Finding Balance in Our Lives with Pets - with Marissa Martino
How can the human side of pet training - understanding and addressing our emotions and mental state - contribute to a stronger bond with our animals and more effective training process?
In this chat with fellow pet professional Marissa Martino, we talk about...
why it's not just about teaching behaviors and working through training plans
how her dog Peru met the love of her life, a cat named Harold
what parallels there are between your work with your pet and your work with yourself
why "self care" most likely isn't the way to go
To listen to the full episode, click here to open it in your podcast player or press play below:
Peru (and Harold)
Peru and Harold’s Second Meeting: Basic Procedure
Put a baby gate between the 2 animals
Harold came into the room in a crate, then was allowed to explore one side of the room
Did “find its” to reduce arousal
Put Peru on a long line and harness to be safe
Reinforced Peru’s calm behavior around Harold
This episode’s guest: Marissa Martino
Marissa Martino began her career working with canine companions after attending the Academy for Dog Trainers in 2007. She is a Certified Dog Behavior Consultant (CDBC) through the International Association of Animal Behavior Consultants (IAABC). Since then, Marissa has had the pleasure of working for three different animal shelters directing their behavior departments in Colorado and California. Her latest role included offering animal shelters and rural CO communities the education and resources needed to expand their animal welfare impact.
In addition to her animal welfare career, Marissa operates her private practice, Paws & Reward, in Boulder, CO. She offers in-person behavior consulting and online programs. She is the author of Human-Canine Behavior Connection: Building Better Relationships Through Dog Training and hosts the Paws & Reward Podcast.
You can get in touch with Marissa here:
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how am I talking to myself throughout the day? Like I'm with that all day long. Mm-hmm. And so if I'm carrying a perspective that is really, unhealthy towards myself or the people around me or my dog, that is really draining me all throughout the day, that in my experience, no amount of bubble bath is going to really, um, sort of like wash that away.
📍 Hello, you cat and dog people. This is, its training cats and dogs. I'm Naomi Rotenberg, a certified professional trainer who specializes in helping cats and dogs get along, and this is the show for pet professionals and pet parents who want to level up their cat and dog coexistence skills. In each episode, we talk nerdy about how to get your pets or your client's pets living safer and happier lives together.
intro!!
I had the distinct pleasure of talking with my friend, Marissa Martino about the human side of living with animals, who we love so much, but honestly, their behavior it's a project. In this episode, we go deep into how to address all the feelings we carry around. And the stories we tell about ourselves and our pets.
That make a big impact on not only our relationships with our animals, but on the training process itself. And in addition to all that heavy stuff, we also talk about her dog. Peru's love affair with a cat named Harold. So without further ado, here's my conversation with Marissa.
Hello Marissa. I am so happy to have you on the podcast. We've been chatting about doing this for a little while and I'm pumped. So before we dive into our topic of the day... People who have been listening to this podcast for a little while, they know that I like to do a quick icebreaker at the beginning to get to know our guests a little better and some interesting information about you as a human. So, with this game of two truths and a lie that we're going to play, you're gonna tell me some facts, well, two facts, and one, that's not a fact.
And since I'm crud at this game, um, I'm gonna try to guess the lie and, and then, you know, that I might be able to do that and I might not. So quick disclaimer for everybody. I do know Marissa outside of this interview, so maybe that's gonna give me a little bit more of an advantage, but we shall see. Okay.
Okay. Um, I worked at Martha Stewart living in New York City for two years as a designer. My brother's name is James. I lived in San Francisco two times. Okay. First of all, my husband's name is James, so that's fun.
okay. Martha Stewart living, you're pretty cool and like have a good sense of style. So maybe, um, uh, wouldn't it be funny if you didn't have a brother? Maybe you don't have a brother. I don't know. I don't know anything about your, your family life. Oh God. Okay. And, um, San Francisco twice.
Lie, lie, I'm so bad at, I can't keep a straight face though. I'm the worst at this. No, I can't figure it out. Okay. I'm gonna say that the lie is, That you lived in San Francisco Twice Wrong. God freaking I do not have a brother. I I knew it was gonna be something stupid like that. Well, and it's funny because I'm like, my brother's name is, what did I pick earlier, James?
I'm really good at reading dog and cat body language, but apparently I not, not, I should not be a detective or some kind of lie. Oh my gosh, detective, that's so funny. I thought I had told you about the Martha Stewart living. That's why I was like, Ooh, I'm, I'm throwing her a softball with that one notice that I like didn't touch that one.
Right. Yeah. And thank you for saying I have some style and I appreciate that. Yeah. I mean, I was a designer before this, in that previous life of ours, previous life. So what an excellent segue to telling us how you got to the place that you are from your previous life to your now to my current life.
Current life dog training slash animal behavior esque life. Yes. I have an interesting story because it's not, it's not your traditional trainer. And it's so funny because when I heard your story mm-hmm. On my podcast, that you did not grow up with dogs mm-hmm. And that you got a cat right after, was it college?
