679: Turning Compassion Into Business Growth with Shannon Rigby

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What does it mean to truly support clients—and your team—when a beloved pet passes away? Collin talks with Shannon Rigby, owner of Puppy Love Pet Sitting in Wimberley, Texas, about the emotional side of pet care and her work as a certified Pet Loss Grief Support Specialist. Shannon shares how her psychology background led her to this calling, how grief shows up for both clients and sitters, and the healthy ways to honor those feelings. They also discuss community engagement, team well-being, and creating resources that strengthen connection. This heartfelt conversation reminds us that love and loss are both part of the work we do.

Main topics:

• Supporting grieving pet parents

• Emotional wellness for pet sitters

• Building community partnerships

• Turning compassion into business growth

• Healthy grief and healing practices

Main takeaway: “The greater the love, the greater the loss—and it’s not meant to be healed in a snap.”

In pet care, we see love in its purest form every day. But we also witness the heartbreak when that love is lost. Shannon Rigby reminds us that grief isn’t something to rush through—it’s something to honor. By allowing clients (and ourselves) to feel, reflect, and remember, we can transform sorrow into gratitude for the bond we were privileged to share. 💛

About our guest: Shannon Rigby is the owner of Puppy Love Pet Sitting in Wimberley, Texas. With a background in psychology and two certifications in Pet Loss Grief Support, she blends compassion with expertise to serve both pets and people. Since 2003, she’s built a thriving business known for heartfelt care, strong community involvement, and an emphasis on emotional well-being for both clients and team members. Shannon’s mission is to ensure every pet—and every person—feels seen, loved, and supported.

Links:

Website: www.puppylovewimberley.com

Facebook: @PuppyLoveWimberley

Instagram: @PuppyLoveWimberley

American Academy of Grief Counseling: https://aihcp.net

Association for Pet Loss and Bereavement: https://aplb.org

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Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed by our guests are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of Pet Sitter Confessional, its hosts, or sponsors. We interview individuals based on their experience and expertise within the pet care industry. Any statements made outside of this platform, or unrelated to the topic discussed, are solely the responsibility of the guest.

A VERY ROUGH TRANSCRIPT OF THE EPISODE

Provided by otter.ai

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

Pet sitting, team well-being, business resources, grief support, pet loss, community engagement, client communication, service offerings, team hiring, pet care, client satisfaction, emotional support, pet grief, professional development, local guide

SPEAKERS

Collin Funkhouser, Shannon Rigby

Collin Funkhouser  00:02

Welcome to pet sitter confessional, an open and honest discussion about life as a pet sitter today, we're brought to you by our friends at time to pet and pet sitters International. How do we engage our community? How do we focus on our team well being, and how do we create resources in our business to strengthen connection. Today, I'm really excited to be speaking with Shannon Rigby, owner of puppy love pet sitting about her building a business, and about walking through the grief for both our clients, our team and ourselves when a pet passes away.

Shannon Rigby  00:40

Let's get started. Yeah, thank you. Okay, well, yep, as you said, my name is Shannon Rigby. I own puppy love pet sitting. I started it kind of as a, just a stop gap, really. Back in 2003 I had gotten my degree in psychology. Was not ready to go get my master's. Didn't really want to go into that debt until I knew exactly what I wanted to do. So I moved back from from my college town, Denton, to Wimberley, because my mom wanted to open a gift shop, and I had worked retail all through college, so I helped her do that. I wasn't very good at the whole Gift Shop angle, but we had a feral cat colony outside, and I loved caring for them. People started dumping cats and kittens at at our location, and I, I was a poor, you know, recovering from college debt students, so the gift shop part of my life was spent, really in animal care, and I realized that that lit me up. I just loved, you know, I would rescue sick cats who were on the on the property. I would take them for vet care. I would get them adopted out. Same with kittens. Started fostering kittens and finding homes. We actually set up in the middle of the gift shop a cage with, like, adoptable cats and kittens, and people would come in to see them. So we weren't making big sales, but I was having a lot of fun in that angle. So when the shop closed down, I just thought, you know, maybe this is something that I can do. And I put flyers up around town. I was newly married, and we were looking into starting our family, and I just thought this would be something I would do on the side, until I found found something else that I wanted to do, and it it grew, and it brought me a lot of joy. So I can kind of continue to do that while I raised my three kids, and then it's been a few years now, but I remember dropping my oldest off at at school, and she said she was asking about my day, and I was, I'm sure, like complaining about how stressed and burned out I was, and she said I would never be a pet sitter. You work all the time and you make no money. And that landed so hard, it felt boy that hit. And I think that was the point where I started thinking about, this is a business? Am I running it like a business, or am I running myself down? And I was, I was just running myself down. I was so burned out. And so I, I joined psi, I started reading, I started learning, started running it like, like an actual business which, you know, a lot of us talk about this. We are animal people. We are not business people, right? Yeah, that's a whole new thing to learn. But I it lit me up. I loved it. And so in 2022 I started hiring, and that was a whole new thing as well. And yeah, and so it has just transformed the business. So in a way, I kind of look at it as the business was really born, kind of the summer of 2022 when I started having a team model and really leaning into the business aspect of this. We have, we do the the in home care for people who, we have more and more people who don't want their dogs to be left alone, yeah, at any point, right? Yeah. And we don't do overnights, so, so, but we do offer, if you have a senior dog, if you have a separation anxiety dog, that we can go over and sit there for, you know, really, they can determine the amount of time, but we divide it so unless one team member wants to be there the whole time snuggling some insecure pugs then and some do you know, it's kind of easy money, and it's really just most of the time the dogs are sleeping. But otherwise we do like two hours, and then somebody comes in and taps in, and the other person. Leaves, because we're used to living our lives in 30 minute increments. Two hours seems ridiculously long. You know,

