Why Wildlife Rehabilitation Taught Me More About Humanity Than Humans Ever Did

For as long as I can remember I have always had a deep love for animals. I tend to relate to them better than most humans.  

The pure honesty and ability to live in the current moment is always something I deeply admired.  

When I was younger, I wanted to be a veterinarian, but life had different plans for me, and I ended up taking a different direction. The older I got, and the more I moved away from jobs with animals.. I felt there was something missing in my life.  

This is when I started exploring different options within the animal community and found wildlife rehabilitation.   

I LOVE spending my days caring for some of the planet’s most vulnerable, but some sad truths have been unveiled during my time as well.  

Many foxes in care will pace the fence repetitively.. Even when all of their needs are seemingly met. With a sadness in their eyes that always breaks my heart.  

Watching animals unravel in captivity made me start paying closer attention to what happens to humans when we’re removed from our natural environments too. 

When animals are taken out of their natural environment they develop ‘Zoochosis.’ This is an onset of wildly abnormal behaviors.. such as pacing, self-injury, dissociation and repetitive movements. And it made me think of a lot of ‘modern day’ diseases that are running rampant.  

Depression, Anxiety, OCD, ADHD.  

Are these genuine disorders that are natural to humans, or are they a by-product of our environment?  

Modern day living often removes autonomy, nature, meaning, and connection.. Then we wonder what is going wrong, for so many people to be suffering? 

When animals are under chronic stress, it really starts to dysregulate their nervous system. This is commonly seen in bears kept in zoos.. pacing the same worn path into the dirt, or orcas endlessly circling concrete tanks until aggression replaces curiosity. 

Humans living in modern day systems are experiencing very much, the exact same thing.  

When animals are severely stressed they also stop reproducing, which mirrors what we’re seeing in humans through declining birth rates. 

The human population is seeing higher than ever cases of mental health issues, even though our medical community is more advanced than ever.  

Our bodies are telling us that something is wrong, but we aren’t listening because we, as a species, have separated ourselves from other animals. Acting like the logic of animal life does not apply to us.  

Humans can ‘act’ like they’re okay, even in toxic environments. Other animals do not do this. If they feel like something is wrong.. Their behavior immediately begins to shift. Overgrooming, self-mutilation, bar biting. 

The biggest thing I learned about healing within wildlife rehabilitation, is that you cannot force anyone to heal. Human or animal. True healing requires respect, a proper environment, time, and a feeling of safety. 

We cannot shove anyone into an unsuitable environment and expect them to thrive.  

Many modern institutions, are actually a form of ‘captivity.’  However, it has become so normalized, that we really don’t think anything of it.  

One of the forms of captivity we currently overlook, would be the modern-day school system. Shoving hundreds of children into a building. Then, when children can’t stay still for eight hours, we often label the child instead of questioning the environment. 

After twelve long years of this, humans conveniently learn to pretend that they are okay. Even when their entire system is screaming the opposite. What have we really learned from this as a species?  

That our individual needs don’t matter?  

That our senses are ‘wrong?’  

Animals don’t ‘pretend’ to be okay. Why does society demand that we do, in order to make their systems work?  

Modern day systems standardize care, and punish authenticity. Which is the very thing keeping us from truly healing the root of our civilization. How are we supposed to heal the individual with a system that demands the compliance of you fitting in it's boxes? If a living system is forced to comply, it will eventually collapse. The body doesn’t lie — it just speaks a language we’ve been systematically trained to ignore. 

Wildlife rehabilitation taught me that healing doesn’t happen through force or protocol — it happens through patience, safety, and understanding the individual story. 

That lesson changed how I see everything. 

Kirby’s Corner exists because I believe we deserve systems that respond instead of control, communities that listen instead of label, and environments that allow both humans and animals to return to themselves. 

Healing starts small. 
With curiosity. 
With care. 
With remembering we were never meant to live this disconnected from life. 

Maybe humans aren’t broken.  

Maybe we’ve just forgotten what we actually need to feel alive.