Latest / Millennial Mental Health Channel / The Human-Animal Connection with Author, Speaker, TV Star, and World Renowned Veterinarian Dr. Doug Mader

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The Human-Animal Connection with Author, Speaker, TV Star, and World Renowned Veterinarian Dr. Doug Mader · Millennial Mental Health Channel

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So again, pets are amazing. They always they always have your back and
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no matter how bad of a day you have you've had, they're there to
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support you. This is Millennial Mental Health Channel. I'm doctor Justin Romano,
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a Child and Adolescent psychiatry fellow, and I'm Eddie Creo, a licensed clinical
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therapist. Our podcast is here because we wanted to start a much needed conversation
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about mental health. Our goal is to teach you as much as we can
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by sharing our own experiences and interviewing experts in the mental health field. We
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will discuss topics like mood disorders, psychotic disorders, substance use, personality disorders,
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and many more. Millennial Mental Health Channel buy Millennials for everyone. We
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hope you enjoyed today's episode. MMHC is a production of Spreaker from iHeartMedia.
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Are all Right and we are back. This is MMHC. We have truly
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a very special episode for you guys today. This is an episode that I
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have been wanting to do for literally years. My wife had the idea to
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try and have a veterinarian in on the show to talk about animal mental health,
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human connection, bond and I've been trying to find the right veterinarian until
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doctor Doug Mader fell right into our laps. So without further ado, I'm
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going to give him a quick bio so you know who you're dealing with here,
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because he's kind of a big deal. So Doctor Doug is a triple
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Board certified veterinary specialist and has been a veterinarian for nearly four decades now.
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He's an internationally recognized speaker. He's written three best selling medical textbooks and numerous
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scientific publications. He has a longstanding pet columns in the Long Beach Press Telegram,
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Reptiles Magazine, and the Key West Citizen. And I've never heard of
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it before, but I am definitely buying Reptiles Magazine. That sounds awesome.
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Doctor Mader is the recipient of the US Fish and Wildlife Conservation Award, the
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UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine Alumni Achievement Award, and the Fred L.
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Fry Lifetime Achievement Award for Veterinary Medicine. He's a seven time winner of the
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North American Veterinary Community Speaker of the Year Award and a four time winner of
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the Western Veterinary Conference Educator of the Year Award. He's also a Fellow of
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the Royal Medical Society of Medicine in the United Kingdom. He's appeared on Animal
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Planet, National Geographic Discovery, and more. He's even cared for the pets
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of such celebrities as Michael Jackson, Kirsty Alley and Slash So. Doctor Mader
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is a Human Animal bond certified and practiced in California for years and years.
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Today he lives in the Florida Keys. It's an honor to have you on
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the show, doctor Mader. How are you doing. It's such a pleasure
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to be here, and it's quite an honor on my part to be with
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you. Also, I really appreciate the invitation. Like Justin said a little
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earlier, he was looking and look, you really wanted to have a veterinarian
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on the show, And he says he felt like you found us, doctor
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Mader. So we are lucky that you wanted to be with us. We
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feel very excited for it. I know Justin has talked about this for a
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long time. We're going on three and a half years almost of the show
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and we finally have made it happen. Yeah, thank you, thank you
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for being a part of it. We're excited to interview justin. I'm ready
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to jump into it if you're ready. We got a lot of questions.
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We're excited to get into it. Let's do it, so, doctor Mader,
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I'll start off by asking. You've got a lot of titles, You've
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done a lot. You're a writer, and I've been reading your book,
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The Vet at Noah's Ark, which has been awesome. It has honestly been
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one of the most exciting reads I've had in a while. You're a veterinarian,
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You've got all these speaking awards, your public speaker. Which title or
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identity do you feel like you identify with the most that you know? That's
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a really good question, and thank you for that very glowing introduction. You
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know, I think one of the things that motivates me is peer recognition and
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knowing that I've done something to help my profession and move things forward. I
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mean, I had some amazing professors when I was going through college, and
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the way I can pay them back is paying it forward and taking the time
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to educate younger students, younger veterinarians, and by writing and sharing some of
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my knowledge and experience that others can take and I'm humbled the fact that a
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lot of my textbooks now are used around the world in VET schools all over
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the world. So I think just that peer recognition and knowing that I had
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contributed something back so long after my ashes or dust or long gone. Still
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there's a part of me that's helping educate people. That's super cool. You
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mentioned it a little bit before we started recording. You've been able to interact
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with a ton of veterinarians. I think it's a veterinarian assistance for me as
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a license fessional counselor like something that I'm just getting into as having like a
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supervisory role and like having that role as like basically a teacher and getting to
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teach the next generation. What has that been like for you? Like,
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what has that been like to pretty much be a leader, not even pretty
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much, to be a leader in your industry? What is that like for
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you? I think it's really important. I think it's part of and I
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think you're probably cut out of the same cloth. You both are. It's
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in our DNA. We like to teach, and I mean, what's what's
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our future hold Our future holds what we take the time to teach the people
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coming up behind us, and if we don't make that effort to help the
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younger generation learn and grow, how are things going to carry on? So
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to me, I feel like it's definitely part of my calling. Again,
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as I mentioned, I've had some excellent mentors growing up, and even as
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at this stage in my career, you know, I learned. I try
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to make it a point to learn something every day, and I just think
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helping pass that on and teaching that knowledge and sharing that knowledge, that's what
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it's all about. I mean, we're all really on it for the same
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page, and that's just to help the world be a better place. One
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of the things I noticed in your book was that you mentioned that a car
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accident happened when you were in grad school that changed your career course. So
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this is a very personal question, and you certainly don't have to answer it
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very deeply if you do not want to. But how did this car accident
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change your life? How did it impact your mental health? And how did
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you get to a point of being able to accept that accident and maybe even
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forgive the because it was a drunk driver. I believe that hit you and
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cause this big change in your career. But I'm curious as to what you
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think. Yeah, that's a tough question. Wow. Yeah, So the
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followers on the show will know. When I was in graduate school, I
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just finished the semester and I had gone out with a friend to a movie.
