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Unconditional Love: A Conversation with Stephen Knight, a 2024 Top Five CNN Hero
00:25:28
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- [00:00]
Steven Knight
I had to learn by baptism by fire on that part. Okay. So if you. If you go back to my first years of fostering, I have so many bark bite marks. And I'll be really honest, if you see my hand, part of my finger, because I. Because I've had eight dogs. At one point, because it was hard for me to say no. And there I was. It wasn't their fault, but I was playing the toy or something that got into like a scuffle of the toy, a fight over the toy, and I put my hand in there to try to separate them, and one of the dogs bit part of my finger off.
- [00:33]
Jay Frost
Welcome to the Philanthropy Masterminds podcast, brought to you by Donor Search, the show that takes you inside the lives of thought leaders, innovators, and change makers in fundraising, philanthropy, and civil society. I'm your host, Jay Frost. Today we speak with Steven Knight, one of the top five CNN heroes of 2024 and the founder of Dogs Matter, a nonprofit organization that has provided foster care for over 1200 pets belonging to individuals in substance abuse recovery. Inspired by his own journey of overcoming meth addiction and the transformative bond with his rescue dog, Jade, Knight has created a program that not only saves animals from shelters, but also offers hope and support to their owners during critical times in recovery.
- [01:18]
Unknown
Maybe we can begin a little bit with the origin story of the organization and how you came to found it.
- [01:24]
Steven Knight
Okay. So, you know, Docs Matter is a very personal kind of mission for me. And 13 years ago, I found myself very hopeless and struggling with addiction. And I made the brave decision to go into rehab. And when I completed rehab, I went into sober living. And at eight months sober, I got a knock on the door, and a friend of mine had relapsed, and she had Jade in her arms, her dog, and she asked, she was, you know, she had relapsed, and she's like, you know, nobody in my family is going to talk to me. I've ruined all my relationships, which usually happens as an addict. And I don't know what to do with my dog. I need to go back to treatment. You know, if you don't take her, can you take me to the shelter and I'll surrender her? And I thought to myself, wow, you know, and that's kind of when I looked into Jade's eyes and we kind of connected. I had. I haven't had a dog as an adult, so I didn't really even know that much of an experience of what a dog really would do to me. Pretty crazy. Like, I Have a dog rescue nonprofit. And that was my first dog as an adult. But thank God it happened because, you know, when she. I not only took her and I. And she became my dog, but I did not realize how important she was to me in my recovery. And my. The loneliness that's experienced at a young, early on in recovery and all the responsibilities and purpose that she gave me to keep going when I was really struggling at times, and I was struggling at eight months. So anyway, I was so grateful to have the dog. And I still have dog. I still have Jade to this day. She's going to be 17 in a couple of weeks, and she's still my everything. So I got the idea, how often does this happen where somebody that needs to go to rehab, which is going to be one of the hardest things to ever do, and they have no place to put their dog, and their only option is to surrender the dog to the shelter where the likelihood that dog will be euthanized. And I thought to myself that, wow, let me look at that. So my first thought was, I want to go volunteer somewhere that maybe is doing this, that I can help them. I didn't. My intention wasn't like, you know, pretty newly sober and, you know, probably shouldn't be opening a nonprofit, so let me go volunteer. And I did research, and there was absolutely nothing, nothing that was even coming close to this. And then. And then even when I would talk to the shelters, like, oh, no, we don't do temporary fostering. When you surrender your dog, you surrender your dog and you're not to get them back. And it was very rigid. And I was like, oh, wow. So I thought. I thought to myself, as. As you hear, I thought to myself, hey, Lucy, girls, I want to. I want to try this and do this. And so I was slowly planning. It took about three years to implement to really start our first dog. So I was also going to school to be a lcdc, which is a licensed chemical dependency counselor for my profession, to help others. And so, Anyway, so in 2015, which will be 10 years this coming year, we did our first dogs. And I thought that I would do maybe 15 a year, and that would be good. And I'll probably foster most of them in my backyard or a couple of friends. And little did I know that it was much bigger than me. And that's when, you know, and that's when I really thought, wow, this could be something. Now the question is, as people that are in nonprofits, that