Collin Funkhouser  05:06

I know, I remember the first time I was training somebody on these three hour adventure hikes, and they were like, checking their watch non stop, and they were like, Is it is it time? Is it between the head back? And I'm like, I'm like, Nope, we're gonna walk another mile. Let's move right. Let's go. And that's, you know, and we have so many team members who we've we just off, started off, so we used to just offer 30 minutes and an hour, and then we, like, slid and we did, like this 20 minute potty break service that I hate it, like, I genuinely do not like it. Everybody tries to use that service, and they're like, I have four dogs and an iguana. Can you come over? You know, can I do 20 No, I'm not going to. So that's the like, if you have one dog, no feeding, no medication, and you have a fence in a backyard, that's 20 minutes. It's because it's just getting anywhere. So we just finally offered a 45 minute service. I have such a hard time making things more complicated. Like, I love the simplicity of, like, just 30 minutes, just, like, just, but we started to have some team members who were like, This is too much for 30 minutes. But I don't know what I would spend an hour doing. And and we found it kind of stinks. We when we added the 45 we had a lot of our clients who were booking the hour come down to the 45 which was like, Ah, I'm not happy about that, but we kind of got an, not necessarily an equal amount, but we got a commensurate amount of people who were at 30 that have started doing 40 fives. And so it's, it's kind of balanced out, but again, it's also trying to shift the stuff in my, my team members minds, of like, it just changes it when you when you add 50% back of your time, you don't have to, like, blitzkrieg and and then you sit there going, Well, what do I do now? It's like, yeah. So we had to even do some additional, like, conversations with our team about what to do with that time, because we were so 30 minutes even I, like Megan, I've been doing this for 14 years. 13 of that was I only did 30 minute visits.

Shannon Rigby  07:07

So we do a 45 and an hour as well. And what's nice is like, if that 30 minute visit that they booked is going long consistently, I tell them we're moving that up to a 45 so it gives us the room. And then we've had employees who hate that they don't have any time to cuddle the pets. That's what they want to do. That's what they joined this team. So it gives them time to just kind of chill and really absorb the time with the animals. It's I also don't want to make things over complicated, but people are so complicated, they kind of, they kind of naturally gravitate toward what is, what feels in alignment with their level of complicatedness.

Collin Funkhouser  07:51

Yeah, yeah. And like you said, like it gave us that interim step to go to our clients and say, 30 minutes isn't enough, and prior, it was a harder sell for me to go. I need to double your time. It said that 45 minutes was a nice is is now a nice? Hey, it's only X amount of dollars more, and it's going to give us plenty of time now to get all the chores done. Plus, still have some some time with the dogs and cats, or whatever they have us do. And that's been, I've that's been good, like, from a like, sales perspective, because I'm trying to get more in that mindset of, like, I'm supposed to be selling, I'm supposed to be doing this stuff, but like, it's a it wasn't easier, because I actually believed in it, right? I think prior to that, it was like, you don't need an hour. So I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna

Shannon Rigby  08:45

push this right? Well, and you know the we do the 15 minute pop in visit for shy cats, which we only made because I was, for years going to visit a cat who never came out from under the bed. Definitely didn't want me laying there on the floor doing Duolingo next to her, yeah, wanting me to leave. And so it was causing her more stress, which went kind of against our fear free philosophy. And so we made that but when people do try to book that, I say, if your cat comes out and rubs against my legs or, you know, wants to engage with the toys we bring, we're immediately shifting all future visits to 30 minutes.

Collin Funkhouser  09:25

No, it is. We get that a lot too. Of, oh, my cat, you'll never see my cat, you'll never see my cat, you'll never see my cat. And it's like the first day you show up and you're like, cat, hi. Well, we'll start. So that was another thing too, of trying to walk that line with communicating to clients, because we do have that 20 minute, or, you know, like you said, like the 15 that short amount of time, like trying to tell them and convince people who that's for and what I am not willing to do in that time that has been, I think that's been one of our biggest challenges, of convincing and. Communicating to potential clients or even existing clients. No, this is not for you. And here's XYZ, I agree.

Shannon Rigby  10:09

I mean, well, like you said, We're never trying to sell to the bargain hunter, but I think most of them look to us for our level of expertise, and so we can say, No, that 15 minute visit isn't going to work for you. You know, we bring toys your cats, if cats are social animals, a lot of times it's new kind of brand new information to them.

