Angie (00:00)
Welcome back to Tails of Truth, where we tell the truth about veterinary medicine. I'm Dr. Angie, and this is my co-host and veterinary nurse, Extraordinaire Jojo. And today we are talking about the woo-woo, the metaphysical, and I don't know, crystals and stuff.

JoJo (00:19)
Yeah, we started

this conversation and I said, I'll be the grounded one in this conversation. Woo-woo is I don't ever think of myself as woo-woo, but I think in the in the world of what is considered woo-woo, I probably am. Like there's a scale. Don't you think? there are people who don't believe anything outside of concrete evidence, and then there are people who are like,

Angie (00:25)
I doubt that is gonna happen.

What?

Yes.

JoJo (00:43)
I'll try on anything and believe anything.

Angie (00:45)
Yeah. Yeah. I would like to think of myself on the scale as being like right in the middle. I thought of this yes. I I went on a date with a woman over last weekend and on my hinge profile I have a prompt that says, Our first date could be like a hike or a climb or

JoJo (00:51)
How did this come to be?

Angie (01:07)
Getting our palms read. And so she's like, let's go get our palms read. I'm into it. So she set up our first date to go get a reading at the Lighthouse bookstore on Pearl Street Mall in Boulder. And so I went to this metaphysical store, which I've never been to, which is kind of strange. How can how could that be? But I was walking through it, and I, you know, there are crystals and there's aromatherapy.

And there's the tarot and the Reiki and I just realized standing in that store how much like I've embraced all of those things throughout my life. Like when my mom died in my early twenties, I'd get all these like psychic readings to try to contact her. I've had tarot decks. I've also done like a lot of consulting. I'm like, is this okay? Is this okay? And I I realized how much of that I I really kind of lost.

And it made me realize, I mean, here in Boulder County, like a lot of people they've got really nice crystals. We're charging our crystals under the full moon. We're bathing in moon water. And, there's a lot of intention and spirituality. And it made me wonder like how much of that belongs in veterinary medicine and how so many people that are into an integrative lifestyle.

Or are really open to the energetics of things because even I practice Chinese medicine, which

JoJo (02:32)
Right. I

was gonna say that in itself is technically woo woo.

Angie (02:36)
It's technically woo woo, but the thing is

JoJo (02:38)
Yeah. Right. Yeah,

I was like, 'Cause what is woo-woo? It it just means 'cause that that maybe is a little bit inflammatory, that language, right? Like it it's suggesting some level of crazy. So I don't mean to say that Chinese medicine is crazy, but it's maybe doesn't have the science to back it up yet.

Angie (02:48)
It is. Yeah.

I mean, it does now, like has science to back it up, but it's all metaphorical diagnoses. So it's like, you're blood deficient, or you're, you have liver chi stagnation. And it's like, what the hell is that even? and so we we kind of understand it in a Western way, like, there's just weakness in digestion, or there's just inflammation, AKA heat. And I

JoJo (03:02)
Yeah.

Angie (03:28)
I came from a very metaphysical family. So my parents met at an ashram in India and my family has a guru. Now I don't participate in that, but that's where I came from. And so it made me think about like I come from all of this and I don't have a crystal in the exam room. I don't use a pendulum, you know, I don't do all these yes. I know.

JoJo (03:50)
a pendulum. I forgot about those. Pendulums for

decision making.

Angie (03:54)
I asked my date, I'm like, do you have any pendulums? So I just like everything we were walking around to each kind of section of the bookstore. I'm like, do you do this? And she's like, Yep, do you do this? Yep. And I just realized I was like, why am I not doing more of this? Now, of course, I I'm not suggesting that I should say, like, hold a pendulum over a cat and be like, Why are you vomiting? Is it kidney disease? Like, I have

JoJo (04:16)
There has to be a vet that does though.

Angie (04:19)
what's called muscle testing now before people come at me for muscle testing. Like I I feel neutral in muscle testing, but like you can't make real like medical choices off of it. That makes sense. we should we should circle back to muscle testing, but people do. I think there are veterinarians that are like, I read the energetics of it. And I oftentimes roll my eyes.

