Richard Leonard confronts the devastating loss of his service dog Gus, detailing how chemotherapy offers no guarantee against lymphoma while highlighting research showing dogs significantly reduce PTSD symptoms and improve sleep for veterans. He explains that losing such a "battle buddy" triggers severe anxiety and hypervigilance, often causing isolation due to stigma, yet urges listeners to check on struggling veterans who view these animals as essential soldiers in their trauma recovery. [Automatically generated summary]
Transcriber: CohereLabs/cohere-transcribe-03-2026, WAV2VEC2_ASR_BASE_960H, sat-12l-sm, script v26.04.01, and large-v3-turbo
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My Dog Has Cancer00:15:10
I just learned the other day that my dog has cancer and that he will not be part of our family physically for very much longer.
And to be quite honest, I'm not dealing with it very well.
And so it got me thinking.
It got me thinking about other veterans who might be in the same situation.
Now, well, it got me thinking about, we'll get into it.
This is just the intro.
It's going to be a tough show to get through, but I'm going to tough through it because I think it's important.
So, today we're going to talk about dogs veterans, the loss of said dogs, and how to get through it.
I don't know how to get through it, but that's going to be part of the discussion.
So, stick with us.
Don't go away.
We start now.
Hey, everybody, and welcome here to the next installment of the Richard Leonard Show.
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Well, not right now, after the show.
Okay, so.
This is a difficult topic, and I'm going to try to get through it the best I can.
To be quite honest, I've been super emotional about hearing this news about my dog.
My dog, Gus, is seven years old, and we just learned a few days ago that he has lymphoma.
And they're really, to the best of our knowledge, what we've been told thus far is there's really no way to cure it.
There's no way to.
To put it into remission and all that.
I mean, there is, but they're very expensive.
And from what I was told, it won't necessarily add a great chunk of life onto Gus's life.
And as the day I record this, in the early days of May 2026, they say that even if we decide to do.
The chemotherapy treatment, for example, he might make it to the end of the year, but there's no promise of that.
And so, my first instinct is to say, Well, if I know that he's going this year, I'm not going to prolong it some extra months.
The chances of it getting ugly and all of those things that happen to dogs at the end of their lives when they're sick.
I don't want to remember my dog that way.
And so now we haven't officially been told exactly, you know, what stage or how long he has.
So I have yet to find that out.
But the idea of the loss is what's really, really hitting me hard because what most people in my life, even the people that are closest to me, don't know is that.
That guy has been here in this studio at home, wherever it is, and during my darkest moments of the last seven years, anyway, there he sits.
He's not judging me.
He's not telling me how to fix it.
He's not like sympathetic.
He's just there, right?
And no matter what you say to him, no matter what you do, no matter how you act, how you.
Tears or anger or elation, whatever it is, he's just there.
And he's always there.
And there's really nothing that you can do short of shoving him out of the house and dropping him off somewhere and hoping he gets lost.
And this dog will find you.
This thing, this living being will find you.
Not because.
I don't believe it's 100% because they depend on you for food and love and shelter and all these things, but because they genuinely want to be there.
Now you're part of the pack.
And I think that that's one of the magical things that dogs offer us.
I've compiled some thoughts into a list to talk about because I figured, well, I better have some kind of like real concrete organized plan for this show, or I'm going to just start mumbling and bumbling on about my dog.
But I think that it presents a real problem.
It's a real issue that veterans have to face.
So this got me interested in researching more about the research and the studies that go into the things that these dogs provide veterans.
And not just veterans, I think everybody, right?
Anybody who's a dog person who has dogs.
They understand it a whole lot better than anyone else.
And I can honestly tell you that up until seven years ago, when we got Gus and our family, I didn't get it.
I didn't understand.
I mean, I was sympathetic to people's emotional response to their pets, whether it was a time of grief or it was a time of elation, as I said, or positive, negative, indifferent.
It didn't really matter.
And so.