Mm-hmm. That is similar to me in that, I didn't really grow up with dogs. I mean, we got a dog when I was like 17, but I was, you know, checked out. It was a Lhasa Apso from a pet store. my sister wanted it. I didn't even want it. Um, I didn't want him excuse the it reference there. and I went to school to become a designer.
I was a designer for several years in New York City and I wasn't passionate about it. There were so many dogs in New York City, and I was like, God, wouldn't it be cool to like, have a career with animals and reached out to all these different types of professionals like groomers and dog trainers and doggy daycare and whatnot.
And this amazing woman, Julie Sontag, we went out for coffee and she was like, I did the San Francisco, Academy for Dog Trainers program at the San Francisco S P C A. And I left that three hour coffee and called my dad, I'm moving to San Francisco, I'm gonna become a dog trainer.
And he was like, what the fuck? Like, y this is like my, my, my Italian dad from the Bronx. He was like, I'm sorry, what are you talking about? And I'd never trained a dog. I had no real experience. I don't know, it's just like an internal knowing Uhhuh where I was like, I'm gonna do that.
And then for a year and a half I planned to go. I shadowed a bunch of trainers in New York City and I went, that was the first time I lived in San Francisco. And since then I have sort of been in both worlds of animal sheltering and private practice. So I have worked at three separate, animal welfare organizations.
Humane Society of Boulder Valley, east Bay, S P C A, and Denver dun Friends League, either being a part of or managing their behavior department. And then I have always really run my private practice on the side of that because I. I never wanted to lose touch with working with private clients. And also I think it's really great to have both the experience of being in the shelter, working with animals, making decisions on which animals are adoptable, and then seeing what it is like when animals go into a home and how we can support both the client and the animal once they're adopted.
So I like living in both worlds. and right now I have my own practice where I am still living in both worlds. I am now doing a lot of shelter behavior consulting for organizations, across the country. And then I'm still seeing my private clients because again, I wanna stay connected to that.
And, they're such a joy to work with. So that's a little bit about me and where I have been.
I would love to chat with you a little bit about that kind of transition from shelter life to a home life, um mm-hmm. And some of the issues that clients of mine have had. They were told that their newly adopted dog is cat friendly or like they have a puppy who just like can't handle this new cat thing that's come into their house. So do you have some strategies that you had working in behavior, shelter behavior to try to figure out if those were gonna be good matches? Oh, that's such a great question.
Um, there's not a great way right now. There are particular evaluations that we used to use and they're not ideal. And I would highly suggest that no shelter do this still, which was we would put a cat in a wire crate mm-hmm. So that they're trapped. In the crate. Mm-hmm. And we would put them in a room.
So they're stationary, right? They're also not running or mm-hmm. Like, you know, climbing up something, they're stationary, put them in a wire crate and you'd walk the dog in and see how the dog responds to the cat. And so there's like, so many things wrong with this. I can like it, like my, my whole body shutters when I, when I hear this mm-hmm.
Because the cat does not have any escape options. We did this with my previous dog, Sully, when we used to do these evaluations at the Humane Society of Boulder Valley. This was like 13, 14 years ago. And Sully saw the cat and then he meandered around the office and sniffed. And I will tell you that that dog lived with a for a brief period of time in San Francisco, and his behavior was not sniffing around the house, meandering, looking at the cat. His behavior was hyper fixated on the cat, to the point where we had to keep them absolutely apart, which is, I'm, I'm loving your, your, uh, labels right, or your categories of how you're working with, with clients.
We kept them absolutely apart. And so that particular evaluation or moment in time, this is why we really steer clear away from behavior evaluations in sheltering in general. Mm-hmm. because they're a moment in time. They are, uh, sort of this, um, contrived situation. We can't make these grandiose generalizations that like, oh, the dog is friendly with other cats.
Mm-hmm. So for me, I don't encourage organizations to do that one because it's, it. This is a dramatic word, but I feel like it's inhumane to the cat. Mm-hmm. Um, and then two, it doesn't really give us the information that we're looking for. So I really try to steer adopters to choose dogs that have a history of living with, with other cats, right?
So if they're very concerned and they're nervous about how their cat's gonna respond to the dog, then we also have a conversation about like, why is that? Is this the right fit? Do we really think a dog is, is going to be a successful at living with your cat? Is your cat gonna have a decreased quality of life?
Like, we have those conversations. but if I were somebody looking for a dog at a shelter to live with my cat, I would want a, a probably a recent owner surrender. So where we have a history on that dog living quote unquote successfully with a cat like that to me, would feel like the safest option.
Even though we know that environment impacts behavior and just because the dog does well in one environment with the cat doesn't mean it will do well in another environment. And cats, you know, how they're engaging with that dog is going to impact their behavior, right? Mm-hmm. So it's, it is not a slam dunk, but to me, if I was looking for something like that, I would probably go that route where I have some history.