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And this was before the days of seat belts, kind of dates me
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and we were coming over from the movie and I jokingly said, put on
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your seat belt, and she said, no, I hate seat belts.
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And I said, well, you know this time of night, it was
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a Saturday night, I said, there's a lot of drunk people on the
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road. Turns out, an underage, drunken driver was drag racing and lost
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control of his car and rear ended me, set me down a freeway in
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a ball of fire. So can I forget it? No? Can I
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forgive him. I can forgive him because we all make mistakes. I lived,
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and it's amazing that I lived, so I always call it my second
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chance day. I no longer celebrate my birthday. I celebrate the day of
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the accident because somehow I managed to live through that. And can I forget
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it? No? I can't because I've had like twenty seven surgeries. I've
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had three four next surgeries, three back surgeries. I've probably got four five
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feet of scars on my body. And so every morning when I wake up,
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every time I look into mirror. How do you how you can't forget
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something like that? I do. I accept it. Yeah, that's the
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cards I was dealt. I'm still here, I'm still writing books, I'm
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still teaching, I'm talking to you. What better you know? Life is
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good. I can't complain, you know, I really can't thank you for
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sharing that. I think anytime we have a guest on it, somehow not
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somehow, it's it's almost pre planned. We always get on some topic that
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that's pretty personal. I'm pretty it's pretty deep dive. So anytime anyone shares
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anything personal like that, we really appreciate it. Um maybe it is because
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we're mental health professionals, but we do truly appreciate it. So thank you
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doctor. Are you welcome? And you know everybody, everybody has their battles,
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and battles are very personal. You know. I look at my struggles
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and I sometimes I feel sorry for myself. And then one of my dearest
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friends, I just went to visit him in the hospital last night, and
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he's got cancer. So Jesus, who am I to complain? Right?
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So I hurt, So I've got scars, you know, my friends battling
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cancer. So yeah, like I said, it's all very personal and you
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have to keep things in perspective and and try and find that silver lining on
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the cloud. There's a reason that I live. There's a reason that you
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know, that higher power has kept me around, and that's what I'm trying
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to focus on. You celebrate the day that you've you've been able to survive
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from the accident instead of your birthday. And it sounds like you've been really
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able to make the most of this the second chance that you said you've had.
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So I think that's really cool, and again, thank you for sharing
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that with us. You're welcome. Justin has a Justin has a made up
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word that he wants to ask him this next question, but I'll ask you
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for them. So a lot of people have a specio centric again that is
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made up. Nobody fact check us view of animals and believe that humans are
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the only ones who can feel deep and complex emotions. So, based off
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of your experience, doctor Mader, what do we know about the range of
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emotions that animals feel? Great question, and I'm sure you guys have probably
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read the literature. There has been a lot of published studies, and I
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can get you the references if you want them, but that's kind of beyond
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the scope of this chat. There was a recent paper that came out in
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Psychology Today where they looked at the range of emotions at pets have compared to
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humans, and they pretty much drew a nice parallel between pets and people up
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to about two and a half years of age. That the range of emotions
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that pets experience are pretty much the same range of emotions that children develop as
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they age up to about two and a half and that's where they feel the
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pets ability kind of stops. So examples would be things like joy sadness,
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love, fear, aggression, protection, and even things like disgusted. These
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are all emotions that have been documented in research labs. Now, the thing
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is, you don't have to have a PhD to know that. All you
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have to do is have a dog or a cat. And if you've got
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a dog or a cat, you see it, you live it every single
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day real quick. Before Justin goes, you mentioned you can provide us with
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the references, but in all respect, you are our referenced doctor painter.
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You are, it's so accomplished, like, well, I will take whatever
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you say is as fact. Well, I promise not to make anything up
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for you. Okay, perfect. We appreciate that well, because animals can
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feel such strong and deep emotions, and I've done a little bit of a
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dive into some of the emotional range of marine mammals and how it does seem
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to be very advanced and compared to the rest of the size of their brain.
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Orca whales have a much larger Lympic system compared to humans, which suggests
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that they might even feel stronger and deeper emotions than humans. And so with
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the specio centric we're just feeling like that. Humans. Oh, they're obviously
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the best, they do everything the best. But I think there's so many
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things in this world that we need to give credit to the animal kingdom for.
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I mean, I guess technically we are in the animal kingdom too,
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But how have you noticed that animals experience mental health problems? Let's throw a
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little bit of science. You know you like fancy words, so I'm gonna
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share one with you, and I'm sure you both are familiar with it.
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It's a German word called umvelt and literal translation means the world as perceived.
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So the umvelt for you and I versus my dog or my cat sitting on
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the bed watching me talk is we experience the same world, but we see
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it differently, just like looking at fireworks from a from an adult size versus
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fireworks from a child's eye. So it's the world is perceived. So we
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may experience something with our dog, and the way we perceive that could be
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totally different than the way the dog perceives it. But what do we do?
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We tend to cast our feelings and our emotions under the dog, So
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like we look at the other dog or the puppy would say how cute it
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is. Yet the dog that we're sitting next to me look at the other
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dog or the other puppy and say, oh, there's competition. So the
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perception is completely different depending on who's the one doing the perceiving. So your
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question was, how do we know that they feel fear or they feel emotions?
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Again, you don't have to have a PhD or going to a lab
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to see this. All you have to do is watch the dog, dog,
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or cat or horse. You can pick the animal. And you've heard
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of the dog whisperer and the horse whisper. Once you're familiar with that animal,
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and people are very familiar with their own pets, and Naken, they
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had that Tascard communication. Yes it's okay, spot, sit, spot,
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bark, spot, lay down. But there's more to it than that.