Collin Funkhouser  10:30

So, I mean, did that? Did that come naturally to you though? Shannon, that

Shannon Rigby  10:35

like what you said, when you said, once I believed it. Once you believe it. It's easy to sell. I think, you know, you this is for, not only for your pet's best interest, but for the client's best interest, because they're, they're going to get what they want in in the time that that we offer and and again, the price is between 20 minutes or 15 minutes and 30 minutes aren't that different. Between 30 minutes and 45 aren't that different? You know, it's minimal. So, yeah, I think once you believe it, and you really are showing that it's a offering that you have based on compassion and knowledge, then people will easily buy in.

Collin Funkhouser  11:14

It definitely feels more like a true recommendation as opposed to an upsell. And that was something that has had to switch, had to flip in my brain. Of, this is a recommendation, not, not, I'm just trying to get more money out of you. Like, yes, more money comes with it, but that's usually because it's, it is, you know, more specialized care. It's more time. It's asking for more of us. So we should be compensated for that. But whenever I have it in my brain, of, I got, I'm upselling the client. I've got to, I've got to do this so this, I've got to stop myself, because I know immediately I'm in kind of, like, I don't know, like, like, toxic territory with me. I've got to reframe it into what's my best recommendation for you, and really make sure that, like, you said, like, yeah, we believe in that.

Shannon Rigby  11:58

Yeah, yeah. The whole upsell thing just doesn't it just feels weird to me. And I understand this is a business and we have to make money, but, you know, we've never charged for additional pets or, you know, it's, it's all based on our our time, because that feels less complicated and in alignment with what we're trying to offer, you know, right? So, but I can only imagine, like, if we start offering yard cleanup, which, you know, everyone is like, maybe we'll do that. Maybe we'll I, I mean, I guess that would be an upsell that I would probably feel okay about, because I've seen your yard, you know, benefit from this additional service, if you'd like it, you know.

Collin Funkhouser  12:38

But, yeah, we started offering that because I was playing fetch with the dog in the backyard, and I threw the ball and it hit, and it landed on this liquid poop, and it like sprayed out. And I just, I was looking, I was going, yeah, no, no, I can't, I can't play fetch with your dog in the backyard, which means you're not playing fetch with your dog in the backyard and enjoying this place. So now we kind of have this with our team, where we go, if you're playing in the backyard and you see a large amount of poop, or you're not able to walk well in the backyard, or play in the backyard, you're stepping over stuff, tell me, so I can go to the client, and I can start from just like, a, hey, here's what we would like to offer you to get your backyard into, you know, like, it's, it's that, again, that recommendation side of things of like, here's how I can get you more enjoyment

Shannon Rigby  13:30

out of your yard. Yeah, yeah. No, I love that. That's great. It the poop cleanup area seems so complicated to me. I'm like, only, only one or two people would be able to do it, because they would be the only people with the equipment. And then you've got to look into sanitation and dispose it. All just seems so complicated. We'll put a pin in that.

Collin Funkhouser  13:51

Yeah, we started, like, we originally we had these plans of, like, we're going to blow it up. There's gonna be this huge service, we're gonna offer it to everybody and do all this stuff. And then, like, you said, like, the more we got into that, just operationally, I was going, I can't, I can't scale this. I can't scale this and do the core business. I'm going to be so distracted by this other thing, and I'm just going to end up wasting a bunch of time. So let's, let's refocus on serving our existing clients well and match it with that, and that's kind of helped it become more manageable for us. And we did have one, one person who's not associated with us as an as a client, who found us randomly, and it was like, Hey, I heard you do this. Will you do it for me? And that's, that's the one client who's not associated with any other like existing pet sitting or dog walking or services. They, they're just poop scooping. We only have one of those, and

Shannon Rigby  14:44

haven't made them a pet sitting or dog walking

Collin Funkhouser  14:46

clients, no. And that was my goal. That's my goal. She's been, she's been a poop scoops client for like, six or seven months, and it's a, it's a slow build, right? It's a slow build like subtle hints, like. In the messages like, hey, holidays are coming up, or hey, you know, it's, it's one of those things of the reason, the only her pain point was her daughter went to college, and it was her daughter's job to pick up the poop that was her dog, because it was her daughter's dogs, and so that was her responsibility. And the mom was like, I am not doing this. So it was like, okay, that's our in now we just need to make sure that we're talking about all that we do for that. Because she didn't come to us for pet sitting or dog walking. So she, you know, does she know? I don't know. So we're working on, we're working

Shannon Rigby  15:32

on it. It's a Yeah, once she's in your time to pet software, then you can, she gets all the messages about all the offerings,

Collin Funkhouser  15:41

right, right. Have you heard of time to pet? Dan from NYC, pooch has this to say?

Speaker 1  15:46

Time to bet, has been a total game changer for us. It helped us streamline many aspects of our operation, from scheduling and communication to billing and customer management. We actually tested other pet sitting softwares in the past, but these other solutions were clunky and riddled with problems. Everything in time to pet has been so well thought out. It's intuitive, feature rich, and it's always improving.

