401. What Every Pet Owner Should Know About Food, Vaccines, Medications & Vet Care

0:00If you have changed your diet, tried supplements, worked with practitioners, and still do not understand why you are not getting better, I wrote Inflammation Fix for you. If we really think about it, most treatments focus on managing inflammation. This book explains why it starts, why it can persist, and what it may take to address the root causes preventing healing. Inflammation Fix covers nutrition, gut health, environmental exposures, immune dysfunction, metabolic health, and the nervous system so you can stop chasing isolated symptoms and better understand the full picture for wellness. Go to InflammationFix.co to get a sneak peek inside the book and join the list for early access and pre-order information. I can't wait for you to get a copy of Inflammation Fix and I hope it serves you as a resource for years to come. Again, that's InflammationFix.co. Practice conventional medicine for about 20 years at a practice for a while and then I opened my own clinic and I got a little disgruntled with medicine.

1:11I felt like we might be harming the animals and they show stakes and pork tops and chickens on the bag and they look at the ingredients and these diets, they're oats and they're rice and they're corn and corn gluten meal and wheat gluten and wheat. And there's some of these kibbles have no meat in them, no meat. I don't think the majority of the veterinarians have an idea of the ingredients in their foods. For the people that feel the seed oils are inflammatory, I just feel like feeding kibble to these animals is a pro-inflammatory diet. The cats are obli-git carnivores, a cat should never be eating kibble. They got this cancer at the site of these injections. Shots are all of these shots necessary. Over a year and a half ago we got a dog and we started to wonder if for human health we are doing things more holistically.

2:15Does it make sense to do that for our dog? I went down this very deep rabbit hole about nutrition, vet visits, vaccines, titers, no-sodes, annual shots, toxins, and what really should we be feeding our dogs? And do our dogs also get impacted by the toxins that we are exposed to. In this conversation I sit down with a holistic vet and we talk about all things pets and what is the proper nutrition to be feeding a dog or a cat. How often should we be going to the vet? What should we be doing for our dogs and cats that will help support them to have a life of wellness? I now eat a lot of meat and so do they. If you want to thrive you need to eat meat. Meat is required. Hey guys, my name is Judy Cho and I'm board certified in holistic nutrition and I have a private functional medicine practice where we focus on root cause healing and that often starts with the carnivore cures all meat elimination diet.

3:22Today the pleasure of sitting down with Dr Judy, she was a holistic vet for dogs and cats and maybe other animals and so we talk in depth about all things holistic pet care. Since I don't do many episodes on holistic pet care since this is a human channel. I wanted to have her on and talk about all the different facets and all the different areas that are so important to our pets well being. As I shared in the podcast episode, why this is so important to holistic wellness is that as loved ones we raise our dogs and cats to be as part of our family. And for many chronic illness individuals, the one person or the one being that seems to understand them is their pet that no matter what how good or low of a day they have their pet is the one being that can understand and love on them. And so for that alone, we would love to extend the wellness of our dog and cat or our pets.

4:22And so to me ever since getting our own dog and the joy and the nervous system regulation and just the overall love our family feels with our dog. I wanted to share as much information as I can with our holistic vet the truth is that holistic health and pet care should be not that different from human health care. We all have an immune system. We all require nutrition. And so if you have been taking care of yourself and not really thinking outside of the standard care model for your pets. I really recommend watching this interview, taking notes and then just going step by step in trying to treat your pets better. Alright guys, let's get right into the interview. Hi, Dr. Judy. I'm very excited to have you on my channel. I was looking for holistic health pet care and you came up in my search because you lived in the Texas area. And then you walk me through so much of what it is to treat your dog holistically. So then I wanted you on my channel to talk about some of the areas that we consider for human health, but then we don't always consider for our pets and our pets mean so much to us that we are willing to pay so much then when they're sick.

5:35But what if we prevented so much of that just starting if you can introduce yourself and then we can get into some other questions. Okay, hi, my name's Judy Keller and I graduated from the Ohio State University in 1986. And then I moved to Tucson and practice conventional medicine for about 20 years at a practice for a while and then I opened my own clinic. And I got a little disgruntled with medicine. I felt like we might be harming the animals. I wasn't happy with relying on pharmaceuticals. We ended up having to move anyway. So I did sell the clinic and I didn't think I would practice again. So homeschool the kids 10 years and then decided to go into holistic health. So got certified in acupuncture and herbal medicine and then opened up a holistic house call practice. And I have found that to be much more rewarding because I feel we're preventing chronic illnesses in the dogs and cats to start off with instead of just treating everything we're actually preventing and healing.

6:47And I found it's a combination of eliminating potential toxins and chemicals, including medications and you're not relying on medications and a species appropriate diet in the dogs. And I think 90% of the dogs and cats we can heal or definitely improve by just those things supporting the immune system eliminating toxins, potential toxins and getting good proper nutrition. I love it. I love it. Our dogs and cats dying earlier. Is it related to some of the kibble is all kibble toxic your thoughts. I do see dogs and cats living long lives still and it does amaze me when they've been eating some of these dogs have been on kibble or cats. So the pros and cons are one I do think maybe the quality of life has possibly decreased maybe they're living as long but these animals are having chronic illnesses.

7:54So whether it's arthritis and they're having a hard time getting around or whether like in cats it's chronic renal failure or diabetes or obesity, whatever it is. So I feel like they're maybe living as long but not as not such a quality of life. It's some of that has to do with look at the different breeds we have now compared to we used to have months. You know now we have these specific grief like the old dogs and the dogs and cats that maybe you know it's not in their best interest. I hate to say that but it's it's hard for them to survive. I'm helpful because of the anatomical things and we do have more tests that we can diagnose things earlier. We have treatments you know surgery. So I think maybe there's things that are improving their quality of life and giving longevity as well as the things that are causing issues with their longevity and quality of life.

8:59I've seen so many different lists of foods that say certain foods are on the table certain foods can cause allergies and then certain foods are just completely off the table for dogs and I'm speaking of dogs specifically. Is there a list of foods that absolutely cannot be eaten by dogs and maybe cats. And I know we you know he had talked about like the grapes and onions and chocolates and those aren't really an allergy thing. They're more toxic and related that either the dog or cat doesn't have the enzyme to break down a product in it like the theobromine and chocolate so it can cause some cardiac issues. So that more has to do with the physiology of the animals not necessarily an allergy. You know the dogs coming from wolves and we have heard recently about the amylase gene for developing amylase which is the enzyme the breaks down carbohydrates.

10:00And I think this might be one of the reasons why some of these dogs may be doing okay on kibble and others aren't. They have developed more genes for developing the amylase enzyme to digest carbohydrates but it's it's breed specific. So some breeds like the huskies they don't have they have the tube like we have and like cats have they just have two of those genes for the amylase. Other breeds may have up to 2025 so they may be able to tolerate those foods better than some now cats. They are obligate carnivores they do not do well on carbohydrates and it we can go into some of the health problems that they run into and including like chronic kidney disease and diabetes and obesity and inflammatory bowel disease and. So many illnesses that I would see these animals come to me and they're on all kinds of antibiotics and cortisones and I'm even because I used to do in home euthanasia calls also and I'd be called out to put some of these pets to sleep when I talked to the clients about the history and realize.

11:18This dog or cat might get better if we get them on a better diet and some of them do nutrition is so important you know the wolves their diet is kind of like a 55% protein 45% fat. There's no need physiologic need for carbohydrates in a dog and especially a cat other than energy and it's an energy source right but nutrition wise they can get everything they need and more of a quality easy to break down protein with the meats then they can with vegetable proteins. If you look at the diets now and I I find it interesting that you look at the bags of kibble and they show stakes and pork tops and chickens on the bag and it might say like beef flavored but you don't see that it's a beef and then flavored is this right and you look at the ingredients and these diets their oats and their rice and their corn and corn gluten

12:26and wheat and wheat and there's some of these kibbles have no meat in them no meat if you start looking at the labels and I wonder would the people buy those bags if it showed the actual ingredients on them if they had a bowl of corn and a bowl of rice and a bowl of oats on that kibble marketing people don't read the labels that's on there they look at the package and are thinking about the ingredients. They're thinking oh wow at least this is what I have experience and they don't know what's in those ingredients and a lot of them are 60% carbohydrates and if you notice on the nutritional analysis on the bags they never put the percent carbohydrates on the bag. They'll have the percent protein and the percent fat and interesting afko which is the association for nutritional guidelines for dog food dog and cat food they put the minimum protein I think it's like 18% and if you've got 18% protein and I think their limit for fats was maybe 14 I can't remember 15.

13:44Then what's the rest of that food it's it's carbohydrates and so I guess with those carbohydrates just like in people is coming an increase in the glyphosate because you know that corn is not organic corn it's GMO it's loaded right the soy beans and soy. So if it's processed through me like if the animal ate a product like that it it goes through and you you've taught probably a lot about that it goes through the meat and you still might be getting some of it but not as much as you'd get if you're eating eating the plant so the the legumes that's also not and the and the seed oils you know they're not getting animal fats in these diets they're putting. Soy oil or corn oil or it's it's certainly not animal fats that they're that they're getting so for the people that feel the seed oils are inflammatory I just feel like feeding kibble to these animals is a pro inflammatory diet.

14:54If you think about a dog or cat in the wild they would not be able to eat any of those food sources without being highly processed they would not go out into a field any wheat or any corn or you price in order for them to be able to metabolize any of that it has to be highly highly processed so highly heated and when they heat when they heat this mix this food mix that destroys a lot of the nutrients in it and so interesting enough a lot of the nutrients that they need the fatty acids the amino acids after it's been heated mixed up extruded they add those nutrients by spraying it on the kibble. With animal digest and the animal digest is more flesh animal tissue that's been processed to taste good because kibble does not taste very well without this spray they won't they won't eat it so they have to spray these agents on it to entice the dogs and cats to eat it and to supply the nutrition that was lost when they heat it up.

16:16So I needed it to these high temperatures. If you've been dealing with digestive discomfort unexplained food sensitivities or that stubborn gut unease that won't go away your gut lining may be crying out for targeted repair. In our practice we often recommend GI resolve a gut lining support powder we use and trust with clients. We also rejuvenate the gut barrier calm inflammation and support immune balance so your digestion and overall wellness can finally feel more stable. This offer is only available through September 4th and you can get 10% off your order. Just visit nutritionwithjudy.com slash podcasts for all the details. Give your gut the foundation it's been missing your body will thank you. Now let's get back to the show. Yes, even me as a holistic nutritionist in the human space when I got into the pets I haven't had a pet in over 20 years because I just had a really tragic moment with my last dog and I said I can never deal with this heartbreak again and so I literally never had a pet and my kids wanted one so bad so I opened myself up to it and I love this dog so much.