Mm-hmm. So I can at least make an educated decision versus like stray that I don't have any history on. Mm-hmm. I'm sort of taking a gamble as to whether or not I can successfully introduce them. Yeah. That's similar to what I recommend is if there's an owner surrender or like a foster situation. Yes.
Who also has cats. but yeah, even then, the personality of the cat really does matter. How the cat responds to the dog really affects how the dog responds to the cat. And then it's absolutely cycle. And so if we have a cat who is the resident cat who does not act like the cats that the dog was okay with in the foster in the previous home, like that might not work.
so I'm really glad that you're counseling your adopters in that way to really get a better and fuller picture of things that might contribute to things going well and things that might be more red flags. I wish that more kind of larger scale, Shelters have that kind of resources to really have those discussions with adopters.
I just, I see so many people who are just like, let's get them in. Let's get them out as quickly as possible. Yes. Mm-hmm. understandably, I mean, there's limited resources, limited time and all of that, but it does sometimes lead to really difficult decisions, that have to be made later on down the road.
Mm-hmm. So, before we get too deep into that, let's back up a little bit to you and your, you talked about Sully. I know you have, she's not a puppy anymore. Um, she's like old now. I'm just kidding. Yeah. You had told me a story kind of offline. How your dog, Peru has interacted with cats.
Yeah. How did those things come about? How did you make sure everyone was safe and just kind of what ended up happening? Yeah, so it, this is funny because I was going away on a trip and my friend was sitting for Peru. Mm-hmm. And she has a cat named Harold. And yeah, he is the sweetest little nugget.
And he has successfully lived with Harold, um, has successfully lived with several other cats, several dogs. Like he is just easygoing. He is like such a confident little nut. Like I just adore this cat and um, she was worried about, like, I could either leave Harold at home with my sister and her other cats, even though the other cats are kind of picking on Harold, or I can bring him here with Peru.
She's like, I would prefer to honestly probably just leave him, but could we try an introduction? I was like, yeah, I have not introduced Peru to cats before. However, she does love a lot of animals and so let's, let's see.
Mm-hmm. Um, and what we did is probably not. The greatest introduction, but I had her on balance harness and a leash, and we set up a baby gate at the top of the steps. And we wanted to bring Harold in, have him meander through the house without Peru there.
Mm-hmm. And so I took her on a pretty long decompression walk in the woods prior to the introduction. then I brought her back inside and Harold was already in there sort of meandering, but we were behind the baby gate. Mm-hmm. So that there was a physical barrier. And they would sniff one another. And I was seeing if she would take food and her level of interest with him, it felt.
A lot to manage. Like she was able to lie down on her mat. She was able to eat, she was able to, engage with me, but it was a lot of active management like you and I call it, Like, if I wasn't actively managing her, it wasn't fixating just watching and really curious.
And so we decided to, at one point, remove the barrier because we're like, okay, is this creating additional levels of frustration? And they engaged with one another, but then she wanted to play in a way that was like lots of legs and she's, she's small, and he was like, I don't really want this. And so then we went back to a lot of the active management and she's lying down on her mat or whatever.
And I looked at my friend and my friend looked at me and I'm like, do you wanna manage this while I'm away? And she was like, No, I, I, I really don't. And I'm like, yeah, I'm not loving this. And it was like, it was a period of time that we were both in the house coexisting. She's on leash, like it was like a 45 minute period where, you know, Harold's walking around and Peru's watching, but she's able to settle, she's able to eat again, it was 45 minutes of supervised management.
Mm-hmm. Um, and so we decided to say no. And I was like, okay, I'm feeling better about that. I don't want you to have to manage that and, you know, whatever. So I'm away and I'm away for like two and a half weeks. Mm-hmm. Cause I'm away for work and I am sick while I'm away. And like, just, I'm having a hard time being away.
And my friend who's amazing, she's a former client, she's incredible. I trust her explicitly. She wound up making this decision on her own. Like, I'm gonna bring Harold to the house because again, the cats were picking on Harold. He was having a hard time. So she's like, okay, I'm just gonna do an intro.
I'll have somebody, somebody else here a extra set of hands. And she did that without telling me. And she sends me a video. She, and she did it without telling me, because I was stressed, I was really sick. Mm-hmm. Like, it was like, I was dealing with a lot. She was like, do I wanna stress her out additionally?
Let me just try this. If it doesn't work, we'll end it, whatever. So she gets Harold and then she sends me videos, like I have to link to these videos. She sends me videos of Peru with her head, like laying on the couch. And Harold has got his paw on her head and he's just grooming, like licking her eye. And she is just in like, bli out.
Like state of being. And then she sends me another video of them curled up together. She sends me a video of when she takes Peru for a walk, and she comes back, Harold comes down and he's shimming with his tail up. And he's, you know, like so excited to see her. And I'm like, okay, stop. Like, this whole thing is darling, especially because Sully like I said, like Sully, no, we are not living with cats.
