Latest / The Scene Projects / Susan Hartzler on Therapy Dogs, Writing, and the Healing Human-Dog Bond

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Susan Hartzler on Therapy Dogs, Writing, and the Healing Human-Dog Bond · The Scene Projects

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  This program is part of the Scene Projects podcast network.
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  Scene Project features interviews with independent musicians, comedians, and artists
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  from across the Midwest.
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  Become part of our community and support local art wherever you are.
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  Welcome in to another exciting episode of Real Biz.
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  I am your host, Bubba Starts, and with me today is award winning writer, author, and advocate
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  for the human animal bond, Susan Hartzler.
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  Susan, welcome to the show.
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  Thank you.
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  Nice to be here, Bubba.
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  It's my pleasure to have you.
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  I know that we got to speak at length in our discovery call a few weeks ago, and I'm so glad
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  that you, popped back on, so quickly.
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  Not everyone gets right back in to have another long conversation with me, but, I'm glad you
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  did.
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  And I love what you're all about.
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  We're huge animal lovers here at our, you know, in our household.
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  We were talking about our cats.
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  But you have some really interesting books and stuff that we're gonna talk about today.
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  But before we get into that, I wanna just kinda give you the floor and let you give us a little
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  bit of your backstory, and we'll pick up the conversation from there.
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  Okay.
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  Well, let's see.
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  My third grade teacher told me to be a writer.
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  So I had that in my mind my whole life, and, I didn't get my I started off as the first female
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  sports writer of my college newspaper.
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  And my goal was to get into the boys' locker room, but they put me on women's sports.
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  Oh, well, what are gonna do?
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  But I didn't, get my first book published until I was 62, and that book is called I'm Not
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  Single.
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  I Have a Dog Dating Tales from the Bark Side.
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  And then last year, I had another book published, The Peace Puppy, A Memoir of
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  Caregiving and Canine Solace.
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  And I have another book coming out this year.
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  It's all about therapy dogs.
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  And I also have a substack, Bliss Dog, where I write soul stories about dogs and my life with
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  my two dogs.
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  I've got two beautiful Australian shepherds, Seven and Paige Turner, and, they pretty much
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  run my life.
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  So, years ago, I I've always been a dog lover since I was a kid.
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  My first dog, Siesta, was a chihuahua mutt, and, she taught me more about love than the
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  humans in my life growing up.
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  I just love that dog.
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  She would she would sit in a little toy baby chair and eat for me, and she'd sleep in a
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  little toy crib, and she was something else.
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  I'd take her around in a baby buggy.
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  She'd be upside down, and I'd knit hats for her and stuff.
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  So it was pretty much love at first sight with dogs.
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  And, ever since, I've been an advocate for the human animal bond, but now I've stepped it up.
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  I'm a therapy dog a part of a therapy dog team with Seven and Page Turner now.
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  And I also, for ten years, was an evaluator for therapy dogs.
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  Now I have the book coming out.
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  So I have a lot of experience with humans and dogs.
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  I
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  love it.
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  I grew up in a dog household.
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  We're a cat house now because the house is probably too small, to have an you know, bigger
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  animals running around, although four cats is probably excessive as well.
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  But but we, we love our boys.
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  I am not saying anything to my wife, Danielle.
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  If you're listening, you know I love our little our little men.
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  But there's something special about those relationships that we have.
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  Right?
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  And for people that, you know, not only grew up with dogs but have had those companions over
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  their life, we all know what it means.
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  And and I don't know if it's I don't I I find it hard to explain sometimes the people that
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  don't have those relationship with animals for whatever reason.
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  And do you find in your, you know, experience that there's I don't know that there's a
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  commonality between, like, dog lovers that do you find all dog lovers are kinda created, you
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  know, equal or there's that bond that you you feel like you know someone when they have a
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  dog?
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  Because I I mean, I kinda feel that way.
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  Right?
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  Well,
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  dog lovers are a wide spectrum of people.
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  I mean, there's so much to love about dogs.
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  I feel like when I meet them, I I do have something in common with them, but they're not
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  all the same just like dogs aren't all the same.