17:37And even with all of the knowledge though when I went to go look at the kibble there's one special for seniors and special for for joint pain and special for for puppies and even after talking with you I thought am I missing some nutrition by not getting this puppy specific kibble and I kept thinking those things and I started going down the rabbit hole I realized not only is this kibble. Pro inflammatory and they're using seed oils and spraying it which I didn't even realize they did that but I knew that they were adding the fortification of vitamins and minerals after so the food is basically dead or not nutritious and all the proteins are denatured but then they're adding stuff and they are using meats if they do sometimes that are that's why they say. It's not human grade because it could have been a dead animal that they allowed into the consumption of animal foods it's just different than what we expect in human foods and the the regulations are different and the the allowances are different with these dead carcasses that then can get into the all of the kibble and as I was telling you offline the biggest concern is Mars.

18:57Candy bar the candy bar company Mars and Nestle and then cold gate palm olive they own the brunt of all of the kibble and then add insult to injury Mars then has bought all of the banfield hospitals the VCA hospitals and then the blue prop hospitals so Mars owns majority of the hospitals that then the animals are going to after they're eating their kibble. So you're giving the poison but then also saying hey come here and I'll take your money from the ailment side and I'll give you all the meds and prescriptions because we feed them all human grade food and we don't even go in the pet aisle at all. We will leave out rib eye pieces or chicken pieces and you know that dogs will devour anything but our dog says I'm good I don't need to eat it anymore and he regulates himself and I have never seen an animal ever behave that way and I realize if you feed the dog,

19:57the proper nutrition it will regulate himself but what have you seen the differences in your standard care and now moving more into holistic diseases anything that is impacted by the nutrition that they're consuming. I mean I was in vet school from 1982 to 86 and at that time science diet was the food you know hills company our extent of nutritional counseling or education. I mean we've been learned the physiology and all but it was pretty much if your dog has liver disease well feed them HD feed them hepatic diet or if they have kidney disease feed them KD and so yeah we learned a little bit on on why that might be but and they sponsor all a lot of the CE you know the continuing education is sponsored by a lot of these food companies and so you can make sure that whatever disease is being discussed in that conference one of the treatments is going to be that diet right and so that's it's very easy then for the veterinarians to come out and you have a business and you sell these prescription diets.

21:14The problem is most veterinarians and I can't hardly fault them they're so busy just trying to keep up with all the illness citizens treatments and equipment and all their employees. They are like this company already figured the nutrition out for me I don't need to get involved with that I don't think the majority of the veterinarians have an idea of the ingredients in their foods because in my mind these prescription diets don't look any better to me than some of the kibbles that are out there on the floor and interesting enough so one of the things that I would like to talk about is urinary disorders and cats. I remember in Prattuctus conventionally it was like every Friday night we had a blocked cat come in where they get a urinary problem they developed little crystals in their urine and the male cats can become blocked and it's an emergency and it's very expensive to take care of it's hospital it's hospitalization and so it's a horrible disease.

22:16Interesting enough one of the main causes for this is the pH of the urine become as alkaline and and their carnivores they're an obligate carnivore so their urine is supposed to be acidic. These crystals tend to form in alkaline urine so because these cats are on a kibble diet that's based on vegetables or you know grains and cardins type thing so their pH goes up they develop these crystals and they get blocked. So one of the treatments to prevent this from happening in them from a clinic is to put them on like a CD diet or assist diet or to add methionine to their diet because it's an acidifier. Well interesting enough methionine is amino acid in meat if these cats had already been on a species appropriate diet this would not have happened in the first place and instead of them being counseled and said to prevent this let's get them on a species appropriate diet and feed them meat.

23:26They still feed them the same diet but they add methionine to it to help us certify the urine and so it seems like that that are don't make sense to me and this methionine I mean it's not from meat it's it's a factory made product you know that they're they're putting in there so the other one several I don't remember how many years ago was there was a big out range of grain free diets so not carnivore diets but grain free diets causing dilated cardiomyopathy in dogs dog there were breeds some breeds are predisposed to this but they were seeing it in dogs that weren't predisposed to this. And some veterinarians that worked for one of the big companies the hills science side whoever they wrote an article talking about how we have to get away from all these meat based grain free diets because it's killing our dogs it's causing heart disease.

24:34Well what they found out after that was because once the veterinarians read that in the journals and people were coming in saying I'm feeding the grain free diet they had it was a fearful thing oh that's going to kill your dog you can't feed that so people weren't here and and taking back their foods and what happened was instead of going carbohydrates free they're advertising the rain free diet. But in place of the grains they were adding potatoes and legumes and those foods have nutrient blocking agents in them so they weren't able to absorb the tarring and the methionine which is what you need for healthy hearts and so again instead of saying maybe we need to stop them.

25:34Feed a species appropriate diet like meat they're adding artificial nutrients to this food to supply that amino acid that they need to prevent heart disease. Yeah it's similar to what they do with humans so you have an issue instead of getting to the root cause of maybe you should change your diet maybe you should find more purpose they say here's an added drug and then when that drug has symptoms then it's here's another added drug and so instead of telling the pet owners. It's very much the same thing they're on drugs instead of the proper nutrition. Another thing is kidney disease you know the cats get chronic kidney please share it again and that's very very common you know and when you when you read and say why do cats get kidney disease it'll say things like inflammation in the body or bacterial infections or but they never say well what's causing the inflammation or why is it having a bacterial infection you know the one some of the main treatments for chronic kidney disease and cats and again cats are obligate carnivores is to restrict their protein because and there has been no

26:56backed up and I know I know all doctors are going to hear this and go oh that's a bunch of lonely but when you do the deep dive there has not been enough good evidence showing that a high protein diet other than end stage kidney disease is adverse or harmful for kidney disease. So you take a cat that's already suffering from inflammation in the kidneys which very well could be from vaccinations because sometimes they grow the viruses on a feline kidney tissue and some of that tissue can be in a vaccine and then cause inflammation in that cats kidneys. So they take a cat that's already on a low low quality protein and they restricted even more so these cats just dwindle down and I remember in practice it was just kind of like that was what was going to happen because they had chronic kidney disease and they just kind of don't do great and they waste away and the other thing that's recommended for these kids is to increase fluid consumption.

28:08A cat should never be eating Kimball because then they have to sequester fluids from their body to be able to digest this stuff you know instead of eating moist food or instead of having to get subcutaneous injections because they're not getting enough fluids if we start them on the get go with the proper diet where they're getting moisture. At least even can food I mean we can talk about how well how do you do this you know if it's not everybody it can be more expensive and not everybody wants to make their own diet and they don't have to there's so many options out there but I feel again if it was on a proper diet this probably never would have happened to it and my own kitty I mean once I sold my practice and she needed some dental work and she was like 16 or something and she was always borderline kidney disease. I took her in a clinic to have her teeth done and of course they did blood work and this was a cat clinic that's what they did and her B2N and creatinine which are two of the chemistries that we look at to tell how what shape the kidneys are again they were a little elevated.

29:23So the veterinarian told me I needed to put her on a kidney diet I needed to restrict her protein well that kitty lived to be almost 23 and her favorite food was raw hamburger you know if we had restricted her protein at that age she would have died much earlier and not been happy so again a species appropriate diet and also since we talked about the U.S. and creatinine those two chemistries will be a little more elevated in dogs and cats that are eating a raw food meat based diet not necessarily raw but meat based because it's a it's a breakdown of protein. So that's something to be aware of if you are feeding a meat based diet and you go into a clinic and they do blood work and say well the B1 and creatinines are a little elevated you shouldn't be feeding that diet anymore you know well it can be a little more elevated because of the diet and that's fine it's normal it's okay.

30:31Yeah we see that also in human so the individuals that are on a carnivore meat centric diet that BUN and creatinine normally goes up you can support it a little bit with hydration but usually it's just a normal response and this is a new normal and I wonder is it even necessary to get blood work for these animals if symptom wise they're okay when I had our pets 20 years ago there weren't as many shots are all of these shots necessary. There are risks in how necessary are these and are we adding toxins to their bodies. On the blood work when you have set first I'll just set on that as far as we need to be getting all this blood work all the time I think there's a tendency now in medicine to treat the blood work and the application. And so I find clients they come back from an appointment and their animal might be doing okay you know but they're so distraught because this was a little elevated or that was a little down or whatever and then they can want to want them to take a medication to do that and so I do think there's a place for you know if they're feeling okay and they're eating that's okay you know there's a place for that.

31:51To be so regarding the vaccinations so I feel the vaccination should be a very individual scenario for every animal. I think the problem that we can run into with the current clinics is they don't have the time to discuss this but we'll go we'll go into it so as far as like the core vaccinations the December and a parvo. Hepatitis for the dogs well I can tell you what I would suggest for my clients sure sure okay a lot of times when you get the puppies the breed or sometimes vaccinated them already and they were like six weeks old and first of all the reason why they do a series of puppy vaccinations like at six and then at 12 and then at 15 and then at 18 is because when they're born they have maternal and I'm going to be able to get a vaccine. They have maternal antibodies from the from the mother dog and those maternal antibodies will block the vaccination the immune response for the pups to make their own so but we never know when those maternal antibodies are going to be gone it's sometime between typically 14 16 weeks of age so they vaccinate a series to try to catch that window so the puppy can develop an immunity from the vaccination.

33:17But I feel if you have a puppy that you're bringing home and it's mostly going to be indoors that first you know a few weeks or not that you don't want to socialize it as you can but if it's not going to the dog parks if it's not going to a shelter if you're not fostering other puppies so it's exposure to parvo. The parvo distemper is really about minimal. I feel it's in their best interest to start on a little bit later you know instead of it six weeks or even eight weeks I would have clients that we would start at 12 weeks and then booster them at 16 weeks because you guys want to have a series of two so then they can give the booster at 16 weeks and then if you want to you can do a tighter vaccine tighter which is a blood test which checks their immune status of their antibody level you can do a tighter than five weeks or so later and see did they develop a good immune response and if not then maybe given another other booster most dogs between if you booster at 12 and 16 weeks they're going to be fine.

34:36Fine with that is what I'm seeing at the clinics and there's many clinics that they require all of the vaccinations they're vaccinating for a lot of those viruses also or maybe even influenza and I know there was an influenza outbreak but again if you do the deep dive and this was several years ago those outbreaks were after one of the major hurricanes and a bunch of dogs. Or brought into the shelters they were highly stressed they were concentrated among each other a lot of strays and there was several influenza outbreaks but that makes sense if you have a puppy that you're loving on and it's eating good food and it's not overly stressed probably doesn't need that influence of vaccination. The biggest place it could probably get exposed would be at the veterinary clinic where people are bringing their sick animals so for just a part of all that would be my suggestion and the tricky thing is finding a clinic that offers minimal vaccinations.