I think that we need to recognize that just because dogs like Gus, for example, never went through training, he was never certified, he didn't have a vest, he didn't have a certificate, couldn't bring him with me to work or on a plane when my wife and I travel, I couldn't, you know, I can't bring him into the movie theater and the grocery and all these things, but that doesn't mean that he wasn't my service dog.
Because now that we're going through this and I have to prepare myself, not only me, but my family also has to prepare themselves for this.
It makes me realize that he is my service dog.
When we are out and about, you know, my wife and I, if we're out shopping or we're out seeing the grandkid or we're at work or just whatever.
And I start to feel like I'm going to freak out.
I go home to my dog.
That's my comfort place.
My home is my safe space.
And I was doing some reading and I read what this guy was writing about losing his service dog.
Because I got interested in that too.
Like, what is the process?
We know that dogs don't live forever, right?
As it relates to our lifespan, they're very short.
And so I started thinking well, if I'm struggling with this, And Gus isn't even a service dog.
How do these organizations that help veterans with dogs prepare these guys and gals for when that dog's mission is over, when their life is coming to an end?
Because to be quite honest, when we first got Gus, of course you don't think about it, right?
My thought wasn't, man, how am I going to deal with him passing away?
Because at the time when we got him, I was more concerned about trying to get him from keeping to eat the goddamn drywall in my house, which he did.
And then that's what triggered my wife and I sending him to this training program, like this obedience class.
Because either he was going to eat all the drywall in our kitchen, or he was going to have to go or get trained.
And so we sent him to training.
Um,.
And I think that part of the discussion and part of the understanding that needs to happen moving forward is that there are things that I believe now that veterans experience with dogs that civilians can't really understand.
And I think there are some, right?
Of course, like first responders and people in real high stress environments.
Probably like ER doctors or these medical professionals that are getting slammed all the time with busy emergency rooms and these tragic things happening under their watch at these hot, wherever they were, anywhere.
But I think that there are things that veterans experience with dogs that the common civilian person doesn't really understand.
And I think it's interesting because I think that common civilian people.
Experience similar interactions with dogs that they have if they're dog people.
But like the deep bond, I don't know if it's the same because I believe that veterans carry with them this idea around their dogs that it's not just a dog, it's not just a companion.
This dog isn't just a pet.
This is my battle buddy.
This is my purpose in life.
And maybe not your full purpose, but I have to take care of this dog.
This dog is going to provide me a lot of support and a lot of relief, whatever words you want to put in there.
But in order to get that, I got to work for it.
And by working for it, I got to make sure that he's, of course, properly trained and we keep up on the training and that he stays healthy, that he eats and exercises, all the things that go with taking care of dogs that everybody has to do.
But to the veteran community, it seems the way that they talk about it in the research is that those, even though they're the same tasks for everybody who owns a dog, these things are deeper rooted in their day to day activities.
They're deeper rooted in their mental health.
Treatment structure.
The research shows that within two to three months of receiving service dogs, many veterans report not extreme, but very, very strong changes in their PTSD symptoms, their sleep, their anger, their hypervigilance, all of these things that we talk about.
And it's.
It's astounding to me because, like I said, I didn't get it.
I didn't get it until just a little while ago.
Research shows that dogs truly help mental health, and studies show that dogs can help reduce PTSD symptoms, depression, anxiety, isolation, panic responses.
In veterans, they say veterans will sleep better, they will feel calmer, re engage socially, which I think is a really important thing.
When you see anybody, but in the context of this conversation, when you see veterans out in the community with service dogs, I believe that one of the biggest helps to that person is the social engagement.
Because you know what it's like, right?
When you're sitting, let's just say you're sitting outside at a coffee shop on some busy sidewalk, and some guy walks by, he looks timid, he looks maybe a little scary.
Looks pissed off.
Looks like he's in distress, maybe.
And he's walking with this dog.
And people see dogs.
Dog people who see dogs in public are always very excited to see other dogs.
The Power of Service Dogs00:10:12
And then they want to pet them.
And they want to ask their name.
And they want to give compliments.
And they want to, can I give your dog a treat?