JoJo (04:22)
huh.

Yes.

Angie (04:43)
And then I wondered like, how much should I be incorporating back in energetically to practice?

JoJo (04:50)
Hmm. Well,

let me give you a starting point that probably feels a little bit grounded. Food is energy. That in itself is metaphysical, right? Like I believe, the way an animal was treated before its death impacts the way our bodies receive it.

Angie (04:58)
Yes.

⁓

Yes. That is so woo woo, but I mean it makes sense. I mean I guess I'm woo-woo. I think maybe we'll just talk about the things that are woo-woo that I already do. Sometimes w someone will say, like, ⁓ my dog and I have the same ailments. And I say out loud, that's just the frequency of the house. Like so I'll

JoJo (05:08)
So I guess that is woo woo.

⁓

Angie (05:33)
say that. 'Cause it probably

JoJo (05:34)
Yeah.

Angie (05:34)
is. Like on some level when people are like, yeah, I also have a very similar autoimmune condition or I also have issues with my kidneys or I also have IBS or, you know, something like that. And so sometimes I'm like, it's just that it's just the frequency of the house.

JoJo (05:50)
I believe that though too. I I do think that we can sometimes see an anxious pet and that pet has anxiety based on their guardian's anxiety, if that makes sense. Like they're mirrors of what we are presenting to them.

Angie (05:52)
Yeah.

Or or did we all know each other in a past life and then we're all coming together to like sometimes I think of it a little bit deeper.

JoJo (06:13)
yeah.

⁓ like I so hope that's

true. You know, those were my last words to Bodhi. My last words to Bodhi when he was dying was make sure we meet again. Yeah, I made me teary so I must believe it on some level.

Angie (06:27)
Aww.

Well, I totally grew up in reincarnation. So to me, I'm just like, yeah, no, of course. And now as an adult woman, when I meet people that I have a lot of chemistry with, sometimes I'm like, did we know each other in a past life? Or is this just really toxic?

JoJo (06:49)
toxic. interesting. Like what it what do they call those? The the twin flames. Aren't those typically very toxic? okay. Maybe I am more on the spectrum of woo-woo than I think 'cause I know about all this stuff. So I've obviously dabbled in it.

Angie (06:57)
I have no idea. I should know. But

I know I love

I love that you thought you were gonna be the grounded one in this.

JoJo (07:12)
Well, I like my data. So that's what makes me think, which there is new data. Dr. Angie, did you see this? That where Western medicine is meeting Eastern medicine and they're finding that Eastern medicine has known all along, what Western medicine doesn't, but they found a new meridian in people of like like a pathway that we didn't even know existed. But Eastern medicine has known it existed.

Angie (07:29)
⁓

I buy that.

⁓ Yeah.

JoJo (07:39)
But now they actually

have the physical data. it. They found it. Yeah.

Angie (07:43)
They found it. Yeah.

I wonder who they is and I wonder what they found. Yeah, I don't know.

JoJo (07:48)
Yeah, they're I'm just gonna leave it vague because I wasn't planning on talking about that. But

yeah, so I mean it's catching up, like you said. And so I wonder if some people are just ahead of the game or like you said, have some people already done this? Right? Like this is their not their first go around. And they're like, Hey, catch up, this works.

Angie (07:58)
Right.

Right.

Yes.

Because on some level, like the metaphysical transcends whether or not you're using pharmaceuticals or herbs. It's almost like up level from that. I would like to know if you're listening to the podcast, do you think you and your pets made a soul contract before you incarnated here? And this was like this was always how it was going to be? Like, for example, when my last cat, Simba.

JoJo (08:34)
For every pet,

Angie (08:36)
Well, I don't know. I

JoJo (08:37)
because we have multiples in our lifetime.

