My dog calls me Daddy. I know this because I employed a psychic to communicate with my pets in an effort to understand how the two cats are feeling about Sunny, our sweet-natured new maltipoo puppy.
They’re not happy about it, that much is clear. The three-year-old male grey cat, Jones, has been behaving erratically since Sunny entered the fray and swiped his alpha status. He hid in the loft and didn’t eat for days. Then things took a weird turn. My wife caught Jones peeing in the toaster on our kitchen counter.
Was he attention-seeking? Having a manic episode? Trying to kill me? Whatever it was, he clearly had something to say. Meanwhile, his sister, Mimi, has taken to bringing live frogs into the house. Safely capturing and removing these screeching amphibians, while my wife and daughter run around in a panic and the dog thinks it’s a great game, adds to the general mayhem of our weekday mornings. Jones is having none of it, dashing for the cat flap as soon as he can.
I’m not proud of how long it took me to admit I needed help. The situation had escalated beyond Google searches and TikTok dog training tips. We had tried calming diffusers, treats, a scattergun approach to praise and discipline. Nothing shifted the tense household dynamic. Desperate to understand what was going on behind the eyes of our beloved pets, I turned to the mystical.
Jackie Weaver, the first pet psychic I reach out to, says Jones is “morose”. It’s not a word she would normally use, so she knows it’s the cat speaking through her. Jackie, a former veterinary nurse, has been communing with animals for 20 years. During her recovery from cancer in 2005, she met an animal communicator — and realised she had the gift too. She has since become the UK’s go-to pet psychic, and has done readings for the likes of Alan Carr, Michelle Keegan and Matthew Rhys.
Pet psychics are quickly becoming a new society status symbol. We have therapists, PTs, facialists, doulas. What’s one more member of “staff” to help us live our optimal lives? Weaver is fully booked for months in advance to cope with growing demand. And it’s no wonder — in this age of AI and data tracking, deep knowledge is the norm. Once we’ve interrogated the facets of our own selfhood, reflecting on everything from our attachment style to our protein intake, it makes sense that we would turn this need to understand behaviour from ourselves to our pets.
“I learn that Sunny thinks of me as his dad, prefers Radio 2 and would like a posher dog food”
GREY HUTTON FOR THE TIMES
I was expecting a little more theatre. Velvet curtains? Candles? A whiff of patchouli? Instead, I send Weaver some pictures on WhatsApp and we talk on Zoom. “It’s exactly the same as connecting to someone who’s passed,” she says. “You don’t need to be in the same room.” Still, I light a Diptyque candle and turn off the overhead light in my bedroom, hoping to set the right ambience for our call.
Weaver tunes into Sunny first. Looking at her photos, she telepathically hops on to her wavelength. “She says, ‘I’m a game girl — not shy. I’m not a yap, yap, yap.’ Oh, she makes me laugh.”
She’s right, Sunny doesn’t bark. I feel unduly proud that my dog’s funny and, if that phrase is anything to go by, speaks like a Dickensian Cockney.
Weaver doesn’t do woo-woo. “There’s nothing spooky about animal communication,” she says. “It’s just a chat.” I learn that Sunny thinks of me as her dad (it’s a little heteronormative for my liking, but she’s five months old — how’s she supposed to understand the nuances of a queer family dynamic?), prefers Radio 2, would like a posher dog food brand and when asked who her favourite person is, tactfully replies: “I’m everyone’s girl.”
• The Times view on pet psychics: Doctor Do Little
Weaver shifts her attention to Jones. “He says it was the smell. Sunny’s presence completely threw him. It was like his space disappeared overnight. He says, ‘She ran right up to my face like a child.’”
That’s exactly what happened.
“He feels sidelined. It’s not anger — it’s sadness. He’s grieving the shift in attention, especially from your daughter.”
Oof. We’ve been terrible cat parents. Weaver gives me advice for showing the cats we still care and passes on an apology from me. What she does is part psychic, part practical. She shares the animals’ issues, then suggests solutions. Some of her insights are oddly specific, like how Sunny tries to get “food from up high”. We do put the cat bowls on a step ladder to stop her eating from them. Not exactly guessable.
“Mimi told the psychic she would like some new toys, preferably squeaky”
GREY HUTTON FOR THE TIMES
Weaver didn’t have time to speak to all three of my animals, so a friend who works in fashion and was having issues with her chihuahua recommended another communicator. “Anita’s great,” she said. “I understand my dog better now, and he knows I’ll always come back.”
Anita Denise, like Weaver, works from photos and over Zoom, and has clients worldwide. She’s also a professional dog trainer and has been “talking” to animals for 20 years, in which time she has helped thousands of animals, and their people, to connect.
First, she speaks to Mimi about the frogs. Mimi, perhaps miffed at the psychic reprimand, explains that the frogs are toys — and we took all hers away. She would like a new one, preferably squeaky. I take note and await further comms.
“We often think of animals as separate from us,” Denise says. “But they’re not. They’re sentient beings with thoughts and feelings — and that’s what I tap into.”
• The dog whisperers to the super-rich
She once found a lost lizard hiding in a speaker box in an American basement by describing the sounds and smells the lizard conveyed to her. She and Weaver also speak to dying or deceased pets, offering much needed closure to grieving pet parents.
“You talk to Sunny but don’t always listen,” Denise tells me. “She says the energy at home can be chaotic. You’re in and out. She feels bombarded — like a ping-pong ball bouncing around.”
This is confronting, but accurate.
“She doesn’t dislike it,” Denise adds, “but she’d appreciate more clarity — just help her process what’s happening.”
Denise’s reading matches Weaver’s. Sunny isn’t a big barker, has a bubbly personality and her feeding routine is inconsistent. “She needs more structure,” Denise says, “more predictability.”
Denise reads energy and prefers the term animal communicator to pet psychic. Extra sensory perception, or ESP, is the ability to receive information beyond the five senses. “It’s not a spoken language,” she explains. “It’s translation — thoughts, feelings, sensory impressions. I hear their ‘voices’. Personalities come through.” She can tell when a horse is from eastern Europe because it “speaks” with an accent. Demand has soared since Covid. “People are more aware of animals’ emotional lives. I have clients in their eighties and their twenties, all over the world.”
I can’t help but wonder how much of our desire to “hear” our pets is less about really listening and more a selfish need to feel loved and validated by these creatures we give so much to. Maybe we should just leave them alone and get comfortable with the possibility that our cats do, actually, find us insufferable.
The downside of the job is that it can get emotionally overwhelming. Denise says she is always picking up on animals’ thoughts and feelings, so she has to be quite disciplined with herself not to tune into every pigeon she passes.
She has wonderful conversations with wild animals sometimes, but occasionally has found herself in awkward situations when pets are really spilling the tea on why they don’t like their owner. “I have to be true to what the animal is telling me. And, yes, I’ve had cases where pets have asked to leave homes or shared deeply personal things. It’s not always easy, but my job is to honour the animal and communicate what they need.”
According to both Weaver and Denise, my pets are happy, they just all need a bit of extra attention and personalised care. So I put on Radio 2 for the dog, toss the cats some toys and hope domestic peace is on the horizon — for all our sakes.
