Most people, when faced with emotional turmoil or the existential hollowness that can accompany a breakup, life change, or midlife cheese crisis, turn to traditional emotional support animals (ESA). The kind you can walk on a leash, teach to fetch, or post about on social media without having to explain yourself to the FBI. Dogs. Cats. Occasionally, a snake.
But I am not most people.
My emotional healing journey took me down an alley behind the pet store of reason and into the black-market reptile tent of chaos. My ESAs weren’t just unusual. They were the kind of creatures that require reinforced enclosures, legally binding waivers, and, in several cases, homeowner’s insurance addendums including a clause about “unforeseeable fang-based incidents.”
There’s a peculiar kind of magic that happens when you meet the right emotional support animal. It’s not always fireworks and soft music. Sometimes, it’s a sneeze coming from their cage. A paw on your hoodie. A long, penetrating gaze from an animal whose species hasn’t evolved in over 65 million years. And in that moment, you know this creature is going to upend your entire life and you’ll thank them for it.
Thus began my journey from fluffball rodents to prehistoric lizards. This is our story.
Sir Waffles III, a Campbell’s Dwarf Hamster
Sir Waffles, III was 45 grams of divine judgment wrapped in fur and passive aggression. He was a Campbell’s Dwarf Hamster, but the only thing “dwarf” about him was his body. His attitude was positively Napoleonic. I found him in a pet store while aimlessly wandering the aisles in a state of post-divorce disrepair. There he was, nestled in sawdust like a judgmental marshmallow. And when he reached out and snagged my hoodie with his teensy paw, it felt less like a choice and more like a jury summons.
Waffles wasn’t a pet. He was a lifestyle.
From the moment he arrived in my apartment, he assumed control. At precisely 5:42 AM each morning, he’d launch himself onto my chest with the calculated force of a nuclear warhead and stare. Not a gentle, loving gaze. But, the unblinking stare of a rodent CEO expecting quarterly results. He simply absorbed your soul like a furry dementor until you got up and made his breakfast.
His diet was finicky beyond comprehension. Shredded cricket in fermented beetle juice, served in a ceramic acorn-shaped dish. He’d nibble, sniff, sneeze into it to “season the dish,” and then either dine gracefully or dramatically flip the bowl over if the seasoning offended his palate.
Waffles’ grooming habits were theatrical. He’d perform intricate ablutions, starting with licking each paw with the intensity of a monk preparing for battle. He smoothed his fur with tiny flourishes, polished his sides until they gleamed, and finished with a full undercarriage inspection so dramatic, it could’ve gotten both of us banned from public libraries. He’d then pause, look directly at me, and blink once in slow motion. It was the rodent equivalent of saying, “Now, fetch me my artisanal yogurt, peasant.”
Playtime was pure anarchy. He had a toy earwig he would attack with the melodrama of a rodent Macbeth. After proudly pooping, he’d enter a trance-like frenzy, racing around the apartment with such speed and fury that I once mistook him for a spectral gerbil screaming into a pot of soup.
I adored his sneezing fits, his fierce grunts when dreaming, his little feet paddling in circles when he was annoyed. But there were things I didn’t miss: like his obsession with chewing cords. Twice he shorted out my fridge. Another time, he crawled inside my electric blanket and vanished for two days, reappearing only to demand dried mealworms.
Unfortunately, Sir Waffles passed away in his sleep, curled up inside my accordion case. Next to him was a tiny chewed-up Post-it with the word “butt” scribbled on it in my handwriting. He’d often “edit” my notes, his final message both poignant and absurd. I wept like a Renaissance widow.
My heart was broken. But fate, ever the chaotic matchmaker, led me next to a sausage-shaped reptile with contempt in his eyes.
Baron Von Slorp the Blue-Tongued Skink
If judgment had scales, legs, and a tongue the color of a demonic Smurf, it would be named Baron Von Slorp. At 1.2 kilograms, he looked like a sausage casing that had achieved sentience and decided to major in disapproval. I met the Blue-Tongued Skink at an exotic pet rescue. He locked eyes with me from inside a tank labeled “Definitely Not Friendly” and flicked his tongue in my direction as if to say, “What are looking at, buster?”
