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Today we explore the sacred bond between humans and animals with Kathy Callahan (puppy expert) and Helen St. Pierre (founder of Old Dogs Go To Helen sanctuary). We discuss how senior dogs teach us about hospice, grief, and spiritual connection—plus why puppies bring healing energy during loss. Learn how animals raise our vibration, recognize signs from departed pets, and create “good deaths” with love. If you’ve ever felt your dog’s soul speaking to yours, this episode is for you.

TIMESTAMPED OVERVIEW

00:00 Introduction & Angelic Guidance Invitation
00:49 Julie Introduces Dr. Dixon Chibanda and The Friendship Bench
02:19 What is The Friendship Bench? Grandmas as Therapists
03:26 Clinical Trials: Grandmas vs. Psychiatrists 36
08:28 Erica’s Story: The Suicide That Sparked a Movement
10:29 Poverty, Mental Health, and Community Solutions
15:46 Nonverbal Healing: Hugs, Eye Contact, and Empathy
19:04 Success Stories: From Loneliness to Hope
24:32 Global Expansion: Bringing Benches to the U.S.
27:55 Grandmas’ Secret: Anchoring in the Present Moment
31:20 How to Start a Friendship Bench in Your Community
34:02 Donations, Training, and Joining the Movement
36:19 Closing: Julie’s Angel Reiki School & Resources

---

TRANSCRIPT:

[00:00:00] Julie: Hello, friends. Welcome to the Angels and Awakening podcast. I’m your host, Julie Janis. If you love this podcast, please be our angel. Ask a friend to listen, subscribe. Rate us five stars, leave a positive review and share a screenshot of this [00:00:19] podcast on your Facebook or Instagram stories. So my dad passed away in 2015.

[00:00:26] We weren’t talking and it took. A month for his family to track me down before I ever knew he was gone. I started hearing from him in heaven. It consumed me [00:00:38] how is communication with the other side even possible? I left my corporate gig. Studied with spiritual teachers on every coast and worked with my angels to figure out the answers.

[00:00:51] Today, my mission is teaching you how to raise your vibration, shift [00:00:57] your thoughts, trust your intuition, develop your unique spiritual gifts, and connect with your loved ones and angels on the other side. Friends, when you have these tools, life really does become heaven on earth. Hello, [00:01:16] beautiful souls.

[00:01:16] Welcome back to the Angels and Awakening Podcast. I’m your host and author, Julie Janis. And friends. We need some love in this world. We need some positivity and what is more positive than our beautiful animal babies that we have in our homes? I’m so excited because today we [00:01:35] have the authors of Old dog, new dog on the show, Helen St.

[00:01:39] Pierre and Kathy Callahan. Thank you ladies so much for being here and taking time to be with us.

[00:01:46] Kathy Callahan: We’re delighted to be here. Thanks for having us. Yeah, so happy.

[00:01:50] Julie: So one of the things that I don’t talk much about on the podcast, but I [00:01:54] actually do a lot of work with, I’ve got a large clientele that I’ve worked with for almost 10 years, and when they have dogs that are passing, uh, a lot of people want to reach out.

[00:02:06] They call me and they say, Julie, do you ever do readings for animals? I, I trust you. I need this. Can you, can you [00:02:13] tune into the energies? And there’s so many different energies connected with angels as well. Archangel Ariel is the angel that works with animals, and you can always see her. She comes in immediately for people with both of you.

[00:02:28] When people work with animals with [00:02:32] nature, because we all get into what I call a oneness state, that highest vibration that is in different ways, and it’s meant to be that way. But for you. You might feel like you’re in a higher vibration just when you’re in nature, when you’re with animals [00:02:51] themselves, because they carry that very high vibration.

[00:02:55] So I was so excited to see your book, old Dog, new Dog, because there’s a lot of. Questions that I’ve had along the way as I’ve done these readings and the things that I’ve seen. Um, so first, thank you for being here. Maybe both of [00:03:10] you tell everybody a little bit about your work. Helen, I know that you have this beautiful animal sanctuary.

[00:03:17] Um, would you like to start and tell people what that means and what that is?

[00:03:22] Helen St. Pierre: I have been in the animal world professionally now for 23 years, but I only founded old [00:03:29] dogs, go to Helen about seven years ago, and old dogs go to Helen is a, we run it out of our home. We are a hospice, uh, senior hospice and special needs sanctuary for, we started as dogs and now we.

[00:03:42] Span pretty much any life form at this point. At some point I’m sure a senior giraffe [00:03:48] will make its way here. And, um, you know, we, we do, we do all of it. And so we focus here on really working through quality of life with the animals. They come to us. For all different reasons, whether they’re transferred from shelters, surrender to us by their previous guardians.

[00:04:05] I mean, you name it, they, they [00:04:07] find their way here and the average stay for them is about three to six months. But we’ve had some that are only here for 24 hours and some that are here for around a year and. So our work really just is hospice care, um, and ensuring that they have a wonderful quality life.

[00:04:23] And on top of that, I’m doing my [00:04:26] training, um, where I work with people with puppies and adolescent dogs and all the fun things that people call. And that’s kind of how Kathy and I connected because Kathy does such amazing work with puppies. And I’m doing work with seniors, and we saw each other at a conference where we were both speaking.

[00:04:42] And I think I tackled [00:04:45] Kathy after, after her talk ’cause our talks on puppies and senior dogs really paralleled a lot of, there were a lot of similarities and I said, we need to write a book and.

[00:04:57] Julie: Amazing. Hi, Kathy. Tell everybody who you are, a little bit more about you that Helen didn’t mention yet.

[00:05:03] Kathy Callahan: Yep. [00:05:04] I love that story.

[00:05:05] We really did. We just had an instant mind meld. And this book, um, th this topic is so important because as people, people have a beloved old dog, they know their. Getting to the end of that story and they start to wonder, is it time for a puppy? And both Helen and I get that question [00:05:23] ’cause her expertise is oldies, mine is puppies.

