation where they are living on a low income.

Amy: Thanks so much, Brooklyn, for sharing some of your experiences. You’ve worked on the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver for much of your career. What are some of the common challenges people living in that area experience?

Brooklyn: I feel like the first caveat I would put on answering that is, I have a lot of different types of privilege. I don’t live in the neighborhood. I’ve worked down there for a long time and I have an enormous amount of love and respect for the neighbourhood as a whole and for folks down there. I can say what I observe and I’m happy to answer that question, but it is tough.

I think that one of the things that comes to my mind a lot is so many of us are coming from a really well-intentioned place. It’s often from people who are very intelligent and very compassionate and very empathetic, who have a lot of ideas for things that we’ve read about, we’ve heard about, we believe will help them out.

We need to be as guided as possible by self determination by everyone down there. Because at the end of the day, you know, these are all human beings who are all extremely aware of what they individually want and need. And those needs are definitely not the same for each person either.

Poverty

Brooklyn: When you ask, what are the common challenges? Really intense poverty is a very difficult issue. My preamble there was to stay away from generalizing. I don’t want to say everyone is in abject poverty, but a lot of people are in very intense poverty.

And by that, I mean, they do not have the basic amount of money to survive, sometimes literally or with any level of dignity from month to month to month.

Overdose crisis

Brooklyn: We’ve been living through a severe poisoned drug crisis for seven years now. The numbers every year of people, I can name who have died from it, people I’ve known and cared a great deal for, I can’t conceive of the level of trauma that causes. When this is your neighbourhood and people you see every day, and you see another poster go up that someone you know has died. The level of baseline trauma that is in someone’s life is something I’m very lucky I can’t relate to because it’s not my life experience.

Policing and lack of resources

Brooklyn: I was at an event on the weekend, where a lot of activists were talking about the level of over-policing and under-resourcing. There’s so much money going into the area for monitoring and policing.

And there’s so much of an under resourcing that people are dealing with. When they actually go through a violent incident and they need help, it’s often not there.

Cost of living and veterinary costs

Brooklyn: Cost of living is absolutely an issue. You know, there’s not a lot people are allowed to put towards rent from government assistance checks.

So that’s a real challenge when you’ve got someone who, like we’ve talked about a lot already, who loves their pet with all their heart, and the wellbeing of their pet is at the immediate forefront of their mind, and they want to do the right thing. But they don’t know what to do for a dog who’s stepped on a piece of glass, or for a dog who is somehow starting to vomit, and that’s not normal for their dog, and they want to do the right thing, but they’re not a vet, right? And how are we supposed to get a pet to a vet?

Lack of transportation

Brooklyn: Another big issue in that situation too, is let’s say the person has called us, we’ve had a conversation, we’ve built a relationship, we’ve confirmed some funding for this person to go to the vet, and now they have to physically get to the vet.

That’s tricky too, because we might be able to say, here’s some money to go to the vet, but now they have to either get their hundred pound dog on the bus, and a lot of drivers may well just say, that’s not practical, it’s not safe, I won’t allow it. Or they need to get a taxi, and okay, that’s going to be 35 bucks, and where are you going to find that 35 bucks?

So that can be a real challenge as well.

Systemic barriers

Brooklyn: There are so many inequities and challenges in the neighbourhood that I could talk about all day.

The criminalization of poverty, being treated like you’re a criminal just for being poor in a public place, is really challenging.

Racism is a huge challenge in the neighborhood, it’s a huge challenge in the world.

Gender-based violence is something that people have been doing a lot of work on, there’s a lot of issues with that across the world.

I’ll leave it there for now, but there’s a lot of issues that people have talked about over the years.

Amy: What is it like to provide support to such a wide range of people experiencing multiple barriers in their lives? How do you keep from taking that all on personally?

Brooklyn: That is a very valuable question. I think for anyone in any form of animal advocacy. Especially because we come to this work because we care a lot in general. We care a lot about animals. We care a lot about human animals, non human animals. And it’s very easy for us, because we’re empathetic people, to overextend ourselves to the point where we can burn out.

I don’t want to say that I have all the answers, even for my own self, but there’s a few things that I try to keep at the forefront of my mind when I approach this work.