Collin Funkhouser  16:07

If you're looking for new pet sitting software, give time to pet a try. Listeners of our show will save 50% off your first three months by visiting time to pet.com/confessions Yeah. Those are really those are really impactful words, very wise words by your daughter, like that. It kind of stings though, like it is like that that just speaks to like, why? I mean people around you, they see and they notice things that you don't and and a lot of times we feel like I can't get out. This is just what I am, a kind of feeling in that muck of, like, this is just what it is. I'm just here, just grinding away, grinding away, grinding away. And it takes things like that sometimes to get our head up to then start looking and going, oh, like, like, did you like in that moment, was it more of a I'm not operating this the right way, or I've I'm not operating on mission anymore. Like, what really was it about that that kind of kicked you into gear? Well, I mean,

Shannon Rigby  17:05

I knew how hard I had been working and for so many years and what I had sacrificed. And, you know, friendships suffer. People stop asking you to do things. Holidays are one of the most stressful times when it should be a joy. Full time, anytime anybody is relaxing and enjoying their life, we're working double time, yeah, and that's hard, you know, that's a sacrifice that we make. But she was right. I was working so hard, I was not finding the joy in it anymore, and the reward for it was was not lining up with the amount of effort that I was putting in that summer of 2022 was a real turning point for me. I mean, the business continued to grow, and as I was solo, I would the summer hours, I would be working so many hours not seeing my kids when they're home for summer, except for as I'm coming in late at night, and you know, they're calling me to ask what's for dinner. It was just it was too much. And I remember three things happened, all in kind of one fell swoop, right around Fourth of July, which is super busy. I got stung in the face by a red Wasp while watering some plants, I went to a new client consultation, and their little dog jumped up and bit me on my rump, and I was pet sitting a like a golden retriever, and I was holding a treat, trying to lure him back to his crate, and he was just a goofy golden and he jumped up and bit my hand trying to Get the treat. And there was, there was blood everywhere, and and to me, it was clear that all those, maybe not the Wasp, but the other things were happening because I was tired, I was not sharp, you know, I was not using forethought, you know, you know, if you're working with animals, if you have a treat in your hand, you're watching that dog that they're not going to jump up and take it. You know, these are safety things that that we understand unless we're exhausted. So it was shortly after that that I hired my first employee. I didn't really know how to use them effectively. I pretty much only used him when I absolutely could not be somewhere, you know, and then once I started trusting that, that I could train somebody to do the job in the way that I wanted it to be done, in the way my clients had come to expect it to be done, then I felt more comfortable hiring more people. And then you just sort of see that not all. I mean, I bring them in with our there's a lot of training on our core values, on our mission, and how I operate, and how I want this business to be seen by the community. But they all bring something unique and special, and it makes it a richer company than it was when it. Was just me, which is so I love seeing that.

Collin Funkhouser  20:03

It's so cool. I know I had those mindsets too, of like, oh man, only, only I can write the perfect update, and only I can do this XYZ. And now that we've been growing a team for last several years and looking at what people write, I'm like, Oh man, Dave is really good at this. What? What is this? I would love this update. Like this is amazing. And then it becomes like this, this circular thing, and it's like this positive feedback of that gives it that incentivizes me to like, let me go find more people like him. Let me go do this kind of thing. Let me get him more involved. Let me, let me give him the opportunity to do more of that stuff that feeds him and that he excels at, right? And then all of a sudden I'm like, that becomes part of my role. Of like, let me help people be awesome and and I love how you also mentioned, like, how you're thinking about how you want your business to be seen in the community. Like that, community mindset. Where did that come from as you were starting and growing? Yeah, I mean,

Shannon Rigby  21:07

so Wimberley is is my city, and it's a very unique small town. We are about an hour from San Antonio, about an hour from Austin. It's a tourist town. It's a beautiful place to live, but but it's small, and you have, I've been here since I went to high school here, so for a long time. And so you, you kind of naturally become part of the community the longer you live here. And it's, it's an important place to me. The people are important to me. I want to serve my community. I think that's part of my mission as a person, too. How do I how do I give back? What is my my purpose in this life? What can I do to help so the the company, I look for ways that we can not only serve in the sense of, you know, do a supply drive for for WAG, for a rescue organization, and, you know, donate pay, have our name on the back of the basketball jerseys for the for the youth sports, and donate to the library and things like that. But also how we can be a resource for people. We are not the right fit for everybody, but we can help people find the right fit. We I actually was printing out before we hopped on this, but I have been working for about probably a year and a half, two years, on a local guide for pet owners, where it has, you know, the the veterinarians, the emergency vets, the groomers, the best trail walking locations, the pet friendly restaurants, pet friendly short term rentals, things like that. And the city ended up noticing, because I would get on our community forum on Facebook and say, Hey, we're on this section. Does anybody have any any feedback, anyone you really love, that we can recognize? So the city started seeing those posts and reached out to us, and so now we're working in tandem with the city of Wimberley. We've been going with the visitors center around to the shops to talk about they're trying to have a more pet friendly initiative. They on their website, they have pet friendly businesses, and we give out stickers to the to the stores to put in their windows, and then I let them know about our company as well. So once the guide is finally finished, we'll do an event where they can kind of launch their pet friendly initiative, and I can launch this guide. So it's really fun.