[00:05:25] People come to us and they say, so is it the time? And we just realized there isn’t a book like that that talks about that. So anyway, that’s, we were very excited to find each other in this. Book Jus kind of wrote itself as we work together. But my background, I’ve of course, you know, always animals have always been super important to me.

[00:05:41] I got more [00:05:42] serious about it. Uh, when we decided to start fostering and we decided to foster because we lost one of our beloved dogs. We always had a bunch of dogs and Zoey died before her time and we were shattered and my husband was. Almost just like, I just don’t know if we can get another dog. Like I was like, [00:06:01] who are you?

[00:06:03] But it was really something. And then somebody said, why don’t you guys try fostering? And I had the same reaction every dog lover has, which is, I could never do that ’cause I could never give them up.

[00:06:14] Julie: Right? And

[00:06:15] Kathy Callahan: then the more we talked, I was like, well maybe could you give me the kind maybe. [00:06:20] Give me ones I won’t love.

[00:06:22] So we tried to do that. How is that possible, Kathy?

[00:06:26] Julie: This is the problem.

[00:06:28] Kathy Callahan: So we’re a big dog family historically, and so those clever people gave us two little Boston Terrier mixed puppies who are like 10 weeks old. [00:06:39] We. Adored them. Oh sure. Of course. But what we did learn is that we can do this. And so we brought them in and we, they melded in with our two other dogs and our cats and our whole, and our two daughters were, were, were, I can’t remember, 1215 at the time.

[00:06:55] And everybody had a ball. [00:06:58] And two weeks later we were able to adopt them out and it has been 250 dogs since then. A, a decade ago. We’ve taken in that many, I did find my sweet spot in the nursing litter. So we moved from, we did a, about a dozen dogs, and then I took in the nursing [00:07:17] mom and I was like, okay, this is, this is what I’m supposed to be doing because I just love giving those moms who, for whatever reason.

[00:07:26] Landed in a shelter at this. Can you imagine at this moment in time, and they just need to feel safe, and they need, you need to. And [00:07:36] so being able to give them that safety and help nurture them and their puppies at the same time. It’s bliss. It’s so fun. Anyway, so that did send me along the, that. Then I started, uh, then I turned into a trainer because the more I wanted to know what was happening with the puppies, the more I studied, the more I read, the more I [00:07:55] took classes.

[00:07:55] The more I took courses, the more I, so now I have my own business and it does kind of focus on puppies. Uh, but I also do, um, adult dogs as well.

[00:08:05] Julie: Okay. So many questions here.

[00:08:11] So every [00:08:14] animal, uh, just feels so different. I think, you know, just being a human mama to a little girl, I really wasn’t prepared for taking her home from the hospital. Mm-hmm. And my sister was actually the first one who commented to me within like the first three weeks. She was like. Oh my [00:08:33] gosh. Your daughter has her own personality and she is showing it to you big time.

[00:08:39] At three weeks old. I remember. This is how your intuition works, right? I remember, um, wanting a trampoline when I was a little girl. My dad was like, if you can make the money to buy it, then you can get it. So I would [00:08:52] go around to my neighbor’s house, knock on their door, ask if I could like wash their cars, right?

[00:08:57] And I’m probably doing a total crap job at a 12. But imagine, thank God they like appeased me and let me do this. And uh, I remember one of the neighbors opening up their doors and they [00:09:11] had these two little shitzu. And I wasn’t even focused on the car washing because I, I had this vision at 12 years old.

[00:09:20] Immediately I knew that that was part of my future. I could see myself having two little shit zoos when I was older. And so I remember them being like, what, [00:09:30] what? And I’m like, have to snap back out of this vision to communicate. But, but that’s what we did. So when I got older. Bought one. I knew when my husband and I were going through a really rough patch almost 10 years ago, maybe 11 years ago.

[00:09:46] We really needed a [00:09:49] shift in energy in the house. Hold. And I knew that we loved each other so much, but I knew that something needed to shift. And he was very anti-D dog. You know, my daughter’s young we’re still taking care of her, and uh, he’s like, no way in hell. And I [00:10:08] literally, he’s talking to El, our daughter, and I’m in the bedroom and I go, you can get out of the house and you can move out of the house.

[00:10:16] Or we can get a dog like it’s your decision. Good job. And goes, we’re getting a dog. So wait, it gets better so we get the [00:10:27] dog. And doesn’t this always happen? It’s his freaking dog. Oh yeah. That happens every single time. The dog won’t cuddle with me at all. That’s game. Have to get two. So then a couple years later, I was like, I’m freaking done with this crap.

[00:10:41] You know, like, let, we’re getting a second dog. Now this is [00:10:46] interesting. People who are very highly empathic, who don’t really know how to work with that energy. Very intuitive. I think a lot of people get a sense when the dog is born, oh my God, I need to get a dog. Like they connect with the energy as soon as it [00:11:05] comes in to this world.

[00:11:07] And yet I see I’m getting frustrated. I’m not finding the dog. I’m not, well, it’s not up yet. You are not seeing the pictures yet because they can’t go home. What? Until like their time. 12 weeks. Weeks, eight weeks. Yeah.

[00:11:20] Kathy Callahan: Yeah.

[00:11:20] Julie: So, um, I think that they have to kind of [00:11:24] hang in because at the, that four month or four week month mark, they’re frustrated, but that dog is really there.

[00:11:33] They were tuning into the birth date, not the take home date.

[00:11:37] Helen St. Pierre: Yeah. The universe works. Like that with the oldies all the time. So a great example [00:11:43] of this fairly, and, and this is where Julie, I was telling you like I have to, I’ve really learned to just. Follow signs. Yeah, like follow your gut. Uh, especially when dealing with end of life, you end up going, you, you have to rely a lot of the times on feeling because you are working with a lot of disease [00:12:02] and elderly stuff where you can’t, I don’t have Superman’s x-ray vision.