Find the good

Brooklyn: One of them is just remaining self reflective throughout our careers, because especially in a career like social services, animal services, you’re going to see really hard things.

It can be very easy to see the challenges, but I would say it’s just as easy if you remember to look for the amazing successes; where you get to see someone has a lot of barriers, they’ve called you, they couldn’t get to the vet, they couldn’t afford the vet, all these different things.

And then you’re able to say, here’s the money that you need to get to the vet for a checkup, some x-rays, blood work, medication, a hospital stay, whatever we might be able to approve. And we were able to get a volunteer to drive you to the vet. And the volunteer was a lovely, empathetic person who stayed with you and emotionally supported you, and your pet got the treatment, and they got better, and now they’ve gone home again.

I mean, seeing the benefits to this work is, they’re everywhere, right? These cases overwhelmingly end happily. There’s so many more wonderful endings than there are really sad and really hard ones.

But with it in mind that this is an industry that’s very heavy in burnout, where a lot of people do see these hard things and you know, you see it once and maybe you can bounce back and you see it twice and maybe you can bounce back and, we all have a different point, but maybe on the 20th time, you just can’t bounce back anymore. And you just find yourself thinking, why should I try? It’s never going to get better. I’m not going to be able to fix the social problems, the systemic problems. So why should I try anymore?

So I try to remind myself of my “why”—and I don’t succeed every day. I don’t want to give off the impression that I’ve solved this or that this is something you can follow these easy steps and you too will have a satisfying career in social or animal services—but I think part of it is remembering why we do this.

Identify consistent ways to help

Brooklyn: And I think another big part of it is having a very clear sense of what I can realistically and reliably provide to folks. And there’s certainly a big piece of that which is beyond my personal ability. Let’s say you work for a huge social service agency where there’s hundreds of staff and dozens of managers, you’re really at the mercy of how good your leadership team is.

You need a very clear image of what your job description is: this is a support that we always provide, this is a support we provide sometimes when possible, and this is support we never provide. When you don’t have that, I think that the probability for burnout is so high because the realities are shifting every day.

Especially in something like the McVitie Fund, I would love to say we had endless money, but we just don’t. We have a set amount of money that we can work with, and knowing that that’s reality, this is what we can provide to people.

I find that’s really helpful for my own mental health; reliability is a big piece of it. Knowing what can I do that someone can rely on? What can I tell everyone who calls that we can do? Something I can promise callers is that we will always listen to you. We will always care about what’s going on for your pet and we will always try our best. I can always promise to try, but I can’t always promise to fund you.

And I think that knowing that really helps me feel like I’m doing something. Even if I can hear you out and not be one of the many burned out people who just says, “no, like we can’t help *click*”. And I’ve also been that person so I understand. I don’t want to say those are bad people. I don’t think that they are bad people. I think people get burned out.

I can be someone who can tell you, “No, I can’t help you, but let’s talk about it for a little bit and let’s explore some resources. Can you give me a bit of a picture of what’s going on? And maybe I can send you some referrals to who might be the best place that might be able to help you.”

Accept and learn from mistakes

Brooklyn: In terms of the sustainability piece, the burnout, emotional, mental health sustainability piece, I think something that’s really important to talk about is just that mistakes are normal.

Mistakes are normal in every part of our lives, but they’re certainly normal in this work. You can learn this work in school, you can train, and you can learn a lot of amazing, applicable skills that way, but it doesn’t come from a manual.

When you’re dealing with a unique human being, every single conversation is different. The thing I usually say works great for almost everyone, and then I could say that same thing to someone else and it’s really upsetting for them. It’s very destabilizing. It doesn’t mean that I’m a bad person, that I said the wrong thing.

Mistakes do not have a relationship to the quality of your character. Mistakes are normal. Things that work a lot of the time don’t work all of the time. Someone can fall into the thought process of I made a mistake, so I’m a bad person. Or the flip side, I’m not a bad person, so I couldn’t have made a mistake.

All of us have so much that we’ve learned, and also so much learning that we have left to do. I find that when we approach working with people whose lives we may not understand, it’s important to allow ourselves to accept when we need to learn something new. And if we’re wrong, it’s okay to be wrong, and it’s okay to apologize, and it’s okay to learn a new thing, and it’s okay to refine our approaches when we talk to each other and to people.

