#长文创作激励计划##头条创作挑战赛##理想家生活##头等旺事#
iiMedia Consulting data shows that
In 2023, the scale of China's pet economy industry will reach 592.8 billion yuan.
More and more young people who are reluctant to enter into marriage,
Trying to get the emotional experience of "raising a baby" through pets.
Diversified pet needs,
There are also many new pet professions derived.
For the treatment of chronic diseases in pets,
Some people spend money to hire acupuncturists for pets, and pet Chinese medicine is becoming more and more popular;
When your pet gets lost,
Many people find pet detectives who develop personalized search plans for their pets;
There are also people who pay for psychological counselors for pets,
Trying to understand what exactly the pet is thinking......
We interviewed 3 people who work in the pet industry.
They are post-90s pet acupuncturists,
Pet detective and pet psychologist.
Here's what they had to say.
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Wei Jiayu shared the knowledge of Chinese veterinary medicine in the lecture
Wei Jiayu, pet acupuncturist, born in the 90s
In 2020, after graduating from Northeast Agricultural University with a master's degree in veterinary medicine, I joined a pet hospital in Shanghai. Over the years, I have treated thousands of kittens and puppies.
People who bring their pets to see TCM often have incurable diseases in their own small animals, including college students and elderly people who keep pets as children.
Perhaps, some people will not trust the veterinarian, "Could it be metaphysics"? But in fact, Chinese veterinary medicine has a history of thousands of years. Animal acupuncture can be traced back to the horse acupuncture books of the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period. The effective acupuncture points that we can confirm on cats and dogs today are all from the ancient Chinese domestic animal acupoint map, there are nearly 100 of them.
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Diagram of important acupuncture points for dogs
We once treated a 16-year-old border herd with dementia, who would go around in circles, top of the wall, and not recognize people. The MRI showed that the Bian Mu had a small infarction of the brain, so we gave him Chinese patent medicine containing Dilong, combined with acupuncture therapy, and after a month, the dog was able to walk in a straight line.
Sub-health problems are also areas in which Chinese veterinarians are better at. Some pets are wilted, inactive, and uncomfortable, but modern medicine cannot detect them, so Chinese medicine provides a treatment to alleviate symptoms.
I have a colleague whose cat is usually very lazy, just after a while to lie there to rest, give it Western medicine, and have been "parkouring" at night, so noisy that people can't sleep at all, after stopping the medicine, the cat wilts again. From the perspective of traditional Chinese medicine, it may be qi deficiency and weakness, and it is necessary to use traditional Chinese medicine to regulate the body. Because like people, pets will also have a weak spleen and stomach, and they must also pay attention to the five elements of yin and yang.
Some cats and dogs walk very slowly and carefully, and they will cry inexplicably when they sleep, all of which are caused by pain problems, which may be intervertebral disc disease, or osteoarthritis diseases. Long-term use of painkillers will bring side effects to the liver and kidneys, so the owner will choose Chinese medicine.
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Acupuncture needles for pets are generally similar to those for human toddlers (left); Chinese patent pills for pets (right)
Being a veterinarian was my decision when I was in college. At that time, I was studying veterinary medicine at Northeast Agricultural University, and Chinese veterinary medicine was just one of them. I found that TCM can treat some cases that I don't have a clue about Western medicine, so when I was going to graduate school, I chose to major in TCM veterinary medicine.
Traditional Chinese medicine pays attention to the four diagnoses - looking, smelling, asking, and cutting, and the same is true for Chinese veterinary medicine. One acupuncture, about 200 yuan.
"Looking" is to look at the overall state of the small animal, is there any abnormal secretion? Do you have eye droppings, snot, or saliva? Another example is to look at the tongue coating, some dogs have a very yellow and greasy tongue coating, and some cats have some barbs on their tongues that have fallen off, which may be a serious disease.
"Smell" is to distinguish the abnormal smell of pet excrement, ears, and mouth. Our university teacher once said that if you don't have a good nose, you can't be a veterinarian.
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In the process of diagnosis and treatment of traditional Chinese veterinarians, the cooperation of cats is generally lower than that of dogs
The animals can't speak, so most of the effective information obtained in the "ask" link comes from the owner. Including the owner's observed appetite problems, bowel and bowel movements, abnormal symptoms, lifestyle habits, and so on.
