The Touch Tells All, a day with Linda Tellington Jones

July 2010 has seen its share of venomous bites and high temperatures in Santa Fe, New Mexico. "My" assistance dog Emma was recently bitten by a slithering critter ( the vet suspects a dry snake bite, but it could have been a six inch centipede) which caused her fragile face to swell and her eyes to become light sensitive. After a few visits to the vet and opthamologist, Emma had greatly improved. As part of Emma's healing curve, the Founder of Assistance Dogs of the West, Jill Felice, had extended to me and Emma an invitation to attend a lecture with world renowned animal healer Linda Tellington Jones.

I was not new to Linda's work. In Kentucky, where I had worked with Event Horses, I had attended an Equitana Trade Show and had purchased books and DVD's by her and had handily applied that knowledge to my horse and some horses who balked at hands near faces, and vets approaching. The results were quick and dramatic. These lessons were available to me again with a different concentration ---- the knowldege was now to be applied on smaller four legged creatures of the canine variety.

And so Emma and I arrived to the Santa Fe Rodeo Grounds on Saturday July tenth and entered the conference room replete with dogs on fancy cushions, dogs on well clad laps, dogs in well fashioned crates, and dogs sequestered in elaborate playpens with owners and caretakers nearby. I felt naked with Emma. We had entered the room with merely a halter and leash. But as Linda Tellington Jones warm words were delivered and hands took action, the self-consciousness abated and the healing began.

Our morning session began with the subject of anxious dogs. Specifically Dogs made anxious by fireworks, thunderstorms and the like. We've all known dogs that lay frantic and shaking under beds or in our arms when those thunderous sounds bellow after the flash of light. On the farm in Kentucky, I had known a typically bold and courageous Heinz 57 dog named Hanna who would cower in the corner with tail "barnacled" ( a new word for Websters) to her haunches with the onslaught of thunder. What to do? Linda had suggestions. Linda brought one thunder-fear-filled client's dog up to a table and applied a "thunder shirt"( a soft shirt made of formidable fabric) which wraps securely around the dog. Once securely wrapped, the dogs feels fortified in the presence of thunder and sudden such noises. I mentioned to Linda that it reminded me of Temple Grandin's (see earlier blog entry) squeeze shoot which she used to help her during bouts of anxiety spawned by her autism. Linda nodded appreciatively and said that it worked off a similar principle.

Linda moved on to illustrate some healing moves, all a part of her now famous "T-Touch"-- A series of hand movements used
to increase cellular communication so that a tense and or traumatized animal would become a healed and well integrated one. The corner stone to her touch technology involves using one pointer and middle finger, pressing gingerly and gently in just over a full circular movement clockwise, resting for a moment, and moving on to an adjacent area, covering the totality of the creature, avoiding senstive areas, until the creature is calm. The various hand movements and techniques read like a list of zoo animals, "coil python, raccoon, abalone, bear claw, lying leopard", and it is no wonder as Linda Tellington Jones has been called by many a world class zoo to help heal animals that zoos haven't been able to heal utilizing conventional methods. But how does it work, and where did this Tellington Jones T-touch come from? Inquiring minds wanna know!

Linda's work arose out of her life long commitment to animals sparked by her childhood home, where animals of all sorts lived and dwelled. Linda began riding horses at age four, traveled on horseback to class through Canadian snow bound lanes, soon began competing on horses, only to later join forces (both in matrimony and career) with fellow equestrian and mentor Wentworth Tellington. Together they opened the Pacific Coast Equestrian Research Farm in Los Osos, California which conducted clinical research for the "improvement of equine performance and care as well as the Pacific Coast School of Horsemanship. After over a decade of success there, Linda divorced, went off on her own, searching for a different destination where she could expand her world beyond equine education. She sold her stable full of horses traveled to Zurich, Germany, collaborated with fellow equestrians involved in Equitana Horse Trade Fairs, and returned to the states to study under Dr. Moshe Feldenkrais over the next four years. Feldenkrais, now famous for his revolutionary methods of mind body reintegration, taught Linda how to utilize non threatening movements to activate unused neural pathways to bypass areas of tension and trauma spawning healing and transformation with humans.

Linda took what she had learned from Feldenkrais, a lifetime of living amongst animals, and some massage techniques her Grandfather had learned from Russian Gypsies while training Tsar Nicholas II's prized Thoroughbred Race horses, added a hefty dash of her well developed intuition, and voila, T- Touch for Horses, Hounds, and now Humans...........

From the front of the room, Linda came to where Emma and I now stood. She bent down to greet Emma. Her well honed hands cupped Emma's eyes in the "Abalone" movement. She gently massaged the spot between Emma's eyes, the spot that Yogi's would call the "third eye". She gently gathered ground across Emma's bodies donning the healing circles with raccoon touches all across little Emma's golden coat. Emma emanated joy. And in the end, I had a special communication that my hands could deliver to Emma. We walked away from the Rodeo Grounds with a prescription for improvement and healing.

To learn more about Linda and her Touch visit her website www.touch.com

1984 reads like a novel

1984: Stranger than Fiction.

Nat Dean's life took an abrupt turn as a vehicle struck hers in 1984. Her world as a successful San Francisco Artist, and Art marketing magnate replete with a six figure salary was tossed asunder just as her body and her brain bounced continuously against the cold metallic boundaries of her vehicle. Nat was struck, struck from behind, back ended, and set on a new course of living.