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  You know, there's dogs especially in today's world, there's so many things you can do with
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  dogs.
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  The trap traveling with dogs is is a huge market right now in the travel industry.
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  People really are starting to do what I feel like I set the set the tone for years ago.
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  Everybody would say, you're so weird about your dog.
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  But now people are are embracing that and just you know, they especially in today's world, I I
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  don't know if you've noticed, but there's all these, like, go pet a cow, go to this farm, go
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  to this and people are doing that more today than ever because we're on screens.
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  We're on, you know, not real life.
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  And people want that real life, that nature, that mother nature.
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  They wanna smell it.
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  They wanna feel it.
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  They wanna pet a llama or whatever.
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  So it's it's really unnecessary.
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  It's not an either or.
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  I think cats and dogs, they're a necessary thing in many of our lives.
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  I mean, I cannot imagine life without a dog.
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  I just can't.
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  No.
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  I'm sure you can't.
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  And the barking in the background is music to your ears.
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  That's what Kate Stern is saying.
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  I wanna be on the show.
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  Yeah.
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  Who are you talking to?
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  What are you doing?
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  Very curious.
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  No.
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  We love it.
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  So tell me more about your first book and dating dating tales from the bark side.
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  Well, you know, I never got married, and I always wanted to get married and have kids.
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  And that never happened for me.
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  So in my early forties, my mom died, and I moved home to take care of my dad who had
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  Parkinson's.
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  And I got involved in therapy dogs, and I went and visited kids at the county hospital in Los
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  Angeles.
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  And I realized if I'd had kids of my own, I might not have had the time or the the
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  inclination to do this type of work that's really necessary.
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  I mean, I've seen so many miracles with dogs in hospitals or at parks with special needs kids.
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  I mean, it's just amazing.
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  And with my new book about therapy dogs, I've got miracles from other people.
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  I mean, it's just I call it a doggy sixth sense.
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  They just know something that we don't know, and they can tap into something that we can't.
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  And I don't know what it is.
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  And I'm sure cats do too.
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  I'm sure cats do too.
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  But, you know, there's a saying, you own dogs, but cats own you.
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  They decide whether or not they're gonna stay.
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  Can confirm.
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  Yes.
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  Yes.
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  So
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  so that's you know, I I just I I don't I think it's really something that's necessary in our
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  world, today, That unconditional love, that mother nature, that that I I don't know.
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  I love everything about dogs.
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  Yeah.
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  The
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  part The the visceral, you know, touching of another living thing, you know, with with human
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  beings, especially post COVID being even more scared of other human beings and contact with
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  another living thing in general that it's so important to, you know, pet a dog.
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  Right?
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  Like, go pet a dog, and it's okay.
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  And
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  Well and there's science behind that.
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  There's science behind that that is proving that petting a dog is good for your health.
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  I mean, it it boosts oxy oxycocin.
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  Tocin, is that?
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  Which is the feel good hormone.
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  It reduces stress.
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  It calms your heart.
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  It lowers your blood pressure.
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  Just petting a dog.
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  Now there are studies saying that people that put a lot of dog pictures up on social media,
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  just looking at a dog can or cat can offer those benefits.
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  That's why people go so crazy about dog and cat videos because they actually are helping them
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  feel better.
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  Oh, I get a lot of cat videos now, Susan.
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  Let me tell you.
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  That's pretty much all I get on Messenger from my wife anymore are memes and reels of funny
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  cat stories and, heartwarming ones as well.
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  You mentioned the LA County Hospital.
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  That's actually a building that I'm very familiar with, in my travels.
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  Throughout my, throughout my early twenties, I had a good friend of mine who was receiving,
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  you know, treatments, and, he had had, osteosarcoma, bone cancer, and we had to spend
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  a lot of time in LA County trying to receive treatment.
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  And and it's I know, especially in that building, how kind of, you know, depressing and
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  oppressive it can be.
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  It's an old building.
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  Right?
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  It's an old, you know, probably built in, what, the thirties or forties.