"Cut" is to cut the pulse, take the pulse, cats, dogs take the pulse of the position on the inside of the two thighs, you will feel a relatively strong arterial beating feeling, if it is for a large animal pulse, such as cows, horses, sheep, is to touch the root of the tail.
After looking and hearing, it is necessary to choose the appropriate treatment method, which may include acupuncture, massage, medication, and dietary therapy...... Among them, acupuncture is the most popular and well-known traditional Chinese veterinary treatment method in recent years.
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Bian Mu (left) with facial paralysis; Wei Jiayu giving corgi acupuncture (right)
About two weeks ago, our hospital successfully treated a paralyzed border herd with acupuncture. When we came to see the doctor, we found that the dog's whole face was down, his tongue drooped out, flung to the side, and drooled incessantly.
After we inquired, we found that this border herd was very skinny, and he must sleep under the air vent of the air conditioner, and he also turned his belly over to blow. In fact, like people, the cause of facial paralysis in pets is most likely due to wind chill. When the pet sweats after exercising and the pores are opened, the cold brought by the wind will lead to condensation, so that the nerve function is temporarily lost, so the facial nerve cannot control the muscles.
We gave the dog an acupuncture prick and asked the owner to cooperate with the cross-massage technique when we got home, and after a day, his saliva stopped. After that, we gave the dog 4 more acupuncture sessions, and now the problem of facial collapse has basically improved.
The principle of pet acupuncture, simply put, is to activate the meridians, activate blood and dissolve stasis, regulate qi and blood, if from the perspective of modern medicine, it is anti-inflammatory and analgesic, and regulate immunity.
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Acupuncture stand for pets
Before giving acupuncture to the pet, we will have a rack like a small maza, let the pet lie on all fours, and then gently fix it. Generally speaking, as long as it is not a small animal with a particularly strong temper, it will cooperate. But in general, cats are less cooperative than dogs, and some cats may fly out as soon as they touch a needle. In this case, I would ask the host to consider other treatments.
There are also many kinds of needles, such as white needles, warm needles, water needles, bloodletting needles, electroacupuncture and so on. After the needle is inserted, you can observe the reaction of the small animal, the first thing is to shrink the skin, and the skin will move immediately. You may find that its muscles are shaking and its tail is wagging suddenly.
In my 4 years of practice, the best case of acupuncture effect I have achieved is an acute paralyzed corgi.
When this corgi was received, it was level 4 paralysis (up to level 5). But because of the cost of the operation, the host wanted us to be able to use TCM physiotherapy. We used electroacupuncture therapy on this dog, which continuously stimulates the acupuncture points through electrical pulses, and after about 6 punctures, the dog can jump as a rabbit. Although the four legs are not very stable, it can jump forward with its butt and run.
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Electroacupuncture is able to generate a continuous electrical stimulation, so the step of "twisting the needle" can be eliminated
Many of the paralyzed dogs I see are corgis and pit bulls, because they are all round bodies, legs are not too long, and the lumbar structure allows the center of gravity of the body to be concentrated in one place. There are also many cats who are paralyzed because of "jumping off the building", and the cat's curiosity is very strong, and if the owner forgets to seal the window, the cat will want to jump out to see.
Sometimes, the therapeutic effects of acupuncture are immediate. It may be that the dog was so painful that he had been wheezing and had not slept for several days, but during the acupuncture process, he was noticeably quieter, and then fell asleep relaxedly.
Now, Chinese veterinary medicine has also achieved good development in the world. In particular, animal acupuncture, some international horse racing activities, will also ask Chinese veterinarians to do acupuncture on horses to treat their movement disorders. Among them, the most famous should be Mr. Xie Huisheng, who established the first Western Chinese veterinary university in the United States at the end of the 90s of the last century, and a horse he treated with acupuncture and moxibustion won the horse racing championship that year.
Therefore, not only in China, but more and more countries and regions around the world have begun to recognize and promote our TCM veterinary therapy.
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Chen Ying (left) with the recovered long-haired cat
Chen Ying, pet detective, born in the 90s
99% of lost cats don't need to be found by a team, as long as they are done correctly, pet owners can find them themselves. But owners who have just lost their pets are often in a mess, and that's when it's the pet detective's turn.