Collin Funkhouser  23:35

Yeah, that is just that. I mean, this so cool. And it's one of those opportunities that like, I mean, it doesn't sound like you were sitting there going, how do I get the city to promote my thing for me, and how do I get to get with the visitor center and get them to like it? Just it happened because of what you were doing for the community at large. And and that's what other like that attracts attention from, obviously, the community, but from other organizations, because that's their mission, too. They want to promote from within and promote the awesome things the city's doing. And so those kind of relationships, like when they develop organically, like that, that's just so cool. I'm that is so exciting.

Shannon Rigby  24:08

Shannon, yeah, no, I think that. Again, it doesn't really align with me to be a hard seller, you know, and to to upsell, and to cold call a veterinarian and say, Can I leave flyers? I I really want to think about, I mean, and I've done all those things, right? I mean, that's part of it as well. But to me, I want to think about the relationships and what kind of not even like how we can help each other, but like, what cool things can we create together in this community. It's a it's a really small community. It limits our it limits our growth. You know that that's something that that is difficult at times, but it's a really unique experience that we are this small, tight community. We can get to know each other.

Collin Funkhouser  25:00

I know a big part of your mission to serving others. Shannon is involved in pet loss and pet grief. Why was that something that you felt was important and necessary for for you to do and be involved in?

Shannon Rigby  25:12

Yeah, well, I think it kind of was a full circle moment from my psychology degree, when I when I did my psychology studies, I took a class psychology of death and dying, and it was one of my favorite courses. I had looked into volunteering for a hospice camp at one point, and it just never worked out with schedule. But when I started hearing more about Pet loss, grief support, I was I was very curious. I thought that might be something that that would fit my skill set. So I, I ended up signing up with the American Institute of healthcare professionals and did their certification program. And it was, it was very interesting. It took me about, gosh, well, probably about seven or eight months, and it was really just a lot of reading, really great, great books, but there was no interaction with anybody teaching. You would read, and then you would take the the test, usually, like 100 questions. So when I completed that, I got my actually got out the certificate so I could see but it's through the American Academy of grief counseling, so they're a division of the American Institute of healthcare professionals. So I got that certification. And right at the time that I was finishing that, the Association of pet loss and bereavement reached out, and I had signed up to be part of their certification program. They have very limited spots, but it wasn't going to be until February of 2026 and I signed up in fall of 2024 so they ended up having an opening unexpectedly. So I jumped on it, and I just at the end of September, completed that certification, and that was that was a really wonderful program. They really you you go through and you learn, you know what a session looks like. You're it was reiterating a lot of the information that I had learned in my first program, but more how to enact that as a service that I can offer. Okay, now

Collin Funkhouser  27:25

is that? I mean, how do you approach people to talk about that? I mean, is that a conversation you have with people when they become a client of like, oh, by the way, here's what I do. Or is that like towards when you start noticing we're approaching kind of in a life with that pet,

Shannon Rigby  27:41

you know? I, I don't. So it's new, right? I haven't really even officially launched it. I've done a couple of sessions just as just free. And then I also have worked with a client who's whose cat was in hospice, and I was doing fluids every other day, and she was profoundly, she is profoundly bonded with her cats. And so I was able to really kind of talk to her, help her process her anticipatory grief. And then I was the one who took the cat to be euthanized and and so I still go now once a week for her other cats, and we're talking a lot about how she's processing this, this loss, and the anticipate, anticipatory grief she has about her other cats, that fear of losing them. So in that way, it's sort of natural, but I don't feel comfortable because we have clients who you know, once or twice a month, we get notification that a client's pet has passed, right? Yeah, and, and it would be very it wouldn't really line up with who I am to say, I'm so sorry for your loss. If you would like to schedule a grief short session. Here's my website and my Venmo, or what you right? Yeah, so I don't do that once I have the the service more figured out. It's a whole thing, you know? I can't, I can't have the client be on time to pet that, that would be, they would then be getting emails about, you know, our our pet sitting services, and that would be triggering. So it will be different software. Anyway, once we have that, and we, and I won't just see people in the community, it's we do it through Google, meet so, so already, the people that I've seen have been a distance away. So, so we'll just kind of, I'll put the word out in our community, but also just through my Facebook community, and word of mouth spreads pretty quickly because they're just. Is not the level of support people need when they lose pets, it is there are family members. We are so bonded with them, and while our loved ones might support us for a while, that pain lingers longer, and we end up feeling it's disenfranchised grief where you know, where we're not getting the support that we still need well.

Collin Funkhouser  30:21

So I mean, you, let's say you get a contact, you get that notification from a client saying, Baxter's passed away. What, what does that set in motion for you? Or what kind of support do you try and give or provide space for for that client?