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You watch their eyes, you watch their ears, You watch the curl of
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their lips, you watch the hair on their back, you watch the way
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they twitch, you react when you talk to them. All of that is
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a really powerful tasked communication in a language that you have developed with that pet.
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And so to answer your question, how do you know they're feeling emotion?
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You pick up the box of dog bones and you shake it and they
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run over. They excited, They wag their tail or, eyes get big,
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their ears get erect. You pick up the dog box of dog bones,
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you shake it and there's no sound. But the dogs have learned that
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the sound means they're getting a treat. They also know that if you shake
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it and there's no sound, you can see it in their body language immediately
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and that they're analyzing it. Going, he's got the box, but it's
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quiet. That means I'm not going to get a treat. So again it's
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you don't need that PhD, your master's degree to be able to read the
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body language. I heard a great saying one time, and this is something
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that I was taught as a student, and I've always shared this, and
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that is even the dumbest person can understand body language. And you know,
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you can explain to a young student some theorem or some theory or a procedure
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and to look at you with the deer in the headlights. But if you
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give them one of these things, or they know right away what you're saying
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without saying I almost felt a reaction when you crossed your arms, like,
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oh, doctor man, I wanted to ask, so I know, um,
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I mean all the points of made are great, but like I think
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of like for like examples of like my friends where like they're with their dog
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and they're like, oh they feel this certain way, or like oh he's
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anxious right now or he's upset, and sometimes like for a while, before
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I really paid attention, I would be like, how do you like how
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do you know that? So I think your points are great? Of like
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you know your your pet, you interact with them, you can you can
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build kind of like that language and relationship with them. I wanted to ask
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specifically about terms like anxiety or maybe even like depression when it comes to like
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pets or animals, Is that something like in the veterinarian world, like that
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those are used or or they're different terms. Absolutely, they're they're used all
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the time. First off, let me just point out there is an actual
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board veterinary board specialty in behavior. So there are veterinarians like myself, I'm
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I'm boarded in Kline Feline Practice, and then a couple of other boards.
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There are actually board specialties in behavior where these veterinarians have gone on and done
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an extra two or three years of study, research, published papers, taken
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tests, and become certified basically like animal psychiatrists. And so again it is
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a fairly complex issue, but there's no question about it that the words like
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anxiety are definitely real, and I think probably one of the classic ones would
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be separation anxiety. And there are several species actually believe it or not when
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that you wouldn't expect, like the German shepherd, cocker spaniel, toy poodle's
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whippets, at tieing greyhounds, they suffer from something called separation anxiety, and
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they get so bonded with their owners that when the owner runs the store or
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runs to work, leaves the pet at home, they go through these anxieties
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like mom and Dad are never coming back. Some of them, the manifestation
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may be as simple as they curl up under the bed in whimper. Some
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of them they get so anxious that they destruct, you know. They they'll
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chew a couch, or they'll lead up the shoes, or they'll damage the
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blinds. And then some of them get really extreme and they can actually injure
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themselves, just like people. Yeah, that's good to know. I knew
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a cocker spaniel once that had terrible separation anxiety, and it would just scream
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and cry when people left the house, and I always felt so bad.
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But eventually they put that dog on prozac, on fluoxytine. So I'm curious
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as to what you have seen in the veterinary world, because in the human
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psychiatry world, we've seen an explosion of medications used for these types of things.
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It's the same thing happening in animals, yes and no. Yes,
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it's being we use prozac in animals. We use xanax. There there are
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several different human medications trouseredonne, clamypromine, you know, TCA, tricyclic Canada
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pressants that are used fairly successfully in dogs and cats. In the reality,
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if you talk to the behaviorist or the specialist, we try not to run
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and grab the drugs right off the top of the bat because we don't want
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to turn these these animals into basically zombies. We don't want to We don't
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want to make them slaves to drugs for theirs their lives. So what we
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try and do is we try and work with them with behavioral and operative conditioning
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and positive reward systems. So let's go back to your friend with the cocker
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spaniel that has separation anxiety. So they get the dog, let's say they
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adopted from the shelter whatever. The dog bonds with them immediately, and the
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dog looks at them as their savior because they were in the shelter. Now
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they've got a great home. They got to couch, sit on TV,
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to watch good food twice a day, get to go for walks, and
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then all of a sudden, mom and dad even go to work, and
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then they're freaked out because oh my god, I'm left alone, and that
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can be really traumatic for these dogs. Cats they go through it too,
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but you know, cats are cats. Cats cats they march to their own.
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Drummer dogs, it's definitely more appropriate for more obvious. So you have
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to shape their behavior and just like with anything, to get to that endpoint,
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it's baby steps. So you love the dog, you pet the dog,
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you hug the dog. You can use clicker training. It just goes
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beyond the scope of today. Maybe I'll come back in a few months we
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can talk some more about it. But you reward the dog. You step
19:19
outside, hopefully through a door that's got a window, so the dog can
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still see you. Waves of the dog, talk to the dog. The
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dog wags its tail and sees you through the door. Yes, you're separated,
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but it knows you're there. Two minutes later, you walk back in.
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You reward the dog because during that two minutes the dog hasn't eating the
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couch. Okay, then you do it again, maybe later in the day
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or the next day, but this time you step away and for five minutes,
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and then you step away and then you step away from the window so
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they don't see you. But you can talk to them so they can hear
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you. So it's called shaping of the behavior, and you can That's how
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they get animals like a dolphin to jump through a hoop twenty feet in the
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air. A dolphin's not actually going to do that. But by shaping their
20:03
behavior with positive rewards, little teeny steps at a time, you can get
20:07
pretty much any animal to do anything as long as they're getting a positive reward
20:11
out of it. So you can positive reward these pets that have these psychological
20:15
issues, and you can train them out of it. And I would much
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rather make the effort to train a dog out of separation anxiety, which can
20:23
be done successfully, rather than put them on a medication like Prozac or z
20:27
annex for the rest of its life. Now that doesn't mean that you can't
20:32
use some of those drugs as a bridge. For instance. I'm gonna get
20:34
personal here because you Eddie, you brought this up. Five years ago.