Pet detective is a new profession, and it's our job to get back those pets that have been lost by their owners. I officially entered the industry in 2020 and later built a team, and over the years, I have recovered more than 1,000 pets, an average of 200~300 per year.
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Left: A cat search notice posted by a pet owner
Right: Chen Ying with the owner of the recovered pet
Most of the people we were asked to look for were cats and dogs, but also parrots, tortoises and rabbits. The most expensive one we have ever found is a 100,000 Maltese, but we are often commissioned to find non-breed cats and dogs. The price of these pets is not as high as ours, but the owners treat them as indispensable family members and want to get them back at any cost.
Every pet has a different personality. In the first step of finding a pet, we will spend a lot of time understanding its living habits and behavioral logic, so as to make predictions. Then collect pet hair, especially cat hair. The only clue we have to track a cat is the cat's hair, and it's rare for two cats to have exactly the same hair. Next, we need to go back to the origin of the pet and spread out to search for it.
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Through the comparison of cat hair, it is confirmed that the lost cat is found
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Cat hair in all corners provides clues for pet detectives
Finding a cat is very different from finding a dog. The kitten's range of activity is basically limited to the community, and it will not run far, as long as the clues continue, it can be found quickly. Dogs are different, they are basically lost outside the community, and the range of activities is particularly large, and the farthest dog we found is 16 kilometers away from the place of loss.
But the most difficult to find is the cat that drills the car engine. As soon as the car starts, the cat doesn't know where it's taken. A cat from Shanghai got into the car and was taken back to his hometown in Anhui by the owner. At any stop along the way, the cat can jump off. It's a miracle that the drill cart's cat can be found, but I've done miracles before. The cat also changed cars in the middle and finally found it at 1:30 a.m. on the seventh day. It already had a 20-centimeter wound on its back, all of which were suppurated, and it would have died a few days later.
Some of the recovered pets are in particularly bad condition. Some were abused outside, others starved and suffered. We found a blue cat that hadn't eaten or drunk for 21 days. I also found a beautiful short that had been lost for 11 days, and it has entered a stress reaction, and I don't even know the owner anymore, and I just want to run away.
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Left: A detector looking for a pet
Right: Chen Ying was bitten by a found kitten with four wounds, one finger was almost bitten through, and he ran to three hospitals overnight to get vaccinated
These little lives don't deserve such torture, but our team is not large, we can't take too many commissions, and we often feel powerless.
We also refuse commissions, especially if they are not lost by the pet owner. We can't be sure if the pet was actually lost or if it was some other human factor. A mother was afraid that the kitten would infect her child, and she was afraid that the child would not accept it, so she secretly gave the kitten away, and said that it was accidentally lost. There are also pets that die unexpectedly, and parents tell their children a white lie, but we find no trace of the pet leaving home, and the parents quietly tell us the facts.
The metaphysics of seeking pets circulating on the Internet seems to us to be superstition. We have all encountered scissors Dafa, fortune tellers, and Taoist priests. We especially understand this mood, no matter how highly educated the pet owner is, when he can't find a pet, he can only hope for metaphysics. There was a TV host who lost his pet, and it stands to reason that such a person has all the connections, but he also tried fortune-telling before approaching us.
Our fees are generally four or five thousand, and the success rate is more than 80%. Most of them were found within two days, and those who couldn't find them either missed the golden time or were taken away by others and were unwilling to return them.
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When looking for a pet, walk 30,000 steps a day
As the industry gets hotter, so do the scammers. In 2020, there are about 10 pet hunting teams I know, and they have sprung up many times in recent years. Many teams pick out low-difficulty orders and find them in ten minutes, so everyone will feel that the money earned by pet detectives is too simple.
In fact, pet detective is not an easy job, and it is normal to walk 30,000 steps a day. Every building, every hallway, every unit, we have to look again. I've looked for a community of 150 buildings, and I've also looked for buildings with more than 30 floors, and it's very tiring to walk down them all. I walked up to 80,000 steps a day, for 17 hours, climbed stairs until I strained my thigh, and lay in bed for a week to recover.
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Chen Ying once flew to Yili, Xinjiang, to look for cats, an old community with 120 buildings, "for a whole week"
We run outside for more than 20 days a month, and the farthest time I went to Yili, Xinjiang. I don't stop working once I get up, and I work late into the night with one meal in the morning. Once, the pet owner cooked and brought it to me, and I looked for it while eating.