[00:12:05] I can just basically feel the energy of the dog changing as they transition. But this was very, very recent. We had a dog that came to us named Mandy. Um, she was only about eight or nine giant Saint Bernard. [00:12:21] Um, and came to the SPCA here in Concord as a medical mess, just like matted and all of this stuff.

[00:12:28] Well, she was adopted after sitting in the SPCA for a while, but she hadn’t been eating, wasn’t doing well. She was adopted and the adopter realized after only a couple of days that her needs were beyond [00:12:40] her scope. Mm-hmm. So she surrendered her to old dogs after the SPCA said, yeah, just send her to Helen.

[00:12:45] So I’d never had a giant St. Bernard. I mean, I’ve had, I’ve had. Great Danes. I’ve had Mastiffs, but I, I mean, in 23 years, I think I’ve probably worked with like six St. Bernard’s. Okay. Like, it’s not like their breed. I mean, [00:12:59] Kathy, you two, like they’re not,

[00:13:00] Kathy Callahan: never, almost, never. Right. Not one. One. Yeah. Right. The way Breezewood is with your daughter.

[00:13:07] Yes. And I know she’s magic with all but just watching. Breeze settle into this life with you. He looks like he’s, he was meant

[00:13:15] Helen St. Pierre: to be here. Absolutely.

[00:13:17] Kathy Callahan: Supposed to be here. Yeah. [00:13:18]

[00:13:18] Helen St. Pierre: And um, the, what I learned, because I was like, I know that they were like, you know, big mountain dogs, but I really wanted, so, and I went, so I went online and I go down this rabbit hole.

[00:13:28] They were hospice guarding dogs. So they were originally bred in the mo monasteries in the St. Bernard monastery up in the Alps [00:13:37] as hospice guard guarding dogs and. Like what are, where did guard, um, they guarded the hospice from Travelers, and so they was it, the St. Bernard pass through the Alps is the highest, one of the highest passes.

[00:13:52] And so the monks developed these dogs to be [00:13:56] large enough to, as they walked in a group, three or two or three of them in a line, they would clear the path for the travelers. And then if Travelers got. Sick or would fall or get, you know, too cold or hypothermic. The dogs were bred to lay on top of the traveler, keep them warm while the other dog would go alert the [00:14:15] monks and the hospice.

[00:14:16] Kathy Callahan: Wow. And

[00:14:16] Helen St. Pierre: come and save them. And so they, they’re known as holy dogs. They’re known as hospice dogs. And like what are the odds? Long story short, all of this stuff that you’re saying to us, that Kathy and I. Chimes into a lot of that, that we know. But it’s difficult sometimes to talk about to the average person.

[00:14:33] It’s, [00:14:34] yeah,

[00:14:35] Kathy Callahan: the average person who’s just trying to get their dog to sit and stay and you know, oh yeah. My gut is to start talking about all these big things and the universe because I wanna make their relationship with their dog way better. And it’s not necessarily gonna come through perfecting the heel, right?

[00:14:50] Yeah. It’s gonna come from [00:14:53] opening up to who is this being? That is, that is a different species that has just landed in your life and open up to that, get, tap into that, that energy. Who is that? That’s a lot more fun than staying stuck in your little human expectations of, I need my dog to da to, could you [00:15:12] teach him to, to go to place while I eat dinner?

[00:15:15] Like, that’s okay. Yes I can, but let’s, let’s also do some other stuff. It’s. But

[00:15:22] Helen St. Pierre: that’s part of the book too, because we really try to talk about stepping away from the sterile clinical version [00:15:31] of having dogs of the sits and the downs, and focusing on. This, there’s really two very important pieces of having dogs, which is the end of the light, their life.

[00:15:42] Mm-hmm. And being prepared for that and being able to be with your dog, not with them, just physically, but through that whole passage.

[00:15:49] Julie: [00:15:50] Yeah. And

[00:15:50] Helen St. Pierre: being open and willing to do. Allow a puppy to come in at the same time and, and what the benefits can be for many people emotionally and spiritually by doing that too.

[00:16:01] Kathy Callahan: They change the energy of your house and they change how you feel. Um, but the thing is, they’re not gonna be able to do that [00:16:09] always. If you have a bunch of blocks to that. Hmm.

[00:16:12] Julie: Describe that so that people understand what that means.

[00:16:14] Kathy Callahan: So, so I mean that just in a really practical way sometimes, um, we humans are spinning.

[00:16:21] With all of our to-dos and all of our stresses and all of our worries, and the dog [00:16:28] managing the dog ends up falling into that to-do list rather than doing, being one in love, which is, um, put, put other things on the back burner and put your dog on the front burner and then you’re gonna. Relax in that allows you to relax into that [00:16:47] vibration that you’re talking about.

[00:16:48] You’re, you’re gonna be open to moving with that, and there’s probably gonna be a lot more nature involved in that too, because the dog wants to be outside and you go outside. That all starts working together for you. But if you are. Stuck in your own stress and to-dos and oh no, the dog is barking and jumping and [00:17:06] shoot, knocked over a toddler and always pulling on the leash.

[00:17:09] If you’re stuck in all sorts of behavioral expectations about that dog, rather than just sitting back and thinking, wait, who’s this guy? Who’s this guy in my house? Yeah. If you sit back and open yourself to that energy, to that soul, you’re gonna end up [00:17:25] also with better behavior. Uh, so, um, you know, you’re gonna, it brings, it brings all sorts of good things.

[00:17:32] Julie: Beautiful souls. This has been one of the hardest years and we’re still kind of in the thick of it, and I just wanted to take a moment and say thank you so [00:17:44] incredibly much to everyone who financially supports my work. Truly, I could not do this work without you and. I am so, so beyond grateful. Um, for those of you who do want to support my work, I do have a new sacred women’s circles.

[00:18:02] [00:18:03] They’re all beginning all of the circles. August 1st. You can now sign up on my website, the angel medium.com. Then go to the women’s circles tab. Also, friends, I just read a report, and this isn’t to scare you. The angels want to. [00:18:22] Prepare you, and this report has talked about how over the next decade, 33% of all jobs in the US could be eliminated, and 47% total could be disrupted due to new.

