Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Animal Psychological Journeys (Bob & Muffin)












(To the left is one of the kittens and Fidget, the Old One. To the right is Muffin meeting the kittens. Click to enlarge. These pictures were taken about 8 months (?) after Bob died.) (For photos of Bob, go here [you must have a facebook account to view the pics].)

The Story

In order to write about this, I must tell a story. Let me take you through it piece by piece, because it's a life we're talking about.

The story is mostly about Bob and Muffin, but it starts back in 2003, when we didn't yet have either of them. (You can skip down to the part about Bob's illness, or Muffin after Bob died, if you want only to read about Muffin's journey.)

Chapter One: Acquiring the Ferrets (How we got Bob & Muffin, et al.)

In 2003, I went on a speaking tour through Europe. We had two ferrets: Tut and Fidget, both brown.

A neighbor (Mike) who also owned two ferrets offered to watch our ferrets while we were gone (my two teen daughters came with me on the tour). At the end of the tour, we returned and reclaimed our two ferrets. Mike asked if we would take care of his ferrets if anything happened to him. I said, of course, anytime, not thinking much about it. I knew Mike was an alcoholic and bipolar -- he had told me so, but I didn't consider him suicidal.

However, some time the following year, Mike committed suicide. When I found out about it, I tracked down his ferrets, who had been taken by a wildlife shelter, and adopted them. We renamed these two ferrets Bob and Geezie. Poor Geezie didn't live more than a year. She had a medical condition common to ferrets but I could not afford surgery for her, which I only later learned was really the only treatment. Tut also sadly lived only a few years, succumbing to another common ferret disease.

Bob and Fidget remained and became buddies. Bob was champaigne colored.

Through this time, I had become increasingly ill myself (what was later diagnosed as trigeminal neuralgia). But it was during this time that I began to take Bob out for morning walks. I occasionally took Fidget out, too, but it was Bob who LOVED these walks the most. It was Bob's joy that started my close observations of and attachment to ferrets. As ill as I was, seeing his joy was about the only thing that made me happy. Knowing I could make him happy seemed to alleviate my pain a bit.

Chapter Two: More Ferrets!

Eventually, we moved to north central Florida. At one point, I saw a sign posted about a stray ferret. I called and said it was not mine, but if nobody called and she didn't want to keep the ferret, I'd take her in. The ferret became ours.

She was an albino and apparently she had been stray for awhile because she didn't know what ferret kibbles were (like, WHY are you feeding me THIS? I want something live!) and she was afraid of the other ferrets -- and of birds! I spent six months, about two hours every day, working with her to get her to adjust, eat, etc.

I decided -- foolishly perhaps -- to buy a baby ferret in the hopes that she would be less threatened by him. The stray (named Oompa) attacked him. So, not being willing to bring him back, I bought another baby who had been in the pet store with him. These two we named Muffin (who was the first and almost all white but with bluish black eyes -- unlike the albinos, whose eyes are red) and Zoombini (after the children's computer game; he was black with white undercoat and a white arrowhead on the back of his head).

To make a longer story less long, it was Zoombini who taught Oompa how to play again. (I say "again" because she had originally been a ferret purchased and kept domestically like most others. I knew this because she had a tatoo on her ear like all the ferrets bred by Marshall Farms. Most Marshall ferrets are well-socialized to both other ferrets and to humans.)

So, with Oompa and Zoombini (and Muffin), I would bring them onto my bed for some supervised playtime and Zoombini would go under the blankets, so she couldn't bite him; then he'd come out when she went under. Eventually she realized he was playing and she came to accept him and Muffin (who were bros).

It's odd because Zoombini is the skittish one, but he always has made friends with newbies first. Muffin (the dark-eyed white one) is a really gentle, kind ferret, but he doesn't make friends as quickly.

Chapter Three: Bob's Illness

But meantime -- and here's the crux of my story -- Bob started jumping Muffin and Muffin -- still a young lad and not as big as Bob -- would literally scream, like he was dying. Since Bob was just plopping his fat belly on top of Muffin and not biting him, I watched and only separated them if Muffin really seemed upset.