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We were destroyed by a hurricane called Hurricane Irma. It's been kind of supplanted
20:42
by a recent hurricane Ian, but where we live. We lost everything,
20:48
literally everything we owned, and we ended up living in our hospital, our
20:52
vet hospital for a while, and then we ended up renting like a one
20:53
room apartment. Cutting to the chase. One of my dogs, who happens
20:57
to be a whippet, has got severe anxiety. He stopped eating. He
21:02
went from forty pounds to twenty eight pounds. We were almost to the point
21:06
where we had to put a feeding tube in him because he was going to
21:07
die. So I ended up starting him on some xanax and just to kind
21:12
of take away that anxiety and chill him out a little bit, and then
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lots of positive rewards. I mean, I took him to work with me
21:21
every day, well he pretty much lived at work with me every day,
21:23
kept him involved in my life as much as possible, so he know,
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even though everything else he knew his yard was gone, his house was gone,
21:30
his bed was gone, I was still there. And then gradually we
21:33
started adding things back into his daily routine, and now I can say he's
21:37
back to being a fairly normal, crazy dog. But yeah, so,
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I mean, we use a combination of pharmacology and behavioral conditioning, but we
21:45
tried to lean toward the behavioral conditioning because you get better results in the long
21:48
run. Basically, we're all on the same page. Then because Justin as
21:52
the psychiatrist and the meds provider, like we talked a lot about like the
21:57
same idea of like wanting to almost exhaust the other options before moving to just
22:03
medication or almost using it, like you said, doctor Mader, as like
22:07
a bridge to kind of help aid in that process. And you know what,
22:10
there's nothing wrong with that. I mean, that's that's why we have
22:12
that those tools in our in our tool chest. Yeah, and it's okay
22:17
to do that because it helps you as the caregiver and it helps to patient
22:21
and then we can gradually wean them off it and continue on a positive mental
22:26
health road. We are coming up on like the three years of the world
22:30
changing kind of forever, and because of all of that changing with COVID,
22:34
there's been a lot of residual impacts that we've all seen, you know,
22:38
Justin and I would talk about it pretty much every time we hop on a
22:41
call to to record an episode, just changes we've seen in things that how
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our teams have been impacted. I was at a plant shop recently with Kevy
22:51
with my partner, doctor Mader, and there was a dog there. There's
22:53
two dogs there. One of the dogs the owner was talking about how it
22:57
was a COVID puppy, so are trying to They're still trying to get kind
23:00
of acclimated to being around other dogs and maybe weren't used to it yet.
23:04
I guess to bring that into a question like how how is COVID? How
23:08
is all over the last three years, how does that? How have you
23:11
seen it impact the lives of pets and their mental health and just maybe overall
23:15
behavior. It's been rough on everybody, you know, Initially when everybody was
23:21
stuck at home, the adoptions at the local shelters went sky high because everybody
23:26
ran out and they were at home, and they ran out and they adopted
23:29
account they adopted a dog. So that was a good thing having the animals
23:33
around. Animals are better than xanex, and they're better than prozac, you
23:37
know. To me, you know, there's so much positive that an animal
23:40
brings to your life. And everybody going through the COVID situation, whether you
23:44
were sick and you needed somebody next year, or whether you just were stuck
23:48
home and you needed somebody with next year, or you lost your job.
23:52
You know, it was interesting. A lot of people who lost their jobs
23:55
couldn't afford to take care of their pets, but they still managed to find
23:57
the time and the energy and the money to do that. So the good
24:00
news was that a lot of animals got adopted and got homed. The bad
24:04
news was when COVID started to settle down and people started to go back to
24:08
work. And for instance, my dog you know and everything. You know,
24:12
they used to have him around all day long. Now all of a
24:15
sudden, Dad's gone again. He's at work. Where did he go?
24:18
I liked him when he was here and we were going for walks on the
24:21
beach, You're watching TV or sitting on the couch, and so it kind
24:23
of worked both ways. So now we're kind of at the other end of
24:26
the bell curve. Was before the pets loved it because mom and Dad were
24:30
home all the time. Now the pets are going like, wow, they're
24:33
gone. Where'd they go? Well, you know, why'd they leave me?
24:34
So it was it's been really interesting, and then of course, you
24:37
know, there's a sadness that goes with it too. And I'm sure you
24:42
probably read the stories in places in China when COVID first broke out, and
24:48
then all the you read about it on the Internet, and you hear all
24:52
the stories about, oh, people are getting it from their dogs and their
24:55
cats, and people were throwing their dogs and cats out the windows and killing
24:57
them, and that truly wasn't the case. I don't know that there has
25:02
ever been any proven cases of people getting it from a dog or a cat.
25:06
We know that people can give it to dogs and cats and other animals.