Those types of things.
And even if that person says, no, fuck off, get away from me, whatever it is.
They're still having to interact socially.
And even if that interaction in the beginning is negative, which would be real negative if someone has to pet my dog and I tell them to fuck off, it's going to be a negative interaction for sure.
But I believe it happens.
I believe it happens because I believe that people get wrapped up in whatever is going on in their mind or their life, and they just don't want to be bothered.
They already have this trauma or these experiences or whatever it is that initiated the need for this animal to help them.
And after a while, these, hey, your dog's cute.
Can I pet your dog?
Can I give your dog a treat?
After a while, I believe that people start to change that social interaction.
Now, is it fair to the first old lady that liked your dog and you told her to fuck off?
Probably not.
That's probably not fair to her.
But at the end of the day, you are interacting, even though negatively.
But over time, those interactions, in my opinion, I believe, will become a lot more positive.
And you can have this thing, this animal, this dog, completely opens up that door for you.
And.
I gotta say, as I'm sitting here and filming this and talking about this, sometimes to me, here's the weirdest thing for me.
Sometimes I feel like I'm way overreacting about my dog dying.
Even though I can articulate exactly the things that he does for me, the way that he makes me feel, the comfort he brings me when I open that door and there he is.
With his tail wagging so hard that he's going to feel like he's going to give himself scoliosis for Christ's sake.
I don't care who you are.
I don't care if you walk through that door pissed as hell.
Even if you lash out at the dog, even if you yell at it or you tell it to get the hell away from you, whatever it is, or you give him a hug when you walk, it doesn't matter.
Either way, that dog is positively affecting your mindset.
I believe that.
And those are the things that when you think about losing them, those are the things that are hard to foresee happening.
Right?
Like, what's going to happen when the time comes, and now I'm going to come home from work and I'm going to open the door?
And every time I open the door, Gus runs out to go potty in the front yard.
How many times am I going to go up those four stairs in my garage to open the door for him and prop it open like I always do?
And get excited to see his little beady ass head point out from the door and run down the steps and go pee in the yard and maybe chase a squirrel if he sees one or bark at the deer across the street.
Well, we're not going to do that anymore, but how many times am I going to open that door and be confused for a second that he's not there?
And then what is that response going to trigger?
What kind of loneliness does that trigger?
What kind of confusion?
What kind of anger?
I'm not sure how I'm going to process that yet.
Sometimes the grief hits harder for veterans than most civilians can understand.
A real common civilian reactions are like, well, you know, I understand you're feeling shitty.
But he's just a dog.
He's just a dog.
He was a good boy.
Yeah, he was a great dog.
Did he do for you what you needed him to do?
Yeah, he did.
Well, then you can get another dog.
Yeah, I don't know about that.
And then people will say, at least he had a good full life.
You could take comfort in knowing that you gave him a good life.
He was comfortable.
He was happy.
He had a good family.
Everyone loved him.
What could be better?
Well, what could be better is that my fucking dog doesn't die.
And so, like, those are, I believe that those are easy responses to give people.
It's the easy thing to try to provide comfort.
And I get that.
And I understand that people are interested in doing that for you.
But for a lot of veterans, I think that that dog becomes part of their routine.
And for many, it's their protector, it's not just a physical protector.
But you know, when people are sitting in the dark at night and those demons start to creep out from the closet, they start to cloud your mind and you start going down the road of intrusive thoughts.
And there he is, staring at you with his tongue hanging out.
I don't know that many people can explain what that does for you unless you've had that, unless you've experienced it.
So, in a way, I feel grateful.
And I think many others should also, if they don't, but many others probably do.
I feel grateful that they had that and that they found a companion that could provide that for them.
But it doesn't make it any easier.
It still hurts.
It still hurts pretty good.
Sometimes it's a trust issue.
Sometimes that dog for people is the only thing that they can trust with their emotions, with their fear, with their anger.
Hopefully, we're not taking our anger out on our dogs.
That's not okay.
But I can tell you, there have been times where I've been sitting with Gus and I had a whole lot to bitch about.