But soon thereafter, Bob became ill with pancreatic tumors. The story of his illness is long and I won't go into it here. Suffice it to say that even after all the medical treatments and surgery, Bob had to be put to sleep.

When we brought Bob to the vet that day, we brought Fidget, Muffin, and Zoombini to be there with him. Bob went to sleep gently and without pain or struggle. Fidget never seemed to notice that Bob was gone. All three surviving ferrets checked out his body after he passed. Then the vet wrapped him and we took him home to bury him in the back yard (where the ferrets often played without restraint, since it is a large, semi-wild, completely enclosed yard).

When we got home, I unwrapped Bob so the three other ferrets could smell and see him one more time. Then we buried Bob. Ferrets love to dig in dirt. Muffin is a great digger and Zoombini particularly goes wild when I dig with a shovel.

Muffin and Zoombini, therefore, helped dig the grave. Muffin was there when I covered Bob with the dirt.

Chapter Four: Muffin, After Bob Passed

The next day, Muffin would not go out into the yard. He went to the glass doors outside of which was Bob's grave, and he looked out, but he wouldn't go out.

For days, Muffin lay around the house, listless. He wouldn't play with Oompa or Zoombini. He ate massive amounts of treats -- that was all he wanted to do, eat treats.

I had never realized how close to Bob Muffin was until then.

After about a week, Muffin finally went out in the yard ... and the first thing he did was to try to bury himself under a pile of leaves.

Our yard is very leafy. Ferrets like to dig tunnels in the dirt and they like to go under things, but they don't generally bury themselves under things, and it's not like they really have the manual dexterity to do so very well.

But Muffin literally tried to get himself under the leaves ... just like he had seen happen to Bob with the dirt.

Chapter Five: My Interpretation of Muffin's Psychological Journey

When I told one of my daughters about this, she said "He wanted to be close to him."

Indeed. I think it's as simple and as complex as that.

Muffin loved Bob. His high-pitched screams had fooled me into thinking he was afraid and upset by Bob, but they were really part of his play with him.

The two looked a lot alike, too. Bob was off-white and Muffin was ivory.

(This is not the first time I've seen ferrets choose or get attached to other ferrets who look like them, by the way. It's happened a few times in my household since Bob and Muffin, one time between two dark ferrets, another time between two albinos.)

Bob was, at the time of his death, bigger than Muffin still. He was like a father figure to Muffin, in a way. He taught Muffin how to play like the big guys did.

In the week after Bob's death, Muffin seemed like he doubled in size, reaching his full length and weight.

What is amazing about all these events is that Muffin clearly was trying to find a way either to experience what had happened to Bob or to get to Bob again. Either way you look at it, Muffin realized at some point that Bob was gone forever. And it was clear that he was quite bereft.

These events and circumstances with Bob and Muffin also suggest that Muffin identified with Bob in a "psychological" way. He saw Bob as his buddy. He saw Bob as "like" him and he was trying to "be like" Bob. He was trying to put himself into the same situation as he understood Bob was in, so he could be with him or find him or be like him somehow. He was like he lost part of himself that he couldn't find a way to make up for, to replace.

Muffin's Recovery & Friendship with Gong

Muffin didn't quite get back his previous joy in life for almost a year ... until we acquired yet another stray animal... or rather animals: this time 3 male kittens (they are a gorgeous Siamese-Lynx-Tabby mix). They were so tiny when we got them. Muffin befriended them -- especially one of them named Gong (pronounced Gung -- don't ask).

Some of the ferrets would sneak up on the kittens and nip them or jump them, holding the backs of their necks with their mouths. (Ferrets do this to each other sometimes and don't hurt each other, so they might not have known it didn't feel so good for the kittens. On the other hand, they might also have been trying to tell them who was boss!)

Muffin never bites, though, and eventually Gong learned how to play with Muffin the ferret way -- jumping and rolling each other.

They chase each other at high speeds, which Muffin loves. Gong got considerably faster than Muffin as he grew, so Muffin learned to hide inside a ferret tube until Gong wasn't looking. Then Muffin would come out and pounce on Gong. Then Gong would roll Muffin and so on...