Angie (08:39)
know, but you're thinking very singular. So maybe we did. Maybe we were like, let's get it all done. When Simba died, I had a dream that there it was like kind of a lucid kind of dream that there was a a tuxedo sitting a tuxedo cat sitting on the end of my bed. And I didn't get another cat for I don't know, it was like a year or two, maybe it was two years.

JoJo (08:42)
Yeah, I am.

Angie (09:03)
but when I went to go look for a cat, I looked for a female tuxedo. So that was kind of like my beacon and I have a cat here in my eye right now. From a from a female tuxedo. so I I found her and Fritz because I was looking for them. But like, was that just my like was that her trying to find me? Or was that just like some vision I had of a tuxedo cat?

JoJo (09:29)
I don't know. Like I feel like these are the things that we can't know. And so maybe this will piss people off when they hear this. But I've dabbled in psychedelics and every time I've done them, my mind is blown so wide open that I just come back to this body going, I know nothing. There's so much. so I try to move through like not eye rolling at what because how can I possibly know that maybe

Angie (09:47)
Yeah.

Yeah.

JoJo (09:57)
Maybe this person can communicate with pets that have passed or pets that are living, but I I really do resist it still.

Angie (10:06)
Yes, I do too. And I've totally used animal communicators. And ⁓ yeah. Yeah, I did. let's do it. Let's have more than one. Because I don't think they're all created equally. I mean, like in

JoJo (10:10)
Have you? I'm so curious about that. I would love to have one on this show.

Mm. Yeah. How do you know

that one's worth trusting? Because I hear this a lot. We get a lot of emails, or even when we were practicing together, people use the animal communicator to well, we had one this week that the animal communicator told her that her cat needed the C B D that we sell for an issue that her cat was selling and gave her the dose and everything. And so I found that really interesting. And it's like across states.

Angie (10:45)
Interesting.

JoJo (10:48)
So this person's not in the same room as the animal.

Angie (10:52)
Like are did those did they just maybe they use our C B D so then they're intuiting that everyone needs the C B D? See, like why am I Yes. Yeah.

JoJo (10:59)
I don't know, there's part of me that's so skeptical and this is where my skeptic comes in, but also

I how can I possibly know? Like what if it is right and what if it is real?

Angie (11:06)
Yeah.

The second horse I had, actually both my horses I had like I felt connected to, but I remember I was a fourth year veterinary student and I was on my equine internal medicine rotation and I turned the corner in the hospital and there was a horse on the scale and I looked at him and I was like, I know you're my horse. And he wasn't my horse at the time. He was literally a client owned horse. And they ended up needing to rehome him because he had asthma and I happened to be moving to Colorado.

And so I took him with me, but like I I knew I looked at him and knew. Like I've had those moments in my life and then I'm like, well, did we just decide ahead of time we were gonna do this together in this lifetime?

JoJo (11:51)
Yeah, I mean I feel that way about people. So of course it can be true. I felt that way about Bodhi. That's why I said his soul dog. You know, and maybe while Sage lives in my house, sh maybe she's not my soul contract, 'cause there's a lot of people living in this house. Maybe she's someone else's.

Angie (11:58)
Yeah.

Yeah, 'cause some animals you're just not quite as connected to as others. It's not that you don't love them and wouldn't do anything for them, but yes, the soul the soul animals are Yeah.

JoJo (12:12)
Yeah.

It's just different.

You wanna can I tell a story? 'Cause you were talking about equine and I don't do a whole lot of story time. You always like I have a story. Okay, yeah, I have a story. My family of origin my grandparents had a young son before my dad was born and my grandfather was watching them, this was in Illinois, and he went out with a little girl and they were like three or four at the time.

Angie (12:21)
Yes.

Yeah, I always have a story.

JoJo (12:44)
And went missing. And because my grandfather had fallen asleep. Nobody could find them. Weeks and weeks. Kids are missing. And so my grandmother flew to Florida to go see the psychic horse. And went to the the horse and the horse tapped out and had a translator would tap with its hoof messages and told her where they could find the children. So she went back to the police in Illinois.

Angie (13:06)
Crazy.

