Dog whisperer Sumathi Neelamegham

Ardent animal lovers mostly come off as crazy to those who are not. The endless banter about their pets and one-sided eloquent baby-talk with their four-legged creatures may even seem silly.

Sumathi Neelamegham, who quit her high-paying corporate job to start Petcetera, an indoor homestay for dogs, and became a full-time caregiver for dogs, says, “Everyone in my family is a pet lover, but they’re not as crazy as me. It was tough to take the decision of making such a big lifestyle change, but I knew this is what I wanted to do and my husband was very supportive. He said, if I wanted to do it, I just had to believe and take the plunge. Now, my house is built in a way that it accommodates the dogs.”

And, good that she did take the plunge, because many pets can now have their own little holiday while the owners are off on theirs. Sumathi started off by just helping out a few friends by taking care of their pets while they were away, and eventually made it a full-time job when she started Petcetera five years ago. Sumathi is staunchly against locking dogs up in kennels and has a theory about why the facility is indoors, within her house.

“Most of our pets have been pampered and are used to sleeping on couches and beds. They even have different eating habits. They would hate it if they are kept caged up under the sun. Here, they are let loose at all times and I supervise them all along. The only time they are caged up is during the night when they have to sleep and during their food time.”

The USP of this homestay is that each dog gets personal attention, so much that Sumathi even feeds them at their own timings, not all at once, and what more? She feeds some of the dogs with her own hands!

“Some dogs are not used to eating by themselves. Once, one client sent me a video to show me how she mixes curd rice for her lab and drops the dollops of rice into the dog’s mouth. She said he doesn’t eat any other way, so I fed him exactly like she illustrated to me,” she explains.

Having the facility within her home makes it a 24-hour job for her, and she says sometimes she has to wake up in the middle of the night to attend to a crying pup.

Sumathi is also a certified animal communicator. A practice very popular abroad, it is slowly finding its way to India. “It is communicating with animals, using telepathy. We don’t necessarily have to be with the dog or really even know the dog. All we need is a picture of the dog and its name and we can create a connection with the dog, from anywhere on earth. The dog then shows us its surroundings, we hear noises and sometimes, we even feel what the dog is feeling, physically.” People may find this a little gimmicky, and Sumathi is aware of that.

“Yes, people don’t believe it and ask me for proof. But, there have been instances where such telepathy has even helped owners find their lost pets. Once, a client told me that her dog was undergoing a treatment, and asked me to check with the dog if everything was alright. She didn’t give me the specifics. So I sat down to concentrate and make the connection and felt a shooting pain on the right side of my hip. At first, I thought I wasn’t sitting right and did it again, but I felt the same thing again. When I gave a list of observations to the owner, I had also included that I felt severe pain in that area, and she revealed to me that her dog had a hip displacement, and that’s what he was taking the treatment for,” she says.

It sounds like magic that only a few can do, but Sumathi says that the ability is there in everyone. “The workshops only teach us how to tune it and make use of it.” This is definitely good news for all those who have been yearning to know what their pets really feel!