Redefine self care

Brooklyn: My last point that I would say about burnout culture is about substantial real self care. I’m uncommonly lucky to work with an organization that talks about the impacts of trauma on those who call us, and the ways that our relationship can flow where we can cause trauma to the person we’re speaking with on the phone, and also the way that trauma can be caused to us by hearing very difficult stories and disclosures.

A lot of times we see a lot of what I call like Instagram self care, you know, bubble baths and exercise classes, things like that. And it can be those things. I don’t think that those are bad examples of self care, but I don’t think that that’s the complete picture.

In work like this, in any job that is psychologically demanding and psychologically taxing, I think it’s so critical to have what I would describe as “substantive” or what other people describe as “real” self care.

That includes trauma therapy. Someone to really talk to who can help us understand, there’s a science to how this process is in the brain. A traumatic disclosure can physically, physiologically change your brain. It can change your reactions. It can change a lot of things about how you feel now. It can change how you feel long term. So access to trauma therapy.

Being able to take paid time off when we experience psychological impacts from our work.

Having people to talk about these issues when they come up.

Connecting with nature or land based healing practices can be incredibly valuable for many people.

Cuddling our pets I think of as a huge part of my own self care. Whenever I have certain types of difficult talks with people, I’ll just think, I’m so glad my little one is here right now. Even though I know that they’re not immortal, I’m not going to have them forever, I’m so lucky that this is a moment where both my cats are in very good health. They’re here, they’re happy.

Safe housing I think is a huge part, medical care, anything that is a necessity to be healthy, safe, and secure in our lives, those are all things I think of as substantive self care.

Free training on mitigating compassion fatigue & burnout

Chantelle: That’s a really good overview of trauma informed care, and thank you for delving into your own practices and your work.

A lot of what you talked about there is what we refer to as trauma-informed care.

If you are interested in learning more about incorporating trauma-informed care into your work and reducing the effects of compassion fatigue and burnout as an animal advocate or person working in the animal services sector, the Vancouver Humane Society offers free training courses..

Amy: We get a lot of people contacting Vancouver Humane Society concerned about animals living outdoors on the street, or animals that are being cared for by people who are drug users. How would you respond to people who have concerns about animals that are living outdoors with their guardians?

Brooklyn: That’s a very important question that does absolutely come up a lot.

There are different mindsets from people who would all agree with each other that we care a lot about non-human animals, we care a lot about pets and their safety, security, happiness, wellbeing, all of those elements.

When we discuss topics with each other, I always try to start from a perspective of where are we completely in alignment? And I think if we can start from the perspective of, this person is sounding to me like they’re communicating that they really care about the wellbeing of the pets that they’re seeing around the city, I’m a hundred percent on board with that.

That is what I hear from guardians as well. That’s my experience.

I would say the majority of guardians we speak with are housed in a literal sense. They have an address. Often it’s those single room hotels, some of which are much better than others, some of which are much worse than others. A lot of them are pet friendly, and so a lot of people do have cats, dogs, rats, rabbits. There are a lot of pets in the SROs, the single room hotels.

For the buildings that are on the worse end of the spectrum, from a safety and dignity perspective, I’ll see a lot of people who, even though they actually do have housing in a literal sense, they’ll spend a lot of time outside.

Even sometimes when it’s too hot because very few, if any, of them are air conditioned. So when there’s a heat wave, people will jump into their tents in the park or on the street or just be outside a lot of the time.

And then we do have a lot of people who simply are not housed at this time.

A lot of it is having relationships across the sector and trying to be as intertwined as possible between animal services and human services. We have a lot of conversations with support workers from housing organizations, from public health.

I get actually a surprising amount of calls from social workers and nurses who refer clients to us because they work with folks who are unhoused and they immediately understand, from a public health perspective, how critical it is to their human client’s wellbeing, to ensure the wellbeing of their pet. It’s really heartening whenever I have those conversations where someone is starting from that perspective.

But it is tricky when someone just disagrees or doesn’t think that someone who is profoundly in the grip of poverty should be allowed to have a pet. I find it challenging emotionally because this isn’t a concept to me.