And he'd just sit there and he'd look at me, you know, and then he'd say a familiar word and he'd do the head tilt.
Because he thinks he's going to get something out of it.
But I think the best part about it is that there's just no judgment.
There's no judgment.
There's no someone trying to fix it, there's no one telling you what you should be doing.
I believe that they just watch, they listen intently, and they can feel or understand whatever emotional response it is that you're having at the time.
And if they sense it's a negative one, they have this really unique knack for intervening and either completely changing your disposition or making that weight a little lighter on your shoulders.
And I think for many people, many veterans, It's just something that works.
And I don't know that we, as a culture, the veteran community, and I mean, I guess I don't know how to respond to any other types of communities or people that would be suffering from the same thing or dealing with the same thing because I'm not in that group.
But I think it's just that ability just to be.
Just to be.
That people really attach to.
And it seems really simple.
It seems like it's the easiest concept.
Right?
Like, you're going to tell me all your heavy shit, and I'm just going to look at you, and maybe I'm thinking about a dried sweet potato.
And Gus loves dried sweet potatoes.
That's why I brought that up.
And maybe he's just watching me, and he's thinking to himself, well, what are you going to make with this fucking sweet potato, bro?
And then I'll get done ranting at him or talking to him.
And if the emotion I'm feeling is sadness or anger or anxiety or fear or anything negative, he just knew.
He knows.
I don't want to talk about him like he's gone already.
He's not gone yet.
He just knows.
It's the oddest thing.
Funding the Network00:04:54
And it's a really scary thing to know that it's coming to an end.
Because there's no replacement coming.
And sometimes I think, well, how dare you think about replacing this dude?
This is your battle buddy.
When the darkness comes knocking, And you need someone to fight with.
There they are.
You feel like they'll take that hill with you.
And it's a scary thing to think about it being gone.
But you have to, right?
Like you can't.
You know going into it that it's going to come to an end.
But you don't think about how you're going to process it.
You don't think about how it's going to affect you.
Anyway, we got to take a break.
We'll be right back.
Don't go away.
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You Are Our Lifeblood00:17:30
What these researchers found was that vaccinated children had 4.29 times the rate of asthma, 3.03 times the rate of atopic disease, 5.96 times the rate of autoimmune disease, and 5.53 times the rate of neurodevelopmental disorders.
A number of different diagnoses, including diabetes and ADHD, and a number of them.
In the unvaccinated group, there was zero.
In other words, all these chronic diseases that we're accepting, the reality is maybe 99% of them don't have to exist in children.
That's not the way God made us.
They looked at over 47,000 Medicaid claims between 1999 and 2011.
Those who were vaccinated versus unvaccinated, I say an odds ratio of like 2.81.
2.81 to 1.
So that would be a 181% increase.
Epilepsy seizures, 252%.
Learning disorders, 581%.
If you look at all these different diagnoses, they're all higher.
For example, I'll just give you one example.
Learning disorders in the full term is 581%.
In the preterm, the ones who are vaccinated, 884% increase.
Every single vaccine has an excipient that is a human toxin.
Human toxin.
Hey folks, welcome back here.
Uh, I told you, I told you this was going to be a tough one for me to get through, and I almost lost it there before the break.
So I apologize for that, but man, it's real.
This thing is real, and it's new to me.
It's very new to me.
But anyway, let's continue.
Let's talk about briefly what happens.
So, research shows.
There's talk in the research and the studies about what happens to veterans when they experience this loss.
And some of the things that were outlined the most were things like increased anxiety, emotional numbness, panic attacks.
So, a lot of these things panic attacks, isolation, difficulty sleeping, emotional loss, and loss of structure and purpose in your life, a lot of these things are.
Symptoms or issues that veterans reported before receiving their service dogs.
And after they have lost them, these things start to creep back in.
When the dog dies, sometimes the silence in the house becomes unbearable, was one quote that I saw in an article.
I believe it was an article about service dogs for veterans in People magazine at some point in the last few years.