Uhhuh. Like, there's no way. and so I, this is one of my favorite things about Peru is that she just loves everyone so much. Like she just, there's a lot of love to give cats, dogs, people, kids. She's like my role model in that way. Like she just loves everyone and I loved that my friend took that initiative to just do it, and then she sent me these amazing videos of the two. She's like, Hey, I didn't wanna stress you out, but I just want you to know the love fest is happening here. And I'm like, stop with this. So that is my cat experience with Peru. I'm joking that I need to start fostering kittens, but yet she's so big in their ti, I don't know.
Anyway, so she definitely loves cats. I'd be interested to ask your friend, like kind of how she did that second intro and what went differently. Do you happen to know or should we like ask her? No, I didn't even, I, I'll ask her. I didn't even ask because I was like so immersed in. My work trip and being sick that I was like, great, it's going great.
Boom. Like, move on. Like, I, I didn't even ask, which is not very behavior consultee of me. You had other things going on. Yes. Yeah. Well, it's funny, Sarah Stremming always says, Marissa Martino, who is the behavior consultant, and Marissa Martino, who is a dog mom, are two totally different human beings with two totally different brains.
And so she's not wrong. I am like your average pet parent with Peru. And then I am a decent behavior consultant in real life. But yeah, I forgot. I forgot to ask. Cool. Well, that'll be your little homework assignment. I am gonna ask her. Yeah, that would be really fun to put in the show notes here's the scoop peeps, how it went down, because clients do that, right? Where like, they kind of, they messaged me. They're like, I kind of, I kind of went rogue totally. Um, where like we had this careful plan and then I was kind of like, fuck it, let's see what happens. And then like, it goes well, and I'm like, okay, well mm-hmm tell me what you did so that we can kind of map through the steps in between and like what was helpful to get you to this new magical land?
And also yay. You know, if you found something that worked better than what I was doing, like, let's try to figure that out because that's good for you. If it didn't go well, well hopefully everyone was safe and we learned some stuff and, uh, going rogue is, uh, you're paying me so.
So, yeah, if you wanna go rogue, sure. You wanna go rogue? Yeah. Yeah. The tricky thing about going rogue too, right, is like that person then got reinforced for going rogue, right? Mm-hmm. And so if there's another thing that you need that client to really not do, right? It's like, Hey, don't go rogue on this thing.
Like, cool, you went rogue on the other thing, but yeah. Yeah. I'm telling you, please don't go rogue on this thing because the risks are high, right? Yeah. And so what I've been starting to do is like being upfront with clients and say like, if what I'm suggesting doesn't seem feasible or Yeah, like you're just not gonna do this a let me know ahead of time so we can come up with something that is more like friendly to your house, to your routine, to your abilities.
Absolutely. All of that stuff. And then also if you want to go rogue, and I've said this to a few people, like if you want to adjust some of the things that we're doing. Let's talk about contingency plans for if things go really well and for if things go less well because, yeah, I love that because maybe a management fail happens. I would like us to be prepared ahead of time to know what to do in order to like minimize damage and also if we have magical interactions to like be ready to reinforce the shit out of those interactions, then.
Mm-hmm. Um, so I'd rather be like an accomplice in the rogue ness than to be, to be, to be like informed later. And Yes. Then they can't give me as much information about like what really happened. Yes. Um, cuz like I can be a maverick. That's cool. Like, yeah. Not always the slow and steady process that works the best.
Um, yep. So, you know, My clients teach me things too. So I'm interested to hear how it went with her going rogue, what it looked like. And it's so nice to know that Peru is such a love bug, that she is happy as a clam to get licked in the face by Harold.
It's also ridiculous because he like paws her head and holds his paw there and she's just like, sure, I will, it, it's like, it's just like I will bow down to you. I am devoted to you Harold. Like, there is just such a love there that I'm like, wow, this is, well now, you know, in the future that if Harold needs to be a house guest, then he's totally welcome. Yeah, he's lovely.
So, shifting gears a little bit, because you yourself, train dogs exclusively, although some of your clients also have cats. Mm-hmm. Um, but one of the things that's really awesome about you and your training programs is that you're very focused on the human side of the relationships.
So can you tell us a little bit about your programs and let's delve a little bit into the human emotions and stress that can come along with having animals that are struggling. Yeah. I think for a long time, gosh, for a long, long time, when I first started therapy in 2007, my therapist at the time , really smart woman, started to equate what was going on for me personally.
To my journey as a dog professional and a dog owner. Mm-hmm. Or pet parent. And I was like, wow, there's a lot of parallel here. Like I'm really curious about this. And I really focused on some of these parallels, like shining a light on my experience and, how I was showing up emotionally around my previous dog, Sully, who had leash reactivity.