Muffin and Gong are inseparable now. Although I'm overseas at the moment, my daughter who is taking care of the pets tells me that if one of them drinks water, the other one does too. If one goes out, so does the other.

We are all on journeys our whole lives. It is amazing that ferret journeys can take years to resolve, just like ours. Even though their lives are short, it can take months or years for them to accept or love each other (or others) and months or years to overcome loss. The emotional or psychological fabric of a ferret is just as complex and nuanced as that of a human. It is only our blindness, our callousness, our separation from nature, that prevent us from seeing or knowing this.

(As an epilogue, Fidget is the sole survivor of the original group. Ferrets normally live only about 8 years. Fidget is going on 9 now. Muffin and Zoombini are about two now. The kittens are rascally teenagers, much larger than the ferrets now. We also have several other ferrets: nine in all! Someday, it will be an epic story!)

Sunday, October 26, 2008

Animals & Humans

As promised on JVB's Astro News and at the end of my first post here.

There are two things I want to discuss:

(1) the animal/human connection

and

(2) psychological journeys experienced by animals.

Here I will discuss the first of these only. In a subsequent post, I will go into the second.

I have a half-baked theory that animals and humans share an evolutionary connection that is critical to the survival of the human race. I mean that it is critical that we recognize this connection and respect it.

This is not quite the same as saying "respect animals." Respecting animals means we leave them alone, don't hurt or kill them unnecessarily (that's a big caveat and I'll say more about it at some point later), and maybe keep some as pets and be nice to them.

Respecting our evolutionary connection with animals means something more. It means that we promote wild animals' right to live in the wild freely and unmolested by us. It means, ultimately, that we stop building human cities out into the wilderness, stop logging and destroying forests, stop polluting the air and waters, get rid of cars, stop paving roads... It means that we stop treating them as toys, sport, or spectacles to view. It means we learn to live with animals again as equals.

Native Americans view animals as teachers. This is, I believe, the proper way to view them. They know a LOT more than we do about nature because they can never really leave it. It's true that they must live according to our conditions in the world we have made over for ourselves and they do adapt, but they never cease their basic connection to the animal and natural world. If they are allowed to be themselves, they can indeed teach us a great deal about ourselves. They can, in fact, bring us back to ourselves, when we have lost our way. It is now well-accepted that animals can help people to heal from trauma or injury, both psychologically and physically.

Part of the reason for this is the capacity of animals to love and accept us unconditionally. They will return love with love. No mind games, no projection of their problems onto us, no ambitions that they want to use us for.

But I believe it's deeper than this. My daughter believes that animals bond "instinctively." By instinct she means that they do it naturally. They don't have to be taught. But what does that mean really? It means that they have feelings, for one thing. It means they can perceive feelings in others -- both in other animals and in humans. It means they can assess feelings for value: is it a "good" feeling or a "bad" one? They don't have words to describe any of this, but they know it, for they know when (and from whom) they should run and hide or when (and with whom) they can play.

It's not really instinctual, because instinct is not developed through social interaction, but animal socialization IS and that includes animals' abilities to love, play, fight, and so on.

And this is a basic reason why our interaction with them is important. Cultures that live in close proximity and relative harmony with animals have historically been environmentally sustainable communities that do not damage their home planet.

The damage we have now done to our environment is so massive that it is almost impossible for us to see it. We live IN it and we're used to it. We walk down paved city streets, with concrete buildings rising directly out of them. There is no wilderness anymore. The visual stimulation from trees and plants and sky and earth and water is gone. Our minds and our eyes are as dead as the ground we walk on. We go into nature as an excursion, to take pictures, to get exercise, to observe nature (as if we are no longer a part of it). Even many who live in relatively rural areas use cars to travel, separating themselves from the world they inhabit.

This disconnection between us and nature has been written about by others. Jerry Mander wrote about it in 1992 in his book (one of my bibles), In the Absence of the Sacred: The Failure of Technology and the Survival of Indian Nations.

In sum, I believe the future of our planet depends on our connections with animals. If we can learn again how to respect our evolutionary connection and to live in nature with them, imagine how different things would be.

