‘Animal Whisperer’ Controversy
PHOENIX (AP) — Debbie Johnstone’s clients are sick, lonely or frightened. Sometimes, they express their fears about finding a home, or connecting with that one special person.
But they can’t speak. They are animals, and it is Johnstone’s job to speak for them, she said.
Johnstone relies on her senses of sight, hearing, smell and taste to read animals’ thoughts. She is an animal whisperer, and her practice, Listen 2 Animals, attracts clients from across the country and as far away as Japan.
“There are people who believe in what I do,” said Johnstone, a Cave Creek resident. “Then there are people who don’t, but are experiencing something dramatic.”
Johnstone claims to tackle pets’ physical, spiritual and emotional issues, or at least give owners insights into their four-legged friends. She works mostly with dogs, cats and horses, but not always.
Recently, she connected with a turkey.
“My highest desire is that people understand that animals are intelligent, sentient beings,” she said.
Johnstone, a self-taught communicator, calls her technique “energetic communication,” or telepathy. The practice has taken off recently, with more people attempting to understand their companions.
Associated Press - Debbie Johnstone pets a horse named Tilly Nov. 20 in Scottsdale, Ariz. Johnstone is an animal whisperer and her practice, Listen 2 Animals, attracts clients from across the country and as far away as Japan.
Books and television series such as Cesar Millan’s “Dog Whisperer” have put the onus on owners to solve their pets’ litter-box problems, irrational fears and puzzling behaviors. Animal communicators claim to do this by channeling pets’ thoughts and, in some cases, trying to heal them.
Dr. Gregg Townsley, a Scottsdale veterinarian, is a doubter, and he warned about the dangers associated with the practice.
“They’re giving people false hope,” Townsley said.
According to Townsley, pet owners can mistakenly rely on animal whisperers as an alternative to veterinary services. By refusing to heal an animal through traditional medicine, they are taking a dangerous risk, he said.
“We see animals that suffer and die, because they (the owners) take their friends’ advice,” Townsley said.
At a recent session, Johnstone connected with Pookie, an 8-year-old calico cat.
The feline, rescued from a euthanasia list, lived in a Scottsdale foster home. Within seconds, Johnstone said she could feel the animal’s sadness. She claimed to sense what she thought were the cat’s allergies and a fondness for women.
“As a child, I collected stray animals,” Johnstone said. “I thought everybody heard them the way I do.”
Johnstone, who charges $125 an hour for at-home visits, also does sessions over the phone and by e-mail.
She said she uses a photo to connect energetically, sometimes from thousands of miles away.
She claims to read animals that have “transitioned” — meaning, died. The service is especially popular among owners who want to know if Fluffy has moved on to a better place.
“The last thing you can ever imagine is having to put an animal down and not knowing if they wanted it or not,” Johnstone said.
Joyce Leake, an animal communicator and co-author of “Decoding the Mystery of Interspecies Communication,” called the practice “everyone’s innate ability to intuit what other individuals are expressing.”
Leake said anyone can become an animal communicator through discipline and training. Her five-level program called “Interspecies Communication” promises to teach owners how to read and converse with their pets, among other skills.
“To communicate with an animal, or to communicate with a human, you must be acutely aware of the other being’s expressions,” Leake said. “We recognize these expressions through the vocal apparatus, or through body language.”
Phoenix animal communicator Barbara Paster said the practice is a spiritual belief that people choose to accept. She works with cats, dogs, horses, iguanas, turtles, even humans, tackling problems ranging from physical pain to the loss of a mate.
Through the healing process, Paster said most clients notice changes in their health, behavior and emotional states. According to her Web site, the energy healing can have a “profound” effect on cellular biology and can alleviate many physical, emotional and spiritual issues.
The technique, she said, is not fool-proof.
“I can’t make an animal change if they don’t want to,” Paster said. “Nobody can do it 100 percent of the time.”
Filed under: Animal Welfare • Pet Health
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We humans are so programed to present our social masks, that many are conditioned out of listening to their intuitive selves. This is a huge liability in many levels, when we cannot hear that inner voice that tells us when something is not right or when to take action…from knowing when a tow legged preditor is stalking us to when we are not getting all of the information we need to make informed decisions appropiate to our lifestyles and choices.
I find that having an impartial intuitive such as the people here to consult with in addition to other more traditional sources, allows me to go beyond the limited or rigid perspective of one professional who has become conditioned into their options and choices, unable to allow the potential for other opportunitites.
Developing my skills in this area has allowed me to consistantly go beyond projections and expectations of traditional professionals with both dogs and humans in both quality and length of life. I also have not listened to my intuitive self when professionals assured me that the problems I reported from my two or four legged loved ones were mis or under diagnosed, costing life and increasing suffering.
While I would never NOT utilize a traditional medical treatment still, I have had GREAT success in utlizing ALL available resources, tradtional professional and alternative, including the use of communicators to cross check my own perpectives (and the potential perspectives), of the humans and animals in my life!