are grassroots that we're beginning, we basically work on a Triage kind of, you know, program where we're just taking it as it comes and it's little time to really go think about fundraising or grant. You know, I was doing that, but it was really difficult, you know, because we're so small. But as we started growing and as I started getting more and more help, I was able to, you know, kind of get more of a rhythm of it and get some more donors and, and start growing. But then part of this for you is also about two and a half, three years ago, my whole goal was I really want a partnership with somebody that's doing the fostering part of it and more experience with the dogs. And I'm. I'm. My whole career in the past has been humans. You know, I've been in social services. I've worked with all the underserved populations, homeless, you know, welfare to work and all these type of programs. That's my expertise. So I thought if I did that work with the human more and I found a partnership that worked with the dogs more because I knew nothing about dogs, is that that would be a really good partnership. And I found a place called Dallas Pets Alive and they're here in Dallas and they are a rescue. And we slowly kind of talked about like how we could partnership and we did this kind of two year partnership where they started kind of working with the boss, you know, the dogs and helping us and the medical and everything. And then last year we decided, well, why don't I merge with them? And that way I don't necessarily have to have my own board and all these things and have all that extra cost of overhead. And that's been just about exactly a year ago and it's been the most wonderful relationship and it's allowed me to branch off and do what I need to do and really focus on the program. And we have actually merged with Dallas Petzlide. That is really allowing me to grow docs matter and me focusing on what I want to do, which is more the Aftercare program. And so in the Aftercare program is basically after they get out of rehab and they're reunited with the, with the dog, is that in which really when the work begins for the client, because the rehab is a very safe kind of sheltered place, is that we have program that, that I'm very proud of that each client is assigned a recovery coach and for up to 12 months they will work with them on their health. And the Dog's Health Institute.
- [07:05]
Unknown
There are a lot of people I know who are battling addiction or people who have had that battle in their families or have it currently. But many others may not know what it's like to go through rehab or the things you've described where people have to give up everything. Could you talk about that a little bit more so that people have a sense about what the risk is and why it's so important to be able to return to their, you know, to their friends, these. These. These animals who have given them unconditional love?
- [07:38]
Steven Knight
Well, yeah, I think that, that, you know, when you. For a lot of us, addiction just strips away everything. And for many of us, and many. And many of our clients, literally some are on the streets with their dogs, and it's the only thing that has not given up on them. It's the only thing they trust. It's the only thing that they allow to love and be loved. So if you have that situation and all of a sudden you have an opportunity to go and get help and change your life, you basically want to do that probably first and foremost for that dog, for that person that. That living being that never gave up on you. Right? And so my thinking is that for a lot of people, because, you know, there. If there's no place to put the dog, and like I said, your relationships have been very damaged. Is that what happens is that they get that choice and they're like, I'm not going to give up my dog. Right. So what happens in addiction is you just get. It gets worse and worse. It's a progressive disease of the brain. And then what ends up happening is they'll eventually either overdose, get arrested, something will happen. Well, they'll lose that dog, and that dog will end up in the shelter, or we can come in and build a trusting relationship with them because, you know, there's. There's this kind of fear of, like, what do you. You're gonna. I'm gonna give you the one thing that. The only thing that I own and the only thing that loves me. So it's a. You know, but because I've been in recovery and I can relate to every client that we have, it really. It really is beneficial. And all my recovery coaches, they're in recovery, so it's a very. It's a very delicate relationship that we build with them so they'll trust us with taking their dog.
- [09:27]
Unknown
I was wondering about the differences you've seen between people who are receiving treatment, who. Who do and who don't. Do not have animals, because this is your work. Beyond the organization itself, is this almost an argument for more people having these Human animal relationships so that they can make this journey more successfully.