Slorp had the disposition of a Victorian magistrate. He disapproved of everything: loud noises, lukewarm breakfasts, sudden movements, and jazz-metal music. Each morning began with a flop onto my chest, followed by a pointed tail smack to my face if I dared sleep in. Then came the march to his litter corner box. A section of the laundry room he’d converted into what can only be described as a miniature reptilian crime scene. He pooped with ceremony, kicked up mulch with flair, and skittered away like he’d just committed a war crime.
His grooming was elaborate. He’d start by licking his front legs, polish each scale with his tongue, and perform tiny squats that I learned were displays of dominance. He had a toy silverfish hanging from a string that he murdered daily with the precision of a tiny, scaly surgeon. The first time he gifted it to me—shredded and soaked in mouse goo—I cried. It was an expression of love.
Meals were sacred. Breakfast involved shredded mice in fermented hamster slime, served in a broken coconut shell. Once, I tried substituting wet dog food. He stared at it, fake-fainted, and flung himself into the laundry basket with such melodrama that I thought he’d joined a community theater.
Slorp had peculiar hobbies, like licking the fridge handle, attempting to crawl into the dishwasher, and watching soap operas with terrifying intensity. He especially loved dramatic zoom-ins and gasps. I caught him once, tears in his lizard eyes during an episode of The Bold and the Beautiful. We never discussed it.
After being together with Slorp for three years, he passed away quietly under the radiator, clutching his toy silverfish. I lit a candle. I whispered his name. And then, I went out and adopted an eight-legged panic attack.
Dame Fangsalot the King Baboon Tarantula
To call Dame Fangsalot unconventional is like calling a lava eruption “slightly warm.” She was 170 grams of hairy, eight-legged existential dread and she did not so much walk as haunt a room. King Baboon Tarantulas are known for their aggression, their drama, and their ability to strike fear into the hearts of even the most seasoned entomologist. I was just a guy with a flannel robe and unresolved “issues.”
One morning while walking through the local humane society, she reached for me with one leg, a single bristled, twitching limb that snagged my bathrobe, and I felt it deep within my soul. Sort of like the Grim Reaper offering me a tiny, vibrating high-five. I knew we were meant to be together.
Fangsalot didn’t live in a terrarium. She ruled from it. Perched high in her enclosure like an eight-eyed despot, she oversaw every movement in my dingy apartment with the haughty disdain of a Victorian widow judging the help. She had a strict grooming ritual: leg-brushing with her pedipalps, fang-polishing with surgical precision, and ominous vibrations every time someone used the blender. Whether it was the motor or a personal vendetta against kale, I’ll never know.
Her litter box was a mossy tray in the sunroom, which she patrolled like a tiny hairy general. Pooping was a formal event. Afterward, she’d do what I came to call her “doom dance”—a ritual where she flexed, vibrated, and clicked like a goth maraca.
Meals were grisly banquets. Shredded gecko in a cricket reduction, garnished with dead mealworms. Served on a polished piece of driftwood, naturally. If her food was late, she’d perform an aggressive fang-flare, vibrating threatening displays so intense that the local power grid flickered.
Her favorite toy was a live centipede on the end of a stick. She would pounce, tear, and drag its twitching remains to her “Surgical Theater” underneath the coffee table. The theater featured a collection of old earbuds, broken action figures, and one unfortunate Hot Pocket I never found in time.
Molting season was especially traumatic. She’d flip onto her back, go stiff, and appear to be dead. The first time it happened, I wept, held a candlelight vigil, and composed a heartfelt poem titled “Elegy for a Hairy Nightmare.” Three days later, she emerged. Bigger, shinier, and more judgmental than ever.
And then, one day… she vanished.
Her enclosure door was ajar. Her bedding, ruffled. A single fang rested on my pillow like a farewell mint from the jaws of Hades. She was gone. I deep-cleaned the apartment, burned incense, and slept with oven mitts for three months.
But healing doesn’t wait. Especially when it comes in the form of a 70-kilo lizard with the presence of a war god.
General Clompers the Komodo Dragon
Imagine, if you will, a leather ottoman crossed with a forklift, a tongue like a slimy measuring tape, and a stare that could see through your soul. That was General Clompers, my adorable Komodo Dragon. I adopted him from a specialty herpetology center after signing a waiver that included a “fatality clause” and a section on “tail-induced blunt force trauma.” I didn’t blink.
From the moment he waddled through my kitchen and snorted at my IKEA throw rug, I knew the household dynamic had shifted. Clompers didn’t cohabitate, as much as he occupied.