Shannon Rigby  30:36

Well, so just this morning, I was working on cards for clients whose pets had passed we I love doing photographs of pets, so I will pull up a photo of the pet and send a card. I'm actually even looking into someday, possibly making some pet sympathy cards, because the ones that I have found generally just, they don't. They just don't seem just right, you know, they're the Rainbow Bridge is a wonderful idea. I just sometimes it seems a little dismissive. So anyway, we send a card, we with our sympathy and with a picture, and then really, my my focus goes to our team, because that is is also disenfranchised grief that we are. We've become so bonded with a lot of these pets, and suddenly we lose them, and we feel deep grief about it, but they're not even our pets. So it's a it's a complicated thing. So I look toward my team. I let them know, in the past, I've paid for them to do psi has a like a webinar for grief support for pet sitters, so I've offered that, if they would like to do that, that the company will pay for that. I think that eventually, you know, you and I have talked before about your community memorial service that you have for pets. I 100% want to do that. But I also would like to do something on a smaller scale for our team, that if they would like to get together and just kind of talk out some of the feelings that they are having. I think that's really important.

Speaker 1  32:23

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Collin Funkhouser  32:58

the events that we do, you know, they're, they're interesting. It's, it's still very new for what we do. We've been doing those for the past three or four years, and it trying to tell people, like, what they are, how they operate. Like, who's it for? It's still a little like, Oh, hmm. Like, what I don't under? I don't understand that. But every time somebody shows up, it's always very reaffirming. Like, yeah, this is exactly what we're here for, for you, for just, you know, we always say, if it's one person or 100 the right people will show up. But more importantly, and like you said, for the team too, because that's something that just giving people that, even the team like, that space and that permission to talk about something of man. There used to be Baxter and Bailey at that house, and Bailey passed away, and I walked in for my first walk with them after Bailey passed, and I it took me several minutes to recollect myself, you know, or to I just cried as I was hugging Baxter. And they don't have anybody else to talk to that about. Nobody else really understands that from that perspective, because it's one thing. When your own pet passes away, and somebody can do you know, they'll dismiss it saying, Oh, it's just a pet. It's even more one remove. When people say it wasn't even your dog, why are you upset about this? Right? So you got disenfranchisement that you talk about. It's very real, real.

Shannon Rigby  34:18

It is well, and grief is a difficult thing anyway. When somebody loses somebody, a lot of times, people don't know what to say, so they don't say anything that makes you feel more isolated and alone. And so my team has brought up to me, you know, I go, I went into Baxter and Bailey's and Bailey isn't there, and it feels so sad, should I even say anything to the client. And I said, Yeah, you know, I believe, yes, you should, if you know if you are feeling if you're missing their dog, I think that that means so much to them, because, you know, they're still missing their dog, whether they're talking about it or not. And you know somebody else loved them in that way and knew them in that way. I. Think is a really incredible thing that we provide, is we really, do we say it, we love your pets. You know, when you're away, in the way that you love them. And it's really true. We really form bonds with these animals.

Collin Funkhouser  35:14

Yeah, and so, I mean, when you talk about that as a as a service, and how you're equipping people. I mean, are there, are there practices or things that people can do that you recommend to help honor that grief, because it is so many times foreign, I know like this is why I asked, like, when we do the our community events, you know, I we had some help with a like a vet tech. The Veterinary Veterinary Clinic was our kind of co sponsor for one of our events this year, and one of the vet techs came out and was reading one of the poems. And she, I mean, she just broke down in the middle of reading, and afterwards it came up to her, and was, you know, talking to her, and she goes, I had no idea that was in me, I had no idea I was, I was bottling all this up. And I mean, so for those people who are especially for those who are, like, surprised by the grief that they're suddenly impacted by and their feelings, how do, how do you, you start working with people and giving them approaches, you know, to walk through that? Well, I think

Shannon Rigby  36:19

giving them a roadmap of the grief stages is really important. They are not step by step. You don't go through one and then the next you cycle back. And as a pet loss Grief Support Specialist, we are trying to help them process those feelings so that they can then move to a place of of healing and being able to remember with joy, but, but it's it's work. So pet loss, grief support is usually only about one to two sessions. It doesn't linger on if they need more support after that, we have a list of mental health professionals that we that are that understand pet loss, that we can refer them to. But a big part, since it's only one or two sessions, a big part of that is homework on their part. And so we give them some ideas that feel right to them. So I mean, different things can be a big one that that I think is very helpful is writing a letter to yourself from the perspective of your pet, because guilt is one of the the primary feelings that we that we see in people. These people love their pet. They are so in tune to their pet, but then they think, well, I waited too long. I missed if I had gotten him to the vet sooner, then we could have had more time with him or or I waited too long to euthanize because I was feeling selfish with you know, I wanted them longer. That guilt is so prevalent, and so when you look at it, from what your your pet would probably say they're not holding they're not holding judgment about the timing. They feel only love, they feel only the utmost care and connection. So that's one a lot of people. They feel like they're going to get lost in their grief. And that's that's familiar if you've grieved, grieved anyone. I lost my dad a number of years ago, and I felt like if I started crying, I would never stop. And somebody recommended, when you're in the shower, let yourself cry. When you're maybe driving, let yourself cry. Give you you need to take that pressure out, you know, or you're going to explode. And so with a recent client we talked about, she has a kind of a memorial set up on her table, and she has probably even looking at it. And I said maybe just set a time, or 10 minutes where you just sit and and try to just feel the feelings you're feeling. Don't attach any judgment to those feelings. Just feel them, but also try to remember some of the things that brought you joy, some of those happy moments, so you're kind of re tying what you loved about that pet with those feelings that are they're scary to feel. You know that loss