But I can understand that, right?
For example, in our house, if the neighbors come home, the neighbor kid works at a local fast food restaurant, and they close at, what, 11 o'clock or something.
And so when he comes home and slams his door in the driveway at 11 o'clock or 10 30, Gus goes nuts, right?
And you kind of get into that routine, right?
The neighbor kid works three, four days a week after school or something like that.
And.
So it's multiple times a week.
He comes home at night.
And so when the dog goes nuts, oh, well, okay, well, the neighbor kid's home.
So now we know we're good for the night.
Right?
And it becomes part of this routine.
Your dog kind of responds.
Part of his routine is to respond to things happening around him.
And one of the things I appreciate about Gus at our house is that I kind of take mental notes here and there.
When he starts barking at night, especially at night, and if it becomes a pattern, then you know, oh well, the neighbor's coming home.
Or, you know, the neighbor across the street has a dog.
Gus is a Bernadoodle, and the neighbor across the street has a Bernadoodle.
Different colors, but you know, when Gus sees him out the window, he goes, ape shit.
Well, the people across the street usually walk their dog sometime in the mid evening hours.
The point being that when it hits 11 o'clock, 11 30, 12 midnight, anything like that, and the dog starts barking, well, that alerts me that there's something out of the normal, out of the usual going on.
And it could just be that the people down across the street or next door have visitors.
But yet, he is still a tool for me in particular to know that something in or around my house is not how it usually is.
Because I know what he reacts to.
I know how he reacts.
And so, if you hear a door slam and you hear two barks out of Gus, that's probably about all you're going to hear, unless they're approaching the house, or unless there's someone at the door, or unless he just senses that something's not right.
And he may not even bark, he may paw at my leg, or he may come to the top of the stairs and start kind of pacing around in circles and whimpering a little bit.
Well, something isn't right because that's not normal for him.
And so part of my fear is that when he reaches the end of his days, and we don't have that around here, well, how the hell am I going to be alerted?
Now I'm used to it.
Now it's part of my routine, it's part of my own mental security check for my house before I retire for the evening.
When my wife and I make our way upstairs to, you know, To end our day, and you know, we like to watch stories together.
We're huge Chicago PD fans, for example.
So we go upstairs, we nestle into our little spots, we'll watch a story or two before bed.
Gus comes in, he gets his nightly sweet potato.
Right?
So we have this whole routine, and when he breaks that routine, that means something is different, and it may not be.
People outside, and maybe that he doesn't feel well, or maybe his belly's upset and he's got a crap again.
Whatever it is, he is the sign that there is a change in the routine in the house.
For me, anyway.
I don't know if my wife would say the same thing.
And that's just one little small snippet of, you know, like, for example, the things I think about when I think about losing our dog.
And there's so many more things that go into it, but that's just an example.
And then I got to thinking well, at what rate do veterans replace their dogs, whether they're service dogs or companion animals or just the rescue dog that you got from the pound because you wanted a dog?
How often do they replace them?
And the answer to that is according to the research, They replace them quite often.
They also say there was a study done in late 2024.
I believe it was by Purdue University.
And they were talking about the reasons as to why people, veterans in particular, do not replace their service dogs and the reasons why they do.
And it seemed to me that the majority of people do replace them.
Which I thought was interesting because I've had this thought that I would feel extremely guilty about getting another dog.
Because I won't like any dog.
I won't love any dog as much as I love Gus.
No other dog will mean to me the same as this dog means.
And maybe that's true.
But the interesting thing I read was.
That sometimes is just a different mindset.
Right?
Like, I had mentioned at the end of the first segment that Gus is my, at this point in my life, is my battle buddy.
When the darkness comes a knocking, he's the thing, the person, the dog, whatever you want to call it.
He is, he's standing right there.
And to be quite honest, for me, he's fought off more of those demons than I could probably explain.
And it's funny because the truth is, if somebody broke into our house, Gus might just lick him to death.
I don't know if he'd be a good guard dog.
We've never been in a situation where he needs to protect me or the kids or my wife or anything from anything.