[00:18:38] AI technology. Again, [00:18:41] this isn’t to scare you, but your angels want you to be prepared. Friends. I would love, love, love to teach you the skills of being an angel, messenger, energy healer, and medium, all in one at my Angel Reiki school. If you’ve been feeling called to serve humanity or start your own healing [00:19:00] business.

[00:19:00] Please do not wait. This is your sign. Your angels are trying to work with you on a whole new level. Friends, a whole new Angel Reiki School begins online August 1st, and when you sign up this month for the online program, I’m gifting you [00:19:19] free tuition to also attend in-person at any of the three to four in-person Angel Reiki schools that we’re gonna have over the next 12 months.

[00:19:29] They’re always held in the Chicago suburbs because takes a few car loads to get all of the materials, massage tables that we use [00:19:38] over there. Friends, the Angel Reiki School certifies you in all three modalities at once, giving you a really unique edge. Also friends, one more thing. If you love this podcast and wanna support me, we’re starting a whole new course.

[00:19:55] August 1st in the [00:19:57] Angel membership. It’s called Release Fear and Step Into Your Power. You can sign up for the Sacred Women’s Circles, angel Reiki School, and the membership all on my website, the angel medium.com. If you want more info, use the contact form [00:20:16] over@theangelmedium.com to submit your question.

[00:20:19] I read. All of them, and from the bottom of my heart, friends, I can’t thank you enough. Thank you for being here. Thank you so much for supporting my work. I truly couldn’t keep all of this going without you, so thank you. Thank you, [00:20:35] thank you. Now back to the show.

[00:20:38] Helen St. Pierre: From the senior dog perspective too, or just, well, for me, what I learned very quickly, especially once we built the sanctuary and I had the barn with the senior horses and the goats, it’s like I couldn’t look at my phone and scoop poop at the same time.

[00:20:53] Right? Yeah. Like [00:20:54] there’s a huge, not, well anyway, but like there’s a huge piece of, because people will ask me all the time, well, how do you do it? How can you do it? It’s so much work. It’s like, yes, but it’s work. That to me is. Is a very different, fulfilling kind of work, right? Because I’m not glued to my [00:21:13] phone and I’m not talking to people.

[00:21:15] I’m, I’m literally immersed in those. Those filters that you’re saying all the time. And that for me, for, for what it does for me, and this is what I was just thinking when Kathy was introducing herself, because you know, she’s taking on these nursing moms and that’s a, that [00:21:32] is if you’ve never fostered a mom with puppies, it is so much work.

[00:21:36] It’s the same kind of difficult work that I’m doing with 15 senior dying dogs. It’s poop scooping, it’s cleaning, it’s shift. It’s, but we both. Really immerse and love immersing ourselves into that. And I think [00:21:51] that people, when it comes to, you know, like what Kathy’s saying, we get so lost in the, the human nitty gritty.

[00:22:01] Quite frankly, like crap that isn’t important. Yeah. And we lose ourselves and then we find it inconvenient and we, you know, and if you look back [00:22:10] at the history of humankind, that’s, we’ve only been this way for about 150 years where we’ve just been so focused on all these other noises around us. Yeah. And it’s when we’ve been the most mentally.

[00:22:21] You know, disconnected and having the most difficulty as human beings. And do you

[00:22:25] Julie: think that there’s some part of that, like I am [00:22:29] 43? Part of that is age. You know, we go through our twenties, our thirties, we’re focused on different things at that period, and maybe us in our forties, fifties, sixties, seventies, are really meant to have a different sole purpose at that time to keep people reconnected to [00:22:48] themselves.

[00:22:48] Those in their twenties and thirties, or no? What do you think,

[00:22:50] Helen St. Pierre: Kathy?

[00:22:51] Kathy Callahan: I

[00:22:51] Julie: don’t,

[00:22:52] Kathy Callahan: that doesn’t strike me as Right. ’cause I feel like I know younger people who are, are more soulful, are very good at this and plenty of older people who are not that. That’s true. Thank you for saying that. I so agree. I don’t think that, but you know, [00:23:07] as you’re, as you’re talking about that, and I’m think I’m.

[00:23:09] Thinking about how animals do. If you can do it, if you can make use of it, um, animals will pull you out of that. And the other thing that does it is death. And, and I don’t mean your own death, but I mean, being around death and I, we just lost a good, went to a [00:23:26] funeral, a good friend this weekend. It was an incredible funeral.

[00:23:29] He lived a, an amazing life, but died at 60, which is too young, but, you know, but the funeral’s incredible. And it showed what, how. Big his impact was, and it had me, he died of brain cancer, as did my dad at 54. And um, I was talking to [00:23:45] them about how there’s something that happens in that time. You know, this person’s gonna die.

[00:23:50] You’re at the bedside, the family is gathered. The months leading up to it, it’s become clear how this is gonna go. There is an intensity to that time that is not all bad. Yeah. And um, I remember my [00:24:04] sister and I, we were in our twenties when this happened, and the few months later, you know, of course we were glad Dad wasn’t suffering anymore and stuff, but the few months later we would check in with each other and be like, you know, it’s weird, I miss cancer because the.

[00:24:19] Vibe in the room. We were all so [00:24:23] present, we were so alive amidst that death. And this is what Helen speaks beautifully about, this, like our society is so bad at death in general and doesn’t allow us to sink into that and actually tap into that energy that is so good for us. Um, Helen writes a lot about that in the book.[00:24:42]

[00:24:42] Julie: Yeah, grief in general, what I’ve seen just in suburbia is I don’t have time for this. I don’t have time for my dog constantly getting sick. And so we’re gonna take him in, we’re going to go through the process, and they’re determining that what is, and I get that to some extent. I [00:25:01] know how busy people are, I know how life works and some people have.

[00:25:05] For children. Um, but you have this inner lens of what is actually happening energetically as the animal is passing. What is that supposed to be teaching us and how is it supposed to be deepening us?