25:08
People have given it to zoo animals. There was a case recently in
25:11
one of the big zoos I won't mention the name, where they think keeper
25:18
actually got COVID from one of the cats that they were carrying from and then
25:22
they spread the COVID to some of their fellow keepers. So it's rare that
25:29
it went in that direction. Usually it went in the direction from humans to
25:32
animals. I can see that you've got such a love and compassion for animals,
25:45
and I love that because it feels like in the world today we just
25:49
treat animals so terribly. In my opinion. I know this is like a
25:55
little bit like asking you which is your favorite child, But what animals do
26:00
you like working with the most and what's most rewarding about it? I get
26:04
that question all the time. Gods they are also different, Like you know
26:08
which which child you like the best. I guess my favorite is whatever I'm
26:14
working on at the time because that's my focus. But if you if you
26:18
took me out to a field with a whole bunch of animals, you'd probably
26:22
find me walking over to the alligators. Wow, I just I don't know,
26:26
I'm just Ever since I was a little kid, I've been fascinated by
26:29
dinosaur as an alligators. You know, they've been around since the Carboniferous period
26:33
for three hundred million years and pretty much unchanged since the beginning. And considering
26:40
if you're watching the screen their brain on a three hundred pound animals about the
26:44
size of my tip of my finger, you know, it's amazing the emotional
26:48
response you can get out of them. Because some of these facilities that I
26:52
work with, I can walk up to a pond with fifty alligators in it,
26:56
and there are certain gators that I work with, like for twenty twenty
26:59
five years, and I can call Casper. Casper the head will pick up,
27:03
he'll look around, I'll call him again, and he'll just swim right
27:06
over to me. So it's pretty impressive the response you get from an animal.
27:11
That you think is just nothing but stupid, and they're not. You
27:14
know, again, go back to that um belt. It's the world is
27:17
perceived, right, so the way they perceive it in the way we perceive
27:21
their behavior. Did you ever see that Far Side cartoon was many many years
27:25
ago, and it was a guy talking to his dog and it says one
27:27
of the cartoons was what we say and the guy's going to sit Fido,
27:32
And then the next one says what they hear, and it's just land land
27:34
land land land. And then the next one is showing the dog and the
27:40
dog is barking. This is what is he saying? And the dog is
27:41
saying, I want to go for a walk. And then the next one
27:45
shows the man and what he hears he hears full full. So it's it's
27:51
all a perception. If you could make the world change in any way and
27:57
how we treat animals, what would you change? Oh man, I just
28:03
I've seen such ugly stuff, you know. I just wish people would respect
28:08
animals. But I mean we got to start with people. People have to
28:12
learn how to respect people, you know, and if people respect people,
28:17
people respect animals. And there have been so many studies that have shown that
28:21
people that abused people tend to abuse animals, and likewise, people that abuse
28:25
animals also tend to abuse people. I think if we can just teach people
28:29
to respect and love each other. You know, you don't have to like
28:32
somebody, but you should at least respect them. And maybe you don't like
28:34
dogs, but don't be disrespectful to the dog. Just accept the fact that
28:38
he's there. Do you go both both go your own ways. I think
28:41
that's probably the most important thing. In my county where I live, I'm
28:45
the only veterinarian it has forensic training, and so I'm the one that gets
28:49
called every time it was an abuse case or something like that, and I
28:52
see some of the stuff that happens and it just you know, I'll go
28:56
days without sleep. And it can be really tough because the animal has no
29:02
advocate. You've got to be their advocate. Yeah, and uh, it's
29:04
it's it could be a real challenge. That's a that's a sensitive subject that
29:08
really precedental perspective that we don't think about it enough to talk about it.
29:12
Like, yeah, you're absolutely right. The animal doesn't have an advocate except
29:15
for us, Like we we have to be the advocate. Thank you for
29:19
sharing that almost similarly I think about And this honestly might be more of a
29:26
personal question just for me. Um, we've talked about pet adoption and like
29:30
we've also talked about like behavior training, and this might be free advice,
29:34
So if you need to charge me at all, send the bill to Justin.
29:38
But what, I guess do you have any like tips for people who
29:44
are interested in in adopting like a pet, adopting a dog or I guess
29:48
I say dogs specifically because I'll be on like the Oregon Humane Society website once
29:52
in a while just looking at you know, We've been wanting to adopt a
29:56
dog, but it just hasn't been the right time. So I think that
29:57
for us that's important that it's the right time. But do you have any
30:02
tips or things that could be helpful for anyone who is interested in adopting any
30:04
kind of animal? I do, and I'm glad you're bringing this up because
30:10
I am a real proponent of going to the shelter and giving these dogs a
30:15
second chance. You know, I love having purr bred dogs, and I
30:18
think that's pretty darn cool. But reality is, there are hundreds of thousands
30:23
if not millions of dogs and cats and other animals in the shelters that need
30:26
homes and any perfectly good homes. Justin you said you started reading my book
30:32
to me. The main character in the book is Walk, and Walk was
30:33
my dog, and Walk was a rescue, best dog I've ever had,
30:37
in no offense to my current dogs, and I hope they're not listening.
30:41
I won't let him watch the podcast. But you know, Walk was the
30:45
best dog I've ever had, and he was an adoptee. You know,
30:47
he was a shelter rescue. And there are so many wonderful dogs out there
30:51
that would love to find a great forever home. And everybody uses that term
30:53
like it's really cute, but it's real. And what I would recommend you,
30:59
and you're the way you brought it up was very good. I would
31:03
never tell you, hey, you know you need to go out and adopt
31:06
a kid. Yeah, it's not, that's simple. I'm adopting a pet
31:08
is adopting a family member. Some animals live ten and twelve years. Some
31:14
animals live a lot longer. I've got a bird that's thirty and she's gonna
31:18
outlive me, So I'm gonna have to find I'm gonna have to rehome her
31:21
or when I'm gone. So maybe if you want one, let me know.
31:26
But no, to get back to your point, and your point is
31:29
very good. How what tips do I have? You know? If you're
31:32
thinking about it? Start volunteering at the local shelter. Hey, they always
31:36
need help, you know, they've got They've got dozens of dogs over there,
31:38
and they would love people to come by. Put a leash on a
31:41
dog, Walk the dog around the block. You spend some quality time with
31:45
a dog. You can talk to the dog, tell them about the crappy
31:48
day you had. I guarantee you that dog will not criticize you or make
31:52
you feel bad. It will make you feel like you are a superstar.