These are people. I obviously for confidentiality will not name them, but I mean, these are people who have names. I know these people and I can tell you that they care profoundly about their pets and these are the same people who buy that $45 bag of cat food first with their last $80 so that their cat has food for the rest of the month at all costs.

These are people who will do incredible things. I’ve had people call and say, I’m going to sell the motorbike that is the only way they get around so that I can get this pet the surgery that they need. These are normal conversations that I have with people.

So I would just say, the level of love, but also the level of practical safety and companionship that this pet is receiving from this guardian is absolutely on the same par as what I’m providing to my pets.

I’ve read studies where people have noted that in a lot of cases, when someone is sheltering outside and doesn’t have housing at all, they’re with their pet almost around the clock. That can be really critical for some pets who have separation anxiety. I think a lot of our pets would love to have that much companionship and that much emotional support.

Amy: Paws for Hope, another organization working in the Lower Mainland to help keep pets and guardians together, released a report called Connections and Companionship. Chantelle, what can we learn from that report?

Chantelle: The report highlights how pets can offer emotional support to young people experiencing hardship in their life by providing stability and comfort. It also highlights how pets can facilitate bonding between youth and foster parents and be a source of security and comfort for youth in government care.

I found it interesting that young people experiencing challenges were more likely to have a pet; like if they were experiencing poverty, had run away from home in the past year, experienced discrimination, had a physical disability or challenges with their mental health or substance use.

The report doesn’t get into causation, so it’s not clear if this is an example of the phenomenon I mentioned earlier, where people who experience challenges want to help animals who are in need, or if these young people adopted pets to help cope with the challenges they were facing, or a combination of the two.

Even though most young people with a companion animal in their lives said that they experienced benefits to their well-being, young people who weren’t well-off financially were more likely to miss out on accessing needed vet care – 38% vs. 5%. Worrying about the cost of pet care also added an extra stressor that led to participants reporting poorer mental health, and having a pet presented problems with youth accessing housing and other services for themselves.

Amy: Brooklyn, who are some of the other agencies that are providing support to people? In what ways do you collaborate?

Brooklyn: Collaboration is absolutely key, especially since like I mentioned before, we don’t have the limitless budget I think all of us would fantasize about a nonprofit having. So with the realities of what we are able to do in a year, it’s essential.

Let’s say we’ve got a $2,000 surgery to save a pet’s life. If we can contribute $500, I look at it as a puzzle. How do we find the other pieces that we need to make this puzzle come together? In that sense, we’re really reliant on an ecosystem in my mind of organizations who have a very similar perspective and a similar value system and provide different types of supports to pets in these kinds of emergencies.

So you mentioned Paws for Hope. That’s absolutely an agency that we work with a great deal.

The BC SPCA is a group that we work with a lot as well, especially their Vancouver Animal Hospital, which does incredible work. That can be really, really critical, you know, for additional funding for a hospital that might be able to offer a discount on the procedure, making a $2,000 procedure less of a mountain to climb.

We work with a lot of shelters and a lot of nonprofit housing providers. A huge amount of our referrals come that way and our work flows in both directions. When they’ve got a pet who’s been attacked and is physically injured, or a guardian who’s really stressed out about a pet who’s showing signs of a very serious illness, we can help in that situation.

And they also help us out a lot when I’ve got someone calling me and saying, you know, I’ve got a veterinary problem, but I don’t have anywhere to sleep tonight. The weather is starting to get bad and it’s raining really hard. And I don’t want to have my pet recovering from something in a place that’s not safe for them to recover. That’s where we’ll go to the shelter list and I’ll be calling shelters or I’ll send them a list of resources to contact and try to find either a housing advocate or just different shelters that are pet friendly and might take them in.

Not every shelter is pet friendly. In Vancouver, we have a lot of social services, but it doesn’t come from the greatest reasons—it’s because we have a lot of poverty. But when you get into some of the smaller towns and cities across B.C., they may have one shelter within a few hundred kilometers. So if that shelter is not pet friendly, you’ve got people making decisions, almost all of which end in, I will shelter outside with my pet, rather than shelter inside and leave my pet to the elements.