Since that time, Nat's life has read like a novel surely as surreal and complex as George Orwell’s 1984. Like 1984, Nat’s life is now all about Mind Control. -- Control of the faculties that she once took for granted. Nat must now muster the patience, courage, and faith to make it through each day. As she wanders through the hours, Nat’s mind makes mince meat of chronology, direction, and content.

Having sustained four major surgeries, a wired jaw and a five year spell of eating through a straw, Nat’s condition is now understood to be primarily Traumatic Brain Injury, a relatively new term that simply describes injury to the brain which can be both small and comprehensive as well as temporary or lingering. Nat has the lingering and far reaching variety, which in the medical circle is described as Contra Coux, an all over global brain injury which has left her with chronic pain, headaches, depression, chronic adjustment disorder, and PTSD.

But aside from the unrelenting pain, Nat has had two other constants in her life, Her husband of twenty three years, Paul Singdahlsen, and her beloved Assistance Dogs who have marched alongside her one step and one moment at a time.

Nat’s veritable pet parade began with Frederick in 1990. Frederick (a student at Guide Dogs for the Blind in San Raphael, CA) who was redirected to become an assistance dog) was then a two-year-old German shepherd assistance dog who immediately helped Nat deal with issues of confidence, getting her out of bed and out into the world, as well as helping her with her repeated black out seizures often spawned by flash cameras. Frederick would stand over the struck down Nat, wearing his assistance dog vest, and would bark beckoning on help. Without Frederick, Nat could easily be construed as a drunk or a drug addict. Frederick’s presence and vested credentials gained Nat credibility and from that credibility a greater chance at assistance both from him and humans nearby. Frederick was a veritable Lassie, rescuing his loving owner time and time again. But there were the more subtle scenarios in which Frederick would redirect Nat’s broken compass by putting her on the correct path home, to the car, or round the corner. Frederick’s constant gait would serve to better Nat’s often inconsistent one, and her meager balance was bolstered by his leash and presence.

And then there was just the simple companionship. Nat often found herself alone in the world. Friends that once had stood by in her Artist –high- on -the -hog hey-day had dissipated as her humpty dumpty –ness became apparent. Friends fell off during the 18-24 months when Nat had simply fallen asleep during conversations. Frederick didn’t seem to mind the sudden slumber or the truncated conversation. Frederick stood by her, with attentiveness, kindness, and the almighty unconditional love. Frederick was the friend for the seemingly friendless. Frederick didn’t judge. Frederick didn’t care if his human partner took to napping or disorienting.

As time traveled forward, Fredericks’ hip dysplasia festered and left him unable to provide the assistance that Nat needed. His eight years by her side had come to an end. That’s when Binny, a two year old female German shepherd entered the picture. Nat describes Binny as more intuitive than Frederick (aren’t all females I quipped) When she sensed trouble, Binny lead Nat away, her proactive nature had her dodging cameras before the flashes were set off. In short Binny thought ahead. Binny had been schooled with Guide Dogs for the Blind in San Raphael California, and hadn’t made the cut as a guide dog. Her unplanned career change brought her to Nat’s side where she effectively reduced Nat’s anxiety and served as a bridge between people and Nat. For six sweet years Nat and Binny bounced about traveling as a team until Binny’s sudden death from sepsis at age eight.

Six months later, in May of 2005, T’ai arrived with the help of Assistance Dogs of the West in Santa Fe, New Mexico. After a comprehensive two-week orientation and training period, T’ai became Nat’s newfound friend. Over the course of the last five years T’ai has stood by Nat’s side while Nat’s health suddenly took a turn for the worse. Met with anaphylactic shock, allergic reactions to antibiotic, the appearance of a rare form of blood cancer, pancreatic and gallbladder removal, Tai kept Nat going.

Nat says that during the days that her depression and ill health kept her wanting to stay in bed, she felt compelled to get out of bed to take care of T’ai. Nat credits taking care of T’ai as the stimulus necessary to keep up her awareness of her environment so that she could effectively take care of T’ai while he was taking care of her. For example T’ai would remind her he was hungry, and so in turn she was reminded that she too should eat. Nat fed herself when she fed T’ai.

Nat says that T’ai acknowledged Nat where her once friends had made her invisible through their failure to call or come by. Further, Nat says that her once friends saw her fragility as something objectionable, something that served to remind them of their own mortality and they flew, flew away in droves. T’ai, however, stuck by Nat with complete dedication. Nat fed herself when she fed T’ai. T’ai would remind her he was hungry, and so in turn she was reminded that she too should eat.

In August of 2008, Nat became seriously ill with gallbladder disease and necrosis of the pancreas leaving her too ill even to get out of bed and tend to T’ai. Eight months went by where T’ai through no fault of his own was essentially retired. That period of “disuse” has left T’ai less able to assist Nat now that she is on the mend. So T’ai is set for retirement as unsuspecting puppy is soon to be selected to fill the shoes that T’ai now occupies.

When I stare into Nat’s sweet light colored eyes, I see an innocence and sweetness seen all too infrequently. I ask her to spell out what assistance dogs do for her and others like her. She says, “ Assistance Dogs are a bridge to be able to live in the world when you’re not quite all there…two brains are better than one. “

I look at Nat’s long flowing gray and brown curly locks surrounding her sweet fair face. I listen to her account of the four times in the last 15 or so years she nearly died. My eyes rise above her head camera like to focus on a framed poster on the kitchen wall above her head with the words that read “Never give up no matter what is going on……………..” Words spoken by the Dali Lama. A simple mantra repeated on the poster over and over. Simple words spawning a simple path of regimen and regularity which taken collectively celebrate the very path Nat has taken with the help of her canine friends.