I was really young when I had him and he was my first real dog, like my first dog as an adult. and I have a part of me that is really naive and wants things to go perfectly and is a perfectionist. And, when he didn't show up perfectly, this is where the behavior consultant brain is completely missing.
But, when he didn't show up perfectly, I very much made up a ton of stories about him, a ton of stories about the situation, and a ton of stories about me. And I walked around with those stories for a long time. Lots of shame towards myself, lots of like victim perspective towards him.
Like, ugh, like why is he reacting this way? And it really, lit up what I call in my coaching program, my saboteurs, the voices in my head that are, eagerly awaiting content to start shouting at me. How I'm in a situation where I'm being victimized, and then also I'm not doing the best that I can.
Right. So like those voices are sort of like waiting in the wings for something. Mm-hmm. And they latched onto the leash reactivity that I was experiencing with my dog. And when I was in therapy, she was making all these parallels and I was like, oh my gosh. Like, this is really interesting.
I'm learning about who I am through my relationship with my dog. And some of it wasn't pleasant. I was starting to shine a light inward and I was like, Ooh. Like, yeah, I'm a little impatient. And I'm projecting a lot of my experience onto this other being, and ooh, I do this in other areas of my life.
Yikes. You know what I'm saying? Like, there started off curiosity and then it got a little, a little real. I also loved that experience cuz I was learning about myself through this, wonderful container.
Right. It's my relationship with my dog, it's my experience with my dog. I was learning about myself and I noticed that when I shifted my mindset, my behavior shifted and then if my behavior shifts, then Sully's behavior shifts and then we're in this productive behavior loop versus this unproductive behavior loop.
And so I got really fascinated about mindset and how I can, you know, not toxic positivity, not. We're gonna have the best walk ever. And it's okay that he reacted or whatever. And not, not that, not like gaslighting my emotional experience more so just being really aware of what I was carrying emotionally and mentally into our interactions and what was working about them and what wasn't.
And so, I talk a lot about this on my podcast and, I was like, gosh, I wanna weave this into training mm-hmm. With my clients in a way so that they're aware. What are the stories they're telling themselves about the training process, about themselves, about their dogs, their animals, the people in their life that are helping them care for, like what are the stories that are being told and are they productive?
I mean, there's no time to do that during training, right? Like, you come to me and you're like, my dog's biting my child. Okay, well let's talk about your mindset. It's like, no, no, no. We need to, we need to set up management. Like we need to, we need to create a protocol that is successful and provide relief and management strategies for clients.
And then we can, like once, once they're like, they can breathe, then I do have a separate coaching session. So it's not training, it is coaching where we focus on their experience, their emotional experience surrounding those relationships that I talked about, their relationship to self, their relationship to their animal, their relationship to the training process.
Mm-hmm. Right? Because we, we have relationships to all of those things. And some might be healthy and others might be really challenged. So, we have that separate from training. So we are solely focused on what's coming up for them and, what's working, what's not working? How might we shift that?
How might we just sit with that? Because, uh, it's hard living and caring for an animal that has behavior concerns. And so I have found that even just creating space for that person to say those things out loud mm-hmm. And take responsibility for what they're feeling because not many of them have a space where they feel comfortable to do that.
Mm-hmm. they might have a therapist or a coach, but because they don't know, quote unquote dogs, like they feel like that's not the, the best place. so when they're talking to a behavior professional that knows their situation and can hold space for them to. To be frustrated and feel resentful and not feel judged about having feelings of grief or shame.
Mm-hmm. That is healing in of itself. Right. Where they can just like, let that out so that they're not holding it in their body and then behaving in a way that doesn't work for themselves or the animal or the training plan.
It's interesting to me how much anecdotal experience I have when people work with me in that way. And then the behavior concern gets slightly better. There is research to support that your mindset impacts your behavior, right?
Mm-hmm. And so, and our behavior impacts our dog's behavior. There is research to support those pieces. but it is fascinating how some, some of my clients have gotten to a place of acceptance around what they're living with, and then they're less grippy and outcome focused and they're not in this really tense, fixing urgent place. They sort of accept what's going on and strive for something better. Like they wind up holding space for both, and that releases a lot of the tension in the space, which is really beautiful. I've seen a lot of cool transformations for some of my clients where they're like, oh, wow.
Not only am I not as stressed, but the dog is feeling better and there's improved quality of life and she's not as reactive. Could this be a correlation? I'm like, yes. And I don't know, right? Mm-hmm. So, so that's my process and in tweaking it all the time.
Yeah. I think I wanna just shine a light a little bit on what you were saying that like in your traditional training plan package, there's no space for addressing the humans, and you only deal with their behavior as related to the context of the animal's behavior and how you can Yes.