[00:25:19] Helen St. Pierre: [00:25:20] Well, yeah, so death, we are very, very disconnected from death in our culture. And, and the reason for that is because we’ve associated.

[00:25:28] Uh, death and grief are one thing. Mm-hmm. And they’re not. Um, grief is its own element because you’ll experience grief in many [00:25:39] forms and for many reasons throughout your life. I mean, even us, all of us here as mothers, I. We’ll have moments when we have young children where we grieve who we were before we had a child.

[00:25:50] Grief is, is just any feeling of loss of something. Mm-hmm. And in our culture, we’ve defined death as being this very [00:25:58] sad, final thing and, and grief being terrible. Mm-hmm. And I use the example that this book was. Written. I wrote this book after my mother, well, we had started, but I had, I, my mother passed last April, um, in 2024.

[00:26:15] And, and Kathy wrote to [00:26:17] me and said, you know, we don’t have to continue if you need a break. Mm-hmm. And I was like, no, I’ve gotta take this now.

[00:26:22] Julie: Right.

[00:26:23] Helen St. Pierre: And utilize it. Grief can actually be extremely beautiful. It can produce wonderful things, but death in and of itself. If we, if we separate grief and we look at death and what the transition looks like, [00:26:36] and I think we’re very separated from it.

[00:26:38] We don’t talk about it. Um, especially even as parents. I’m, how many of us have had discussions on life and where babies come from, but we really only talk about death after and when we are experiencing not as a preparation or understanding what’s coming. And [00:26:55] then when it’s right there, we either have a.

[00:26:58] Visceral reaction of like, I don’t wanna deal with it, get it away from me.

[00:27:02] Julie: Mm-hmm. Um, as if like, they, by doing that, we’re gonna push away. Yes. All death. And, you know, like, it, it, like, you’ll never have

[00:27:09] Helen St. Pierre: to touch it. Right. Yeah. But we do

[00:27:11] Julie: that

[00:27:12] Helen St. Pierre: in our culture with our [00:27:14] elderly relatives. Right. This, our culture has shifted now where we, we put our elderly relatives away.

[00:27:20] Mm-hmm. You know, we used to as, as culture, have our elderly relatives would pass in the home. There are a lot of cultures that still do that. Mm-hmm. So death was just sort of like as much a part of life as, oh, there’s been a [00:27:33] baby born, but now grandpa’s getting sick. The point of the book was also not just to help people with.

[00:27:39] Uh, thinking, contemplating getting new life, but also to start contemplating about death, thinking about it proactively and becoming more comfortable with it so that when it comes down to, you know, if you’ve got four kids, you have a [00:27:52] senior dog he’s urinating on himself, and we can tell that it’s, it’s probably time.

[00:27:56] I would much rather advocate for a early than too late, right? Mm-hmm. So I will never shame anybody for saying to me. I know that I’m really too busy to continue caring for him the way that he needs. I’ve got young kids, there’s poop all over my house. [00:28:11] Absolutely. Let’s make the call before it’s too difficult for everybody.

[00:28:14] Julie: Right.

[00:28:14] Helen St. Pierre: But giving a good death is still a like something that we need to be discussing and talking about. And a good death, not just for the animal or the person, but for the people that are surrounded by it. You can. So what does

[00:28:27] Julie: that look like? That good death? [00:28:30] Well, good

[00:28:30] Helen St. Pierre: Death is. It’s that you have to think about what you would define as a good death for yourself.

[00:28:35] Mm-hmm. Right. So like for me, a good death would be. You know, we can’t plan it. I don’t know what day, but if I could, if I could say, okay, I’m really sick, I’m old, I’m sick, I’m frail. I can’t do the things that I love to do. [00:28:49] So what I’d really like is I’d like to be able to have a a week of no pain up. All those pain meds.

[00:28:54] ’cause who cares about my liver and my kidneys at this point? Yeah, I’d like to eat whatever the hell I want and not have to worry about any bit. I’d like to do the things, go to the ocean, say goodbye to my kids, and very peacefully go to [00:29:08] sleep. And have it be very calm and non-traumatic or painful for everybody around it.

[00:29:13] Julie: Wow. We can

[00:29:13] Helen St. Pierre: do that with our dogs.

[00:29:15] Julie: Yeah.

[00:29:15] Helen St. Pierre: Like we can do that, but we can’t do it with people and yet we. We don’t want to talk about being able to do that with people.

[00:29:25] Kathy Callahan: Wow. [00:29:27] It’s a gift to be able to do this for our dogs and, um, at those of us who have been through this enough. If you love enough animals, you have been through this.

[00:29:35] And, um, if you’ve done it before, the odds science shows, I think the data shows that you are, you are going to elect to choose, choose it again to eliminate [00:29:46] that suffering again, because. People kind of assume that a natural, a natural death sounds great, doesn’t it? Doesn’t it sound like the puppy’s just gonna, the dog’s just gonna walk downstairs and curl up in his little bed and go night night?

[00:29:58] That is not what it looks like most of the time. And so what happens is people are caught [00:30:05] unaware because they don’t want to actually recognize that their senior is getting to that point. Sometimes people have some blinders on. They don’t really see how much their dog is slowing down. They don’t see that their dog’s, um, loves and desires and joys are changing.

[00:30:22] They, they [00:30:24] don’t see that the dog snapped at somebody at Thanksgiving, and that’s kind of unusual. They are not. They’re making excuses for that stuff instead of recognizing the inevitable that we are getting closer to that time that this dog’s journey is. Done. And so the best thing we want people to do is to talk about that amongst themselves before [00:30:43] that moment gets there.

[00:30:43] Because if you can gather the family talk together about what, when is that line gonna be there where you, you don’t wanna see your dog suffering anymore, how would you feel? What, you know, what, what do you want for yourself? And that’s gonna be different for everybody. And then think about what do you guys together feel [00:31:02] about that for your animal?

