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Are you in control of your pet’s health? When your pet first gets ill, do you immediately call the veterinarian (holistic or conventional) or do you have reference books to read, or great web sites to consult? How
active is your role in your cherished companion’s health, as well as for your own health? My wonderful web expert and I have cleaned up the books section on my website and I am adding those I think will help you have the healthiest pets.
Several new clients have gotten pets for the first time. They have knowledge of holistic health for themselves, but did not know the ABCs of pet care. Even those of us with years of holistic care under our belts may benefit from
reviewing the basics. And we can all be inspired by animals with severe problems healed with holistic approaches.
Please let me know what you would like to learn about, how I can best help you heal your animals and yourselves while healing our planet. Many prior newsletters can be found on my site,
www.MyHealthyAnimals.com
The RSS feed is working well. Go to any page of the website and click on the RSS icon. Then when I make posts to my blog, you will be notified. I frequently post briefly on the blog and give links to other resources even when I am behind on the newsletters.
April 2015 index
1. Classes so you can heal your
animals
2. Holistic Perspectives and Treatments
a. ABCs of health care – books on health topics
b. Acupressure success story
3. News
1. Classes to improve animal health
- If you know a
veterinarian or a veterinary student who has some interest in homeopathy, the Academy of Veterinary Homeopathy’s Annual conference June 12,13,14 (near Charlottesville, VA) will be free to any who join or are currently members of the AVH. www.theAVH.org. Great chance for interested veterinarians to see the potential of this
modality and learn from colleagues.
- Toni Martin has started a great site in Chico, California that offers many classes – currently Muscle Testing to see what your pet needs, acupressure and Reiki classes. http://www.chicoholisticpet.net
- Near Santa Rosa, CA are classes in
acupressure and massage offered by teachers at Brighthaven.org.
- Baltimore, MD, now has Reiki classes and more at www.AnimalReikialliance.com
- Email me with topics you would like for live webinars with me. The first will be very soon (so watch your RSS feed) on nutrition, followed by an introduction to homeopathy for animals.
- From 2-3 Eastern I do a live chat on the second Monday at Animal Wellness Magazine facebook page and the last Monday at my Healthy Animal Vet Facebook page.
2. Holistic Perspectives and Treatments
Book on the ABCs of health care
I have two categories of health care books in my house for medical type issues. Ones for animals and ones for children. I am just realizing that other than homeopathy books I do not have books telling me how to heal myself. When I have a runny nose, or eye or other minor problem I go to the books for children or use the reference books in the health food store where I will be buying products
anyway.
What books do you have for animal health care? How do you know what to do if your dog or cat or horse or gerbil gets diarrhea, eczema, worms, injured, etc? How have you decided what to feed; what chemicals to use for fleas, ticks, heartworm; how to stop your dog from jumping up on you, your cat from scratching your furniture or your horse from cribbing? Do you rely on a call to the veterinary clinic for every issue? Your neighbor or friends? Others in the
dog club? Your breeder or pet store?
After 35 years in the field I have my favorites and that list keeps getting longer. Start with a few basic holistic overview books that cover animal care as well as specific treatments for different ailments. In the
favorite books section of my website I have selected some of my favorites. Please post in the comments section below the book list what are your favorites, or why you find one book great or not so great (or email me).
A basic health care book should have a large section on feeding the best food, leaving you confident about feeding a fresh food diet from local, sustainably raised
sources.
Each author will have different opinions on what to feed and that is fine. You will, ultimately, be tracking the early warning signs of ill health to know which foods are the best for your companion, just as you do with people in your life.
Dr. Pitcairn & Juliette Baircle Levy, for instance, have always recommended feeding grains as part of the diet, especially the high protein grains. Anitra Frazier’s earlier editions of the Natural
Cat recommended 60% meat, 20% vegetables and 20% grains. Her newer books 4 parts meat to 1 part pureed vegetables and lots of hints on how to help cats swith; Royal encourages improving livestock conditions and using 60-75% of meat and 15-25% vegetables cooked and/or raw; PaleoDog diet features raw meat and is grain free.