Change it. Yes. And that makes sense financially, time wise mm-hmm. For people. Mm-hmm. Yep. But when you have these kind of longer term projects where, Things are gonna go up and down, that holding that space for the humans to work through whatever they're feeling is invaluable. I mean, I've included that in my programs from the beginning because as much as I can support you as a human, these are universal feelings that people who are going through stuff like this with their animals, we are all feeling very similar things.
And so it's nice to connect with people who understand and that it's not just your dog, it's not just your animals. Like this is affecting totally your life, your general stress level, your quality of life, and it's not auxiliary to the problems that the animals are having.
It's. Integral to the problems that the animals are having. Mm-hmm. Um, and I think that that's really awesome that you've recognized that and that at the beginning of your programs, you're like, damage control management. Let's take the immediate stressors off and then let's take a breath and be like, what's going on with you?
Mm-hmm. What's going on with, you know, in your brain? Do you have an example of a client recently who had a big kind of breakthrough about themselves based on how they were dealing with their dog?
Yes. I'm gonna give you like a general example because I tend to see clients that Sarah Stremming, and I call them like PET Plus, like they're, they are really into the podcast. Their dog or dogs are their life. They're really committed to training. They are savvy. Mm-hmm. Pet parents. Right. And because they know a lot and because they're doing a lot emphasis on doing, like they are listening to all the podcasts, buying all the webinar, like whatever.
Right. They're sort of immersed in the world. They also have a tendency to be really hard on themselves. So one of the questions I ask is, when your dog engages in a, b, c behavior, what assumptions do you make about yourself? And Yeah. Right. It's a big one.
And so my clients will be like, I'm the worst. I failed. If the dog lives elsewhere, he would be more successful. I'm a trainer, like cuz I see some trainers as well. I heard this the other day. If I can't, fix my dog, why am I in the business of supporting an anyone else?
Right? Like, just so much pressure. It's like, it's so heavy. Mm-hmm. And it, and you know, that's who I am as well. mm-hmm. And so I have so much empathy for them because it's so heavy, right? It's like, how are you measuring success? Oh, if your dog shows up perfectly, then that means you are a good enough pet parent.
And so, I have done some sessions with a few different clients around like, what does good enough even mean? Or, what are some other truths that are also existing? Like, is that the only reality? If your dog does this particular behavior, that means you are this. Is there another alternative reality besides what you just said?
We've talked a lot about, how they celebrate their dogs so much. How can we celebrate their attempts as well? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. So like one of my clients, she's, she's so sweet. She was like, after our coaching session, I feel like a new person because I was carrying around so much pressure with me, and now I'm like, oh, wow.
I, I have other new perspectives that we worked on together during the coaching session that tell a new story that don't require her to be perfect. Right? And that, that don't require her to get trapped in that perfection story. And it's been life changing for her in a variety of places. Like, not even just with her dog.
And this is what I love about this work is that she's learning through the context of her dog, but then she's like, oh my gosh, I do this with my job and I do this with my husband and, how, how can I make some small tweaks or what's a new perspective that I can bring in?
And a lot of my clients really, they wind up generalizing it to other parts of their life. On their own. Like, I'm not going, okay, let's talk about your relationship with your mother. Like, that's so not my lane at all. Um, but they do, like my client last night, she got on a call with me and was like, Hey, I gotta celebrate me.
I'm like, okay, do it girl. She's like, I set boundaries with my family. They're coming to vi. And I was like, amazing. I didn't teach her how to set boundaries with her family, but we did talk a lot about setting boundaries and advocating for her dogs. Mm-hmm. And then she's just now doing it in this other context and she wants to share it with me because she knows I love this.
Yeah. I mean, we have behavioral tendencies that are, while they are cued by certain specific contexts, they are likely to show up in a lot of different contexts in a similar way. Because we have schema for addressing our life and being like, well that kind of worked for this, so it's gonna work for this.
And it's nice that you can kind of flip that on its head and say, let's adjust here. And then they can adjust in other areas too. Yeah. I as well have a lot of wonderful pet plus clients who also find that sometimes I'll say, do less. Yes, yes. Totally Do, do less with your animals, cuz you're like a, putting pressure on yourself.
But like they're doing cooperative care work. They're doing activity work. Totally. They're doing cat and dog stuff. Like all the webinars at the same time. Mm-hmm. And I'm just like, well, let's focus on one and then use management for the other stuff so that you can breathe.
You don't feel like if you're not doing everything all at once. That everything is failing all at once, right? Yes. and magically sometimes me just saying, do less, do less cat and dog stuff, check in with me next week. They're like, the dog is relaxing more uhhuh because we're not doing like a thousand setups.
Setups. Yep. Mm-hmm. You know, the cat is just, is making a choice about whether they're gonna come out and then go back in, or like whatevs, they're just able to relax and just exist and enjoy each other more. Because as much as we love positive reinforcement based training, it's still a lot of learning.
