I have heard the term “compassion fatigue” many times, but I don’t think I fully understood it until now. Compassion fatigue is the depression and sorrow that comes from having an open heart and dealing with an overwhelming amount of loss, grief, or pain. People in healing professions can suffer from this, like veterinarians, social workers, therapists, doctors, nurses, and, of course, people in rescue. I have heard that many sanctuaries have closed and rescuers have quit because the compassion fatigue is so overpowering. Over the years, I have done many things to try to prevent compassion fatigue and stay strong, like meditate, visualize the gentle world I want to create, surround myself with positivity, and avoid negativity at all costs. I have lasted eighteen years ...

When Dudley passed away it hurt so badly that I couldn’t breathe. It wasn’t just the tragic and sudden loss of our beloved Dudley, but of all the animals we have lost in the last year - Sassy, Fancy, Lilly, Jazz, Monty, Mufasa, Biscuit, Bodhi, Lazar, and Princess, to name a few. With over a hundred senior and special needs animals, who have lived way past their life expectancy, we have had to say farewell to a lot of loved ones this year. Jay and I have so much work to do that we do not have time to grieve; we must keep going. So, the pain gets bottled up inside of us and after a while it overflows.

Jay and I have worked years without a vacation and for the most part we’re fine, as we are living our dream and we love what we do. However, when Dudley passed away and we finally returned home after our travels, we knew that we needed to let ourselves mourn. I stayed in bed for about a week and cried, looked at pictures of Dudley and all my babies, ran through memories in my head, and let myself fall apart. It is so hard to be on this planet with so much cruelty. It is hard to love animals with every fiber of my being and let them go when it is their time. It is also hard to keep an open heart when there are people who want to tear it to pieces. After a week of mourning, I had to find a way to get up and keep going. Nature and animals have always been my healers and this time was no different. Jay and I packed up our things and went to the ocean for a few days.

Standing on the beach, facing the waves, marveling at the enormous strength of the ocean made me a feel better. It is so gigantic, larger than life. My work involves specific details, like a particular animal’s rescue or recovery, or opening individual hearts through the interactions with the animals, or hosting field trips one at a time to teach kindness to children. My work exposes me to the slaughter of animals, to animal testing, to factory farms, to the dairy industry – to so many problems that seem insurmountable. Standing at the ocean shoreline and feeling the sheer might of nature, feeling her breeze kiss my cheek, seeing the ocean go on endlessly until it touched the sky, I felt so small and insignificant, and for some reason that made me feel safe.

In addition to saving animals, I always thought that part of our work was to help the environment. I think that we accomplish that by helping people connect to nature and be more mindful of her. I thought that we were actually helping to save the planet. Sometimes I think that there is no way we can do that with all the damage that humans are doing on a daily basis. Standing next to the ocean, toes in the sand, feeling her roar in my ear, I knew that the planet is so much stronger than we think it is. It has been here since the beginning of time and will be here forever more. What we are really fighting for is our right to be here. If the destruction and the devastation continue, it is not nature that we are ultimately hurting, we are hurting ourselves and our own chances of survival. Just like the body heats itself up to rid itself of harmful bacteria, and that is why we have fevers when we are sick, Mother Earth will shake us off or make conditions unlivable for us if we don’t start turning things around.

Breathing in the fresh air, letting the sand have my weight as I lay on the beach, watching the clouds float by in their wonderful shapes and patterns, and hearing the oceans roar made me see that there is an enormously big picture that we are all a part of. We are all so lucky to be on this planet! Hopefully, humans will have the privilege to be here many generations from now, if only we can come from reverence and not ownership.

As we were driving home from the beach back to The Gentle Barn I heard a quote in an Ed Sheeran song that stuck with me and is helping me turn the grief into gratitude: “a heart that is broken, is a heart that has been loved.” Dudley loved us all so, so much! From now on, every time my heart hurts over the loss of Dudley, or any of our beloveds, I’m going to remember that the reason I’m hurting is because I was so loved. I am so deeply grateful for being loved by all of them and for the chance to do this work! I now have a renewed sense of strength and purpose to save animals, heal children, open peoples’ hearts, and continue Dudley’s message; St. Louis here we come!