Your Pet Peeved? She’ll Listen

Sonya Fitzpatrick, a stunning former British fashion model with a penchant for calling people “darling,” is a modern-day Doctor Dolittle. During her hourlong weekly series on cable’s Animal Planet, “The Pet Psychic,” she meets with animals and their owners and even feral creatures to solve behavioral problems or just to find out whatever is on Rover’s or Puss’ mind.

And just like her counterparts who deal with humans, spiritual mediums John Edward and James Van Praagh, Fitzpatrick says she can speak with deceased pets.

During the three months her series has been on the air, she’s helped two lions with mating problems, solved allergy problems in a cat and comforted a prairie dog in mourning for his dead mate. No wonder “The Pet Psychic,” which debuted in June, has become one of the top-rated series on the critter-friendly network, sometimes outpacing such better-established favorites as “Animal Precinct,” “The Crocodile Hunter” and “The Jeff Corwin Experience.”

Michael Cascio, executive vice president and general manager of Animal Planet, said the cable outlet had been looking for a pet communicator to build a series around for the past few years. He was familiar with personable and charming Fitzpatrick because she had appeared on a series on A&E;, “The Unexplained,” when Cascio worked at that network.

“It was a real risk for us,” he said. “You are going into an area that is fraught with either ridicule or disbelief.”

“The Pet Psychic” does boast a disclaimer stating that the show is solely for entertainment purposes.

“What sold me on Sonya was her genuine love for animals. She’s more of a therapist than a psychic, really. She is almost a behaviorist--why is your pet acting funny? She can tell you why and what to do. I don’t know how she does it. I know she is very sensitive to animals and that fits into Animal Planet. She is someone uniquely attuned to the animal kingdom.”

As with all “psychics,” the world is divided into two camps: the believers and those who consider the idea a lot of balderdash.

Agreeing to be put to the test, Fitzpatrick visited my apartment recently to conduct a “reading” of McGwire, my rambunctious, 4-year-old orange tabby named after slugger Mark McGwire.

McGwire decided to hide during the entire reading, but that didn’t seem to bother Fitzpatrick. “He’ll come out when he’s ready and if he’s ready,” said Fitzpatrick, looking at two photos of McGwire.

“He is your whole world, he is not just a cat, darling,” she told me. Of course, one doesn’t have to be a psychic to figure that out, since my apartment looks like the cat toy aisle at PetSmart.

“He is your companion. You adore him. He is the most important spiritual being in your life.”

But a lot of what she said I couldn’t explain rationally.

“Who is the older lady you see sometimes?” Fitzpatrick asked.

Tina. She lives across the courtyard.

“He says you go and see her, and you get along with her. He says he listens to your conversations.”

And McGwire, she said, also communicates with Tina’s dog, Daisy. “She is two colors, the dog?”

Yes, black and white.

“The dog isn’t an over-big dog. She’s very gentle.”

Yes, she’s a medium-sized dog.

Fitzpatrick explained how she is able to communicate with animals. “Every time you look at something, he gets a picture from you,” she explained. “Like, if I said to you, ‘Could you tell me where the Statue of Liberty is?’ What happens in your mind? You see it. It’s not like a solid, it is almost like sort of an imagination picture; that’s how I talk to animals [by thinking in pictures].”

Domesticated animals, she claimed, know our language.

“They learn our language when they have been with us. When I talk to wild animals, it’s different. I get signals from them through my body and feelings and emotions. But it’s different when they have lived with you.

“And he’s a bit of a gossip. Sometimes you talk to the [neighbor] too long and you should be paying attention to him [McGwire says].”

I did want to ask Fitzpatrick why such a friendly cat bites me whenever I pet him. But she beat me to the question.

Why Does He Bite?

Fitzpatrick put her index finger in her mouth and bit down on it slightly. “Does he do this sometimes?” she asked.

Yes, every time I pet him.

“Cats are so sensitive,” she explained.

“Some cats are more sensitive than others. They’re sensitive to static. He says he doesn’t do it hard, but he wants you to know why he does it. It is because static builds up when you pet him or when you walk too quickly. He doesn’t know why he is feeling that from you. Let me explain to him what static is and [that] he is a very special cat. He’s discussed it with the dog and she doesn’t feel that.”

Fitzpatrick told me to just pet him on the top of the head and around his face. I have been heeding her advice ever since and McGwire’s biting incidents have been cut down by 90%.

Then she brought up the mouse. Though McGwire has had tons of mice, scratchers, teasers and balls, he is obsessed with a pink yarn mouse that he loves to fetch and then dump into his water bowl. I sometimes hide it in the kitchen to let it dry out.

“He wants to know, where is the mouse?” Fitzpatrick said. “He loves it. He just loves that one. He never had things like this before.”

Fitzpatrick stared at me. “You have been with him before, you know that, don’t you?” she said.

Excuse me?

“He just knows that he has been with you before,” she said. “When you got him, it was like he had come home. He said he had come home to you again. That’s all he’ll tell me.”

She then looked around the living room. “When did you have another cat?” she asked.

I had Warren. He died four years ago, a few months shy of his 20th birthday.

I handed her some pictures of the crusty gray-and-white tabby that was very different from the carefree McGwire.

“The cat is still here,” she said. “It had a different personality all together from him. This one was like superior, like a king. He’s still right here,” she said, pointing to a spot at the top of the sofa where she “saw” the cat.

“The other one sees him in spirit--but, my goodness, what a different personality. This one was so secure. He [Warren] says he didn’t take to everybody, and he would just walk away from them. He is still with you all the time.”

Though a lot of what Fitzpatrick said rang true about McGwire and even Warren, she wasn’t always on target. I still have open cans of tuna in the refrigerator after Fitzpatrick insisted he wanted tuna with oil. He didn’t.

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“The Pet Psychic” can be seen Mondays at 8 p.m. on Animal Planet.