Your brain is just working really hard. Mm-hmm. And if you're doing too much of it, then it can be stressful. Yeah. For your body, your brain, both on the trainee and the trainer side. So I love that. You hold that space for the people who really just wanna get it right and they do so much to try to get it right.
Yes. And sometimes it's not about getting it right. Sometimes it's about taking a step back and getting it right in certain places and kind of letting go in other places.
So when you're talking through these big emotions with people and help helping them reevaluate their perspectives, are there situations in which they kind of realize. I care about my animals so much that I'm not caring about myself enough. Oh, all the time. All time. You had talked about like celebrating your own wins all the time, but one thing that I am interested in is once they kind of add themselves into the picture and mm-hmm.
Start to rebalance priorities of quality of life, do they sometimes make different decisions about how much they're willing to do to work on their animals stuff? Oh, that's a great question. I have not seen that. I have not seen that change. They just are like energetically and cognitively holding a different perspective.
I haven't seen them go. Okay. Well, I don't need to do A, b, and C for my dog. I need to focus on this for me. Mm-hmm. like when I think about meeting my own needs, I call it like you're resourcing yourself. You can look at it in two different ways. One is the way that we have been taught all the time, that is like self-care, right? It's titled self-care. And some people have a reaction to the words that self-care, right? Mm-hmm. Because it can be negative.
And that can be a list of things to do. In our culture it usually is, right? Like, take a bubble bath, go to yoga, call a friend, go for a walk, right? Like, that can be a list of things to do, but it also can be a list of ways to be and like, If I'm just focusing on resourcing myself by doing stuff, I'm exhausted before I even do it.
Mm-hmm. Oh, I have to go take a bubble bath. Oh, I should really go to yoga. Oh, I should. Like, it becomes more of that doing again. Mm-hmm. Versus the way of being is how am I talking to myself throughout the day? Like I'm with that all day long. Mm-hmm. And so if I'm carrying a perspective that is really, unhealthy towards myself or the people around me or my dog, that is really draining me all throughout the day, that in my experience, no amount of bubble bath is going to really, um, sort of like wash that away.
Because then again, I wake up the next morning with that recurring story and that recurring shame and I need 40 bubble baths. Right? And so for me, I look at resourcing , in two ways, right? Like there are things, like yesterday I had a really hard day and I was like, okay, I gotta get away from this computer and go outside and go for a walk.
And I did need to do something. I need to physically move my body. I need to have the sun on, on my skin. Like I did need to change my environment. Like that was true. And I was also like, what's going on? What are some of my thoughts? Like, where am I getting trapped throughout the day? Why am I feeling down, oh, I'm thinking about A, B and C.
Is that true? What else might I need right now? can I think about that in a different way? Oh, no, I can't. Okay. I'm just gonna sit with that level of concern for a little bit. It's gonna come and go the same way that behavior is fluid. Our emotions are fluid as well, right?
So I think both are valid, right? Like how I'm talking to myself, how I'm supporting myself throughout the day, internally is as valid, maybe even more so than the going for the walk piece, right?
So I do feel like it doesn't have to be like, Marissa said I should resource myself. Well, screw the decompression walk for my dog. I need to go to yoga, right? Like, you may make that decision, but I don't see my clients just like foregoing the training plan or the enrichment strategy or whatever because they're now focusing on themselves.
There's ways that they can do it throughout the day that are productive. I think that's great that it's not adding more to your plate. It's not taking away from the time and energy. Well, it might take away from the energy a little bit the mental energy, right? Yeah. Because you have to, that is for sure a finite resource.
Mm-hmm. Right? Um, but in that, taking away from the mental energy, maybe we're also taking away from the unhelpful rumination and stories. Yeah. Yeah. And so it's actually good to take some stuff away from the animal's issue. If you take a little bit away from that mentally and you push it to, how can I shift my own focus to be more kind to myself and potentially have a more clear perspective on what's happening, a more realistic perspective on what's happening. Am I understanding what you're saying?
Yeah, absolutely. Mm-hmm. Yeah. I think about renewable resources a lot. Especially in my line of work where we're talking about multiple animals, we're talking about lots of stuff to juggle and adding more stuff onto the human is not the usually the best way to, yeah, absolutely.
We're talking about. All of this really deep stuff. And one thing we haven't talked about, which I think is a really good way to end this, which is like, how can we have fun with our animals?
Yes. how can we kind of get out of that heavy part of the relationship of like, I'm trying to help you feel better about certain situations that are stressful for you. I'm stressed. You're stressed. What space can we hold for activities that are enjoyable for us to do together to strengthen the relationship?
Because your whole thing is reflective relationship. That's your program. So do you have suggestions for people when they're trying to hold all of this? In their mind and come up with kind of a plan for themselves. What part of improving the relationship is literally like doing stuff with the animal that is unrelated to Absolutely.
Yeah. Yeah. We talk about that a lot. And I, I do ask the question like, when do you feel most connected with your animal? Mm-hmm. And, a lot of times it's snuggling with them, like it is some sort of physical engagement with them. and so I ask that question so that people recognize like, when do I feel most connected?