[00:31:03] You don’t have to come to any conclusions because it’s gonna show up in a way that you don’t really can’t anticipate anyway. But if you’ve had this grounding conversation first, right, you’re gonna be better prepared. When you have to rush that dog to the vet, or hopefully you won’t even have to rush them.

[00:31:19] Hopefully you’ll see things coming. [00:31:21] You’ll go to the vet. You’ll be able to have a slow conversation about what the trajectory here might look like, and you’ll be able to choose that good day that mm-hmm. Is in fact a week early instead of a day late.

[00:31:32] Julie: Okay. Helen, I have to ask you this question. How are you able to run the sanctuary and keep it [00:31:40] profitable enough to keep it open?

[00:31:42] Helen St. Pierre: Prayer. Um,

[00:31:44] Julie: really? Okay.

[00:31:45] Helen St. Pierre: No, no, no, no, no. We rely strictly on public donations, but we don’t adopt any of our animals out benefited me the most was that I’d been in the industry for a long time and before I became a 5 0 1 C3, [00:31:59] I was taking these, just like Kathy, we bring our work home all the time. Mm-hmm. I was taking in senior animals, but one at a time.

[00:32:06] And bringing them sort of quote unquote back to life, giving them a really good quality life. And then they were passing and I, and I was talking about that work in my training business, which had a very good following [00:32:18] healthy public following. ’cause I’ve been in the Concord area now for 18 years, so that really.

[00:32:25] Got the people talking about what? And then of course my phone wouldn’t stop ringing because people were like, oh, will you take my dog? Will you take my dog? But what was nice was that I didn’t start old dogs. Go to Helen, just. [00:32:37] I literally just evolved by, it evolved out of something else. It really became a sister from my training business, and I already had a reputation.

[00:32:46] Mm-hmm. Um, which was, thank God, mostly good. Right. So, uh,

[00:32:50] Kathy Callahan: I’m gonna start in here and say people adore this woman. You guys, I, I don’t know if you can tell, but [00:32:56] she has. Uh, she’s extraordinary. Her charisma. Oh my gosh, of course. She’s amazing. And so because of the power of Helen, when she sends out a request, hopefully all she does is she talks about, okay, here’s the dog that’s on our doorstep.

[00:33:10] And, and, um, people, because they trust her and they [00:33:15] understand her work and her motives, it stays afloat. Anyway, just yeah, very,

[00:33:20] Helen St. Pierre: very transparent. Uh, we, we. You know, and we’re not a facility. It’s my husband and I and our daughters. We do this out of our home. There are less than 50 senior sanctuaries in the US so they, we are not, and you know, [00:33:34] sanctuaries get a really, um, we get a tough bit, you know, like I do talks for the Gray Muzzle Foundation, which is this incredible foundation that helps senior dogs, um, and senior dog rescues and sanctuaries, but they will not give grants.

[00:33:47] To sanctuaries because the idea is to take them and then rehome them. [00:33:53] So we rely strictly on public donation. But I will tell you this right now, that even if, and I say this to my husband all the time, if Facebook wasn’t a thing, if there was no way of doing this. Like financially at the level we would still be doing it probably just on a lesser extent.

[00:34:11] And [00:34:12] if that comes down to it, if it comes down to it where the money stops and we can’t do as many that we are okay with that, we will never stop. Helping Animals Pass. I’m a certified end of life pet death doula. I’m a certified peaceful, euthanasia professional. I’ll even help client, I’ll do whatever it is.

[00:34:30] I [00:34:31] will try to continue doing this as much as I can and, and I think that I’m lucky in that respect to have found a purpose in the rescue community that I can, I will continue no matter what. Even if it’s on my own dime.

[00:34:43] Julie: Wow. Oh my gosh. You all are just like blowing me away sometimes [00:34:50] when a dog is passing.

[00:34:52] And I go do a reading, um, as that dog is sick, kind of nearing the end, it will show the owner and sometimes this is six months, a year before they want to get another puppy. In the house [00:35:09] because New dog. Old dog, there is a transferral of energy. Yes. Where the old dog is asking you to bring the new dog in because you can see all of.

[00:35:23] Almost kinda like a DNA, but it’s just energetics [00:35:28] of the old dog passing to the new dog. All the information, teaching it how to be with a family. I see this with people who have passed, fathers who are at the end of their life, who are a hundred years old, who are passing, still feel their role. [00:35:47] I’m father, I’m grandfather.

[00:35:48] How do you leave that role that you’ve always known? How do you not be that anymore? And same with mamas, you know, when they’re passing at the end of life, how do you not be that role anymore? And you feel that in dogs too? Not always. There are [00:36:06] some dogs. That are like, Nope. Right. Yeah. Case out. Don’t bring that new like little and they’ll kind of go off.

[00:36:14] They don’t want that new sucker in the house. They just wanna be with the family, pick up all the time to the very end. But I would say nine times outta 10, that’s not the way that it [00:36:25] is, but they want. The new dog to come in because out of respect for the family, they want that transfer of energy because they wanna know that their role is gonna continue.

[00:36:37] It is

[00:36:37] Kathy Callahan: exactly what we see is that sometimes you just see it, you’re like. Wow. Look at what’s [00:36:44] happening here. And then sometimes we also see, oh no, this was not, it’s really not what, what this dog wanted. What we try to do in the book, we are big fans of the overlap. We love it when people give it a try because it can be absolutely beautiful for, for so many [00:37:03] different reasons.

[00:37:04] And you can help support it so that your odds are higher, that in fact it’s gonna be this beautiful, a beautiful friendship can develop between them and they can really connect. Um, sometimes it’ll happen magically, you know, sometimes I’ll look, I’ll look on paper at what’s happening at the house. You know, [00:37:22] two really busy parents and three young kids.

[00:37:24] And the old dog already has been diagnosed with something bad. And then the, the family wants a puppy. And I’m like. Oh, you guys do you understand how intense puppy hood is and you’re gonna be emotionally devastated by death and trying to do puppyhood, and then they do a great job. And [00:37:41] somehow magically the, the older dog does get better for a while and they become best friends.