(Note that I don't mean to ignore the fact that there are animals who would prey on humans. Again, though, I would point to the relationships between First Peoples (Native Americans) and animals, including predators -- as well, as those they would traditionally hunt for food. There's a good amount of evidence (some discussed in Mander's book) that aboriginal hunters hunted in a way that preserved indigenous species. For example, the Inuit traditionally hunted only younger weaker Elk. The stronger elk remained to protect their herds. This is quite different from raising animals for slaughter.)

Saturday, October 25, 2008

Enantiadromia -

There has been some discussion recently on one of the listserves I'm on about the Jungian/Heraclitian term "enantiadromia" in relation to the present election.

For example, one person wrote:

"
At the more collective level of the two parties, I do see some enantiadromia being expressed. McCain is the antithesis of a 'conservative' in his public persona, while Obama is far removed from the emotionally driven 'bleeding heart' stereotype as one could get. Their policies may each be driven by their respective parties (party's?) traditional stands, but their public performances have enacted alot of the opposites." (See JVB's Astro News for Maureen's complete post.)

What is enantiadromia?

It's not listed in dictionary.com.

One astrology writer defines this as "A psychological phenomenon wherein, when one resists something long enough and hard enough, one becomes that thing by flipping violently to the opposite." From: Definition of Jungian Terms, by Nancy R. Fenn

Here are some examples provided by "Gritchka."

And here's from a therapist's perspective:

"This pendulum swing, or enantiadromia, is defined by the Greek Heraclitis as 'Where the deepest point of saturation with darkness gives birth to a rapidly expanding point of light.
'"
From: Dream Talk, by Ken Kimmel, M.A., C.M.H.C.

For me, saying that one may turn into one's opposite is quite different from talking about the birth of light out of darkness.

The simplification inherent in the entire ying/yan idea has always bothered me. Women are not simply the opposite of men. There really is no such thing as a simple good versus evil in life.

I think that opposites are a good initial way to frame and distinguish things. We can see that if he acts unkind, he is not our friend. If she makes lots of money, she is not poor.

Defining something by the negative can help us to see what it IS.

Another example of how humans "do" opposites: we tend to create oppositions relative to parts of ourselves that we have a hard time accepting or integrating into our self-image.
The psychological term for this is "projection." We deny and dissociate from ourselves whatever part(s) we cannot accept and project those parts (or characteristics) onto another (or onto an entire other social group). Thus it is that a great deal can be learned about someone by studying who is his mortal enemy.

But neither of these facts compel the conclusion that life is made up of opposites. The "deepest point of saturation with darkness" is not the opposite of light (or of lightness). It is a specific emotional, psychological "place" that you don't arrive at by simply turning off the psychological lights or by seeking out a cave.

Quantum physics has shown, however, that there is no place without light. The lowest state of background light and energy, in the vast darkness of the "empty" regions of space, is called the "zero point field."

Astrophysicist Bernard Haisch writes:

"
The fact that the zero-point field is the lowest energy state makes it unobservable. We see things by way of contrast. The eye works by letting light fall on the otherwise dark retina. But if the eye were filled with light, there would be no darkness to afford a contrast. The zero-point field is such a blinding light. Since it is everywhere, inside and outside of us, permeating every atom in our bodies, we are effectively blind to it. It blinds us to its presence."

Our own personal darkness comes out of pain, denial, loss, grief. In the movie, What Dreams May Come, Chris (played by Robin Williams) dies and goes to heaven. After his death, his wife commits suicide and goes to hell. Nobody who goes to hell ever gets out, but Chris decides to try to retrieve his wife and bring her back to heaven. The key to his success is that he is willing to go there and be there with her in her great grief and sorrow. He doesn't try to convince her to come out of hell with him; he doesn't try to convince her that her awful pain is just a delusion. He goes into her darkness with her because he loves her.

While it is easiest to explain this event as "going into the darkness in order to find its opposite," the important message in this story cannot be adequately conveyed by a metaphor of opposites. Nor can it be conveyed by the cliched aphorism "love conquers all." The deep message can only be conveyed by the story itself. It tells of a unique human psychological situation and inner journey.

(Animals are not exempt from such psychological journeys, by the way. More on this later.)