What is it about dogs that renders dog-lovers utterly incoherent? I wondered at myself as I played with Brownie, a stately golden retriever in Emily Ray’s Dubai home, all the while expressing excited gibberish that included the repetition of the word ‘floof’, which, in truth, has no real meaning at all.
Brownie appeared to share this sentiment. As his eyes politely said, he, sir, was no floof, but a true gentleman. He let me scratch his ears and hold his paws, and then took residence on the sofa, and listened to Ray explain his story. Ray, a school teacher, has fostered several dogs before, as she noticed that they had a calming effect on her son, Sam, who has Angelman’s Syndrome, a rare neuro-genetic disorder, that primarily affects the nervous system, leading to developmental delays, intellectual disabilities, and distinctive behavioral and physical characteristics. And so, she found out about Brownie through a Facebook post, and decided to foster him at first. As she explained, she wanted to make sure that the dog could settle in well with her daughter May, Sam, as well as the five cats roaming around the house. “Brownie just looked so calm and lovely, and was just so good with my son, who can’t really talk, but communicates with sounds and hand gestures,” she explained. Indeed, when Sam came running in excitedly, he rushed to hug Brownie, first. Every time Brownie moved, it made the child happy: He would clap, and his smile would shine even brighter than before.
Brownie’s magical composure extended beyond the comfort of Ray’s home, too; he has acquired legendary status as the reading dog in her school. “I take him to school once a week, where he spends all day in different classes. The children read to him, and then they play with him, by massaging, patting his ears, or play with his tail. He is called the reading dog, as the children read to him.” Brownie laps up the attention, and owing to his peaceful demeanour, the fear around dogs among the children, abates.
They’re such healing, calm creatures, Ray explained, as the entire family was seated on the sofa, cuddling the dog and two cats. She isn’t the only one who shares this sentiment; most people agree that dogs, cats, horses, or any animal you’ve cared for deeply, and that has returned your affection in the same way or perhaps more, offers a powerful kind of healing. They can pull you out of depths of grief, perhaps more than a human can. There is home and healing in just going out for a walk with them, brushing their fur in the morning, throwing biscuits for them to catch, and just scratching them for hours, till the heaviness lifts, even a little.
Healers of the heart
For many, animals nudge their way into people’s lives during moments of grief or turmoil, offering solace and companionship, when they need it the most. Trina Mole, a UAE resident, shared how her dog Dobby became her anchor. “He saved my life, and he saves it every day,” she said Unlike demure Brownie in another corner of the country, Dobby is known to be a rather difficult, reactive dog, she explains. “That’s supposed to make your life hard, isn’t it? But that’s far from the case with Dobby,” she says, adding that the dog is ‘as obsessed with her’ as she is with him.
Mole is the only one that he trusts fully: There’s no one else. He’s a rather different dog, when he is just with her. “He is so loving and gentle, and just knows when I’m in a bad place, and I’ve been in so many of them,” explains Mole. The past few years have been filled with several professional and personal upheavals: Her partner was laid-off and had to return to the US, a few years ago. “I was left alone with three dogs and then I found him, just via a Facebook post, ironically on my father’s death anniversary. It seemed like a sign.”
She adds, “He stuck to me like glue, and just finds different, goofy, ways to make me laugh every day,” she says. It’s the little things that he does: Launching himself into a pool, running in circles in the garden, getting her to go for walks, every day. It’s the light, when things go dark.
A love that changes us
Rupkatha Bhowmick, canine caregiver and Founder of Wiser Woofs, had her ‘whole life changed’ when she found Mr Popo, a cheery beagle. “Our whole day got structured around him,” she recalls, admitting that she had never owned a dog before and this was her first. After eight years of Mr Popo, she started noticing that he was falling back on his hind legs. They got it checked and learnt that he developed an illness, where he suffered seizures regularly. Bhowmick recalls how she even changed her job timings to be with him and care unconditionally for him. Worse, later, he got dementia too. Yet, the love just grew stronger, and Bhowmick learnt the extent that she could go to look after her old, senior dog. Perhaps that's what you do when you love something so dearly: It pushes you to see parts of yourself that you did not know, and you find yourself doing things that you didn't know that you were capable of. “He has taught me lessons of love, acceptance and patience. And there’s such tremendous beauty in how such wordless love changes you. Taking care of him gave me a purpose, a new purpose in life,” she says.
I heard this story and thought of my own dog Loki. To many others, she is diffident, quiet and rather timid. When large groups of people are home, she hides under the table, or stays firmly by our side. Yet, this little one with her large brown eyes, has rescued us, more than we can admit. For the past two years, there has been comfort in returning home to her. It is solace to hear the squeaks from the moment I set foot on the floor, and when I start walking to the apartment. The scratches on the door get more frantic, and I’m greeted with a happy dog and running in circles. I see this, and the troubles instantly recede.