31:55
And then that dog gets out of its cage you know, or out of
31:57
its jail cell for an hour or two a day. So go over there,
32:01
test drive a few dogs and cats. Right, I can test drive
32:05
a car. You find one that's the right fit, you know what,
32:07
take it home and try it at home for a couple of days. Odds
32:10
are you won't take it back? Yeah? Absolutely, Oh that warms my
32:15
heart. The idea of a dog won't criticize me. You're absolutely right,
32:22
you know. Since we're talking about mental health, I have to tell you
32:25
I have a frog. His name is Kevin, and I don't sit on
32:31
the couch and watch TV with him. I don't sit there and pet in.
32:35
He lives in his cage on my desk and he watches me, right,
32:37
gives me motivation. But I always talk to him. He always listens.
32:43
It seems like he's always got some really good ideas. We have a
32:45
task communication thing going back and forth. But you know, I take care
32:50
of him every single day. I see him every single day. I talk
32:52
to him every single day. And all the times that I've known him,
32:57
and I did something that was bad, I'll admit this and everybody can hear
33:01
it. When the hurricane came, I evacuated with my dogs, my cats,
33:06
my bird. I left Kevin at my hospital by himself, and so
33:10
he had to ride out the storm all by himself. And I still to
33:15
this day feel guilty about that, you know, but he has never once
33:17
criticized me for leaving them behind. Yeah, so again, pets are amazing.
33:22
They always they always have your back, and no matter how bad of
33:27
a day you have, you've had, they're there to support you. Yeah
33:31
and listen. Yeah, we've touched on it a couple of times. What
33:35
I guess I want to ask specifically since we have written down as one of
33:38
our questions. Like I said, we've touched on it, but I guess
33:42
in your words, doctor Mader, like, what do you think the role
33:45
is that animals have in the treatment of human mental health? Professionally, there
33:50
are three groups of animals. There's what they call service animals, they have
33:54
what's called therapy animals, and they have mental health animals. A service animal
33:59
would be like a seeing eye dog for the blind. That's pretty pretty cut,
34:02
cut and dry. A therapy dog would be, for instance, you
34:07
have an autistic child, or if you have a child that's gone through a
34:10
traumatic experience and doesn't want to open up, or you maybe have a injured
34:15
war veteran that is having trouble relating when they get back home the United States
34:21
and you bring an animal in and now you're bringing in this neutral animal that
34:24
is actually nothing but positive because these animals don't judge, they don't care that
34:30
whatever it is that you've been through, they're there to support you and make
34:34
you happy. So that would be a therapy dog, then an emotional support
34:37
dog. There they're there basically just to offer the warm and fuzzy and that
34:42
would be the one you see wearing the coats that maybe we'll get on an
34:44
airplane with you, although now that's no longer legal and for money airlines don't
34:49
allow it. But so just the presence alone helps support our emotional well being
34:55
in many different ways, be it physical like a seeing eye dog, or
34:59
being a mental support for just being somebody to listen. And I don't I
35:02
can't stress enough how important that is because again, maybe they don't talk back
35:08
and tell you whether you should get the blue dress or the red dress,
35:12
you know, but they listen to you and then as you're talking to them,
35:15
you talk it out loud, and then you hear yourself and you can
35:17
help yourself make decisions by having a sounding board. And these animals are great
35:22
about that. It's so true. Animals are such a great way, a
35:28
great release, and such a positive energy and influence in your life. And
35:32
to touch on what you said earlier, the you are forensic trained, which
35:37
man, that sounds intense and rough. I've gotten to do a little bit
35:43
of child forensic psychiatry and just having to hear what those children have to go
35:50
through that vicarious trauma you take on. But by just trying to understand what
35:57
these kids just these horrible situations that they have to go through. It sounds
36:00
like to me that pets are both your source of trauma sometimes because of what
36:07
you have to do with your job, but they're also your healing force,
36:12
something that helps you. But I wanted to ask specifically, what do you
36:15
do to deal with the weight of being a veterinarian because it seems like a
36:21
heavy job. Oh God, it's funny you bring that up today, because
36:25
today was one of those days. On a scale of one to ten,
36:28
it was a one. Started out with one animal that was attacked by another
36:31
animal and shredded, and then I go to another case of a horse that
36:38
was poisoned deliberately by a neighbor who didn't get along with another neighbor. And
36:45
then eventually, like for instance, the dog that was shredded, it was
36:50
so bad we had we had to put it down. And that's that's hard,
36:53
and so that's difficult. And somebody wants to ask me, like,
36:58
you know, what's your favorite case that you member and God. In nearly
37:01
four decades, I've treated thousands and thousands of cases, and I don't remember
37:06
a lot of the positive cases. The ones that I remember are the ones
37:08
that I lost, and those are the ones that you take home with you
37:13
and that you loose sleep for several days over and they always come back and
37:16
somebody asks you a question, or you smell something that reminds you of the
37:22
smell of the burning dog that you saw in the house or the car you
37:25
know it's and that kind of stuff comes back and haunt you whatever it is,
37:30
whether it's the hurricane that destroys everything your own, whether it's a drunk
37:32
driver that nearly killed you, or whether it's a child that's going through trauma
37:38
or a pet that's been abused. I think it's important, and this is
37:44
your expertise, not mine, but I think it's important that we surround ourselves
37:46
with support network, that group of family and friends that you can talk to
37:52
and know that they're there for you and you'll be there for them. You
37:53
may never never need them, but knowing that they're there, it's nice to
37:59
know, because odds are at some point in your life you're going to have
38:01
a bad day. And to know that there's somebody there that you can lean
38:06
on, cry on their shoulder. It really makes a big difference, and
38:08
likewise it helps you if you're there to help them get through a rough time
38:14
too. Does that answer your question? Absolutely, I appreciate it, Doctor
38:19
May to thank you for being with us on a day that you would categorize
38:22
as a one. We appreciate that a lot. I was actually looking forward
38:25
to this because I needed something positive. We all have these good days and
38:30
bad days, you know, and you know, every day nothing defines you.