We've just never been in that situation.
So I don't know what he would do.
But he loves everybody.
We had the AC people here to inspect their air conditioner because summer's coming, of course.
And, you know, the guy comes knocking on the door, and Gus is super excited, barking and carrying on, tails going nuts.
And you open the door, and it's like, oh my God, this is my best friend.
I haven't seen him for centuries, and here he is.
You know, and most everybody is service people, you know, that come to your house to do repairs or inspections or whatever.
They're usually pretty cool with dogs, most of them.
And so he gets his loves, and, you know, it's always pleasant.
He's got friends, right?
He's got friends coming to the house to visit him.
I think it's how he sees it.
Oh my God, look at my buddies here.
Well, who's this guy?
I don't know, but he's my buddy.
Those are the things that I believe are just so magical about that relationship.
And why it's so important and why people get so attached.
So, anyway, the research showed that many veterans replace their dogs, but usually not right away.
Usually there's a grieving period.
They talked about some guys and gals even go years before they'll replace them.
The average that I read that they talked about was six months to a year, get through that grieving process.
And a lot of it, I think, also depends for people on if they think they can manage without.
I think some people have the thought, well, you know, I miss my dog.
I'll never like another one as much as I like him, whatever those feelings are.
And then when the symptoms that the dog helped to alleviate start coming back and they become disruptive and.
People's ability to function day to day starts to change in a way that's not conducive to success at work or positive relationships or whatever it is.
That's when they approach the idea of getting another dog because they now see the difference between having it and not.
And I think it's easy to forget, right?
It's easy to forget what life was like before.
And I can say that honestly.
I know what I went through before I got my dog.
I understand it.
I can comprehend it.
I can articulate it.
I can talk about it.
But to be quite honest, I don't really fully remember what it felt like.
All of these things that Gus now alleviates for me that were negative or not so great before he came, as it relates to my mental health or anything like that, you kind of forget how it feels.
Because it hurts.
It's not fun to deal with.
It's not cool to think about.
It gets in the way of your day to day function and ability to operate.
So you kind of just forget a little bit what it feels like, what these emotional responses feel like to the hypervigilance or whatever it is that you may have the depression, anxiety, the hypervigilance, the sadness, the destructive behavior, all of these things.
You forget what it feels like when those things negatively affect you.
And they do.
But now, in my situation, for seven years, I've had this fallback plan, I've had this comfort zone.
And I'll tell you guys my wife is extremely, extremely patient and supportive and is always ready to stand right there next to me when I need her.
Not behind me, but beside me.
And I'll tell you openly and honestly, just like I've told her, it's just not the same.
And it's nothing that anybody does that's lacking.
There's nobody's at fault, none of that.
It's just not the same.
And I wish that I could figure out how to better articulate it to help people understand.
But I think that people who are pet people, who are dog people, who are animal people understand what I'm trying to say.
Maybe not, though.
Maybe I'm just not doing a good job at articulating it.
Veterans often grieve the loss of their service animals or their dogs or their pets or their emotions, whatever you want to call it.
They grieve it pretty quietly, according to the research.
And I could tell you, I'm trying to grieve it real quietly, also.
I really don't want to talk about it with my family members, with my coworkers, with my friends, really anybody.
There's a couple people that are close to me that I've called for advice about what to do moving forward.
One of my best friends and cousin, through marriage, oddly enough, has had a lot of dogs.
And he's been through this quite a bit, and he's got three dogs currently, so he's not done with it.
And so he's been a good help to just try to help me to understand what I should do.
Like, what's the most fair for Gus?
What's the best option, right?
You know, the three things in particular that I want to make sure of is that Gus isn't hurting, he's not scared, and I don't want him to die alone.
And in fact, when that time comes, that we need to make the decision for him so that he doesn't get super sick and we don't have to carry him outside to go to the bathroom.
He doesn't have to be in pain and discomfort and all that stuff like we were talking about in the beginning of the show.
Avoiding Isolation in Grief00:13:32
I don't want to remember him that way.