Dr. Elizabeth Hodgkins was a veterinary nutritionist at Hills when her 5 year old cat developed diabetes and she was shocked to figure out
it was because she was feeding dry food – full of grains. She recommends avoiding grains and never feeding dry food, though she is not a proponent of a raw food diet.
A good holistic health care book recommends avoiding toxins, even those in vaccines and gives you alternative to think about for this. Though Dr. Hamilton’s book is mostly about homeopathy, one of the great sections is a review of vaccines that may change how you view their historic efficacy. I love the
playful way Chicklet talks about those “poisons”!
Understanding the holistic paradigm is one of the important jobs of every author of holistic health books (for people or animals). Because our media, conventional vets and even friends keep telling us to get rid of symptoms rather than build deep health, we all need reminding by reading different authors’ perspectives.
Dr. Hamilton’s chapters two and three may be the best I have ever read on how
we become ill and how we heal. Dr. Goldstein uses his own health crisis and how he used good food to recover, then decided to help his dog. After seeing the amazing difference merely by changing the diet, he began to be one of the first veterinarians to use home made diets and acupuncture, then Dr. Burton’s IAT (Immune Augmented Therapy). He has a lovely list of 18 Principles of Natural Healing and a chapter on the healing crisis.
You will
benefit from having several books that help you be the best nurse when your dogs and cats are ill. I think that Anitra Frazier was a cat for at least 10 lifetimes because she is so good at explaining how to force feed, put drops in cat’s eyes, trim toenails, brush teeth and lots more. Dr. Pitcairn & Dr. Hamilton give practical tips on home care along with their homeopathic suggestions.
Every general health book will give you multiple approaches to help
the illnesses covered in their book. Some, like Dr. Hamilton focus mostly on homeopathy, while many (Pitcairn, Frazier, Goldstein, Chicklet, etc.) give herbal, homeopathic, nutritional, and more. Even the more focused books (see the sections on herbal, Acupressure, flower essences, Homeopathy and Massage) books give a few additional aids to healing, especially nutritional supplements (Schwartz offers Chinese herbs and supplements along with acupressure points). Therefore it is important to
have a small (or big) library of books so when your cat develops a runny eye and is sneezing, you will be able to find more than one way to help.
Acupressure to the rescue
Ben, a 13-year old Golden Retriever was fed a relatively high-quality dry “dog” food. After a week on a new bag, Ben vomited yellow sudsy bile. They fed him par-boiled meat and rice for a few days and his stomach went back to normal. This repeated until Ben became completely lethargic and could not eat or defecate. The veterinarian thought
it was time to put him down as Ben’s pancreatic function was zero. His guardians hoped that acupressure could help. When the practitioner arrived, Ben was lying flat and not moving a muscle, not even raising his head when she entered the living room. She “Opened” Ben along the Bladder meridian (BL 20 & 21) and felt he was close to dying. Because Ben’s energy level was so low, she suggested the owners merely use Stomach 36, Conception Vessel 12, & Bladder 20 & 21. Other
pancreatitis points could be Pericardium 6, Spleen 3, Liver 2, and Stomach 39. The key in holistic medicine is always individualize each animal’s treatment plan.
The next day Ben was up, walking, and eating small meals of meat and rice. By the second day, Ben had a bit of a bounce in his step, was interested in eating, and was defecating. Ben was back! “WHEW!” is all she could say. When she arrived for the second session, Ben came bouncing out the front door to greet her. What a different dog. She added 2 more immune system strengthening acupoints
to Ben’s acupressure session regime and strongly suggested they only feed Ben home cooked meals and consult with a Traditional Chinese Medicine practitioner specifically trained in food therapy. This case is adapted from the TallGrass newsletter which came from their blog. Acupressure is a 100% safe modality you can use at home, so it would be great to buy a few books, take a class and subscribe to their newsletter.
3. News
Sophia Yin died this year and is greatly missed. Facebook pages were full of tributes to her work in animal behavior and her caring, loving, teaching ways of making a difference for people and pets. A great site for behavior tip is her blog, which is still being maintained.
Believe
Big, an organization helping people navigate the journey of human cancer, is raising funding for a study of Mistletoe for cancer that will start at Johns Hopkins Department of Oncology. It also helps people become aware of alternatives in addition to conventional therapies.