35:45I know if you call a clinic and ask can can I get a distemper shot or just some for parable shot and in your mind you're thinking I just want to some for parable. The receptionist doesn't know that and they'll say poor yeah we have a December shot and you have to ask what else is in that shot depending on your lifestyle again if you have a dog that's going to be a hunting dog and they're going to be out and about all the time they're going to be swimming and water. Then the leptospirosis vaccination maybe one you want to get for that dog but you have to look at the risk assessment on these there's about seven to eight types of lepto organisms that can harm our dogs. The vaccine I think covers for for of them so first of all the vaccine doesn't cover all of the zero types of the organism that vaccination has to be given every year it's not every three years there's no titers we can't do titers on it.

36:51Because it didn't stimulate a great immune response they had to use more adjuvant which is the chemical that kind of stimulates inflammation to help increase the immune response for them so at least in the past that was a vaccination that seemed to have the most reactions as far as like an anaphylactic reaction or a swelling at this side of the induction type thing. Lepto can be treated with an anaphyotic if your dog gets it it can also be very dangerous and can kill them if it's not caught so i'm not saying lepto is not something you need to be aware of but you have to look at the risk assessment and say okay it's it lepto is carried in the urine of some wild animals so you have to ask yourself is the risk of my dog. To get lepto is the risk of getting it greater than the potential risk of vaccinating him for it every single year and not just lepto but there's the rattlesnake vaccination again the influenza you know there's several of them I think that's what you always have to ask and there might be some people saying well what's the problem with vaccinating I mean you're not going to harm anything why.

38:16Not just vaccinating for us you can have to worry about it vaccinations can harm your pet and i've seen all of these reactions they can develop an autoimmune disease autoimmune hemolytic anemia where the dog starts destroying it's been blood cells this is up an emergency illness that needs treatment serious. They can develop autoimmune thrombocytopenia where the dogs platelets start getting attacked also life-threatening and i've seen both of these now you can say well how do you know the vaccine cause that and i'm not saying this is common okay i've seen a couple cases out of thousands of dogs probably that we've vaccinated so this is not common but the issue is if your dog doesn't need that vaccine you're potentially causing harm to that animal by vaccinating if he doesn't need it so those are two autoimmune illnesses and the reason why we associate them is because we would see it within a week after they were vaccinated and that's not.

39:27I mean it's written up you can google that can't trigger autoimmune diseases yes it can in cats fibro sarcoma. Is a cancer and that they can get they can get from it from any injections so not just vaccinations because they mount a high inflammatory response when they're injected with things so antibiotics whatever. But i don't know if people notice that you know it used to be when you took your cat into the clinic they would give it's just a per shot and it's rabies and it's feeling the chemia shot all in the same place in the back of the neck you know you call up the scruff and then give subcue injections there well they found out these cat some of these cats and i've seen several of these. They got this cancer at the site of these injections it's a rapidly growing cancer and it's once you find it it's. surgically not operable in those cases in that area because it goes down into the scapula and the vertebrae and you just can't remove it all and so these cats will end up having to be put to sleep so if how the veterinary community dealt with that is you'll notice when you take your cat in they might get one shot back here maybe the December.

40:49But then like feeling the chemia or the rabies they will give them in the distal rear leg some will even give them in the tail distal meaning it's closer to the foot than it is to the body and the reason for that is if they do get fibro sarcoma from that injection you can amputate away you know you can get rid of the cancer so again here you bring in a kitty that's an indoor kitty. And for their annual check up and they say well we should vaccinate him to cycle he doesn't go outside well he might escape some time and who knows you know get exposed to whatever and so people go well okay let's go ahead and vaccinate them if that kitty gets fibro sarcoma and he didn't need to get that vaccine that's the kind of stuff i'm talking about and they don't have the time to explain that to everybody. Well I also think it depends now where you go so my dog had a good tell there was something in his paw that was bothering him and so we let it go for one day and he kept limping and he kept licking it and so and I noticed it was red so I said i'm going to go to my vet and my vet is I'd say he's middle of the line holistic he's okay if we say no I don't want to take that thing but he does didn't have availability right away and I love that he's a small mom and.

42:15Pop shop you could tell he really loves animals so I decided to go to bandfield which at that time I didn't know was owned by Mars and they were trying to sell me everything what's the latest shots I think he needs a little bit of dental work and his teeth I look to his teeth are very very clean and he's only a year not even a year and a half yet and and they were asking about flea and tit medication nothing to do with the paw. And they were very very aggressive and I left there thinking am I a bad owner and I felt this guilt even knowing everything I know I left there thinking I i'm going to kill my dog that that was the sentiment I felt because I was saying no to many things there their whole diagnosis with the the paw was we have to do much more testing and I decided to just leave my normal vet was open the next day he shaved some of the teeth. And he took it out and it was nothing that they had recommended and that that also checked the teeth and said teeth are beautiful and it was just so different and again it's we love our pets so much that we would be willing to do and pay for anything that the vet recommends and I told my vet the the office person about what had happened at bandfield and she said never go to a vet even if it's an emergency that says hospital because that's usually.

43:40The indicator that it's corporate own it's just so disheartening knowing that we are forced to do things that we really think is in the best interest for our pets but in reality if we took a pause and and actually researched is it worth it for my pet it might not be but in that moment I mean they forced a 24 hour some flea medication on my dog and they said no you don't have a right we saw one flea on your dog and so we. We are giving this medication and I was just so dumbfounded and they fed it in front of me and I just felt so coerced to take the medication there's so much of that going on and even as much as I know I still felt that I what I again felt this guilt this aggressive marketing that that is telling me what I'm doing is wrong and you're going to kill your dog. Yeah I've had clients walk out of well of clinics and tears because they've been feeding raw for a couple years and they go in and and it doesn't it's not the veterinarian it starts with the staff right you know the technicians will come in and hear.

44:53That you're feeding raw or whatever and you will be shamed so I think your best bet is to not go go to court for clinic they're having to follow protocols they have these you know they have their shareholders they have all that equipment that they have to pay for and. I've talked to some that said it worked there and they have to keep up like their average transaction and they have to make X amount of money and. If an animal walks in with this problem there's a protocol that you need to follow so your best and emergency clinics to emergency clinics you will pay a lot of money they will do everything that they can think of under the sun unless you really have to go in right. But so if you can find a privately owned clinic that's going to be your best bet and then I would ask them do they require all the vaccinations or do they honor vaccine titers for December and parvo which would be you know and if they aren't if they get honor titers.

46:02And they don't require every single vaccination then there at least a little more open minded me on what you can and can't do. Let me bring up some of the vaccine stuff so that was a big question I had for you, especially after COVID and we're seeing some of the ramifications of. Taking that shot and some people having immune responses that are never turning off now, but now I have a dog and i'm thinking the same things. If my dog is going to be mostly indoor it's a Yorkie it's mostly home we walk in but we make sure to just sort of wipe down is. Here we keep it really short during the summers we make sure to clean as pause and we keep him. Pretty clean and we feed him a good diet so we hope that his own immune system will take care of him and we. Allow him to sniff everything because that will stimulate his mind as well and so beyond that. My questions to you back then were. If a lot of these shots are all given at once and then I learned that one shot whether you're a going to be a hundred pound dog or a five pound dog.

47:09They give the same shot and so and then I looked into it and it says it's okay because it's just an immune response it doesn't have to be dose dependent but. i'll let you clarify that but what I ended up doing was getting going to a vet that gave smaller doses of the parbo and the distemper and then gave it separately and also. When he was older and then now i'm going to use the titers meaning that I will go in and do a test to show that he does have the antibodies and so I don't need an updated vaccine. And everything else that I don't think he needs I am not getting and I know there's always a risk that the conversation comes up with fleas and heartworm but I am monitoring my dog because I want the best for him and those medications have risk and so I would love for you to explain. How the vaccines it doesn't matter what size you are you get the same shot. You get one one milliliter one CC yeah 150 pound while or whatever and a three pound teacup to wow gets the same same dose and the unfortunate thing there actually was a veterinarian in Texas that was.

48:20Giving smaller doses and he was taken to court I think he might have lost his. So I mean I would do that in my practice to we would give dose appropriate in my mind and we would tighter these animals later they amounted a response you know an immune response what's not like they weren't. Here's an interesting thing to I worked with several clients that were natural breeders they didn't. Accinate their puppies and this is so interesting we tighter those dogs after a year and these dogs would often mount an immune response they had a tiger they had protected. So I think it's a lot of different types of breeders. Mostly for parvo not so much as December I think it's very easy for dogs to get exposed to low doses maybe non pathogenic types of the parvo virus they can amount their own immune response without being vaccinated kind of like the chickenpox party you know the kids.

49:25It's hard to find a vet that will do that because they don't want to get in trouble you know. With all of this stuff there's the standard of care you know what not using that antibiotics I think I use that antibiotics maybe three times in the last you know 10 years that I was practicing holistically yet just don't need a most of the time and again people are thinking well why not you know it's not going to hurt anything but that's not true you're affecting the biome which affects the immune system and here's my other thing of vaccinations. Is there vaccinating animals that are sick know if you come if your dog has allergies that animal is sick his immune system is not happy. But we see sick animals so much now you know they're diabetic or there'll be so they have kidney disease whatever it is and they're still vaccinating them I was doing we leave for a cataclytic and they were very traditional clinic.

50:29I came in one day and I saw this puppy that had come in and this puppy was getting all the vaccinations in its series and I noticed in its records within several days after it was vaccinated every time it came in with a urinary tract infection and they put them on antibiotics and they sent them home and then you come in and you get his vaccination and he. He get antibiotics and they just you know vaccinate them and send them home well and the one I talked to the vet and I'm like maybe he's immune suppress like why is he getting a urinary tract infection he's a puppy there's no reason for that and we shouldn't be vaccinating this puppy we should give him a break you know let's get him better whatever. I came in and he was in the back room having seizures he looked like a dog that had to temper and I honestly feel that this dog probably was immune compromised from the get go came in was vaccinated and challenged the immune system he got a urinary infection put them on antibiotics again we can just.

51:42And I think his immune system was so shot and the December Parvaux vaccine is modified live I think they gave that dog the temper you know and again it's one of those things I feel like people aren't thinking about what they're doing anymore it's just this protocol of you come in the door you do all these drugs you vaccinate everybody you know but the vets they don't know what else to do that's their toolbox. I remember when I started doing titers in my conventional clinic and I found myself you know spending more time with the clients and making less money because I was essentially talking them out of doing everything we normally do and so it's pretty it's hard for the best. Yeah I heard the salary of a vet Narian is so much less than a doctor a human doctor and you and I realized that you only go into the industry if you really love animals and then to accidentally be hurting animals and it's just so heartbreaking just owning a dog recently and loving him I want him to live as long as he can and that's where.

