2023-06-14 16:02:02
The yellow-skinned snake with brown circles wraps itself like a scarf around the neck of Brazilian David de Oliveira Gomes, who gently holds it: “It’s a boa,” but “I’m not afraid.”
The scene of this 15-year-old adolescent with autism takes place in a therapeutic center in São Paulo, where patients with disorders of this type or, for example, anxiety receive an atypical treatment with reptiles that helps them relax and improve skills such as communication.
“Her name is Gold, she’s cold, she eats mice,” says David, challenged by therapist Andrea Ribeiro to describe the boa constrictor crawling up his camouflage-patterned jacket.
David “is working on the elaboration of speech and memory,” explains Ribeiro, a specialist in animal therapy and a speech therapist, sitting at the table with him.
The original therapy developed a decade ago in that São Paulo center, where some 160 people have already been treated, takes place in an open space next to a corral where others do sessions with horses.
On one side are more than a dozen plastic containers with different types of snakes, lizards, turtles, and even an alligator, a species of alligator that lives in Brazil and other Latin American countries.
Depending on the needs and interest of the patient, one animal or another is used, explains Ribeiro.
“Medicine has proven that (…) during contact with an animal, there is a release of neurotransmitters such as serotonin, beta-endorphin, which give a sensation of pleasure and well-being,” explains Ribeiro.
In addition, he adds, the animals “open the channels of communication” with the patients.
Therefore, they allow “greater effectiveness and faster results” than work in a doctor’s office, he says regarding this therapy that has no scientific validation.
Patients with autism also arrive “without prejudice” regarding boas, alligators or others, which most people fear.
Another advantage of these species, according to Ribeiro, is that “they remain indifferent: they don’t go towards you, unlike mammals like dogs, which can make people with autism uncomfortable.”
song for alligator
“Ya-ca-ré. Opening his mouth three times.” Gabriel Pinheiro, 10, tries to imitate Ribeiro while he strokes the back of a small specimen.
“It’s his favorite,” says the therapist, who takes advantage of the boy’s curiosity to focus his attention and exercise his communication.
“It’s wet,” Gabriel guesses, bringing his face closer to the animal and looking at it with fixed eyes behind his glasses.
After describing the “hard” scales and “soft” belly, taking advantage of the animal’s textures to highlight the opposites, the two sing a song regarding the alligator that tests Gabriel’s auditory memory.
In four years of therapy, the accompaniment contributed to improving Gabriel’s “understanding, communication and motor skills”, says his mother, Cristina de Oliveira Pinheiro, who emphasizes enjoyment: “He comes here happy and leaves here in a good mood.”
animal stress control
The case of Paulo Palacio Santos, 34, who was left unable to communicate or walk following suffering a serious head injury in an accident, is different.
Ribeiro surrounds her face with a thick snake that with its pressure activates the swallowing reflex. His neck is cold, like the skin of the animal.
Then slide a thinner boa across Santos’s face to activate the muscles around the mouth.
Beatriz Araujo, a 24-year-old biologist, is always with Ribeiro to minimize the risks.
She is in charge of caring for and evaluating the stress of the animals, whose possession is regulated by the Brazilian Institute of Environment and Renewable Natural Resources.
“The dangers are those of contact with any animal. They are raised here and we do not use poisonous snakes, but constrictors (which kill by pressure), but I am always with them because they may have a reaction,” says Araujo.
According to Ribeiro, there have been no accidents in a decade of operation. (AFP)
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