These little antics are balm, especially during times of grief, tears and sickness that we’ve been through in the past two years. She doesn’t leave our side, the moment, she knows something is wrong. And, moreover, I often admire how she brought out the soft side in my husband, who hadn’t been around dogs for a long time, and before Loki, didn’t have the same affection for dogs that I did. That’s all changed, I know, as I watch him throwing biscuits up and down the hallway, waiting for her to find them, or him expressing slight remorse at leaving her alone for a few hours on the weekend. “But it’s the weekend. She expects us home. Shouldn’t we go home and just check on her for a while,” he once asked.
It's a miracle how wordless, unconditional love can change us so completely.
‘Couldn’t have had a better protector’
Not all animals heal with gentle love; some protect with ferocity. In this regard, Rihea Sen, a Dubai-based marketing professional recalls her mother’s cat, whom she found as a stray, starving kitten, abandoned on the streets. Named Chessy, the cat’s face had been mauled by an animal, and Sen’s mother took the kitten to a vet for help. After several operations, the kitten’s face was slowly reconstructed, though she still could not see with one eye. “My mother adored Chessy, and Chessy worshipped the floor my mother walked on,” remembers Sen. “Chessy hated and distrusted everyone else; she regarded even me warily. But she would do anything for my mother, and was always by her side,” she says.
Chessy was fiercely protective of her mother too. For instance, when a male relative raised his voice at Sen’s mother in their house, Chessy sprang in front of her mother, hissing, back arched, with a tail like a bottle-brush. “She would have scratched him for sure, but my mother sternly said, ‘No, Chessy. Behave.’” Realising that there was an order to follow, Chessy perched herself on the armchair and watched the uncle, carefully,” laughs Sen. “I don’t think we could have had a better protector than Chessy.”
While her mother battled cancer, the cat stayed by her side, sleeping next to her and would hiss at anyone who made any sort of noise that could disturb Sen’s mother. This connection became a source of comfort and strength for Sen’s mother, a reminder that healing can take many forms - sometimes as a soothing presence, other times as a shield against the world.“A year after my mother passed away, Chessy ran out of the door and we never found her,” says Sen, remembering how she and her brother ran up and down streets, looking for her. “I don’t think she wanted to come to a home that didn’t have my mother.”
Learning from horses
For some, animals offer lessons that go beyond companionship. Horses, with their commanding presence and sensitivity, can calm people, and pull them from the depths of grief. Saliha Afridi, a Dubai-based clinical psychologist, started riding horses five years ago. She felt an energetic shift: It changed her life, changed the relationship that she had with her body, and she became a more attuned and sensitive communicator, as she says. It taught her humility. “My horse, and our relationship has had a big role in my healing journey and my ability to trust … trust myself and others. He taught me how the body holds our traumas and how horses can help you unlock and process stuck emotions,” she says. “He is a strong and spirited animal, but calm and steady and his nervous system had an incredible effect on mine. Horses can do that. Their intuitive and calming presence can regulate and mirror our nervous systems.”
Moreover, Afridi adds that she learnt about power versus force from her horse. “Real power is rooted in trust, presence, and respect rather than control. And true partnership involves safety and surrender,” she explains, disagreeing with those who believe in ‘dominating’ their horse. “I never felt that I was in absolute control, but he also did not take me for a ride either. I had clear expectations of him and was firm and gentle in communicating those expectations,” she says. There would be days when he was in an ‘off’ mood, and she sensed it in his energy, and took it easy. There were days, when he sensed the heaviness in his heart, and did everything in his power to be a source of strength for her. “The truth is you are never really in control, when there is another spirit involved … you can control what you do and how you show up, but whether it is a horse, or a child or a partner, they will bring their own energy to the dynamic. And if you try to control them, their hearts will close and they will disengage. Where there is control there is no trust.”
Similarly, for Omnia Al Desoukie, a Dubai-based media professional, her horse GB became a companion through profound grief. Al Soukie, who had taken a 20-year break from riding, found respite during the Covid-19 pandemic after she encountered the horse GB, at a stable, in Dubai. “I would just spend several hours with him, cuddling him, every day,” she says. When even a broken foot didn’t prevent her from spending time with the horse, she realised that she must have him. She finally bought him, two days before her mother passed away, and he became a steadfast companion in overwhelming grief and sorrow. “I used to go and spend time with him, because he was everything I had. He was my friend; I could talk to him and cry with him, and go back home, and feel so much better about myself. Being around him, helped me process the raw grief, little by little. I realised, it's just a process.”
However one November in 2021, he suffered a terrible accident, and she couldn’t ride him again. Yet, the love only grew stronger. “It was a beautiful friendship, and I could just tell him anything; and it was as if he understood what I was going through,” she says. A few years later, she lost him to cancer, and grief felt even more brutal this time. “I had to get help after losing him, because I didn’t just lose him, I felt as if I had lost my mother again,” she says.
Through these stories, one idea remains strong: Animals just know how to move us. Whether it’s Brownie bringing joy to a boy with Angelman Syndrome, Dobby pulling Mole out of darkness, or Chessy guarding Sen’s mother, some bonds defy logic.
As each of them say, animals teach us to trust, to love without conditions, and to find light even in the darkest of times. And as they heal us, they remind us of the profound truth: In saving them, we often end up saving ourselves.