- [09:51]
Steven Knight
Yeah. One of my goals is I want to formalize the effects of a pet with recovery. And I've actually done some workshops in the state of Texas at some addiction professional workshops, conferences where I would like for them to implement the role of the pet and treatment. Put in your treatment plan when you get out, what does that look like? If you had a child, it's going to be a part of your discharge plan. Right. So, and that has never been. And so my goal is, what I'm trying to get the, the, the rehabs to do is at the very beginning of intake, ask the question just like you would ask question, do you have children? Do you have this? Do you have a pet? And if the answer is yes, is the pet sick? Will the pet, you know, and if they're like, well, I don't know what I'm going to do, can I bring that? You know, and so that starts the conversation and they said, you know, I had nowhere. Well, here, let me, let me connect you with dogs matter. And so, and so that begins the journey of formalizing it. Then when they get into rehab, we're very much, we work with each rehab and we need to verify it. We have a contact person. Then at the time of discharge, we have a conversation with the therapist at the rehab and the client and say, okay, let's talk about a discharge plan. Are they going to go to sober living? Are they going to go to an outpatient program? Are they going to go back to their, whatever it is we want to know and talk together about what's best for you and the dog if they need to go to sober living. Okay, well, either we can maybe try to find a suburb living. They will take a dog, which is rare, or we will continue to foster the dog longer, you know, so, so that part of it is when they're discharged, they're kind of gently given over to us, you know, whether it's sober living, because that rehab is going to be done with them. Right. So they're going to transition to us and then we are going to be a part of the next steps of their journey into it. And it's all formalized with us. They had the same thing. They'll have like a treatment plan and they meet weekly and they set goals and, and you, and you know, we check it. Are you walking your dog every day? You know, is your dog, is your, are we connecting you guys with low, like low cost vaccination and medical needs?
- [12:03]
Unknown
You have five dogs There they look like they're getting along great. But how do you make those kinds of associations? Because you're. I guess you're dealing with a couple of things. One is foster families for the dogs. So I'm sure you're vetting them very carefully as well as vetting the people who are in part of the program. Are they ready to make that commitment? But then you're also potentially having dogs that don't know one another in the same space.
- [12:27]
Steven Knight
Right. And that's exactly why I had to learn by baptism by fire on that part. Okay. So if you go back to my first years of fostering, I have so many bark bite moves. And I'll be really honest, if you see my hand, part of my finger, because I've had eight dogs at one point, because it was hard for me to say no. And there I was. It wasn't their fault, but I was playing with a toy or something that got into like a scuffle of the toy, a fight over the toy. And I put my hand in there to try to separate them and one of the dogs bit part of my finger off. And I thought at that time it's like. And literally my friends and family sit down. Almost did like its own intervention going, stephen, you need help. So that's when I started thinking, I need help. I need. That's. I started going, okay, I'm really going to go try to find. Thank God for dog spreads live, because I need help trying to navigate all this. So anyway, so there are manuals and now I know how to decompress a dog when they come into my house and they said, I separate them for a day or so and we do slow introductions. And I've been very lucky. Like everybody here has been. Has gotten along. So if it wouldn't be like if I don't, you know, if I brought somebody that was aggressive doggery thing, we didn't to find it its own foster home without any other dog. So I'm lucky that two of them are going to go back to their owner. And then my three are from both Jade and then the person that overdosed her dog. And I have one more that she ended up going to prison. And she just asked me if I would take the dog and I said yes.
- [14:03]
Unknown
There's a lot of memory in each of these stories. What has that been like for you? Because I.
- [14:11]
Jay Frost
To 1 de.
- [14:12]
Unknown
1 to 1 degree, it must be validating every time you're making these connections and helping people through this journey. But it also must be a reminder of everything you've personally gone through.