JoJo (13:13)
And told them this is where the horse said. And sure enough, they found the children under they had fallen through the ice of the river and had died and were trapped under a tree. Found the bodies there. And so this horse died years ago, not that long ago, 'cause horses live a long time. And this story was in the paper, 'cause that's the story I grew up with. Like, yeah, your grandmother believed in all of that. She went all the way to get this horse to tell her. And this horse would do that for different places.

Angie (13:23)
My God.

my gosh.

JoJo (13:39)
would help police on investigations. So tell me how that happens.

Angie (13:39)
Yeah.

That's amazing.

Yeah. The horse knew. Like, yeah. There's just so much our brains can't get. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

JoJo (13:48)
And they had been searching for weeks, right? So I don't know. Yeah. And

it's like all the the dogs that we use for like I guess that's all more I don't know. Like for determining cancer and all the kinds of things that they do. Or knowing a seizure's coming. So is that considered metaphysical? Because if a human was doing that saying, Hey, you're gonna have a seizure, we'd be like, hmm, what do you know?

Angie (14:06)
yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

No.

Well, I think we always well and here I am just intellectualizing everything 'cause that's what I do. Well, we probably attribute it to some kind of smell or there's some kind of cue. But yeah. So it's like I guess both both can be true. It's a both and.

JoJo (14:33)
Right. So that's what I think is so the animals are just more hypersensitive in their senses. And humans just haven't developed that yet, but maybe some have.

Angie (14:39)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. And I'm afraid too. I've definitely had to be careful about what I say because I'm a veterinarian and I I feel like I have a certain role. I took a certain oath. I'm governed by a certain body governing body. I have to there's I have rules and so I have to s I have to color inside those lines as much as I can to keep doing what I'm doing.

And I wonder how much of that has kind of squashed any in like, although I mean I have intuition with my patients all the time. I I can feel what they feel often. Like if my patient comes in with a fever, I can all I feel the fever. You know, like I definitely have that, which is I don't know, is that a gift or is that just like having no boundaries? I don't know.

JoJo (15:36)
You just keep coming back to the toxic piece of it. Like like are we meant to be or are we just toxic together? Is this a gift or is this no boundaries? Like

Angie (15:38)
I'm like, is this just

Well like

now if I go on a first date with someone and like there's immediate chemistry, I'm like, this is maybe not good.

JoJo (15:50)
Yeah.

I

I'm such the opposite. If there's immediate chemistry, like let's this needs to happen. Let's just make this happen.

Angie (16:01)
Does it need to happen? I don't know. I mean I can't I don't usually stop it from happening, but so far it hasn't turned out well. That's all I'm saying.

JoJo (16:09)
So you're

like, I gotta do something different.

Angie (16:13)
Well, I wonder like how can you like have that?

JoJo (16:16)
Okay, is

that your own self sabotage in your mind? Like this is so good that it's toxic.

Angie (16:19)
No. No,

I Jojo, I you watch me. I just keep doing it over and over again. It's not like I say, it's not like I'm like, like, are we twin flames or are we just triggering the same childhood wound in each other? And I think that's the same way I look at veterinary medicine. Like, is is this cat really pissed off?

JoJo (16:24)
I yes. ⁓

That is true. ⁓

Angie (16:45)
And pissed off meaning like it's upset about its surroundings, or does it just have inflammation in its bladder because it's a cat you know like

JoJo (16:52)
Yeah, that

is like such a dichotomy to hold. So maybe the maybe the path and I think you already do this. Well, 'cause first of all, we live in Boulder, so we're exposed to this all the time. And I lived in Portland before this. We're exposed to it all the time. I mean, you have the pet that comes in that's wearing a a crystal in his collar. Or, you know, there'll be they have grounding mats that they use, which I think is a little bit on the woo-woo side. I'm like

Angie (16:54)
Yes, yes.

Yes. Yeah.

Yes.