When do I have most fun with my dog? What are mutually beneficial activities that we both enjoy, so that they have that awareness so that when they are feeling that way, it's like, Hey, we're gonna do less this week and you're gonna have fun. I'm noticing that you're really burnt out with A, B, and C or you don't have the bandwidth or whatever.
Okay. We've got our management, strategies in place. Go ahead and have fun. And so my, my client the other day, I just, she's so great. She, she takes all my content and like, runs with it. She sent me her videos cuz she's a virtual client and then she said, I sent you a video.
Uh, it's in our folder. It's titled, the Reason I Love Oliver or something like that. And, She took a video of him laying down next to his sister Ruby, another dog, while Ruby's eating brussel sprouts just so slowly and ridiculously cute. And Oliver's just sitting there and he's got this cute little mohawk, like schnauzer terrier, uh, amazing cuteness.
Mm-hmm. And he's just wagging his tail, looking at his mom, looking at the brussel sprouts, just like, waiting his turn, because then like their routine is that Ruby leaves some, she walks away and then he gets to eat them or whatever. And they have a lovely engagement. The two dogs, like, it's, it's really quite lovely to watch.
And so she filmed that, like she took a video of that so that when she's overwhelmed by his leash reactivity or whatever, she's gonna watch that. And I was like, you are so damn smart. When do I feel so filled up by this dog? I'm gonna fill up our relationship cup by watching that video, and then I'm gonna go interact with him.
Right. And so, yes, always time for fun. I'm not the best at having fun. I'm trying to expand my behavior repertoire around fun. Mm-hmm. Um, I'm like very business oriented, type A, gotta get stuff done, high productive. And so there's a lot of times where I'm like, drop everything and go be silly with Peru.
Right. So it's, it is hard for me. and so I talk to my clients about that as well. Like, what's fun for you right now? How can we incorporate that into your relationship with your dog? What does that look like? And so some of 'em already have that, and some of them need a little support in terms of what that might look like.
I love Amy Cook's work, the Play I tell my clients to take those courses like on Fenzi Academy. Like I, I love the work that she's doing around play. And so, um, yeah, we do have fun. I am also really bad at having fun. Mm. Um, well, aren't you originally from the East Coast?
I'm gonna make a stereotype right now. Yeah. we're like East coast, like high drive, do it, get it done, go. Yeah. You know, neurotic Jewish upbringing, blah, blah. Yeah. Which is speaking of telling stories about ourselves... let's get personal, right? I think of myself as funny and like entertaining. You're very funny, but I'm not fun. Oh, I s I think about myself the same way. Yeah. So it's like, am I projecting the fun to other people? But like, not internalizing it, like, like, oh, wow. Okay guys. Well, and also I wanna say there's something like, for me growing up, I danced competitively, uh, growing up and there's a performing element.
So I love to like be a ham and make people laugh and I feel connected to people in that way. And so, I think for me personally, having fun would really be like totally letting loose, right? Whereas like, Being funny to me is a little bit performy, if that makes sense.
But yeah, I definitely, just being silly, that's not an fluent behavior for me working on it though. Agenda for therapy for next week. No. Yeah, Exactly. Marissa, thank you so much for being on this podcast. And everyone I am sure is like, she's so freaking cool. And wanting to know a little bit more about you and your program. So where can they go to find you your awesome content and potentially work with you?
Yeah, go to paws and reward.com and I'm on Instagram Paws and Reward. Also have Paws and Reward podcast wherever you find your podcasts. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you so much for having me. This was so fun.
I had so much fun talking with Marissa. Her take on self care has made a huge impact on how I think about my energy levels, being realistic with what I'm able to accomplish in my life and with my pets and just being more intentional with my thoughts. Plus, she's just a really cool human. So if you want to learn more about Marissa, please head over to the episode, show notes.
That's linked in the episode description in your podcast app. And as a bonus, there is also a few pictures of Peru and Harold up there for your viewing pleasure.
And listen up you fellow pet professionals. If you are working some cat and dog cases, and you'd like a second set of eyes on your training plan or some troubleshooting help, I have gotten mentorship and consulting options for you. Because working solo on a case is fine, but it's much more fun to have someone to bounce ideas off of. So you can go to praiseworthy, pets.com/services for pet pros to get more info.
And the link to that page is in the episode description as well. I cannot wait to talk nerdy with you.
And my wonderful listeners, if you've made it this far in the episode, please tell your friends about the awesomeness of this podcast. If you know anyone who has dogs and cats send them your favorite episode. Or you can just give them a call catch up about your lives and then drop a casual mention about it's training, cats and dogs.
I'm sure you'll be able to work it into your conversation somehow in a super casual way. And that is all for this episode. You wonderful cat and dog people. I will see you soon for more it's training cats and dogs.
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