But he also doesn't deserve that.
None of this is his fault.
None of this is really anybody's fault.
But I just think that it's the best option just to make that decision for him.
And when that time comes, I want to be the one to press the plunger.
I don't know how I could sit in a room with anybody and have somebody else do it the vet, anybody, if they will allow me.
I'm going to be the one to do it.
He's my fucking dog.
And I think that I owe that to him.
There's nothing else that that dude owes me.
He's paid further ahead than he can ever imagine.
So, how do veterans grieve this quietly?
Many vets hide the pain any way that they can.
They'll look you dead in the face and say, I'm good, man.
No big deal.
It's all right.
Some will avoid talking about it, like me.
With the exception of this show that the whole world can view if they're interested, they'll avoid it.
And I have been until now.
I guess I can say the only reason I've really chosen to talk about this at this point.
I mean, I think eventually I can get through it a lot better, but I mean, it's only two days old.
And I think it's important to talk about it because I can't be the only one.
And part of what my goal is with my legacy in general is to have conversations like this because maybe it'll help somebody else.
Maybe it'll help someone else feel like they're not alone or they don't have to be embarrassed.
They don't have to feel like a pussy because they're sad about their dog dying.
Because the truth is, the way that I see it, he is like one of my children.
He's part of our family.
And he was part of the fabric that kept our family together and as strong as possible when we needed him the most.
You know, it's an interesting thing because.
The way that we got our dog, and if my wife was on here, she'd tell you that I beat her up.
I beat her up over a few years about this dog because she was not really for it at first.
Dogs are a lot of responsibility.
You have a dog at home, you can't always necessarily meet up with your wife after work at 7 o'clock, have dinner, and get home at 11 because the dog's been home most of the day.
You know, and maybe you went and let them out or something, or you have a, you know, like the neighbor kids help us walk Gus throughout the week because we both work until evening.
And so they help us get them some exercise, which is great.
But it becomes a really difficult thing to talk about.
And a lot of folks avoid it.
Some folks feel like this is very embarrassing, the way that this is making me feel.
I mentioned it earlier in the show.
Sometimes I think in the past couple of days, maybe I'm overreacting about this.
I mean, some people will say it's okay to get attached to your dog, but also remember.
That they're a tool.
Yeah, you get attached to them.
They integrate with your family.
And, you know, you have to care for them.
And they show you all this love and affection and this unconditional affection.
But at the end of the day, they're just a tool.
Right?
Like, did Gus provide me mental health support?
Did he provide me comfort?
Did he provide me laughter?
Did he?
Provide me positive shit?
And the answer is yes.
So, by some people's logic, they will say, be thankful that you got a good dog.
I guess I think the majority of dogs are good dogs, right?
It depends on how you train them and the way you take care of them.
That determines whether or not they're good dogs.
Kind of like kids, right?
If you choose not to raise your fucking kids, they're going to be heathens.
Same with dogs, right?
If you don't take the proper steps to teach them properly, they're going to be fucking heathens.
It just so happens that sometimes it seems dogs are harder to train than kids.
And it's weird, man, because some people can, for example, go rescue a dog.
And in a month, they got this thing completely trained.
I guess maybe they come with training already, some of the used dogs.
A lot of other veterans will isolate.
They'll isolate instead of grieving openly.
They'll hide.
They'll refuse to come out of the house.
And just isolate.
And that's not a healthy way to do it either.
But again, I think that it stems from all of these grieving techniques, these coping mechanisms that they talked about veterans using in these studies.
In my opinion, it is a bunch of avoidance.
Right?
We hide the pain.
It says here, hide the pain.
We avoid talking about it, feel embarrassed about how bad it hurts, and isolate and grieve instead of grieving openly.
Is that part of the image?
Is it an image thing for veterans?
Maybe it is.
I don't know.
Losing a dog can absolutely create real grief, depression, and emotional crisis, especially for people and veterans who have had super traumatic things happen to them, like losing limbs or watching your buddies die in combat, whatever it is, like these super traumatic things.