[00:37:46] They sleep together the same bed anyway. That does happen, and we hope that happens for you. However, the book talks about how, um, we want to help you prepare for when that isn’t the case. But we don’t want anyone to get robbed. And so [00:38:00] we do. We like the idea of trying the overlap. If it’s gonna work for you, if you have the bandwidth, you’re gonna have to have the bandwidth because if it isn’t a magical.

[00:38:09] Kumbaya situation. You are gonna have to be covering all those bases. You’re gonna have to figure out how are you gonna divvy up your household? Who have you got? What [00:38:19] village do you have? How can you outsource some stuff to make sure that you are there for your old dog’s twilight, and that you aren’t removing yourself from that old dog or forcing the old dog to go into off into a peaceful corner of the house when really he wants to be with you and that you’re not shortchanging the puppy who [00:38:38] truly.

[00:38:38] He’s just started here. We wanna, there’s no idea. Yes, no idea what’s happening. And he needs a heck of a lot of support. I mean, puppyhood just by itself is quite a lot, right? So to be managing it with an older dog who isn’t fired up for this situation, gosh, that’s a lot to handle. And so the whole, the book is about helping you prepare to do [00:38:57] that.

[00:38:57] ’cause if you’re prepared for it. If you have some strategies, if you know how to set up your house and you think about sketching your time, you’re gonna be able to do it. But anyway, I love hearing your description of that energy ’cause Wow. I just really do think we’ve seen that before

[00:39:09] Helen St. Pierre: over overlaps are, are huge.

[00:39:12] I’ve seen it in my own personal dogs. I’ve seen it with the [00:39:16] oldies even here and, and even if there isn’t a, what we call like the passing the torch. So the passing the torch is where the old dog and the new dog. Really connect with each other. Um, even if it’s not through like playing or anything, but they do a lot of mirroring.

[00:39:31] They will, the old dog will lay down and the puppy will start laying down sort of in the [00:39:35] exact, they’ll, they’ll mirror little things like that and you’ll see it slowly develop. That sort of, that is very much a, what I call passing the torch. The senior dog is really teaching, this is what we do and this is how we do it.

[00:39:47] Mm-hmm. Um, even if it’s like, let’s get in the trash together. Right. But then there’s also the form where [00:39:54] it’s not necessarily passing the torch, but the overlap is where the senior dog goes. Okay, I now can go because I am no longer the center of the universe for these people, and I feel that I can actually let my disease and let my age fully go, which [00:40:13] I see a lot with the senior dogs in the sanctuary.

[00:40:15] They will come in and they’ll go. Oh, okay. This is a safe place to die. And that’s the same thing with like human hospices too. That’s what they want to create. A place where the body can just say, I can let go. Now there doesn’t have to, the overlap doesn’t have to be their beautiful [00:40:32] passing the torch moments.

[00:40:33] Sometimes that happens and that’s wonderful. Sure. But if it doesn’t. Sometimes it can be that the dog goes, all right, cool. Like, you guys are good. Now I’ve, I’ve, you have your new purpose and I can let myself go.

[00:40:47] Julie: I have to share this [00:40:51] and I have a purpose for sharing it. Your angel said that you need to understand this so that you can communicate it to your clients.

[00:40:57] I went out to LA this year and a celebrity invited me to dinner and, um, when we were at dinner, they let me know that their dog had just recently [00:41:10] passed. And when I tuned in, the way that I tune in is I believe your imagination really is your third eye. People make this way too complex in order to sell shit, right?

[00:41:21] It’s your imagination. And so when I was sitting in there at dinner and tuning into their energy, what I kept. Seeing is the owner on the [00:41:29] couch with the dog in their arms. And you know, she goes, Julie, that’s how he passed was he just wanted to be on the couch in my arms. And then I kept seeing with my imagination, um, mind’s eye.

[00:41:45] Spirit showing me this vision [00:41:48] of the collar. I could see the collar in detail. I could see the leash, and I could see it like in this kind of like clear box that’s sitting on a table and she’s like, I just went today. And I got all of that to put the leash in the collar into like this acrylic. Box to just like look at it.

[00:42:06] And I brought through [00:42:07] a, a number of emotional messages too, but they said to tell you, your angel said to tell you that when you get those visuals, um, it’s very simple. It’s very easy, but people so often just dismiss it. Hmm. Um, and it really is. [00:42:26] That animal spirit trying to come in and communicate. I’m so glad that you had me on the couch and you just held me in my final moments.

[00:42:36] I’m so glad that you’re remembering me, you know, with my leash and my collar in this acrylic box. So just make sure that like when [00:42:45] you’re telling people it’s okay to,

[00:42:48] Helen St. Pierre: yeah.

[00:42:48] Julie: Uh, um, just know they’re with you. That was one thing. And then we share angel stories on the podcast where a lot of them are angel signs too that come from animals.

[00:43:00] There’s just so many different stories of animals coming [00:43:04] through in various different ways. Could I ask for your help? If you ever have those, will you forward people over to me? Sure. I’d love to have them come on the podcast and share those. Stories. Yeah, I

[00:43:14] Helen St. Pierre: think I’ve gotten so probably too much though, where I just like follow that imagination piece of me, whatever the universe basically shows me, I’m [00:43:23] like, we’re doing it.

[00:43:23] And a great example was we created a rainbow bridge, our own version of Rainbow Bridge here at the property. And I was just walking up to it and I could see exactly what I wanted it to look like. And I’m like, we’re making this happen. This is, this is going to happen. This is what you know. You know, to many people it would feel insane [00:43:42] to, to, to do the level of work, but for me it’s, it’s a huge piece of really learning who I am and being unapologetic for it at this point.

[00:43:52] Um, sure, because I can’t keep doing this level of work this much if I don’t pay attention to that piece, because [00:44:01] it’s the only piece that in many ways, levels. Levels me for it. Does that make sense? Like Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah. It’s

[00:44:10] Kathy Callahan: the part that feeds you, it’s the part that that energizes you, feeds you, rewards you, grounds you.