- [14:24]
Steven Knight
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's why it's so personal and that's why it's. You know, I. I'm so grateful that this opportunity has developed that I get to do this, but at the same time, a. It keeps me sober because I'm reminded so many times of where I came from and, and to say I've been you, you know, I've been in your shoes is. Is very. Keeps me very humble and grateful that I have the life that I have today. However, I will say that there's a lot of challenges because, I mean, you know, I'm talking about all really the good stuff and the reunions and everything, but 25 to 30% of our, our. The docs that we do get end up having to be rehomed or something does happen, you know, so 70 of the time, which is huge and great success number, they will go to their home and, you know, they're working. But the other 25 to 30% is that the person, you know, with addiction, the person leaves, you know, goes. And because I'll sign a contract if you leave and you don't complete it, it doesn't mean we, we are not. You're not going to get the dog. But if, if you don't come back or we don't do a plan of action, we will find a forever home for your dog. And that's hard. And that's especially when they call us and they're in, you know, they're. And they are like, I want my dog back. And I, you know, so there's a lot of. There's a lot of layers. And I think that's why a lot of people, you know, I've had a lot of meetings and people trying, oh, I want to do what you do. It sounds great and fun and get to see the reunions. And it is. And 70% of the time it is. But 30% of the time is really, really hard.
- [16:02]
Unknown
And I guess your obligation then is to both to the animal as well as to the agreement you had with the person when they made the original agreement to, to try and go through this. This hard road of sobriety.
- [16:15]
Steven Knight
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And, you know, and I mean, it's, it's. It's. The addiction is really, really tough. And some people, you know, and like, you know, there's, you know, relapse is usually a part of it at times. We want to be the safety net, but we're also not going to enable that person just to go off every time and say, oh, well, dogs matter. I'll take my dog. So we have to. You have to be a fine line of when are we enabling that person to continue the behaviors? And when are we going to say, no, enough is enough? You know.
- [16:44]
Unknown
So you talked about essentially needing a manual for, for the. For the animals themselves, but also some kind of game plan for people who are going through counseling and so that they'll have a checklist. It's very surprising to me, I'm sure it will be to others that that isn't one of the aspects of the. The interview process where they say, do you have children? Do you have animals? The same way they would try to figure out what are your financial resources for reintroduction after you, you know, get out of treatment, all these basic things. So what remains to be done and how do you make sure that that doesn't just stay with the people that you're able to touch and the animals you're able to serve? But. But the broader community throughout Texas and throughout the country.
- [17:29]
Steven Knight
That's my goal. That's why I'm doing this. That's why I am. I mean, I'm grateful to be a CNN hero where I'm going to have a platform now to be able to communicate this. I'm going to. I hope to have webinars and I hope to have, you know, workshops where I can have everybody come in and say, we got to formalize this. Because what's happening is they get to rehab and all of a sudden they thought maybe the dog would be okay here or there, and. Or they had to leave it with their. Their, you know, their drug, the friend that's also using or whatever else, and that the dog's in a very unsafe. Because one of those questions, is the dog safe? So the bottom line is that one of my mission is to be able to get the word out and train and change the intake process all the way from intake, which is the bone interview, you know, when I need help, all the way to. I'm leaving the. I'm leaving treatment now. What is my discharge plan? You know, what am I going to be doing for my dog? What. How am I going to be taking care of my dog? You know, and, and keeping. And keeping it that. And keeping it where the dog is going to be part of the schedule and part of the structure on both ends. Real quick. Our goal is also, is that next year, in 2025, we're going to actually look into doing a capital campaign to have a facility. And if you want to know my future of it. It's going to be a one stop center where half of it's going to be for the, the animal and the other half's going to be for the human. It's going to be social services for both. So you'll walk in and literally you can take all your needs of what you need as a person and why, what you know and what your dog needs. Like if it's rehab, you know, then you then go work with one of our recovery coaches and try to get your rehab. We'll put the dog over here and we'll do an assessment of the dog. We'll get the updated so you're not around the whole town trying to get all this stuff done. Well, mercy boarding, I'm gonna have 12 step meetings with where you can bring your dog and all these things. So that's my goal. My goal is I want to be able to. Now I think the solution is to have a place where you can bring everybody together and do that. Because not only that, we're going to offer to our clients that a lot of them are homeless, have lost everything. We're going to offer them job training as maybe a vet tech or a dog groomer in the field because they're always like, oh, I want to work, I love dogs, obviously. So we're going to do job training, you know, 12 step meetings with your animals and then, and then Dallas Pets Alive is going to have the trainer, the trainers and the boarding and the daycare and all these affordable things are free services so, so everybody can stay healthy.