38:36
You have a bad day, that's not the rest of your life.
38:37
It's a bad day. You have a good day that's not the rest of
38:38
your life. It's a good day. But you need the days to balance
38:42
each other out so you can appreciate day to day and you know, everything
38:45
that went bad today, somehow I will turn it into a positive tomorrow.
38:49
And that's the way you have to kind of approach it. Your story reminded
38:52
me of one of the first couple chapters in your book, where you were
38:55
describing the story of Mickey the Mouse. The It was a school class mouse
39:01
that was brought in and you had done essentially a ton of work pro bono
39:07
for this teacher in her classroom to try and save this mouse. And it
39:12
ended up not going the way that you were hoping. And after you had
39:15
put your heart and your soul and your finances and so much on the line
39:20
for this mouse, your assistant had come in and knocked on the door and
39:23
said, the snakes are out of food. We need mice. Like that,
39:29
that irony in that book was just that was what drew me into the
39:32
book so much, because man, it's a balance, it's so it's such
39:37
a weird dichotomy of the things that you have to go through in your job.
39:42
Yeah, thank you for appreciating that. And it really is. And
39:47
no disrespect to m d's, but there are days where as a veterinarian,
39:54
I'll walk into a room and the first case I may have is somebody putting
40:00
down their dog that has cancer they've had for seventeen years. You can't rush
40:06
that, you can't hurry it through, like, hey, I've got another
40:07
appointment, excuse me, Let's get this over with. You have to be
40:10
there for him until they're ready. You walk out of the room, the
40:14
reception of stands you would chart and says, hey, Jane and John just
40:17
got a new puppy five feet away. You step into another room, Gotta
40:22
put on a happy face. I'm excited for your puppy. This is great,
40:25
you know. You gotta look all this to look forward to puppy school,
40:29
new toys, you know, blah blah blah. Then you walk into
40:30
the next room and then you have somebody with the kitty cat with a broken
40:34
leg five feet away, and like, hey, I can fix this.
40:37
You know, I'm a trained orthopedic surgeon. Well, I can't afford it.
40:39
Just put them down. So the range of emotions that veterinarians go through,
40:44
and that's one of the reasons that our profession sadly has such a high
40:46
suicide rate because you literally have to do this all day long. Where I
40:52
do know that in some countries suicide is legal. It's not in this country
40:55
here. But we basically, as veterinarians, we have to play god and
41:00
we put animals down often, you know, quite a bit, And that
41:04
to me will always be hands down the hardest part of my job. Even
41:08
though I know, like that animal this morning that was so badly mauled,
41:13
it wasn't salvageable. It was the proper thing to do. You never want
41:17
to have to do that because you can't go back from it. You know,
41:21
in a perfect world, we all want to walk on water. You
41:23
know, in the real world, you don't always see the stones and you
41:27
end up falling in. You know, my mantra every morning when I wake
41:31
up is my goal is I want to do everything I can to promote the
41:35
human animal bond and keep it as live as long as possible. And when
41:38
I fail, I take it really personally. I have to sit in like
41:44
silence for a little bit. The knowledge you're dropping to talk to me that
41:47
this is thank I mean, thank you for your wisdom. This is awesome.
41:53
Well, I appreciate you all letting me have a chance of platform to
41:57
share it. You know, it's I think a lot of people will get
42:00
to know their veterinarian in a very myopic world. They know they're veterinarian through
42:07
their particular pet. They don't get to see all the other exam rooms that
42:10
the veterinarian goes through on a day to day basis, and how their emotions
42:15
are basically a roller coaster, and allowing me to articulate that with you and
42:22
your listeners and your viewers. I think it's good. It helps them understand.
42:25
Yeah, I have to share with you real quickly. I write a
42:30
weekly column for a newspaper and then every year on New Year's Day, for
42:34
the New Year's column, I write the New Year's resolution for pet owners and
42:37
I always end that column every single year. Hug your Veterinarian. Yes that
42:43
I think we're going to adopt that as an official millennium mental health channel,
42:47
like we stand behind that. Hug your Veterinarian. I will say for sure
42:54
you have changed my perspective and my thoughts related to veterinarians. That is so
43:00
well. I thank you very much. You've worked with so many different veterinarians
43:06
in your lifetime. I hope that hearing you be open and honest and vulnerable
43:10
about talking about this stuff how hard it really is, encourages other people to
43:16
speak to maybe go get some therapy. What do you think because you've worked
43:22
with so many people, you've probably got a decent sample size. Is this
43:24
something that people talk about in the veterinary world. Is it something that people
43:28
are willing to go get helpful? Is there stigma? It's a stigma The
43:32
American veterinary medical Association has a great support system and you're able to go online
43:39
and then you can reach out and get help, and they have numbers where
43:44
you don't talk to a robot, you actually talk to a real person counselors.
43:47
So there is there is definitely help out there for the veterinarians that and
43:52
the everybody in the animal care team, you know. I mean, people
43:57
have this feeling that veterinarians are just for the money and we don't care about
44:00
animals. Truly not the case, because if you look at the salaries that
44:04
we make, it's certainly nowhere near in comparison to other professionals with the same
44:08
amount of training. And it can be very mentally challenging. And so whether
44:14
it's the receptionist at the front desk or an animal caretaker, an animal nurse,
44:19
or a veterinarian, it can be extremely challenging. And so, yes,
44:22
to answer your question, there are fortunately avenues out there. But I'm
44:27
sure, as you've seen, because you deal with this, this is what
44:30
you do. People are afraid to ask for help. This is maybe it's
44:34
a sign or weakness, or they're afraid to let people know that they need
44:37
to help. And I think this is where the three of us getting together
44:42
talking about it helps people understand that it's okay. You know, it's okay
44:45
to raise your hand and say, hey, listen, I need some help.