[00:44:17] Um, yeah.

[00:44:18] Helen St. Pierre: And people don’t have to understand it. [00:44:20] Right. And I learned that too, Julie, when mom passed, because I kept, you know, I’m so good at. Waiting for dog signs of that where what I realized and what you basically described, and Kathy you did the same thing, was visits from dogs are not, um, like they appear in front of you.

[00:44:38] It’s when they [00:44:39] literally just come into your mind. They come into your mind or you see them somewhere like, or a memory of them and like that’s. That’s them just sort of showing up.

[00:44:47] Julie: Yeah,

[00:44:48] Helen St. Pierre: and I had a medium talk to me with my mom a year after she passed and I said, I haven’t had a visit from her. And for some reason in my head with a [00:44:58] person, I thought it would be different.

[00:44:59] I thought that she would just like show up in my doorway at my office and I’d have a, and she said, well. How often are you thinking of your mom or little memories are coming up and I’m like, well, that’s happening all the time. She’s like, well, that’s her Helen. Like it’s, it’s where she’s just constantly just checking in and it, I was like, oh.

[00:45:16] [00:45:17] So it is like the animals, she’s like, you, you’ve been doing this the whole time, but it’s, and it, but it, it, it is very interesting to tell people that Yes, it’s like that imagination piece. It’s those images that flicker on that third screen. Yeah. Where they’re not memories. There are things, there are images that you’ve been thinking of or [00:45:36] that will come and that’s, that’s them coming in.

[00:45:39] Kathy Callahan: We think a lot about when we were bringing in these moms and these puppies and we could feel, so our first pack when we first got together, shadow Keah, Piper, and Ben, and they had all passed on, and then there’s the next crew. So we’ve had about 10 dogs between us, but. [00:45:55] Like by now, like eight of them are no longer with us, but boy are they with us.

[00:45:59] Mm-hmm. And so we sit there in the basement, in the puppy den and we just feel them all in that room. Yeah. Comforting those puppies, having fun with them, just guiding [00:46:14] them. And you know, we, again, I don’t really talk about this very often because you can’t, you just can’t. People like she’s wacko book. It’s palpable in this house.

[00:46:26] Yeah, and I don’t even question it. I just, I absolutely. Expected things

[00:46:31] Julie: are changing. I [00:46:33] think open yourselves up to that because things are changing dramatically. And actually I think that that could bring in a whole new, you know, group to you. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Tell everybody where they can find you, your work and, um, where they can donate if they so feel called.

[00:46:50] You

[00:46:50] Kathy Callahan: Go ahead Kathy. [00:46:52] Okay. Um, okay, so I’m just, I have a website, uh, puppy pick. Dot com and, um, I have three books. One is about the rescue work and it’s got a bunch of, it’s called 101 Rescue Puppies. You’ll find it wherever you buy your books. Um, and it’s basically the 13 best stories we’ve had. Uh, so it’s a [00:47:11] chapter on each.

[00:47:11] It’s, I think it’s, it’s pretty fun. I, I, I just had to write it because it was too good to keep to myself. So then the second book is a puppy guide. So it’s called, um, we Welcoming Your Puppy from Planet Dog. And it just talks about helps you get inside that who is this being who’s come to [00:47:30] my house and that’s your first step.

[00:47:31] So that was, that came out last year. And then our new book is Old Dog, new Dog. Um, I also have a little baby podcast called, um, pick of the Litter. It’s just my trainer friend Mike and I talking about the training tips that honestly help our clients the most. Amazing. Um, and that’s about [00:47:49] it. Awesome.

[00:47:50] Helen St. Pierre: And for me it’s, you can go to old dogs, go to helen.com.

[00:47:55] And on that you can also, you can see our residents, senior animals. You can also see at the learning center, I teach courses on a good death and, um, really trying to reach the [00:48:08] public as well as vet staff. I mean, basically anybody with animals, um, either in a professional or public way. Um, how to start looking at quality of life, preparing and proactively thinking about death.

[00:48:19] Um, and, uh, no Monkey Business Dog training. And, and if you go to no monkey business dog training.com, the, you [00:48:27] can get the book there I’m working on. It’s a very sticky, I don’t really wanna put the book on the nonprofit site, so, um, but there is a link to Nom Monkey Business on the site so you can find, um, old dog, new dog that way as well.

[00:48:40] Julie: Amazing ladies, thank you so much for the work that you’re doing in the [00:48:46] world and keep in touch. Um, I so appreciate just who you are in this lifetime. So thank you. Thank you for having

[00:48:53] Kathy Callahan: us. This was great. Just such a neat conversation. I’m gonna carry some of this with me. Yeah, me too. Thank you so much for having us on

[00:49:02] Julie: Beautiful Souls.

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[00:51:02] Deep breath out.

[00:51:08] Again, deep breath. Inhaling the pure white light and love of God, making you feel weightless [00:51:18] and filled with joy. And I want you to exhale all of the heaviness that you’ve been carrying in your ORIC field, in your chakras, in your body. Friends, no matter where you are in your life, your angels need you to know that you are [00:51:37] so, so loved.

[00:51:40] Never doubt that you have big, big purpose here and now. What is your soul here to do? My friends, your spirit team is always working with you. I want you to see and feel your heart chakra [00:51:56] and your heart itself opening like French doors. I want you to see God and your spirit team sending you a multitude of blessings, of abundance in health, wealth, happiness, love and peace.

[00:52:13] See all [00:52:15] of those unexpected blessings filling your heart right now, my friends, your soul is love, joy, peace, bliss, ease, and grace. And because that’s who and what you truly are, these elements [00:52:34] can never leave you. They can never be taken away from you and my friends. All you really ever have to do is just be, be you, and radiate the beautiful light that you are.

[00:52:46] So go forth today and be an angel in the lives of others. Radiate your [00:52:53] love and live in the high vibration of simply being.