The brother of the Princess of Wales, James Middleton, appeared on ITV's This Morning on Wednesday, February 8, to discuss the incredible impact pets - and dogs in particular - can have on a person's life, especially when it comes to mental health.
The 35-year-old - who has been open about his battle with clinical depression - sat on the sofa alongside Matthew Robinson from the charity Pets as Therapy, where James is a volunteer, and explained how during some of his most challenging times, his dog Ella, who recently passed away, would know there was something up and would distract him to get him out of his depressive states.
Ella passed away in January and, honouring her, James wrote a heartfelt post detailing how she had been at his side for 15 years "from my darkest days to my happiest".
He told Holly and Phil on This Morning: "It is true, everybody's dog is the best dog. Nobody's dog is better than everybody else's. So for me Ella was truly there for huge moments in my life and it as a really challenging time to prospect the next phase of my life without her."
He credits Ella, as Holly pointed out, with saving his life and said: "When I suffered from clinical depression, Ella came to each and every one of my therapy sessions and it was during that time I started to recognise the power that she had in helping me verbalise some of the thoughts that I was having but along with just being the consistent in my life at the time when a lot of my friends and family and people around me were trying to help and wanting to help but it was difficult for me to let them help.
"But Ella would come with a shoe in her mouth and it would be the suggestion of 'right, I want to go for a walk, you're coming for a walk with me."
Reflecting on his own expereience with dogs' intuition when it comes to moods, Phil reiterated how dogs can sense the mood of its owner.
James agreed: "There would be this look [Ella] would have and the tip of her tail would just wag a little bit and she would know that there was something and that she just had to come and nestle herself - it might be just her resting her head on my knee or distracting me with something that would potentially help me stop a challenging thought that I was having, and would just distract me and that would move me on to taking her out or something.
He added how Ella was the one constant who he could go to who would give him the confidence to know that 'everything was ok' with just a look: "You don't always need a response when you talk. And for me talking to Ella was actually me hearing me say things and when you have a thought about something and you say it outloud, it's a very different experience."
James went on to tell the sweet anecdote of not only Ella helping him through some seriously tough times with his mental health, but she was the one who introduced him to his now wife Alizée.
He said: "I'm very fortunate for Ella. She introduced me to my now wife, Alizée, and it was from my trust actually of her that was... I knew that she was able to tell if someone was interested in saying hello to her and actually she, without me noticing while I was at a restaurant, slipped away from under the table. The next minute I saw her she was with this very pretty girl who was saying hello to her and I went over to say 'I'm so sorry I hope she's not bothering you' and actually she turned around and ordered her drinks thinking I was the waiter. So rather taken aback I didn't know what to do so went and ordered her drinks for her. A few years later we're married."
For more information on the Pets as Therapy charity, see here.
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