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  Or Well, they do have
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  a new campus now, but we did
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  start with the
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  old building.
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  Yeah.
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  Yeah.
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  Even the new building, it's
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  it's Well, and it's a hospital.
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  My my wife kids.
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  Seeing the kids, it's like, it breaks your heart.
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  Nope.
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  And we have a large medical, center in Sioux Falls, South Dakota.
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  I have a good friend of mine in the music world that is always going in and playing music for,
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  for the patients there.
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  And to see what it does, especially to be in such an environment that, you know, my wife
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  gets just going into the doctor's office for for not unrelated and not sick, it raises her
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  blood pressure.
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  So for someone who is sick and receiving treatment or or is not feeling well, it can be
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  even more so.
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  And especially when you talk about some of these children that are spending, you know,
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  months months of their lives and not being able to leave, you know, because of, you know, a a
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  diagnosis of a more severe case.
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  And it it's so awesome that you are able to not just go in and to take part in that, but now to
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  document that and to document some of the miracles that you've seen.
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  I think that's so important that it will then spurn more of these kind of therapy sessions
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  with the dogs.
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  And, you know, for us, we work with a lot of veterans, operation combating veteran suicide,
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  very near and dear to our hearts, but also another organization, out here in South Dakota,
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  Guardian, Shepherd Dogs, and their German Shepherds who had worked as military service
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  dogs.
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  And now, you know, not just training them to be you know, to continue doing a job, but just a
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  different kind of job.
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  And and helping them and then connecting them with other veterans as well.
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  So, we well, I love it.
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  I I love that you're writing about it and sharing your stories with the world to educate
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  more people on the not just therapeutic, but the scientifically proven therapeutic, benefits
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  of having animals in our lives.
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  One of the things that I'm doing on my Substack, and this just occurred to me when I
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  started writing Substack, is, yes, there's therapeutic benefits, but no one knows how to
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  tap into them.
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  So I'm actually offering, like, meditations or rituals you can do.
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  Like, if you you're feeling a panic attack coming on, if you just lie down next to your
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  dog, touch them, sink in with their breathing, it can really it can really stop a panic
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  attack.
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  I mean, you've got the dog right there.
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  I'm sure a cat's the same way.
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  It's just it's
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  A cat might give you a panic attack first, but
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  That's true.
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  They help my wife.
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  I I've seen who she is.
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  When she comes home, it's the first thing she does is grabs one of them and spends, you know,
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  five, ten minutes after work relaxing with them.
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  And it's made her a completely different human being.
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  I can't completely.
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  And each cat's kinda different.
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  Not all not all the cats like to be picked up and held like that, but they have all have
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  their times and dogs the same way, I'm sure.
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  That's that's why one is never enough.
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  Right?
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  I I don't I have three myself.
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  I wish I had a farm and could just have a million.
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  You know?
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  Yeah.
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  Well
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  humans anymore.
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  So except for you, Bubba.
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  Well, thank you.
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  I appreciate that.
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  Well, before I let you go, I'd love to have you share once again the Substack and where people
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  can find the books, and I'll let you get out of here so you can go ease A lot.
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  Paige Turner's nerves a little bit, and then let them know that everything's okay.
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  Okay, Bubba.
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  Well, my substack is bliss dog at bliss dog, b l I s s d o g, which was the name of my first
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  Aussie bliss.
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  And then my books, can get on my website, susanhartzler.comcomcom, susanhartzler.
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  They're also available on Amazon, all booksellers.
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  But the thing is if you put in I'm not single, I have a dog, you'll get T shirts and all sorts
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  of things.
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  So it's best if you're on Amazon to put in my name.
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  And that book is coming out as an audiobook this spring.
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  You'll be to
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  order I'm Not Single this spring as an audiobook.
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  Fantastic.
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  Well, Susan, thanks for taking some time away from your beautiful animals to talk with me
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  this morning.
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  I wish you all the best.
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  I'm looking forward to the new audiobook as well, and, thank you for being part of the
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  scene.
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  Papa.
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  It was really fun.
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  Thank you.