Collin Funkhouser  39:15

is so deep? Yeah, I know after we lost our Kobe, our dog passed away last year. It was hard. We knew we wanted to put together a photo album of the memories that we'd had with him for the last 11 years. And even kind of scrolling back to the beginning of our first picture ever with him, was like, that was all like I could manage. Like, okay, it was kind of like a, just like a picture by picture thing and by but by the time I went through that, all of a sudden, it was all those happy memories came flooding back, and then that became a point of of joy to go back to, of Oh man, look at these photos. This is so good. What started out as painful turned into this loving memory that we have, and now we've got this beautiful photo album that we love to flip through. So, and it still hurts because I don't get any new memories with him, but it's a lot of joy to go back and remember his personality and that stuff. So having that like, that's kind of that process that you're talking about, of, you know, giving yourself that one step at a time, and knowing that sometimes it's only going to be a half step, but that is enough. That is enough, right?

Shannon Rigby  40:23

And it won't always be a step forward. There's going to be setbacks, and you That's okay. That's all part of it, you know, the the greater the love, the greater the loss. And it's not meant to be just just healed in a snap, you know? So anything that that somebody feels is okay. I think that validation is just really important, and then finding some meaning. I think that, you know, planting a tree, doing a service with your family, sharing just going out to dinner and sharing happy memories is really it's it's really meaningful, volunteering at a at a shelter, when you have time, refocusing some of that love on the remaining pets, because it's all in you, you know, so just little we try to talk together about just homework, ideas that feel like they could be Healing. Some people are artists, and so we've talked about just drawing them from memory, and really not focusing on the what it looks like, but kind of the sensation of what their fur felt like, and how that falls on the paper, and just really kind of getting out of your head and back into knowing that those feelings are safe well.

Collin Funkhouser  41:43

And what I love about that Shannon is it's still connected to who the person is. It's not this foreign thing. Like, hey, in order to go through this grieving process, you have to basically pretend to be somebody else, right? And like, I know for me, if you were like, let's draw the dog, I'd be like, I don't know if that's how I want to honor that memory. I'm out right. And then what happens then is then, then I would not move forward in that process, and I would just say, well, this isn't for me. I guess I'll just bottle this up instead. I love how you're finding ways to say, how can you connect on a very personal, intimate level with your your passions, your skills, your talents, where you want to go with this memory, and let's use that for

Shannon Rigby  42:24

this process, right? I mean, I think one thing about being in this industry too, and I love this is, a lot of it is Psychology. You're meeting these different clients, and some of them will never update their portal with instructions, and you are just figuring it out when you walk in, and that's fine.

Collin Funkhouser  42:41

Oh, we've got a new dog. This is News, great.

Shannon Rigby  42:45

Oh, that's happened, and it's crazy, right? And then sometimes it's, you know, six pages of single space front and back. And I tell everyone, you know, it's in our welcome folder that you are not bothering us with your weird details. You know, the thing that you think this is too weird. You don't have to do that. I'm like, No, we let us do that. We want to do that. That's the benefit of coming into your home. We want it to be consistent with with your care and your expectations. But it's the same thing with working with somebody in their grieving is, we are all different. Not everybody's going to want to write a letter to themselves from their pet it. We have to be on this journey together to figure out what feels like you have that that's something that I'm interested in doing. I'm going to try it and then no judgment if you try it and that did not feel right, you know, then we figure out something else well.

Collin Funkhouser  43:39

So for you, though, I mean, this is a really, I mean, this is really weighty. This is emotionally, I'm sure, emotionally draining and emotionally taxing on you. How do you serve people in that while still making sure you're taking care of yourself?

Shannon Rigby  43:52

That's a good question. I think in the pet loss grief support sessions, it's easier, because it is kind of limited to one or two sessions. When I was doing the fluids for the the cat who was dying, and really navigating this client who who was just not ready to let this cat go. And I would, I would go with her to vet appointments, and the vets would say, we really need to talk about quality of life, like really trying to gently guide her in a direction that went on for a good month, and it was, it was draining, that was really tough. So in that case, you know, I, I talk to my kids about this all the time. If my bucket is empty, I cannot pour from it. And so I'm going to do what, what I need to do to reclaim some joy, whether that means go out with a girlfriend and laugh and or watch a ridiculous Love is blind episode. You know, whatever, whatever it might be, whatever just feels like it is not giving to someone. Else so that I can fill up my bucket again. I'll do that.