He awoke each morning by trampling across my chest with the grace of a Godzilla audition reject. His breath smelled like anchovy remorse. His grooming routine included full-body tongue wipes, enthusiastic burps, and angrily staring into his dirty water bowl like it owed him an apology. Pooping was no minor affair. The entire garage became his personal latrine, roped off and labeled “Biohazard Zone: Komodo Content.” The smell alone could melt window blinds.
His diet consisted of goat shavings in congealed eel broth. Served warm, or risk total destruction. One time I served it cold. He slapped the bowl into the drywall with his tail and stormed off like a pouting diva denied a turkey leg.
Zoomies with Clompers were cataclysmic. He once knocked over the TV, a bookshelf, and my entire sense of purpose in a single ten-second sprint. His favorite toys were moldy, beady-eyed cockroaches on the end of a rope that met violent ends every week. I bought them in bulk.
What he most enjoyed was lying over heating vents, licking the dishwasher, and listening to true crime podcasts with intense interest. He hated sirens, mirrors, and any suggestion that he couldn’t eat the neighbor’s hydrangeas anymore.
Unfortunately, Clompers passed away from organ failure after biting the mailman. I buried him with his favorite lizard in a box large enough to fit an old dishwasher. I wept for days. Then, at a livestock adoption fair, something headbutted my parka and stared straight into my soul.
Duke Snortlesworth the East African Cape Buffalo
Duke Snortlesworth was 860 kilograms of horned, snorting, East African Cape Buffalo gravitas. I met him at a “Gentle Giants Rescue Fair” where he galloped directly into my emotional baggage and stared at me like a bovine therapist who only accepted payment in beet slurry and personal growth. He was massive, majestic, and had the personal space awareness of a bulldozer on Red Bull.
Each morning, he would begin his day by launching himself onto my bed like a 2,000 lb. cement mixer, often knocking loose at least one bookshelf and several of my teeth. His stare was intense. His snorts were frequent, and his love was absolutely smothering.
His grooming was surprisingly elegant for such a large beast. He’d begin by licking his flanks, polishing his horns against the patio screen door, and standing before the hallway mirror for twenty minutes, grunting softly as if preparing for a TED Talk on meadow appreciation.
His usual breakfast was shredded wildebeest in curdled weasel slurry. And if I was late? He would eat a throw pillow and stare directly into my eyes while scraping his front hooves through the carpet. His zoomies could flatten drywall. I lost three lamps, one doorframe, and my favorite ottoman in a single afternoon.
He adored his gelatinous cicada toy, which he gutted daily and then attempted to flush down the toilet. He despised rain, squirrels, and reruns of Frasier.
We had one glorious year together. One night, during a midnight zoomie, he collapsed with a soft pfft. A final blink, and he was gone. I grieved for a month. Then, during a blizzard, I heard a snort that shook my next emotional reckoning.
Butterscotch the Alaskan Grizzly Bear
Butterscotch was 540 kilograms of majestic, huggable apocalypse. I adopted the Alaskan Grizzly Bear from a wildlife sanctuary that made me promise I wouldn’t use him to rob banks or intimidate HOA meetings.
While passing by his cage at the sanctuary, he pawed at me through the reinforced steel with a giant mitt, his eyes soft and complicated. I knew instantly, he was mine. The neighbors were apoplectic.
Butterscotch had the soul of a poet and the jaw of a backhoe. He woke me each morning with slow-motion bear hugs that threatened my vertebrae but healed my heart. He gazed at me with affection, hunger, and low-grade murder potential.
His grooming routine was absurdly meticulous. He’d begin by licking each paw, polishing his belly fur, scratching his back on the living room wall until the drywall shredded, then waddled into his basement litterbox, reinforced with hope and a prayer.
His diet consisted of shredded salmon in boiled batfish syrup, served on chilled pizza dough. He would eat, burp, and then nap atop a warm laundry hamper with a satisfied groan that threatened my Wi-Fi reception. His zoomies were Titanic. He once burst through a wall and kept going right into the backyard, flattening the fence and half the begonias. I didn’t bother rebuilding the damage. I called it our “open-concept landscaping.”
Butterscotch loved jazz music. Especially Coltrane. He’d sway his bulk in time to the sax and sigh with what I can only imagine was deep existential melancholy. But he chewed TV remotes like they owed him money, left pinecones in my shoes, and once stole my breakfast burrito, leaving me a stick in return.