53:02So much of human health and the holistic side of it is so similar to the animal side and I see the pain that other owners go through or the animals and I can't say anything because it's already hard on the human side and then to see all these animals suffering and I can't you know i'm not a vet i'm not even trained in the nutrition side of animals but it breaks my heart. So many individuals that we work with that have chronic illness and that sometimes cause them to have isolation or not be understood by individuals or humans and so they have a pet that they absolutely love that gives them connection and some semblance of it's going to be okay it helps regulate their nervous system and then to know that unknowingly you are hurting your pet and that pet may leave you earlier because we are being told to do the wrong things. So that's what happened to that chronic illness individual and that's the side that really makes me want to share about this pet health because it absolutely influences the family that owns the pet and it's heartbreaking.

54:08I have to say maybe 50% of my client I did not advertise my my business I just had a website people found me 50% I say about of my clients looked for me because they had a history of some of my clients. So I was a child of some of the family of something that went wrong regarding vaccinations whether it was with themselves whether it was with a child or whether it was with a pet and so they were looking for somebody that was okay with not vaccinating or with minimal vaccinations in fact I there was a couple of moms that I had and they when their kids came up due for boosters I don't know what age or which vaccine it was they had interesting I didn't even know you could do that. That amazed me I'm like wow that's awesome. So and when I started doing tight I started doing titers back in the 1990s and rarely reclinics doing them and over the decades I have found that most dogs for a distemper and parable one safe cat their initial series of puppy shots which couldn't be just to maybe then an annual one.

55:24They maintain immunity sometimes for eight to 12 years so even though they've reduced them to every three years you know most clinics now I think they're following the high guidelines which do say every three years is fine we're still what a over vaccinating these dogs and a problem that I see is the vaccines aren't as extensive as doing a vaccine tiger and so when they go in there and say when I've heard about this tighter could we do a tighter well first of all the clinic might not offer it or I've seen they charge absorb an amount or because it is more expensive the client will say oh gosh I didn't know it was going to be $80 or $100 just vaccinate them or if they're not getting explained to on why you might want to do a tighter instead of a vaccination why wouldn't they go with the cheaper one you know and they don't have time to explain it so something like with humans we kind of have to educate ourselves there's an interesting book called PUCAS Promise it's P-U-K-K-A-S Promise and it's about a man he's a writer and he wants his dog to live as long as possible

56:44and so he studies health for a year he looks up everything that we're talking about vaccinations toxins diet and it's kind of an eye-opener book for anybody who is not quite sure about this to kind of like yeah I don't know it's a very interesting book. when I was looking at the vaccinations there was also this option about no so it's I didn't I couldn't find a ton of information about it but what are your thoughts about instead of or in lieu of vaccinations using no sods which is more homeopathy. right so I'm not trained in homeopathy I do know even even one of the major homeopathic veterinarians says that the no sods will not amount an immune response that we can see on a tighter vaccine higher I only had a handful of clients that use no sods so unfortunately I don't have a lot of experience with it I would say that none of those dogs got sick and

57:46they did have titers to parvo but not always to the stemper but again you have to look and say well what's your risk of getting the stemper you know you have to get your dog has to get exposed to a dog that has a stemper there's not a lot out there anymore and again indoor mainly dog or you live in neighborhood that everybody's taking care of their pets so so unfortunately I don't have a lot of experience with the no sods. what about heartworm and tick prevention so we live in Texas obviously it's very humid and I honestly don't use heartworm it's been something I go back and forth all the time and I always worry I look up almost once a month what are the symptoms. just in case because I'm so scared but I also know all the toxins that are in that heartworm medication and that I am choosing because he is an indoor dog because he really lives and breathes with us all the time and I have making the choice even with the risk of mosquitoes in Austin that I'm not going to get the heartworm medication and I think most of my friends and obviously the vet is so against it.

59:00what are your thoughts about heartworm and flea prevention. so heartworm is right does depend on where you live because it's transmitted by mosquitoes and it depends on what season it is and it depends on the lifestyle of your dog right you can have a little dog that's probably mostly indoors or you're with it when it's outdoors so you know there's mosquitoes around not the same mosquitoes can't get inside yes they can but again it's that risk is a risk of getting the stemper. there's a risk of using a mosquito can but again it's that risk assessment that that's what you're doing right. if you have a dog that's an outdoor dog or again you take them camping all the time in lots of mosquitoes well that's a dog you would I would recommend having unheartworm prevention. ways you can do that. It's frustrating in that so many of the products know they're like these three in ones, you know, it's very difficult to find an isolated treatment for heart harm. And my go-to was was heart guard because it was just Ivermectin, which has been around forever.

1:00:08And I personally never saw a problem with it. And there is a test that can be run on the different breeds that have may have a sensitivity to it. You can run it yourself to see. But at the the doses that are recommended for heartworm prevention, it's not an issue for them. So my go-to would be a fear feeling at high risk than to use the Ivermectin only, but heart guard doesn't make plain heart guard anymore. It's heart guard plus, which has a dewormer in it, which there's no reason in my understanding why a dog would need to have monthly dewormer. Adult dogs kind of develop a bit of an immunity to most intestinal parasites. And unless they're being exposed to puppies all the time and they have to eat that fecal material or step in fecal material to get that intestinal parasite. So I don't see any reason to have a dog on monthly dewormer. And we have to remember

1:01:12all of these chemicals that we're putting in or on our dogs. They're getting in the environment as well. So they're affecting the microbe, I don't know, in the environment. Your kids, it's just happening. So we don't need that dewormer. So the product that I would suggest is called that a heart. And it's sold online by Pets Megastore. Am I allowed to? Yes, yes, please. Of course, absolutely. Yes. Okay. So it's called Pets Megastore. The product is called that a heart. And you don't need a veterinarian's prescription to get it. It's sold through Australia. It's the same. It's just Ivermectin. There's no other chemicals in it. And it's the same dosing as part guard is. And I feel you can pretty safely give it every six weeks instead of monthly. I mean, monthly is very easy for people. You know, they remember every month, the company

1:02:15makes more money to do that. But you can go every six weeks with that. And that's kind of a I feel a way that you can protect him minimally. The other thing too is once the temperature gets below 57 degrees, the life cycle of the heartworm stops in the mosquito. So if you are in an area where you have winter times that are below 57 degrees, you do not need to give the, well, you wouldn't have to give the heartworm prevention during that time. The thing to remember is these heartworm medications work backwards. So you don't give it to your dog. And then over the next six weeks, it's protective. And instead what's happening is when you give it to your dog, it kills the larval stage that's in the skin of the dog from the prior six weeks where it might have been bitten.

1:03:19So you have to keep that in mind. And when you may stop the medication or when you want to start the medication again. But yeah, if you live up in Idaho or Montana, they certainly don't need to be in heartworm prevention all year long. I don't think it's a bad idea still to test every year. That's not going to hurt anything. And I know you asked about the microphyllaria test or the antigen test. And they test the differences like if there's only female worms, you know, versus you know, or if they're too young. So it doesn't hurt to get them both done. But I think the antigen test is fine. So that's with, oh, and also there are some herbal treatments or prevention for heartworm. Amber Tech makes some herbal preparations for heartworm prevention. I only had a handful of clients use that because it's not convenient. You like have to give it to

1:04:21it's an irregular cycle that you have to give it to them. And also since it's transmitted by mosquitoes, you know, mosquito control will help prevent it as well. What about flee prevention? I don't like flee prevention and tick prevention at all. I don't like any of them. And this is interesting too. What I found was so many people would come in and I'd ask if they've ever had flee problems. And they'd say no, but they're on a, they're on a flee preventive. So we don't really know if they had fleas or not. And most of these people might say, well, let's, let's try taking them off of it, you know, and they take them off of it. And they didn't have fleas. They didn't have, they didn't have fleas because they were on a flee prevention. They didn't have fleas because their dog was not in an environment that had had fleas. So the only clients that I had that we

1:05:25ended up having to use flee prevention, a traditional conventional flee prevention, were people that had horses or they lived on a ranch or they lived next to an open area and their dogs were out running in the fields all the time. Those were dogs sometimes we, and they ended up getting fleas and they had to go on a conventional treatment. This is interesting also. When you're on a fresh food meat-based diet versus a kibble, I think because it's a healthier diet and it's not inflammatory, the skin is not, these animals are not as prone to attracting parasites. Whereas when they're on a paramedy diet, you know, you hear about the yeast infections and the stinky smelling skin and and even like plants, you know, you look up and when how do parasites know when there's a sick plant,

1:06:25right? There's there's either chemicals that are released or pheromones but somehow they know. And I think it's the same thing with fleas and ticks. For example, I've had situations where a neighboring dog is on a carbohydrate diet. It's getting vaccinated for everything. It's on all the different medications and they're covered in fleas. And the dog that lives next door is on, you know, not over-medicated is on a meat-based species-appropriate diet and they are not having a problem with fleas. So I do feel that's it's all connected. Dieted is such an important part of this and not having a toxin. So regarding fleas, I do think you need to do a trial and see, does my dog even need this stuff? And if you're in a typical neighborhood where people are out walking their dogs and everybody's taking care of their pets, chances are you're not going to need

1:07:29to be on that flea product. But I would recommend getting a flea comb, you know, flea comb your dog or cat and check them, you know, make sure that they are flea-freebie. And there's a product called Wonderside or Cedar Side, the Cedar Oils, for essential oils. And you can use the oils, maybe spray it on their feet or if you are going to be going for a hike, you know, make sure that you use one of those products and then make sure you flea comb them when they get home. Now, I know there's commercials that you see on fleas and it shows people finding a flea in their house and all of a sudden there's a million of them and you have to bomb it and everything. But in our case, every once in a while, I'd flea comb my dog right, see her itch and she'd have a patch of fleas. And we never had to use the treatment. We'd just start flea combing your several times a day.