44:49
I know when I had my bad car accident after about the tenth or
44:51
eleventh surgery, I remember driving home from the hospital finding out I had to
44:54
have more surgery, aiming my car at the center divider on the freeway,
44:59
thinking okay, screw it, I'm not doing this anymore, and then sell
45:02
a little angel or devil or whoever reach down and grab my staring wheel and
45:06
straight in the car and I kept on going. But there are certainly times
45:09
when we all have those moments where it's you wonder, like why, why
45:14
is it worth it? But it is it is. You just have to
45:16
get through it, one moment at a time. Well, I love it.
45:21
I appreciate how open you've been, how honest you've been. I just
45:24
get the sense in talking with you and reading with you that you love animals,
45:30
You really, genuinely, truly enjoy and love animals. I love animals
45:35
and I love people, but I mean it's the whole package. I like
45:38
it. Well, we are getting towards the end of the episode, I
45:43
just cut off Edny there anything you wanted to add there? No, I
45:45
was just gonna say, I think every single answer you've given us, doctor
45:50
Mader, has been a take home point, and it's been crucial information for
45:55
our listeners. We like to finish with take home points. I wanted to
45:59
ask you if you had any take home points for us, and then Justin
46:02
and I can can drop ours, but if you have a take home point,
46:06
but also I want to give you an opportunity. Please whatever avenue that
46:09
people can find you plug away. I know you we've talked about your book.
46:13
Let us know where we can find your book, whatever, social media.
46:15
Just I guess take home point slash, where can everybody find you?
46:21
Take home point is I think it's really important to be open, and you
46:23
know, not everybody's going to be an extrovert, but certainly share your feelings
46:29
with the people that you're close to. And if you have a situation,
46:35
don't be afraid to ask for help. It's okay, you know, I
46:37
mean we all occasionally need help. I like to try and think of myself
46:42
as a superman. My body is so full of metal and nothing's going to
46:45
knock me down. But the reality is at the end of the day,
46:47
I hurt, and in the morning I wake up, I hurt. And
46:51
there are some days I don't want to get up, but then I think
46:52
about, Okay, today I get to go see missus Smith and I get
46:55
to help her canary, or I get to go and take care of this
46:58
horse, so I get to go play with an alligator, you know,
47:01
and then all of a sudden, the other stuff kind of falls away.
47:05
So don't be afraid to ask for help, don't be afraid to let your
47:08
emotions out. And it's not a sign of weakness. That's I think that's
47:12
really important. As far as how to get a hold of me, real
47:15
easy dougmator dot com. I'll get a very simple website to remember and you
47:19
can contact me through there. I'm also on Instagram and LinkedIn and Facebook.
47:25
I have a public Facebook page and Instagram page. Lots of cool pictures.
47:30
I share a lot of cases, and I deliberately do not put sad things
47:34
on there because I like people who look at it and walk away with a
47:36
smile. And I will share with you a very happy note if you log
47:40
onto my Facebook page. My most recent post was a picture of my kiddie
47:45
cat that I entered into a photo contest and it won first place in the
47:49
photo contest. And it was a picture of my cat sitting at the dinner
47:52
table reaching out to grab a piece of sushi off the plate. Oh,
47:57
I gotta go look at that. That's so cool. I will make sure
48:00
to put your website and everything on our show notes so people can find you
48:05
easily. Yeah, and the book right up there, the Noah's Ark again.
48:08
You can find it on my website or Amazon or any any internet seller.
48:13
It really celebrates the human animal bond. It's technically m M mark because
48:17
I wrote it. It's in the first person, but it's not about me.
48:21
It's about a bunch of people in the inner city that really love animals.
48:24
And it happened to take place during a really rough period in LA when
48:30
the unrests surrounding the Rodney King riots. So you take away nineteen ninety two
48:35
and sadly it could be anywhere a USA right now, and the human animal
48:38
bond is timeless. And if you like good animal stories, you'll love the
48:40
book. Love it. My take hoome point, I didn't know what I
48:45
was going to use today, but but I have one short one. Make
48:49
sure you hug your veterinarian. I love it. What do you got for
48:52
us? Just my take home point is you gotta go check out doctor madersgram.
49:00
He's got the bass pictures of all. Like, there's this really amazing
49:05
picture of him like in the water with a gator and it's just he's smiling,
49:09
the gators smiling. It's just so cool. So yeah, like Eddie
49:13
said, we're going to put links to all his stuff in the description of
49:16
this video. We're excited that you were able to come on the show.
49:21
It has been such an honor. You did an awesome job. We appreciate
49:24
you so much being on with us. Thank you so much for the invitation.
49:28
Maybe we can do this again down the road. You're a friend of
49:30
the show now, so that's absolutely we can do a part two. I'll
49:37
go ahead and tonight I'll go ahead and sign us off. If you've made
49:40
it this far, you probably know where to find us, but we'll remind
49:43
you we're available wherever you get your podcasts on Spotify. Feel free to leave
49:46
us a five star review. On Apple Podcasts, you can leave us a
49:51
comment as well as a five star review on social media TikTok, Instagram and
49:54
Twitter at Millennial MHC. I think you can also use that to find us
49:59
on YouTube. I think I say that every single time, but I never
50:00
confirm it. But you can just look up Millennial Mental Health Channel on YouTube.
50:05
And as always, well, as always think you all, but as
50:07
always, take care of your mentals.