The training cycle of a pet detective takes at least one year. Doing this line of work requires high-intensity physical labor, often staying up late and traveling, rarely accompanying their families, and many people can't accept it and leave.
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Late at night in the construction complex looking for traces of pets
I used to be a director in the advertising industry. In 2019, the blue cat I had had for three years was lost. The first time I heard about a cat hunting team on the Internet, the fee was very high at that time, and the lowest was 8,000 yuan. I researched the skills of finding cats on my own, and even paid to go to Beijing to study. In the end, I didn't find my cat, but I found that the pet detective was not so mysterious, and I used my experience to help some people find pets, and more and more people were looking for me, so I entered the industry passively.
I love having cats, and I have 7 at home, and at the most there were 9. There are those who have been abandoned, and there are those who have been rescued. For this reason, I rented a house with a yard on the first floor and let them move freely. Taking care of them every day, the feelings are getting deeper and deeper, and I also know that their outdoor survival ability is not strong, and once they are lost, they will not live long, so I especially empathize with the owners of lost pets.
I work with a sense of purpose. One year, on New Year's Day, we were also looking for pets, and we also wanted to have a good holiday, but if we didn't go, maybe we couldn't find it again, which meant a lifetime of separation, and this is the last thing we want to see.
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King Nuan and dog
Wang Nuan, pet psychological counselor, born in the 90s
I have been working in animal counselling for 3 years. In fact, at present, there are not many animal psychological counseling in China, and there is no industry standard, so it is mixed.
Last year, the animal communicator industry was very popular, and more and more people were willing to spend money on small animals, wanted to know more about small animals, and hoped to seek some answers through animal communicators.
However, we are different from most animals on the market, we communicate with them in a scientific way, combined with professional psychological counseling techniques to provide psychological counseling to animals and their parents. People who don't understand will confuse psychological counseling and metaphysics, but in fact, the two are not the same.
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Wang Nuan, who is taking offline classes
Generally speaking, we need parents to send 3 positive photos that can clearly see the pet's facial features. The way we use it is different from metaphysics, and we don't need any special functions. By learning theory, coupled with practice, everyone can learn how to communicate with animals and become animal counselors.
Generally speaking, before doing a case, the counselor will enter a subconscious state, which is a bit like a hypnotic state, which means that our brain waves are alpha waves.
In the alpha wave state, the counselor will enter the subconscious level to connect with the small animal, and complete the communication in the middle subconscious.
Some people think that animal psychology is not animal behavior. It is undeniable that ethology is a part of animal psychology, but it is not exactly the same as animal psychology. For example, we think that "laughing" means happy, but if a person smiles at us, must he be happy? Will there be a smirk? The same is true for animals, the dog wagging its tail is not necessarily happy, sometimes it may be polite or polite.
At present, the price of our psychological counseling cases is 268 yuan for 30 minutes. Many animals on the market also have dozens of dollars to communicate, but to give an inappropriate example, being able to do animal communication means that you can understand the "language" of animals, and you have many ways to communicate with animals, but this is not the same thing as giving them psychotherapy.
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Wang Nuan and her team will also organize many offline pet communication workshops
Most of the people who come to us for consultation come from all over the world, most of them are women, and most of them are single, about 30 years old.
Most people give psychological counseling to small animals because they feel that small animals have affected them, and feel that they are unreasonable, "screaming", "urinating" and so on. There are also some people who have seen an animal doctor and their babies have been diagnosed with depression or anxiety and want psychological counseling to help solve this problem.
There are also people who want to know how the little animal thinks of themselves, whether they are unhappy, and what their wishes are. Or you need to move and want to talk to the animals in advance to reduce their fear of the unknown and the probability of a stress response (cats are the majority). Overall, most of them are mentally health-conscious people.
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Wang Nuan is teaching a course on animal communication
When I first started counseling animals, my mother was also very surprised, she used to think that dressing animals was incredible, but now she has to pay attention to animal mental health.
Just like many people think that pets can just have food to eat, how can they still be depressed? Just like parents in the seventies and eighties in the past, what do they think their children know and what troubles can they have?