1:08:30And this was a golden retriever, you know, I mean, so it takes time, but we would flea comb her and use the Wonderside, maybe rug, diatomaceous earth, you know, in her skin, you can use food, grade, diatomaceous earth, vacuum the house every three days, the places that she hangs out, wash, wash their bedding. And within a couple of weeks, you're not finding any fleas. The only time really that I found you have to use it is if there's a source of fleas that you can't take care of. If your neighbor, if there's a fence, say, but your neighbor has dogs or cats and they have fleas and they're not taking care of them and they're constantly coming into your yard, that's a situation that you might end up having to use it, but I rarely saw it. Kind of the same with the the ticks, you're going to find ticks when you're flea combing. Depends on where you live, you know, do you have a lot of ticks in that area? Are you going some

1:09:32place where you're hiking? And I've had people that say if they're going someplace where there's a lot of ticks or limes and zis, maybe they'll use a product during that time that they're out there, but if they're living in an area where we're rarely seeing them, I don't find that they're necessary and again, it depends on where you live. That reminds me of how it used to be, if your dog, if you took them in to be state or neutered and they weren't vaccinated, they'd make you vaccinated, like they vaccinate them on the day they're getting spayed. And again, I don't believe in that, break, like you can mention, break up the vaccinations. Do not get your December Cargo and rabies on the same day. And if you just ask the clinic, well, can we wait a month and come in just for a tech visit or something like that to get his rabies shot? You know, do that, break them up. Don't do it if they're not feeling well. You know, if you bring them in for a health issue,

1:10:33and they say he's due for his December today, so I want to wait till he's all better and until we vaccinate him. I want to touch on neutering and spaying. So back in the day, you used to be at, I think it was four months that they would get neutered and spayed. And now, the holistic that I went to said that's way too early, it can cause issues. And then there are also thoughts that if you don't get them spayed or neutered that other than the mass population of breeding, it's more the issue that long term they can get cancers and other issues. What are your thoughts about neutering and spaying? I have found the non-neutered males. They're amazing animals. They are big and strong. And there are thoughts that it helps reduce anxiety, that neutering can increase their anxiety. It's not as black and white anymore regarding if you neuter, you will

1:11:36eliminate cancers. They're finding it can go both ways. This is the females and the males that sometimes neutering seems to reduce certain cancers, but it may increase other types of cancers. You can do vasectomies on the males. I've done vasectomy so that they can't breed who knows who, but they can maintain their hormones. You do have to watch for behavioral issues. Are they aggressive or not? But again, there are thoughts that non-neutered dogs can be more calm than the neutered dogs. It's marking territory. You could have that issue, which neutering may or may not not help. So it's not like every dog that's not neutered is going to get a prosthetic cancer or parianoe adenomas. So again, it's kind of that risk assessment, what's the benefit versus the the disadvantage. Females are a little harder. Oh, and regarding both males and females, it is felt

1:12:40to wait until they're older, especially the larger breeds, to help prevent the dysplasia and the elbow shoulders. Hips wait until their bones are fully grown instead of neutering numbers, being them before they're grown because they feel that can predispose them to joint issues. A lot of those dogs are waiting until they're one or two years of age. The females, I have had clients that they'll have a hysterectomy done instead of an ovario hysterectomy. So they'll just have the uterus removed so they can't get pregnant, but they've retained their hormones. The difficult thing is finding a veterinarian that does that. There's not very many that do that. And it's not without its risks. If any part of the uterus is left down by the cervix, they can still get what's called a stompiometra, which is an infection, which if a dog is not spayed,

1:13:48one of the risks that can happen, this hormonal related, is pymetra, which is an infection of the sterile infection of the uterus. It fills up with pus. And if it's a closed pymetra, meaning it's not draining, that's an emergency situation. And the treatment is typically to have them spayed. If it's an open pymetra, that means they're kind of draining the pus, not as much of an emergency, and they may be able to medically manage that. So it's not as cut and dry as far as we are definitely preventing cancer by spaying and neutering. It's not that way anymore. When I walk the dog, I know that some neighbors just put on fresh grass, or they obviously maybe sprayed their homes with some types of pesticide to remove bugs. How much is the environmental toxins

1:14:50impacting our pets? I know you mentioned glyphosate already. So I know the herbicides are, and we have a lot of human data on that. But what about everything else? I don't know how to respond to that. I know whenever I have a dog that comes in with what we're calling allergies, because they're licking their feet, they're scratching, you know, that's certainly on the list of things to stop doing, is to use using the lawn pesticides. And you're right, you have no control over what's out there. I don't know. How do you guys assess that in your practice regarding the environmental toxins? Yeah, so we test for mold in the homes. So that's one way. And so and we have, there's actually studies where mold can absolutely impact pets and make them sick. But beyond that, but with humans, you can test for a lot of the environmental toxins through

1:15:52urinary. I'm sure it's not perfect, because if you're really unwell, you won't even be releasing some of the toxins, or you could be super healthy, and you're releasing toxins, and that's a great response. So there's sometimes not a good answer to your result. And also, I know there's some doctors that will then recommend provoking, which is basically you take NAC, or you take glutathione, you force the body to try to release some of these toxins and see how much are you releasing. But again, it'll so be dependent on the time you're taking it. What other things you've been impacted by is that a healthy response. We just don't know. And so I'm not the biggest fan of those tests, just because I think there's so much more we can work on. Obviously, try to eliminate as many toxins, but we are just so surrounded by toxins that I think the best bet as you have been talking about throughout this whole podcast is strengthen the immune system. And the best way we can do that is feed species appropriate foods, and then ensure that even their mental wellness is good. I recently

1:16:54I was looking at how there are so many dogs that are in mental health drugs now. And that to me is so shocking that my dog is anxiety, my dog is depression. So let's give them medications. But at least on the human side, we there's an affect and then you talk with the person and they voice the gaps or the emotional issues. But with pets, they don't even have a say in we're giving them medications. And I think it was I did a quick search and I believe it was above 5% that are on mental health drugs or psychiatric drugs. And that to me is concerning because I think that if you just walk your dog daily and stimulate them and give them adequate exercise and love on them, maybe some of that will go away instead of just, oh, your dog has anxiety. I don't know. I'll ask the experts. So I don't know what your thoughts are on all the psychiatric drugs for dog. Yeah, you know, I didn't deal a whole lot with that. I did have clients that had

1:17:59dogs that were easily triggered. Like they couldn't lock their dogs during the daytime. Right. They had to lock them like at night when nobody else was around. And I didn't have anybody that I recall actually used the drugs. I know there's specialists, animal behavioral specialists. And that's kind of what they do. They're kind of like dog psychiatrists. They dispense, spends drugs. And I do know, so epilepsy or seizures is one of the things that I would see an improvement with all the things that we're talking about reducing vaccinations, reducing drugs and getting them out of good diet. Because if you look at the stuff that's in a lot of these foods, I mean, there's food, colorings, there's all kinds of chemicals in there. And again, if we're giving a pro inflammatory diet, you don't always know where that's going to set up in that particular dog. So I have had dogs that came in on, I don't know, half a dozen drugs for controlling seizures. And we'd get them down to maybe one. So I think that speaks as far

1:19:05as what's going on with the brain. And I know you mentioned in your your thing regarding the the ice, well, some of the insecticides that stimulate the gabber receptors. And so there you go. You know, we know we're we're causing some problems with the brain receptors. So I didn't have a lot of dogs on that that I personally worked with. And I didn't do the toxin tests like that. I generally found if we just decreased all the chemicals and got them on a better diet, that like handled so many of these cases. Two other big ones that I'm sure a lot of people will go, otitis, you know, ear infections, these dogs that are in and out of the clinic, they're on antibiotics, they're on steroids. The majority of those dogs will improve when you get them on a fresh food diet. And urinary tract infections, I know we talked about that in the cats,

1:20:07but in the dogs also, I would see dogs that are in and out of the clinic and on antibiotics. They're on the special urinary diets. And we get them on the fresh food diet and eliminate the toxins. And they don't get it anymore. They don't have it anymore. So we were to list out all the things that a person can do for their pet. There's obviously nutrition, then the shots, the preventative medications that they're on, exercise, and then even keeping your home safe environmentally. Have you noticed in the last 10 years when you were treating more holistically that there was one lever that's the biggest? I mean, where would you start for somebody? nutrition. Hands down. Hands down. Other than the cases that or medications, I'd have dogs that would go into the emergency clinic for whatever. And that was one I think. Like, when do you take them in and when do you not? But so they're vomiting and they go in

1:21:12and of course they get an injection and they get sent home with three different medications for diarrhea and vomiting, nausea, whatever. Interesting enough, a lot of those drugs, potential side effects are vomiting and diarrhea. And so I've had cases that we just take them off their drugs and they get better. So there's those situations. Wean them slowly carefully. We're watching them off their medications and they will improve. But it has to say nutrition hands down. What are some big changes you've seen over the years by changing nutrition? A big one is a lot of the older dogs that are so they're on a number of pain medications. You know, they're having a hard time getting up. They don't want to move around anymore. And not necessarily old old, just kind of older. They respond really nicely to getting them on a fresh food diet. They're more active. They seem to feel better. So that's a big obesity,

1:22:21getting their weight down, which improves their skin, improving their their cold, you know, their skin cold. If you think about the fatty acids that they're getting in kibble, they're usually sprayed on after they've been heated. And those, if people leave them in their bag with the bag open, those are oxidizing and becoming rancid. So now they're not helping inflammation. They're pro-inflammatory. And you know, a lot of times people will say, you know, he just doesn't like his food anymore. Am I always able to change food? Well, if it's been sitting in that bag open or in a can or exposed to the air, when it becomes rancid, they're not going to want to eat it anymore. So skin coat diabetes. I had some diabetics that were especially the cats. Again, because they're obligate carnivores. If you put them on carbohydrates, they'll, you know, get type two diabetes. And that can totally go away on

1:23:22on a diet. The dogs is a little harder. I mean, it is felt that it's autoimmune. You know, the type one may have some autoimmune influences, as well as genetics. So again, by decreasing antigens in vaccinations or toxins or possibly diets, we can certainly improve the diabetics. Pancreatitis. Oh, a big one. Inflammatory bowel disease, dogs and cats that are in antibiotics and stirries for IBD. And if you think about if they aren't eating something that's causing inflammation in the gut and changing the biome and causing leaky gut, and it just makes sense that they might improve when they get put on a species appropriate diet. I mean, a lot of those diets seem to putting them on are these hydrolyzed protein diets. They're so manufactured and processed. And I guess what's frustrating to me is why aren't meat-based fresh food diets at least on

1:24:29a possible treatment plan? You know, why don't we, why don't, why isn't that even looked at? As well, let's try a fresh food diet. Now again, the veterinarians are trained in this. So when we're asking them about that, it might put them on the defensive. They might feel insecure. They don't know about it. They might have read the article saying that you're going to kill your dog on it, or that there was a recall. Well, there's recalls on kibbles and canned dog foods also. It's not just the possibilities of raw food, but I am just frustrated that that isn't on the potential treatment plan instead of jumping to these prescription hydrolyzed diets. I feel that the reason they don't do it is if Mars truly owns a big chunk of all the kibble foods, it's their money maker. And even though they know that it's not ideal for the dogs, I mean, they have the vets. They own the vets

