Take Care of Your ESA Pet: 7 Best Tips

Emotional support animals or ESAs have become quite popular in the last few years, courtesy of their support and benefits. Emotional support animals are a kind of assistance animals, like the service and therapy animals that are there to provide you with their support. These types of animals are there to help you get through any difficulties you face in life. Emotional support animals, as their name suggests, are there to provide you with emotional and mental support to help you cope with the effects of any diseases or physical disabilities.

Emotional support animals provide you with comfort and affection to help you through your stress. Therefore, it is up to you to decide what kind of animal you believe will be the best companion for you. Many different animals can be considered emotional support animals. For instance, dogs, cats, ferrets, rabbits, ponies, hamsters, and even snakes. To get an emotional support animal, you require an emotional support animal letterthat officially declares your animal as an ESA.

Some Benefits of Having an ESA

• Emotional support animals help you relax and reduce stress.
• They are proven to provide relief from mental ailments like anxiety and depression.
• Emotional support animals help with any traumas and reduce any feelings of loneliness.
• They elevate your mood according to research that proves that they increase levels of serotonin and dopamine in a human – hormones related to feelings of calm and happiness.
• Emotional support animals are protected under the Fair Housing Act (FHA), which states that you will be allowed to keep your ESA with you in your homes or apartments without any costs. You receive a realesaletterfor housing once you register for an emotional support animal, and then you will be allowed to keep it anywhere irrespective of any restrictions or no-animal policies.

Now that we know how emotional support animals can be beneficial for us, you can decide whether you need an emotional support companion for yourself or not. Emotional support animals are different from other assistance animals such as service animals. This is why they require special care for them to be healthy and useful. Following are the seven best tips to take care of your emotional support animals so that they are active and happy, and will provide you with their affection and care.

7 Best Tips to Take Good Care of Your ESA

1. Provide your ESA with a clean living space and environment

It is important to provide your emotional support animal with a cleaner living space. All animals, especially pets, expect a good living environment from their owners, which allows them to be more comfortable. If the emotional support animals are allowed to move around the house, be sure to keep any dangerous things away from them.

2. Choose healthy food for them

Keeping your emotional support animal healthy will ensure their support for you as well. To help you out with any problems, they need to be active and fresh. Therefore, you must choose the right food for them. You can contact vets or other people, who own the same animal, about good brands of food. Make sure to get the best quality food for them so that they get their required amount of nutrients to stay healthy.

3. Grooming

Grooming is a super important part of owning an emotional support animal. Unlike other assistance animals, emotional support animals are not exactly well-trained. You need to make sure you develop a grooming routine for them and train them for at least the basic commands.

4. Exercise with them

Animals love to play around and exercise. It keeps them happy. Make sure you exercise with your emotional support animals or take them out for walks so that they can be active and lively. This will make them more beneficial for you as they will be able to provide you with their full support in your downtimes.

5. Build trust

Building a bond between you and your emotional support animal is highly important. If your emotional support animal is new to your home, you have to take good care of them, give them attention, and make a little effort to get them to trust you. The friendly bond helps them be content, which is very healthy for them.

6. Keep your ESA hydrated

Do not forget to make sure that your emotional support animal is hydrated. Animal food can be of different types; either wet or dry food. Hence, if your animal is being fed dry food, you must give them an adequate amount of water with it as well.

7. Take your ESA for regular checkups

Regular checkups are important for any animal. Make sure to take your emotional support animal for regular checkups to the vet to keep an eye on its health. You can also consult the vets if there is an issue with your ESA and provide them with the right remedies to make them feel better.

Hence, emotional support animals become an important part of a person’s life, especially when they are dealing with some kind of pain. You can get any emotional support animal for yourself depending on your comfort. The procedure to get an ESA is simple. All you need to do is to go to a licensed professional, identify why you require an ESA, and then apply for a real esa letter. Once all the preparations are done, you will officially become the owner of your emotional support animal. 

Useful Resources

How often should you take your ESA to the vet?

5 ways an ESA can help your overall wellbeing

Do German shepherds make good ESA?

A day out with your ESA dog: everything you must know

Why Dogs and Cats are the Most Popular Choice for an ESA