- [20:00]
Unknown
Listening to all this, I can't help but wonder who's helped who more, you know, you helping the dogs, the dogs helping you.
- [20:09]
Steven Knight
I would say the doc's helping me, you know, in a way, because when you get down to it, having jade now for 13 years, I'm 13, I'll be 14 years sober next year. Is that when, when it's all said and done and everything that's happened to me, all the great things at the end of the day when I still get to have this living being, give me unconditional love and come home after, you know, dealing with other dogs and people and everything, it's, it's, it's all about her. It's all about the dogs and it's all about the other two that now are in my family. So. And that's what, and that's the thing about it. That's where, that's where also that we also have found out we're collecting data too so we're still fairly new. We got a third party now with DOS Pets Alive that's coming in and collecting a bunch of data. And we're finding out is that if you have your dog and you get with treatment, you'll be able to get the dog back. The likelihood of you staying sober the first year, reaching that year with maybe one slip or whatever else and you're sober after that 12 months is the national rate is about 30 to 35. That's being very generous of staying sober the first year. We're seeing about 65 to 70% of people staying sober. So think about that. Why is that much higher than the national rate now? The ones that don't, that's just somebody that doesn't have a dog or whatever, you know, and whatever. But now take that person that gives up their dog then goes into rehab. The likelihood of them staying Sober is probably 5, 10%, maybe.
- [21:54]
Jay Frost
Wow.
- [21:56]
Unknown
And for all the people that are going to watch the CNN program and hear this advocacy and think about what they can do in their communities, what are your recommendations for them to set up something that's akin to what you've done here? Because it sounds like the entire country's methods of addressing addiction are. Well, they're not evenly distributed certainly, but they're also not all the same. So what are the ways that this model can be applied virtually everywhere?
- [22:27]
Steven Knight
It's a good question. And I think that it's about community and partnerships and finding out areas of what. Finding out people and organizations that do what they do best and coming together. And that means the social services and the animal and the medical and type of things and be able to find those partnerships to create a solid program. Because the bottom line, what you basically need is people that have experts on each of those fields. But here, the bottom line, if you go into the community, you want to set a program like Docs Matter on a general scale. This is what you need. Foster families, you need homes that these dogs can go to, number one. And you get out in the community. For us, we also feel like in what we do is they go into the recovery community because we have found out that if you started a new dog of dog rescue, there are, you know, they're flooded with little dog rescues everywhere and all those rescues have fosters. Right. It is so difficult to find a foster home for these dogs. So. But here's the thing, because we specialize in the recovery community, we went into the recovery community and went to 12 step meetings and went to places and said, hey, want to be a service and help another addict or alcoholic foster a dog. So you got to work in the communities, you got to work in the rescue community, you have to work in the addiction community, you have to work in the field of the professional communities, make partnerships with boarding places. If you need emergency boarding, low income vets, maybe, you know, places they'll give you discounters, maybe some free services. And it's all about really seeing what's in your community and bringing together individualized not everybody that's going to be about dogs, not everybody's going to be out people, bring a bunch of people in with all those aspects and I think you have a solid place to do it. So for foster families is the number one thing. And, and being able to, if you have that, that's, that's the like the number one piece of the puzzle.
- [24:36]
Jay Frost
Well, that's it for this episode of the Philanthropy Masterminds podcast. If you'd like to learn more about Steven Knight and his work, go to dogsMatterTheNumber2.org to vote for your favorite CNN Hero of 2024, go to CNN.com World Heroes. Our thanks to our sponsors sponsor Donor Search, the world leader in AI and research solutions for nonprofit fundraising, and our producer, Jack Frost. If you like what you heard, please subscribe on Apple Podcasts, the donor search YouTube channel or wherever you like to listen and consider giving us a like and a positive review so others can find us as well. Check out our live webinars and webcasts on Tuesdays and Thursdays and come back next week for another conversation with a leader in the world of social good. Until then, this is Jay Frost. Thanks for joining me. See you soon.