1:25:31that also are treating these dogs and cats and other animals. There's no way since they own the whole supply chain. There's no way that they don't know that the kibble is part of the issue, because they have the medical side of it. And if it would be easier to say just feed these pets the right foods for them, but I think it gets into so many things. One, it could reduce the the money that they make on the hospital side. But secondly, then they have to acknowledge that meat is not something that causes heart disease in humans. So if my dog and cat are healing, with meat and saturated fats, then what does that mean for a human health? And so I just think it's easier to let this continue in a capitalistic society that, hey, we know it's probably not the best. It's convenient. People want convenience. And it's cheaper and we're making a ton of money. Hey, and on the back end, we know that they're going to get sick. So here's all the medications and

1:26:31all the things that they can use through us that's giving them the kibble. And I think it's this vicious cycle. And if you try to get out of that, as you said, there was that one hospital or that one vet that got in trouble for giving less of the vaccine dose. When you try to play outside of the standard norm, there's risks that are involved. And I think people aren't willing to do it. I unfortunately believe that most people would rather just do what's the what's the easy common path because it's cheaper. It's easier. It's conventional. And you're playing by the rules that everyone else plays by. And it just makes life a little easier until you get the $10,000, $20,000 bill at the end when you're you can let your dog maybe live one more year with you, but you have to pay all of that. But what if you just use that money over the course of the 15 years, the dog is alive? And that's the part where that's exactly right. I would say this also since I did a lot in home euthanasias too, what I saw with dogs and cats that were more conventional. I mean, the dogs that were not

1:27:38overbexinated and were unfreshly died. They still died. You know, they still died. But they they would do well, like they're doing well, even if they had cancer or something, they would be doing well until they didn't. It was like they're swimming. They're eating. They're fine. You know, not fine, but they're not these chronically ill, sad, slow moving, all kinds of medication, you know, dogs. So the quality of life lasts a lot longer. And then you just know it's time versus those chronic illnesses. But yeah, you said it way better than I could have said it. It's just frustrating to me that that's aren't looking at this. So if people wanted to start feeding more

1:28:39raw foods or more, we don't always feed our dog raw food. So I just wanted to put that out there. I know it's more beneficial, more nutrient sufficient to feed raw food than cooked meats, but we just got in a habit of having cooked meat. So we do a mix of both. And our dog loves dehydrated meats. It's his favorite snack. And so we feed a lot of that. But if someone were to get started, what does a healthy dog or cat bowl look like? So there's two school thoughts. This is a generality as far as this is dog. Do they need vegetables or not? You know, do they benefit by fruits and vegetables or not? And there's a school of thoughts saying yes, they definitely do. And then there's the group of people that say no, they don't. And personally, I haven't seen the difference between the two. It's not like every time they ate plants, they were sicker than the ones that didn't. But it would depend on how much they're feeding them. Right. So the general

1:29:39guideline is like 80% muscle meat, 10% organ meat, and 10% bone. Okay. And organ meat like half of that should probably be liver. It would be a good idea to have liver. If you do too much organ meat, like if people get excited, no, I can give them raw liver, it'll give them the runs, give them diarrhea. So you can't do too much organ meat. So in Austin and Texas, the nice thing about there is there is that company, Texas tribe, and they can make a raw mix of 80, 10, 10, 80% muscle 10 or 10 bone. And it's that probably the best price you can find than at the stores. So if you have a large breed dog, the majority of my clients would use Texas tribe, or there's a company called Jake and Blues. There's several companies that make it in the area. And it's one of these things you go on their website and you place your order and then you meet the truck at a designated

1:30:44spot, whenever the store bought diets, they're they're definitely more expensive. But you can get pre-made diets that are frozen raw. Little dogs, you can get the little pucks, you know, as you know, or you can get freeze-dried raw. That's going to be more expensive because it's been the most processed. But it's really nice for travel, especially like for little little dogs. Cats, same thing, you can get frozen raw, you get the freeze-dried raw. So for transitioning, if somebody wants to try this way of feeding, one of the options would be to just start including some meat in the diet. And you know, some of my favorites are the ones that are high in the omega-3 fatty acids. So like pasture raised eggs and include the shell. You know, that membrane inside the shell,

1:31:46they even make joint supplements out of that membrane. I mean, it's like a con droid and, you know, glucose mean type of a thing. So they can have eggs. If you want to lightly cook them, that's fine. If you want to just put that whole egg in there, you know, you can do that. Sardines, you know, can sardines or canned wild caught salmon. All of these in water. You don't want to be in the oils, even if it says olive oil, it could be soybean oil. So you don't want that. So, so sardines and macros, salmon, those are good meats to give them. And again, the eggs. And then if you are, you know, a hamburger, if you want to lightly cook it up, you know, lightly cook up a hamburger, let them have a hamburger. And not just dogs. There's a lot of cats love hamburger. We have a cat that begs for our steak every time we have steak. She is there pond my hand down to get steak. So just start incorporating meats if you're having chicken, let them have some chicken. Now you got to remember

1:32:51there's different enzymes that are needed. There's different gut biomes that are going to be start up when you start changing the diet. So don't be surprised if there's some loose stool. And my go to is like, as long as they're feeling good, if they're eating and they're feeling good, but there are still a little loose, I don't get too worried about it. You got to remember the dog food companies. One of the things that they're making that dog food for is to make a good, normal poop that people like to see. I mean, that's one of the things that they go geared for, right? Dogs in the, they probably have stools that are sometimes more firm and sometimes a little looser depending on what they're eating. So like, I think that's okay. So let's just start incorporating some fresh food into their diet. There's some people that say you shouldn't mix it with

1:33:51kibble. And it's because of the different enzymes and the different P80s and all that. And then you might cause gut upset. That's another one of those things that I never saw. I've had people cold turkey. Like one day they were given them kibble. And then we have our discussion and they run out and they get freeze dried or whatever. And they cold turkey amount it. I've only seen one dog get sick from that. And it was an older dog that had cancer. And I told the owner to go slow, to transition. And what happened is the dog hadn't been eating, you know, for days. And that dog was so excited to get it meat. She couldn't help herself. She just kept giving it because she was so excited to see her dog excited about eating. And that dog got sick. And I understand why. So whether you transition it very slowly, which is usually what I recommend, or whether you just jump right in and cold turkey, you know, just be careful. So yeah, just start incorporating

1:34:58meats into their food and decreasing the kibble. I think would definitely be a way to start. I have some like fresh food guidelines and some diets. I don't know if you can list them. I'm happy to. I'll do that. No, it's I could send those to you. Also some book. Well, actually, there's some recommended books on that list. Okay. You could post for people to get ideas. If you got a small dog, there's so much easier because it's not as expensive. When you have a large dog, you almost have to have an extra freezer, you know, for them because you're feeding two to three percent of their ideal body weight a day. So 60 pound dog, you're talking 1.2, you know, one in a quarter to one in three quarters pounds, you know, a day. So like start off with one and a half pounds of food a day. And that, you know, that does add up. The thing to remember, some people will

1:36:05say, I feel like I'm hardly giving them anything, you know, compared to a big bowl of kibble. Right. Right. All of a sudden they're just getting, you know, and it's because it's such a concentrated nutrient, dense food, you find that both in cats and dogs, their poofs don't stink as bad. I don't know. They tend to be smaller because they're utilizing everything. There isn't all of this extra fibrous, wasted material. But like you said, you know, your dog, I think because of the increase in fats and protein, they're satiated. They feel good. And they're excited. Not all dogs. 90% when you switch them over on a fresh food, people are just like, it's so fun to feed them now because he's so excited to eat. You mentioned that cats are obligatory carnivores, but dogs are not. Is there a threshold that you think dogs can have in terms of

1:37:10carbohydrates? So if we were to just look at it as a macro's perspective, would it be 5%, 10%, 15% because of that whole amylase study? Okay. I see all it might almost be breed specific. No. You know, if it's a breed that's been hanging around humans for a long time versus like the huskies, I think that depends on the breed now. So for a husky, let's say, so let's say huskies are the least able to tolerate a lot of carbs. What percentage is that for a husky? I don't have that an answer for you. I don't know what I'd say. I do know there are people that want to feed this way of feeding, but because of expense, they do use carbohydrates also. Kind of has a filler energy source. I know that it was a study done on sled dogs. They're high energy dogs, right? Yeah. And they offered them meat versus carbs because these are high energy work in dogs.

1:38:16They chose the meat. Interesting. They're getting their energy from the fats. It's longer lasting than the carbs. I have to wonder if some of the carb dogs aren't the ones that people say. He wakes up early in the morning and he's nauseous or he vomits a bile or whatever. Is it because of that cycle of up and down, the insulin resistance that's forming and the need for carbs all the time? I think it's I think it's dog dependent. People don't think about the trees. They are feeding a good diet. And then I see on the counter this thing of trees and you read the ingredients and there it is. It's wheat gluten and corn and soy. There's so many treats that you can do carnivore. You can get packages of dehydrated hearts. Yes. You can buy hearts at the grocery store. Fresh hearts. Cut them into bits or cook them. Oh, here's a really

1:39:18good food that I'd recommend that most dogs love is green tripe. Some of the pet stores carry a candor frozen. Not the white tripe that's at the grocery stores that we eat. It has to be the green tripe that still has the enzymes and the bacteria on it. It stinks to high heaven, but dogs seem to love it and it's really good for them. So, treat-wise, they don't care if it says treat on the packet. All they know is they're getting something special. We have right now we have pig ears and we have chicken feet. Those are his treats. And I think we have like a salmon or some type of fish skin that those are his treats that he gets. So, dental disease, you know, again, if the dog was eating full raw, giving them raw meaty bones, dogs love chewing on bones.

