Snakes Are My Emotional Support Animal. I Used To Keep 13 Snakes for This Reason.
These smooth, cold-blooded, scaly creatures are my favorite animals of all time, and they make excellent pets.
I’ve kept reptiles as pets for many years, basically for as long as I can remember: I started out by catching Alligator Lizards and Western Fence Lizards with a net in my backyard in California. I would keep them in glass aquariums in the house and feed them crickets.
My parents were always supportive of this, though they hated having to constantly go to the pet store to buy live crickets, and they always seemed afraid I would catch Salmonella. (They never had to worry about that, though, because I’m obsessively germophobic and I always did an excellent job of disinfecting all the equipment and washing my hands thoroughly.)
I later graduated to keeping a massive Green Iguana in a 55-gallon tank that took up a huge amount of space and was kept on display right behind the guest couch in our living room. Unlike the lizards I kept before, Iguanas are vegetarians, so he was much easier to feed: I just bought him a bag of mixed salad greens twice a week from the grocery store. Problem solved.
Since my very earliest days, I’ve kept all manner of reptiles and amphibians as pets, including frogs, toads, tortoises, lizards, newts, and salamanders, but my favorites have always been snakes.
I think snakes are the most magnificent creatures in all of creation, and they can be just as ornate as more “mainstream” animals like hummingbirds, falcons, or tigers.
They can be truly breathtaking in their beauty, and their bodies have an unbelievable, streamlined, aerodynamic shape that is unparalleled anywhere in the animal kingdom.
There are lots of things I can say about snakes as pets and the particular snakes I’ve kept over the years, but one specific thing I want to say is just how important animals can be for emotional support, and that does NOT just mean dogs or cats.
I know about this firsthand.
Several years ago, I was living in Colorado and had gotten laid off from my job, and I was in utter despair. It was already hard enough to try to support my wife and five kids while she was going to college full-time, and we lived in one of the most expensive counties in the USA… so losing my job (once again) felt almost like a fatal blow.
I had sunk into a pit of terrible darkness that seemed deadly. I was on a downward spiral. I felt like I needed help, so I went to talk to a therapist who specialized in anxiety and depression.
We talked about several things, and she told me to focus on things that reminded me of what I was living for and what I cared about. I was encouraged to “take walks, get outside, get exercise, get enough sleep, have some structure to my day” and, above all, avoid things that make me feel “lonely and isolated.”
So, I met with a therapist during some of my darkest hours, and while I can’t technically state that she told me “You should start collecting lots of snakes to keep you company,” and that sounds kind of weird to even say, that’s what I did.
I started out small, buying a California Kingsnake to keep me company in my home office with me as I started my job search. Later, as it became apparent that I was going to be better off self-employed, I decided, “If one pet snake is good, two are better,” so I got a Ball Python to add to the collection.
I quickly realized that this was an addictive habit, but that it gave me life. To quote Marie Kondo, I would say that keeping snakes “sparked joy” for me. I loved taking care of them, handling them, feeding them their mice and rats (frozen; not live), and taking them out in the back yard, letting them explore in the back lawn.
I can personally attest to the power of “emotional support animals” whether what I had technically qualified as that or not.
Quickly, my collection grew from just the lone kingsnake I started with until I eventually realized I had over a dozen snakes in my home office with me:
Solomon: California Kingsnake
Rex: Ball Python
Phoenix: Blood Python
Prince: Boa Constrictor Imperator
Rio: Brazilian Rainbow Boa
Checkers: Carpet Python
Laocoön: Green Tree Python
Eric: Kenyan Sand Boa
Trinidad: Apricot Pueblan Milksnake
Barb: Rhinoceros Ratsnake (Female)
Pinocchio: Rhinoceros Ratsnake (Male)
Hiss: Western Hognose
Sheila: Woma Python
That’s right: as I decided that job-seeking wasn’t for me after all, and I instead spent my days building up my own business to get back to full-time self-employment, I had a baker’s dozen of reptilian friends silently sitting there in the office with me as I made sales calls and signed contracts.
It was a blast. It may also have helped save my life.
Having a wife and kids, of course, is a serious responsibility, and I don’t take that lightly. But it’s also really hard, especially when you lose your job and somehow need to figure out how to make money quickly from scratch. I knew I had a job to do, and I was going to do it, no matter what it took.
But having a few other “mouths to feed” in the house who were always happy to see me, never complained, and needed very little money to provide for was a welcome distraction. It gave me something to do. It gave me small companions who lived a fascinating life, needed very little from me, never complained, and were content with very little.
If you’ve ever thought about getting a small pet to help you get through a hard time in life, a dog or cat may be just fine for you. And while I love cats (and have had many of them over the years), there’s a special place in my heart for the calm, steady, quiet presence that snakes have provided for me.
I love snakes. They make amazing pets. They’re extremely low maintenance. They’re hypoallergenic. They don’t make a big mess, they don’t need a large space, and you can even keep them in a tiny place like a studio apartment.
They don’t need to be brushed, they don’t need to be walked, they don’t need their hoofs trimmed, or their toenails clipped, and they never need to visit the groomers to get a haircut.
They only need to be fed—literally—once or twice per month. These days, you can feed them frozen feeder mice, so you don’t even need to kill anything yourself or watch them kill their prey like you had to in years past.
They don’t bark, and while they do bite, that doesn’t happen very often.
They’re not exactly “fluffy” or “cuddly,” but they are remarkably inquisitive and curious, they usually tolerate being handled, they don’t get bored easily, and they live a very long time: they have been known to live 20 to 30 years in captivity.
I highly recommend snakes as pets in general and especially as emotional support animals. They have been amazing for me. I’m a huge fan, and if you give them a try, I’m sure you’ll find them as pleasant as I did.
If you ever have any questions about keeping snakes, let me know. I’m very happy to help! Also, if you’d like to see videos of these snakes, check out this YouTube Playlist.
I love this! Do you still have any of these snakes??