Collin Funkhouser  45:03

Yeah, and having again, finding those, I don't know if the word is healthy appropriate outlets and ways to recharge. And I think that starts with knowing just who you are and what you need and that. And what's interesting is that that that also just goes across the spectrum of everything that we do in a business of when we talk about, oh, avoiding burnout and avoiding passion, compassion, fatigue and avoiding all this stuff, it's like this is also a support mechanism for you in these times and and how we handle grief and how we process grief, and how we help our clients handle and process grief. Because I'll tell you, it's not easy when getting those messages from clients that a pets have passed away, and if that's kind of like my chick like, that's happening multiple, multiple, multiple, multiple times, and I don't do anything about that, then I'm not present for that next visit. I'm not I'm not happy on that phone call that I get for that next client. I'm not myself. And that's really gets into some dangerous territory when, when we aren't processing that, and oftentimes we just kind of wave it away and say, Well, I'm too busy for this. I have to, I have to focus on other stuff right now,

Shannon Rigby  46:09

right, right? Well, I think also being realistic and knowing that they have shorter lives than we have, and so we are going to have to say these goodbyes all too frequently. And it's it's difficult, so then to me, I find purpose in being able to help people get through that grief and not be alone in that grief. Because I lost my I had a soulmate, dog that I found in college. He was in my wedding in a tuxedo. You know, he was my everything. And when he died from brain cancer, I was just devastated. I mean, I was young, but I brought his urn with me in the car, you know. I mean, he was I wrote his story and in a notebook. It was really hard, and I kind of felt crazy, you know. I thought, Why am I feeling this so deeply and so to be able to help people feel seen in their grief, and to hold them during it and help them think of solutions to not get stuck. That's so meaningful to me.

Collin Funkhouser  47:16

That's what helps me. Yeah, well, and you mentioned, like we only have a short amount of time with them. I think that's something that I think can go off on one direction of Well, then why bother? Oh, it's all kind of lost cause or whatever. I think the other way to steer that, though, and I'm even thinking about how to talk about this to my team of like, there's only so much time we have them. Let's make it amazing. Let's make sure that every visit is spectacular, that every memory that we can gift to the client, because that's I know we focus on that of like when we're doing visits, our photos, our written description, the quality that's a gift to the client, because that's time that the client doesn't have with their pet. And let's make sure that that's a spectacular every time, and being able to tie it back to this limited time, right? And make sure there's high quality of life and giving imbuing some of that with more purpose than maybe we do from day to day. Yeah.

Shannon Rigby  48:12

Well, and also, when I am going through and looking for photos to send to the client after their pet has passed, they've got a cache of quality photos that I have. I can't my poor cobblers. Children have no shoes. Kind of pets, so I do not have great pictures of my pets, right? You know? And, and there's something to be said. I mean, when you're a parent to knowing other adults, teachers or caregivers who love your children, boy, that means the world. And so always in my cards to clients, I say, Thank you for letting us know them and thank you for letting us love them. That's you shared them with us. And I think that that's really, really special, too. So one of our we've, you know, core values that we that I really do Lean into with this company, and the last one is gratitude, and we really lean in hard to that, because we are so lucky that we get to to spend our time caring for animals. My team is a wide variety of people. We have a full time ICU nurse, we have a retired engineer. We've retired teachers who don't need to do this. They do it because they love animals, and this just is good for their soul, you know. So we're so we're so blessed. What does

Collin Funkhouser  49:29

your daughter think about your business now?

Shannon Rigby  49:31

Oh, I think she's very actually, you know what? I hired her.

Collin Funkhouser  49:38

That's awesome. Yeah,

Shannon Rigby  49:40

yep, she was working as, like, kitchen help at a camp for a couple of summers and and was just kind of not loving it. And got her license and said, I want to work for you. And so she Yeah, I think she's proud now, and she really sees the value in this, and she kind of thinks I'm a badass now. I. Yeah, that was really helpful for her to give me that that route away.

Collin Funkhouser  50:10

Well, Shannon, I want to thank you for coming on the show today and sharing this and encouraging us to dig into our community and give back in whatever ways we can to help make that better and more, not just pet friendly, but more people friendly, as we work to spread that joy and that love and to support people along that journey. If people want to get in touch with you and follow along with all the cool stuff that you're doing, how best can they do that?

Shannon Rigby  50:33

Well, they can. We have Instagram and Facebook, and they're both. Our handle is at Puppy Love, winberlee and Wemberly is W, I, M, B, E, R, L, E, y, so there's an extra e there at the end. And then our website is puppy love.

Collin Funkhouser  50:48

Wimberley.com, awesome. Well, I'll have those links in the show notes so people can click right to that and on our website too. Shannon, this has been just an immense pleasure. I can't thank you enough for your time. Thank you for coming on the show today.

Shannon Rigby  50:59

Thanks so much for having me. Collin, it's been really fun. I love

Collin Funkhouser  51:03

when Shannon said that the greater the love, the greater the loss, and it's not meant to be healed in a snap. In pet care, we see love in its purest form every single day, but we also witness the heartbreak when that love is lost. Shannon reminds us that grief isn't something to rush through. It's something to truly honor. By allowing our clients, ourselves, our team, to feel, to reflect, to remember, we can transform sorrow into gratitude for that bond that we were privileged to share no matter how long we had it. We want to thank our sponsors today, tying to pet and pet sitters international for making the show possible. We also want to thank you so much for listening. We hope you have a wonderful rest of your week, and we'll be back again soon. You