1:40:19Aren't there wrists? There's definitely wrists that can break a tooth, especially if you give them a weight-bearing femur or a tibia and you've got a big dog. You want to bite that up so they can break a tooth. But if you feed, like turkey necks or chicken necks or chicken feet, chicken feet, here's another thing why I think it helps the dogs that have joint pain so much is when they're eating joints, like in chicken feet. Look at all the connective tissue that's in there. A lot of natural glucosamine condra, right? Cartilage. So, instead of buying a pre-made, you know, factory made glucosamine condra and give them bones, give them joints. It's just so helpful for their joints. And it's so that that is really economical too because you can buy. So, we sometimes buy the ones that are already made, but sometimes we will buy the chicken feet from the grocery store. We'll just wash it and then I put in the dehydrator for hours and then it's ready to go and

1:41:22and my dog loves gnawing on it. Yeah. Neals and all. It's kind of gross, but I know, right? Turkey necks, you gotta be careful on the side. You gotta be careful on the side. Okay, because they're gonna get so excited. They're gonna want to swallow it whole. So, you don't want them choking. Okay. On that. No, I love it. One thing I just want to bring up is the dietary recommendations for dog and cat nutrition. It looks like it's old nutritional recommendations. It was a certain breed. I think it was a beagle and it was very it was it was very generalized and then just shared across the board. And as an example with vitamin A, there's no real there's a limit on how much vitamin A a dog can be fed, but it's way past a human size. And I just think logically if a human has a much smaller threshold for vitamin A, how can my Yorkie who's only eight pounds not have that threshold and can eat more than a hundred X my amount and that does not make sense to

1:42:28me. And so then thinking of that, the level of vitamin A toxicity for a human or even copper is I think if you eat two ounces of liver, you will pass that threshold. Maybe it was three ounces. And so then I think of a small Yorkie and obviously because I have a small dog, it's a lot more nuanced than if you're you have a big dog. But I think you can hit that vitamin A and copper threshold much higher, but that discussion is not being had in the pet world right now. If we did just we're to compare a lot of the studies for human and pass that over to dog nutrition, the vitamin A levels are way too high and I think it's a risk. And there are some studies with copper toxicity with dogs and copper and vitamin A are the highest in liver or beef liver specifically and some in chicken and then pork as well. So my I actually don't feed any liver to my dogs. I will feed them heart. I will feed them all the other organs. I don't also feed kidney because kidney I believe is also high in vitamin A and copper. And my

1:43:33concern is for all the people that are holistically raising their pets, almost every holistic treat has liver in it too. Not only are they feeding the the actual mainstay of their food, some organ meats, they're also now getting it as treat. So liver treats they're really cheap. And so then they're feeding this constant amount of liver. And I just worry again, we're not being super mindful of where they're sourcing their liver and liver is one of the biggest organs that gets sick when an animal is sick. And so for all these reasons, I actually don't recommend. Now I don't give any recommendations for dog nutrition on my platforms at all, but I personally don't feed my dog any liver. And so we have a nutritional supplement that we will sometimes supplement from a from a human company that we and I think there's like small doses of liver in that and I have to

1:44:34live with that. But otherwise I do not give any liver. I will give all the other organs. I will do the chicken feet. I'll do the gizzards. I will do all the things, but I will not give liver. And that is just more of a safety measure just from the research I've seen on the humans. So that's just my little asterisk I put by liver. Yeah, I haven't done that deep dive. I guess I tend to look more at if this dog caught a rabbit, how much liver would it be eating? And so that's going to be you know, depending on the size of the dog. Yes, the size of the prey. That's fair. It's a bird or mouse. Small little livers, right? But they're going to eat that liver. They have found that they don't don't typically eat the stomachs, at least in the wolves. You know, I used to think, well, they are getting some greens because they're eating the digestive greens in the stomach, but it sounds like the findings they don't typically eat that. So that's that that's a great

1:45:40topic regarding vitamins and minerals and how much of what do you give? And I guess my personal font on this. Yes, it's a cane to this later in my career. I'm just so happy to see dogs doing better on on these fresh food. Yeah, diets. And I look at the nutrition in the kibbles now, and I think this has got to be better. Right. Absolutely. Spray done artificially made vitamins. You know, so I guess I just saw them do better, but regarding toxicity, I don't know, you know, it's a good question. I think also is we tend to look at if they're eating too many organs, they get diarrhea, you know, it's kind of like you don't want to do that. That's how some people determine like if they're giving them too much bone, they tend to get constipated, you know.

1:46:44So there are stools that are solid wide or whatever. And so there's kind of this judgment of going back and forth of monitoring how much they're getting by what their stools are looking like. Also, yeah, that's fair. Vitamin A can get stored in the liver. So it's a whole I just hope that one day we get to that point. So I saw the other day at Costco, they sell liver treats. It was this whole five, six pound bag of just liver. And it's considered a healthy treat. So then I imagined families that would buy kibble. And that's the one treat they buy. And if you do a comparison, and this is the side I have done a ton of research, if you look at liver and you look at any other animal-based food you eat, there is nothing that liver is very high in compared to I mean, that is so nutritionally special than any other food. If you were to feed an animal-based diet to an animal, so the muscle meats, omega, so sardines and salmon, and then you get some of the bones and

1:47:49maybe some of the other organ meats, there's nothing special about liver. Just that it's super high in maybe iron B12, but those things again are in all the other meats. And then the vitamin A and and copper is in an exorbitant amount that that's the worry I have with the level that we're giving it. So again, I think of the families that are feeding kibble. And then the one treat being liver, which then you're getting the the process version of vitamin A in that kibble. And then you're thinking you're doing a great job by giving the organ meat of liver just a liver snack. And that liver though is so high in vitamin A. And I know that this is not discussed yet, but I really hope we get to a point where we can think about that because liver has always been a throwaway product. It's always been that in the last 20, 30 years, it's become this revered product. And if you look at all the even the crappy kibbles, some of the ones where they say we have real meat in this kibble, the second or third product is liver. And they don't even advertise that as a health food. They

1:48:53just have it in there. And that to me again, just reaffirms liver is the one of the biggest organs in any animal. And is it a filler in a sense? And then in the wellness space, we've just latched on to liver being so healthy. And it does have certain nutrients that are high. But then there's also the risk of excess. And so we can have an acute response with with loose stools and stuff. But then there's also the chronic absorption of vitamin A and copper that can get stored in the tissues. And that's my concern. I know that's a bigger discussion that no one is really doing. But I hope one day we get there. We it's a good too much of a good thing maybe or you brought it when you were talking about where it's listed on the ingredient list. And I wanted to address some of the kibbles when they have like you might look at the ingredient list. And you know the the highest ingredient is for worse than then you know, and you might see,

1:49:55oh, the third ingredient is chicken and then turkey. But something to be aware of is they often weigh the meat while it's moist while it's still hydrated. So you take that meat and maybe it weighs a pound, you know, when it's when it's moist and hydrated. And by the time you dehydrated that and put it in the processing, it would probably be 10th or 12th on the ingredient list. So just keep that in mind. Sometimes we will supplement a powder that may give me more sanity or a piece of mind that I'm still giving my dog proper nutrition, especially if we're feeding just beef that day. Do you have a recommendation that you share in terms of something like that that even may end up making things a little bit more economical and easier for people that want to eat more meat base for their pets? Yeah. So there are different mixes and I don't I don't know how

1:51:02more economical it is because I never faced this particular product. Okay, that's I still have to check the ingredient. You know, there are just you know, you don't fancy feast teaky cat. There are some I'm talking about cat foods. Okay, okay. There are some of the main stream cat foods can that don't have all the garbage in them. So you just have to read the ingredients. You don't want wheat gluten, you don't want legumes, you know, you have to read the ingredients. So don't think you have to buy all these specialty foods because sometimes you don't have to. But one of the powdered mixes is called Dr. Harvey's paradigm mix, not Dr. Marty, but Dr. Harvey's paradigm mix. And it's a powdered food and it has all the vitamins and minerals in it and some dehydrated, I think fruits, investibles. And then you add the meat. That's all that you have to do is add the meat. So that's a lot easier for people because you feel like

1:52:06you said you feel like you're getting everything in need, but it's still a fresh meat diet. Now, I think he recommends, I can't remember what oils he recommends adding. It might even be a vegetable oil, which I would not recommend. It might be coconut oil, which would probably be okay, but honestly, I would put in, you know, talo or put in an animal based oil. Now one thing I do want to say, a lot of people might be thinking, well, my pancreatitis can be triggered by a fat, but this is the dogs that are used to eating kibble when they might be on a 15% fat diet. Okay, so it's a low fat diet, they're carb eaters. And it's Christmas dinner and you give them the leftover fat, you know, they can end up running into pancreatitis and it's an emergency visit.

1:53:07So when we're talking about these high fat diets for these dogs, when they have been adjusted to this way of eating, that fat is not going to be a problem. Okay, so they're not gonna automatically get pancreatitis. So anyways, Dr. Harvey's period and I mix might be a nice go-to for people that are wanting to transition with a little more control. Yeah, we do that sometimes if we're having one or two days of just eating beef, I mean, we'll still give the snacks of the pig ears and the chicken feet, but sometimes I feel he's not getting enough omega. So then we'll sprinkle a little bit. I actually use a SPM powder that I found that's human grade and I just sprinkle a little bit. That's more of the omega side, but then I use a dog a little, it's from standard process. I don't even remember what they're herbal. It's a canine mix, but similar thing I think it has a mixed in standard process. My favorite go-to is food. I just agree on the whole foods instead of the omega, the fish oils.

1:54:09You don't know where those fish were fished from. But yes, to supplement once in a while with a vitamin mineral mix, this fine, there's a lot of them out there. Sometimes people like to use the biome. Oh, like probiotics? Oh, thank you. Probiotics aren't up. You know, it's not a bad thing. You can certainly add probiotics when you're transitioning over. I just don't know how much of it actually gets to where you need it. Okay. Yes, it's not going to hurt anything. And sometimes people like using digestive enzymes at the beginning too, but other than that, yeah. Yeah, I couldn't test to the high fat. So my dog, there was a period he was really eating a lot of lean beef, and I was worried he wasn't getting enough fat. So I literally gave him a teaspoon of duck fat, and he was going wild over it. So I gave him, and he probably ate way too much than he should. And he didn't really have digestive upset surprisingly, but he did have a little bit

1:55:11looser of stools, but then he just regulated himself. And then the next day I tried to give him the duck fat and he didn't want it at all. And that was to me again, his society cue of I had enough fat. I'm good for now. And so we'll just go through spurt so he'll eat some of the duck fat, and then he won't. And so I just think again, if we feed species appropriate, their cues just come back online of what they need and what they don't. Yeah. So it's just very interesting. You know, at the beginning, you had asked about like puppy, all those specific foods that they have out there. Yes. In my opinion, and I know this varies a lot, but I think, okay, in the wild, the wolves are bringing back the food for them, the same type of thing. You do have to feed them more. Yes. So that 2 to 3% of ideal body weight for a puppy, it would be 2 to 3% of their adult body weight that you would be feeding them, or some people say like 10% of their body weight. So

1:56:13and that number is just a guideline. You know, it's, and if you have, if you have a 60 pound old inactive dog versus a 60 pound two year old labrador, you know, one might be at the 2%, the other is going to be up at the 3%, or maybe more, you know, if they're needing it, you have to give it to them. That's just a guideline. No, I love it. I love it. Whenever I had a small concern with my dog, I would rush or consider rushing to the vet for any little thing, because it's new, and it makes you worry, especially because the dogs can't talk to you. I know they communicate in their own ways, but when is it that we should sort of wait and not go to the vet and see how they're doing, and when should we just go, and do you have any recommendations of where we can find good vets? So for finding a clinic to go to, again, I think you just, if you can find an open-minded clinic, that's just great right there. A privately-owned one, not that all privately-owned ones