JoJo (17:19)
Why can't they just walk in nature and get the same thing? I don't understand it. Yeah, I I feel like you are really accepting and open to those things when people bring it in, which makes you safe as a veterinarian because they're also coming to you because they do want your medical expertise because something is happening. But you're open to like, let's try it on. not if the animal was suffering, let me just say.

Angie (17:39)
Right.

Of course not. Like yeah, of course not.

JoJo (17:45)
Then then yeah,

you wouldn't be like, your cat is pooping blood. Let's do a crystal. Like that's not gonna happen. I don't think you could get to that place. But if they were like, Well, I'm gonna have wear this crystal because it's supposed to work for bloody diarrhea, you would say, Okay, and could we also Yeah. I don't know.

Angie (17:49)
Let's Yeah.

No.

A good yes. Yeah.

I don't know. So I just feel like I I would like to explore that part of me. I don't know what that looks like as a veterinarian. And maybe that's just something that, I just charge my moon water under the full moon and take a bath. And that's that's is the extent for this veterinarian. But I wonder how how that could fit. And for those of you that are listening, I would love to know.

How do you want your veterinarian to be on the woo-woo scale? I mean, if you're listening to this podcast, you probably have some kind of integrative leanings, inklings, something. What so like what's our role? What do you want from us?

JoJo (18:38)
Well, and what are

you doing? I also want to know what are you as a pet parent doing that maybe you feel is so outside the norm. But you believe it works. Like what are what's happening out in the world?

Angie (18:48)
Yes.

Yeah. Like I don't necessarily I I can't wrap my mind around homeopathy. I can't. But when people say, ⁓ you can't, okay, well, I can't get there. Maybe you can bring me there. I've gone to like seminars, I've done it all, but but when people tell me, ⁓ I use this homeopathic and it works every time, I still believe them. It's not like I'm like, my God, that can't work. I believe them. I just can't.

JoJo (19:01)
I can. Yeah.

Angie (19:19)
I can't get there to endorse it to say, like, your dog has diarrhea. Here's this homeopathy. Probably because I don't understand it, but

JoJo (19:27)
like you said, it's a whole it's a whole another learning. And maybe that yeah, I don't know. Can you do that in one lifetime? Become a homeopathic practitioner while also doing Chinese medicine while also being a traditional veterinarian. Like that's a lot to do in one lifetime.

Angie (19:30)
It's a whole yeah.

It's

If you're

Steve Marsden has done it. Yeah. So if you're Steve Marsden, he actually has a Facebook page. Like he has a Facebook group. You can join it and you can ask him questions. And he and his wife are brilliant and they'll answer it. So, anyways, that's an aside. but no, I I I think I can't. I probably cannot. That's not within my skill set.

JoJo (19:49)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Well, the more you

practice it with yourself and find like what's benefiting and what's not, then the more you can implement that.

Angie (20:15)
Right.

Maybe. Well, I wanna see what people say to this episode. I wanna hear your woo-woo. I wanna hear what you wanna hear from your vet because maybe people are like, you stay in your lane, you provide the herbs or the pharmaceuticals, and I'll get the crystals. that's not your job. And they're gonna wave their finger at me just like that. They're gonna be like, get back into your lane. I don't know.

JoJo (20:33)
Yeah. Yeah, that'd be interesting.

Well, that topic could go on forever because I just think of all of the things that we don't know that we're exploring.

Angie (20:40)
Okay. It

But I do know some stuff and I want to share it with you. So if you want a course that I've taught, you can go to boulderholisticvet.com and you can go to learn more. And we have a great course selection. And because you've listened to this podcast all the way to the end, you can use the code what is it? Truth Tales. I got it. And you can spell it T-A-L-E-S or T-A-I-L-S. And you can get.

JoJo (20:50)
Yeah.

I was like, She's got it. She's gonna do it.

Angie (21:17)
Something I do know for sure for free, just for listening. We'd also love to hear from you. let us know what you think about the podcast. What do you want to hear about? And what's your woo-woo? Let's hear about it. Okay. See you later. Bye.

JoJo (21:30)
Yeah. All right.

Bye.