Transition houses is another one. We work with a number of transition houses who are helping women fleeing domestic violence, gender based violence.

We work with a lot of pet food banks across the province. Those are amazing resources. At the end of the day, I think a lot of this boils down to, we are doing the best we can as individuals and as small organizations and sometimes as large organizations to try to pull together survival for a lot of pets.

Sometimes my job doesn’t entail providing survival to humans, but sometimes it involves working with others who do. There are a lot of nurses that we work with. There are a lot of housing providers who are providing survival resources to people and their pets

It is a challenge for all of us to do this as separate organizations, even as ones that work together in an ecosystem. This is not government funded, like human medical care. This isn’t a resource where there’s a clear series of steps for what you do when you go through a crisis and money is not available. If money is not available, this is a much bigger, sometimes insurmountable, problem in a way that it isn’t with human medical care.

Amy: Thanks for mentioning the government funding piece. I think this is crucial for understanding why people face the challenges they are facing. With limited government resources focused on providing basic needs for structurally vulnerable people; pets are often left out of the equation.

There is one government program from the Ministry of Social Development and Poverty Reduction that is providing some hope, though. It provides people the deposit needed to for accessing housing with a pet. This deposit is so crucial for accessing housing.

We’re hopeful that more advocacy will also lead to agencies that provide human services, also having a budget line for pets. Organizations like ATIRA Women’s Resource Society now have dedicated staff to assist with pets.

Brooklyn, in your mind, what would an ideal model for support for pets and their guardians that are struggling financially look like?

Brooklyn: That’s a really good question. It is one that’s hard to give a specific answer to.

Different organizations do provide these kinds of resources and supports in different methods. I definitely don’t feel like there’s one method that is the best method.

The way that we’ve settled on is to provide one-time crisis care funding for pets in an immediate life threatening emergency. There are reasons why we feel strongly that that’s an excellent method. And there are things that are not possible in that method, such as continuing care.

There are other organizations that have a different approach where they’ll work with the same pet throughout the duration of their whole lifetime providing care. There are obviously huge benefits to that method; and there are challenges when you can only realistically afford to take on so many pets and then a lot of pets are being turned away.

I think it’s really great that different organizations are providing care in different ways. Hopefully together, we can come together like a puzzle and make this all come together for each pet as much as possible.

On the whole though, I think it’s really important that any model for supporting pets and guardians in crisis be trauma informed. It’s really important to treat everyone with the dignity that they deserve, regardless of the specifics of their circumstances.

To be trauma informed, we need to be non-stigmatizing and always be reflecting on our programming; for ways for it to be easier to access and more inclusive. That’s a huge ongoing priority for our programming. At the end of the day, it is really challenging for a bunch of different organizations to be working on this separately, instead of in a cohesive, government funded way.

Chantelle: We like to end the episode by sharing something that our listeners can do to make an impact with regard to the topic of the month, so are there any actions you can share for people today to help people access resources for their pets?

Brooklyn: We can do so much as a program, but at the end of the day, the struggle is tangible, budgetary realities. It’s just what we do and don’t have access to. There are certain parameters we have to put on our programs of how much we can fund the same pet in a year and in their lifetime so that we can keep going so that we don’t just run out of funding and turn away every single other pet.

The real challenge is donations. We’re very, very lucky to have a lot of monthly donors and a lot of people who are very generous and will do birthday fundraisers and just the most incredible things to help pull these funds together for pets in crisis.

It absolutely all makes a difference. And that money, when it’s earmarked for McVitie, goes directly into medical care for these pets.

There are pets who will not survive without a certain surgery or a hospitalization or medication today. And the relationship between the donor and the recipient is such a close one. Folks will donate and then a pet is able to get emergency life saving care. And it makes such a difference. So I would just say the more funds we have, the more we can do with them.

Chantelle: Also, just to add on, doing advocacy to get these programs funded is also really important.

Like you mentioned, veterinary care is not subsidized like human medical care is. Animal’s lives have inherent value. They also have these major benefits for their guardians, like mental health benefits, physical health benefits, emotional benefits. And advocating for those resources to be funded can go a really long way in making those programs accessible to people.

Next episode

Please join us next month as we discuss how to handle compassion fatigue and burnout as an animal advocate.