1:57:19aren't conventional and hardcore, because some of them are. But the other advantage of a privately-owned one is they don't have a corporation telling them how they have to practice. So they're more able to make the decisions on their own if somebody doesn't want to do something. They're not going to have the corporation breathing down their neck. Why didn't you vaccinate all these animals? You know, they're an individual. So you'd like to find a privately-owned one. Again, see if they are open to doing vaccine titers and doing minimal vaccinations. If that's what works for for your lifestyle, the animal or the American Association of Holistic Veterinarians, so A-A-V-A-What is that? I think it's A-A-V-H-A. They have a website and on their website, they have a section where you can put in what state you're in. Okay. And the list, the veterinarians. Unfortunately, there is not

1:58:23too many of them, which makes me really, really sad. But you might be in an area where you could find one. Possibly traditional Chinese medicine practitioners. So TCM, people that do acupuncture. The Chinese medicine way of feeding is they still use fresh foods, but it's more the whole yin yang, the energetics of the food. So they will also use grains and things, which I don't particularly agree with. But I do think it's better than the conventional diet. So you might be able to find someone that's traditional Chinese medicine that can help with feeding. Also, that would be better. A lot of times they don't vaccinate, but they might. So that's what I would look for. Privately owned, open-minded. They're open for doing titers. They don't shame you if you say you feed raw or you don't want to do all the vaccinations. If somebody gets, if you get shamed when you walk in that door, you can just walk in the office and talk to them. You'll get a

1:59:27vibe for what's going on in there. That's what I would look for. The emergency clinics, try not to go to the emergency clinics. These are the things I see people taking to the emergency clinic that didn't need to go limping. That was me. Dogs are always getting stepped on or trip something and people freak out and they run into the clinic. And in most cases, within one or two days, they're not limping anymore. Rarely is it an emergency. Broken bones are not the most common thing. It's usually a bruise, a torn ACL, a cruciate ligament. Those aren't uncommon, but it's not an emergency situation. It's going to be the same in a day or two or three than it is right then. So rarely are they broken bones that you're running into. And even a broken bone, rarely is an emergency situation. Depending on where it's broken, I understand and all that.

2:00:29You don't want them to be in pain. But so limping really try to take the stance of if you can't find anything obvious, let them be for a day or two or three. Okay. Do people want to put them on anine flammatories? They're hurting. I don't want them to be hurting, but you have to realize you put them on something that makes them feel better. He might be more apt to re-injuring it again, because he's going to feel then want to run on it. So that's nature's way of saying don't be so active. Okay. So limping's one. Biting, vomiting and diarrhea are also very common. And in the majority of the cases, it's not an emergency. As far as Coddy to tell, tell that typically, if you have a dog that's with our jet, no matter what else the problem is, or just on its own. And he's not eating, that's a little scarier to me. Okay. You can take their temperatures, you can take it

2:01:32rectally, 101 to 102 is normal. But if you have a dog that vomit or cat that vomited a little bit, but they're still acting normal or they're still eating or maybe they're off of eating for a day, I don't get too stressed about that. You have to realize what's going to happen when you take them into that emergency clinic. They're going to do x-rays. They're going to do ultrasound. They're going to do blood work. They're going to give them injections of medications. So you have to ask yourself if the stress of that visit plus expense is worth it. Not to say your animal's not worth that, but say, do I have a day or two that I can kind of watch this and see how he's doing? Because the majority of these dogs get better. And I'm talking about typically younger, healthier dogs, not an old, old dog. You have to look at everything. But vomiting and then diarrhea, here's a real common one

2:02:35is colitis. A lot of dogs, when they've been at the kennel, or you've been on a trip or anything that's more stressful, they get colitis, which it shows up as a diarrhea with blood in it, which of course freaks everybody out. But a lot of these dogs are acting normal. They just have a mucous-y bloody poo. Now I'm not talking if you got a little puppy that has mucous-y bloody diarrhea. That one you might want to take in because it might be coxidia or parvo, you don't want to mess around. But your regular dog is doing fine. A bloody diarrhea with mucous. If he's acting okay, and he's eating, give him time, just give him a couple days of going through this. He's already on a good diet. Otherwise they say we'll put him on a bland diet of rice and chicken or something. But

2:03:36so that's another one that I see often. Those are probably big ones that I see. They just get run through the diagnostics. You come out with an over a thousand dollar bill. Here's another thing, though, that I think people can treat at home. Hot spots on dogs. You've got the German shepherd, and maybe he's got a little allergy thing going on. You go to bed and the morning you wake up, and he's got this raw sore on his hip from chewing on it all night. And it's usually people freak out and they run into the clinic. And I'll tell you one thing that works 90% of the time if you have the tools, but if you shave up the fur, if you cut the fur around the it's spot where he's they're chewing on, get rid of all the fur, clean it up, you know, and you can use a tea solution. You can use green tea or chamomile tea, clean it up, and you can put honey on it. Honey's a great

2:04:40for wound, other than if he's laying on his side on your carpet, you might not want honey on it. But honestly, if you just get the fur out of there and clean it up, they do 90% better. Once in a while, so if you go to a clinic, what will probably happen is you're going to get antibiotics and you're going to get steroids. And so I guess you could take them in and have them clean it up, but say, can we hold off on any of the antibiotics and steroids? You know, let's just see how he does. Because you got to realize those things aren't benign. Right. You know, they're not benign. So see if you can just take care of it by your on your own or just have the wound cleaned up. And the anal glands, like one of the yes, yes, yes. So dogs don't need their anal glands expressed all the time. And I think what just happened is every time they go into the groomer, every time they go to the vet, you know, they check and express their anal glands. And maybe they end up becoming dependent on it then. But if you've ever had your

2:05:43dog's anal glands expressed, you know, it's not comfortable. They don't like it. And rarely do they need it once in a while. They'll get really full or they'll get impacted and they'll scoot. And they do need care. Sometimes they abscess. Okay. So that can happen. But if you're going in for your annual checkup and they just kind of run their glove, hand down there and say, oh, is anal glands are full. Let's express them. But your dog hasn't been showing any signs of discomfort, like lifting his butt all the time or scooting. Chances are it's just normal for him. But it does increase their average transaction for the day. That's okay. I don't know. I just tell my clients, tell the groomers not to express their anal glands anymore. It's irritating. And you can cause a problem. You can cause a problem if they're done incorrectly. Okay. Thank you so much for your time, Dr. Judy. This was so helpful. Do you work with individuals at all? At this point,

2:06:47I just fully retired. So I'm not, I don't mind doing like general consultations. Like you had mentioned, if some people had a bunch of questions, we could do it in a group format. Okay. Maybe we could get a bunch of things answered at that time. Okay. But no, I'm kind of living on the land now with my grandkids and family, chickens and bees. And you're raising bees. I'm a beekeeper. That is amazing. I have to tell you something. This has opened my eyes to the world of pharmaceuticals and pesticides with beekeeping. It's a whole nether, a whole nether rabbit hole, Judy, that I didn't know anything about. And it's breaking my heart as I've got into the bees. We'll have to have another conversation. But I will say that every once in a while, if I do a post on honey or if I do something adjacent to beekeeping, I will get comments from beekeepers

2:07:49about how the bee population is being decimated and how the world we know as it is would end if that were the case. And I think the majority of conventional beekeeping is a major driver of it. It's a similar system. They don't know what to do. There's the vero on my it's there's pesticides. A large part of beekeeping is using pesticides in the hives. It's really sad. Okay. We'll have to definitely have you come on. And so if anyone has questions, they could put it in the comments and then maybe we have a just a Q&A where you come back and then I can ask you a bunch of the questions that we got in the comments. That might work. Yeah. And we can do that. But thank you so much for your time. This was been so helpful. And I hope for individuals watching it. It really helped us. And helpful. I hope it opened some eyes. Yeah. Yeah. Thanks, Judy. For a long time. Thank you so much. Thank you. Okay. We'll talk to you later.

2:08:49That little one is why I have become so passionate about having dogs and cats really be able to live their best life and have wellness so that their last years of life is not hard for them. And it also doesn't cost us such a pretty penny. The reality is that Mars, the candy bar company. So you can imagine, do they think of wellness when they're selling candy bars, but they own majority of the pet food industry. So the kibble you're buying, there is a chance that the Mars brand owns that kibble company. And then from there, they also now own all the vanfield hospitals, which is probably the biggest hospital in the US and also owns the VCA hospitals. So if you're going into pet smart and you go to their hospital, that company is owned by the Mars company. And knowing what they own and what needs to make money, do you think that their number one priority is that your dog as well?

2:09:50And if your dog is well, would they be making enough money? And so these things really need to be front and center as we're talking about holistic health, holistic pet care, because at the end of the day, when your vet says that you need to pay $5,000 or $10,000 for some type of surgery to keep your dog or cat living a little longer, that's when the decisions we had made for all those years will have mattered. It can be overwhelming. And it was for me too when I first got into this whole area. But take it step by step, you don't have to change from kibble overnight. You can add a little bit of meat. You can give treats, ideally not liver, but you can give treats that are all meat base. You could buy chicken feet. You can buy beef heart and chicken heart, even at grocery stores. There are little things we could do that can move the needle. But it is so important that our dogs are well and our cats are well because we know how much we love them and how much we would grieve if we lost them. But more importantly, how much we would do just to keep them a little bit longer.

2:10:54And I hope that this conversation really just shares ways that we can have that and that we can give our dogs and cats wellness, just like in the human health space, where we need to be empowered with the information that will allow us to be better each day, we can do the same with our pets. I hope you check out Dr. Judy's resources. It is a link in the show notes. And I hope that these things give you more empowerment as you try to live more holistically and allow our bodies and our immune systems to just thrive. And one way we can do that is by eating a proper human species dog cat diet that is meant for us to be eating to be thriving. All right, guys, make sure to eat a lot of meat. Take care of your bodies because it is the only place you have to live. I will talk to you later. Bye guys. I'm going to say hi. No, you're not a fan.

2:12:05Thanks for listening to the Nutrition with Judy podcast. If this episode helped you, please support us by leaving a rating and review wherever you listen. It'll help more people find the show and listen to actionable conversations around nutrition, chronic illness, root cause healing, and real empowering wellness. The main place I stay in touch is through my newsletter where I share free resources, the latest research, and sneak peaks. I'd love for you to keep in touch and join our newsletter community. Visit nutritionwith Judy dot com slash newsletter for one on one clinical care with our team. Visit empower functional health dot com. We work with clients internationally who are struggling with metabolic syndrome, navigating complex chronic illness, autoimmune patterns, thyroid and hormone issues, and nervous system dysregulation supporting you with the wholeness method. We will always meet you where you are because our team has had our own health journeys

2:13:07and we commit to leading with heart and helping you find root cause healing. Thanks again for being here and I'll see you in the next episode.