One guy said a lot of men cry harder over their dogs than they do almost anything else because that dog loved them at their absolute worst.
And I think that many people can get down with that idea.
There's many people that can talk about what I just talked about earlier.
When I can have my dog sitting in front of me and I can tell him anything, I can have whatever emotional response I need to have.
I can be ashamed, I can be sad, I can be pissed, I can be happy, frustrated, whatever.
And the response that you get is always supportive, right?
Because they just love you.
They just want your approval.
And it's always very innocent, right?
Like it seems like there's no strings attached, right?
It's true, unconditional love, I guess is the best way to put it.
So, in closing, we've run to the end, and I realize that this second half of the show is pretty slow, pretty somber, and I'm sorry for that.
But in closing, these dogs help veterans survive civilian life, I guess is the best way to put it.
They bring routine, loyalty, calmness, and they bring purpose back to veterans in places that are damaged, maybe even deeply.
But what we know about veterans who are struggling is that they thrive for a mission.
If we give veterans who are struggling a mission again and a reason to keep putting one foot in front of the other when that darkness comes knocking, I think we could save a lot.
And that's what these dogs do for people.
All these things that we've talked about, all of the positive and the negative situations that you can just insert a dog into.
I'll never say that it makes the shit go away, but it certainly makes trudging through the fucking mud a lot easier.
And it's okay.
It's okay that Gus is coming to the end of his life, although extremely early.
Because he completed his mission a long time ago.
And so I guess in a way I feel lucky.
I feel lucky that he was here.
He was put next to me at the exact right time.
Maybe dogs enter veterans' lives because.
They know how to sit beside damaged people without asking them to explain themselves.
And Gus may not wear a service vest, but he certainly carried me in particular through some extremely hard times in my life.
And so, if you know anybody, if you know veterans who could use a companion such as this, or if you know somebody who's really struggling, maybe they've lost their dog recently or are about to.
Check in on them.
Especially if they're a service person, if they're a veteran, a first responder, even.
The bond that these folks make with dogs, I believe, in many cases, is stronger than civilians make with their dogs.
And I realize that might not be a fair statement because I think that everybody.
Can be extremely connected to their dogs.
But for our community, for the warrior community, the warrior culture, these things are soldiers.
There are soldiers, there are battle buddies.
And if you talk to anybody who has served and ask them what their battle buddies mean to them, And then ask veterans what their dogs mean to them.
I think the response that you get will be extremely similar.
Maybe even word for word the same.
So, check on your people, folks.
Check on them.
It's a real thing.
Thanks for joining us tonight.
We'll be back next week.
Hopefully, with brighter topics.
But I think this is important dogs are superheroes.
If not all of them, I can tell you for sure Gus is a superhero.
Good night.
Pets as Superheroes00:02:38
As Christians in a Christian country, we have a right to be at minimum agnostic about the leadership being all Jewishly occupied.
We literally should be at war with fucking Israel a hundred times over, and instead we're just sending them money, and it's fucking craziness.
Look at the side of Israel, look at the side of Televaven, look at the side of Philadelphia.
You tell me where this money's going, you tell me who's benefiting from this.
I am prepared to die in the battle.
fighting this monstrosity that would wish to enslave me and my family and steal away any rights to my property and to take away my God, go fuck yourself.
Will I submit to that?
And if you've got a foreign state, you've got dual citizens in your government, who do you think they're supporting?
God, right now, would you protect the nation of Israel and protect those of us, not just our church, but every church in the world and in this nation that's willing to put their neck on the line and say, we stand with them.
You go to Trump's cabinet, you go to Biden's cabinet, it's full of Jews.
I have a black friend in school.
I have nothing against blacks.
She has nothing against me.
She understands where I'm coming from.
Excuse me, I'm a Jew, and I just like to say that, you know, in our Bible it says that you're like animals.
The Jews crucified our God.
There's nothing we wouldn't do for our pets.
They're like our children.
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Unleash Your Inner Rebel00:01:06
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