But in recent years, people's attitudes and ideas towards animals have also slowly changed. Animals are also living beings, and although their thoughts are relatively simple compared to humans, they also have a wealth of emotions and feelings. They not only have the need for food and clothing, but also the need to be loved, respected, and accepted.
Previously, a parent did a case consultation, and the cat she adopted had self-harm - plucking her own hair, baldness, and even bleeding and continued to pluck.
We found out that the cat had been abandoned twice and had suffered a certain degree of psychological trauma as a result.
From the cat's point of view, it knows that its previous family members don't like its fur and accuses itself of being dirty. Because they don't want to be abandoned anymore, they unconsciously derive a way to please as a survival strategy.
Again and again, it plucked its own hair with all its might. In the consciousness level, I just feel that pain can bring refreshment. But in its subconscious layer, it only hopes that it will no longer be disliked, begging the new mother not to abandon itself and have a stable environment to live......
To be honest, at that moment, the vitality of "wanting to live" in the bones of the individual was really touching and distressing......
In this case, I guided its current mother to see its past pain together. The mother was also distressed and repeatedly promised it that she would not abandon it. We also told the cat that its fur was not dirty and beautiful. The other furry children in the new mother's house also love it and accept it.
I said to him, "Maybe you can give it a try and play with them, they're all friendly and like you." ”
We also talked to the parents about the precautions in getting along with each other and how to encourage the child to integrate into the family. After a few days, the parent gave me feedback that his self-harm had lessened and he began to try to interact with other animals in the house. After a month or so, the kitten stopped plucking its own fur and was playing with the other children in the family, which was really happy.
There are also some parents who come to consult because they have a complex to satisfy themselves. For example, many parents want to know how their furry children think of themselves and whether they like them. They hope that they are a capable and powerful person in the hearts of the furry children.
Nowadays, more and more young people are reluctant to enter into marriage and do not want to have children, but they want to have the experience of having children. Therefore, they will raise a small animal, and in the process, just like raising a child, they will also worry that the small animal will eat too much, eat too little, or be unhappy, too naughty, etc.
Many people will have expectations for small animals, and in power relations, there is often a belief that "because I raise you, you have to listen to me". In this process, it will stimulate people to think about some deep life issues.
个案里经常遇到的就是：如把何家里动小物变成己自想象中的样子？ 我经们常听到就的是希望自己家的毛孩子“乖懂巧事”。 于希是望懂毛的事孩子们不会断琢磨大的人期待，在长家累的候时可以不不吵闹，甚至压自抑己的需求，这样的案例数胜不数。
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Dogs who come for psychological counseling
There was a case where the dog's sister (owner) locked it up and said that if she didn't obey her, she would be locked up. The dog doesn't understand what it means to be unbelieving. The counselor told him that because you scratched your sister, she locked you up.
The dog doesn't understand why it's wrong to scratch someone, because it doesn't like others to touch the soles of its feet, and its sister has to touch it, so it does it, and it seems that it is the sister's fault first, but the sister blames it for its bad character.
In fact, the way we treat them is usually unconsciously a continuation of the way our elders treated us in our childhood. In this case, we guided my sister to look back on her own upbringing, and found that when she was young, she did not receive enough respect from her family of origin.
My sister realized that she had unconsciously continued the way the elders in the family treated children. Since then, she has become more understanding and respectful of her dogs, so her life with dogs has become much more harmonious.
In another case, the parent had a conflict with the cat. The mother was angry and hit the cat and put the cat out of the door. Intimidate the cat into abandoning it. The cat bangs the door and meows. Mom said that in fact, she didn't really want it anymore, but just wanted to scare it by "abandoning" it, so that it would listen to her words and stop grabbing the sofa.
In this case, we talked about her childhood. Her parents also often use "I don't want you anymore" as a way to intimidate her, making her obedient and obedient in the way of her parents.
I helped her apologize to the cat, and I also helped her heal the little girl who was frightened by fear.
In our case studies or teachings, we will let everyone see how they get along with small animals. This is animal psychological counseling, which will involve the way parents and small animals get along, and even the whole family system. Let people also gain self-awareness.
Sometimes, what seems to be an animal's problem is actually a problem with the entire family system, which also contains a lot of unconscious intergenerational problems. Nowadays, people are more and more pursuing spiritual growth, understanding animals, and it is also a process of understanding themselves and healing themselves.
(Excerpted from a WeChat public account)