OUR STORY

Seeking Liberation

It is incredible how life moves in ways that lead you to the unexpected. The Farmette Sanctuary came about in response to my own need for liberation, and is rooted in the belief that human liberation and animal liberation are intertwined.
 

In January of 2021, I had a complete mental breakdown and had to re-evaluate everything in my life. Following a years of pandemic-living, my heart was hurting. I fell into a deep, suicidal depression and took time off from work to focus fully on my healing journey. In August 2021, I made the tough decision not to return to my career, and I quit my job without a plan. Spending a weekend of self-exploration Zion National Park made me realize that I never want to go back to living a life that didn't feel worthwhile. I didn't know what that would look like, but I was committed to radical change, in the hopes of feeling liberation. One day, I heard a news story about a local sanctuary, Unity Farm Sanctuary, and signed up to volunteer. Spending time with the goats, sheep, chickens, pigs, ducks, and alpaca renewed my spirit and opened my heart to a world of healing through caring for animals that would not have a life if not for this sanctuary. 

In December 2021, an email arrived in my inbox, telling me there was a 20-acre property in the Quiet Corner of Connecticut that I might be interested in. At the time, my wife, dog Bentley, and I were living in a small apartment in Boston, feeling disconnected from one another and from the earth. We decided to check out the property on a whim, and immediately fell in love with the magic and the potential of this space.

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While we decided pretty quickly that we would use our barn to create a microsanctuary, we knew we had a lot to learn! I continued volunteering at Unity Farm Sanctuary to learn all about animal care and sanctuary processes. We adopted our second dog, Sparkle, in May 2022, and welcomed our first chickens in October 2022! These chickens are rescues from Kaporos in Brooklyn, NYC. Each year, over 80,000 chickens are purchased by the Hasidic Jewish community to be used as animal sacrifice over Yom Kippur, allowing humans to absolve their sins by transferring them to a chicken and then killing it. Cruelly, most of these chickens end up being thrown away in dumpsters after their use. A powerful group of activists saves as many as 800 chickens a year from this unnecessary procedure. Our first ten chicken residents were saved from there in 2022. Our second flock arrived in October 2023, and in the fall of 2023 we were able to put up a goat fence with support from generous donors. We welcomed our first four goat residents to The Farmette in February 2024, and welcomed two ducks, another goat, two sheep, a mini horse to the sanctuary.

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