He passed away peacefully during his hibernation of ‘67. A mountain of a bear, breathing slowly, then not at all. I lit incense. I framed his pawprint. I even talk to it sometimes. But life wasn’t done with me yet. It had one more surprise. One more impossible, screeching miracle.
Admiral Chompington the Theropod Megaraptor
When the local museum caught fire and issued an emergency foster call, I expected turtles. Maybe a traumatized iguana. What I didn’t expect was a 1,050-kilogram feathered war god with claws like steak knives and the attention span of a caffeinated crow. But when fate tosses a living fossil at your emotional void, you catch it. Ideally with welding gloves.
Admiral Chompington was a Theropod Megaraptor and arrived at my one-bedroom apartment via forklift and a handler named Rick who said, “He’s affectionate. Just don’t make any sudden moves.” Noted. From the moment he strutted into my backyard, he established dominance by screeching at the sun, knocking over the lawn furniture, and promptly pooping on my grill. I was in love.
His daily grooming routine resembled a dystopian ballet: claw-polishing against a brick wall, feather-ruffling that shook the roof shingles loose, and an eerie whirring noise he made that sounded like a blender trying to speak French. He pooped with flair. Diagonally, with full tail extensions, like a majestic cannon of doom. He had one preferred poop spot: directly next to my herb garden, which he later ate.
Breakfast was sacred. He demanded shredded emu in liquefied bone marrow, served in a stainless-steel tub the size of a kiddie pool. If I served anything else, he’d screech, knock over the mailbox, and give me a side-eye that withered my houseplants.
His zoomies were seismic. He once outran a UPS truck and chased a drone into a tree. His favorite toy was a twitchy, robotic cockroach I’d bought at a tech expo. He would stalk it with terrifying silence, pounce like a dino-panther, and shred it to pieces. I’ve replaced that toy thirty-six times in the past six months.
Admiral Chompington slept on a tanning bed in the sunroom, occasionally opening one eye and making a noise like a fax machine possessed by a ghost. I learned to live with it. You’d be amazed at what becomes normal when your ESA has a death roar. He loved me with all the primal devotion a Theropod Megaraptor can muster. When I was sad, he’d bring me a dead Ball Python. When I was happy, he’d screech so loudly that three counties issued weather alerts.
Thankfully, he’s still here. Still shredding my mattress, knocking over trellises, and doing interpretive dances on my deck. I tried to register him officially as an emotional support animal, but the agency sent the form back with a one-word reply: “No.” I just hope the landlord doesn’t find out.
Final Thoughts About Finding Love In Chaos
People often ask me why I didn’t just get a dog. Or a nice tabby cat. Something you can pet without needing a tetanus booster. I tell them, love is not a formula. Healing doesn’t always come with soft ears and wet noses. Sometimes it hisses. Sometimes it molts. Sometimes it rips the screen door off its hinges and craps on your bed.
Each of these extraordinary creatures tore my world apart and rebuilt it with claws, scales, fur, and feathered mayhem. They taught me patience. Humility. And the basics of emergency wound care. They filled my home with life, noise, and the occasional biological hazard. And while cowering in a closet, they taught me how to love again—completely, irrationally, and without judgment.
Now, as I sip my over-priced Venti Iced White Chocolate Mocha with Cold Foam and Three Pumps of Raspberry, I enjoy watching Admiral Chompington do aerial tail flips in the hallway while holding the remnants of my laptop in his talons. The house shakes. The neighbors scream. A potted plant flies across the kitchen. And I smile.
Because tomorrow, we get to do it all over again.
About the Author
Burl Weatherby is a seasoned wordsmith and champion of the art of aging with style, sass, and a suspiciously large collection of heating pads. His writing has been called the “Mark Twain of Medicare.” He’s best known for such gems as Fifty Shades of Periwinkle: Redecorating After Retirement, The Great Prune Debate: Fiber, Flavor, and Fanfare, and Chair Yoga and Other Ways I Didn’t Die Last Week. When not penning odes to liniment or hosting underground bingo games, Burl lives with his beloved wife, Junebug, and their emotionally complex pet armadillo, Captain Niblets. He frequently enjoys enthusiastic, unsolicited advice from his three grown children, Tildy, Opal Mae, and Tater Joe, who constantly remind him that he’s aging disgracefully. A critique he takes as high praise.
