A Path With Paws

Natural Pet Pantry has long been somewhere I recommend to clients for food but I have yet to actually make it there myself. Today Randi dropped off some samples for me and my clients and who better to try them on than my own fur kids. Everything is made fresh at their kitchen in the south park neighborhood in Seattle. They are a great locally owned company with retail locations in Burien and Kirkland and sell at many of the local pet supply stores. They also do some home delivery in the Seattle area.

While they make a great raw product, they are one of the only companies that offered cooked stews for cats and dogs.

Their cat food is made with fresh ingredients and is mostly meat, as it should be. This is the raw turkey.

I have four kitties with difference preferences. Three of them jumped in immediately, the forth had to sniff for about 30 seconds and then went to town. Rating – four cat approval!

Melody got left out of the first photo. She is my toothless little girl and had no problems eating this.

Alli has been on a raw diet since I got her but decided to try her on NPP’s turkey cooked stew. There are so few good options for cooked homemade foods for dogs.

Alli was in love with this food!

More food love. It disappears in about a minute. Overall Natural Pet Pantry Rating – 5/5!

I hold no special magic that others can’t have. I do write a lot, I try to write articles that others can follow and that give good solid information. There are many vets out there that do what I do and do it well but don’t write articles. I don’t know them all. Many of them don’t know me.

Part of why I started writing is that I was one person and only one person. I could not help everyone who needed my help, even just in my city of Seattle. There was only so much of me. I received calls and I had no appointments for weeks or months. Peoples’ animals were dying and I had no time to help.

So I began to write and I found in writing I could help more people and I was able to use a talent that I have had since I was young. The ability to share part of who I am through words on paper.

I do hold magic, its just not unique to me. I know how to put love into what I do. I know how to appreciate animals and people for who they are and where they are at. And I’ve learned to use the incredible brain I was given that processes medical and botanical information well (but can’t spell the most simple of words – thank good for spell check) and combine that with the intuition that comes from my heart. I’m grateful for this.

The more I write, the more emails and phone calls I get asking me to help specific animals. I can’t help them all. I know that every animal out there is unique and loved. And it pains me that I am not able to help every furry companion and family member. My main magic lies in those animals I can see in person, with people I can look in the eye and guide. I can’t do what I do best on a phone, over distance.

When I write an article it helps thousands of animals. I need to keep my blogging work on articles and my local practice on seeing animals.

I know people will continue to ask, I know I will continue to hurt that I can’t reach out to everyone individually.

But there are other great veterinarians out there that can guide. Nothing compares to having someone in your community to guide you through your animals’ chronic illnesses. It is not a one stop visit with chronic disease. Sometimes that guide is a great western veterinarian, more and more I find that my profession is opening to some of the holistic medical options. Many times it is a wonderful holistic practitioner.

I know there are those who will be their our guides, those that live 500 miles from the nearest holistic veterinarian. I have tried to make my articles the most straight forward yet detailed I can. Consider taking them to your western veterinarian and discussing. We need to get more veterinarians interested in holistic medicine. There is nothing as frustrating as having a chronic disease without options. If there are no good western options many vets will be open to something more unconventional.

I know this article doesn’t help animals. It helps me. I have tried in so many ways to express this to everyone who asks for help. I can’t type it any more. Thank you for listening.

To find a holistic vet in your community
How To Find a Good Holistic Vet To Work With

If you are working with an animal with cancer
Integrative and Holistic Treatments for Cancer in Dogs and Cats

Treating and stabilizing cancer and chronic disease long term is sometimes like learning how to ride a bike. At first it feels impossible and every small setback or fall you think I can’t do this, this is the end. However at one point you realize that you are going on your own and that you actually have a lot of power in this process.

Ok so maybe a bad comparison. Bikes don’t normally kill you and most of us learn to ride them eventually. But I have found one of the hardest things for people with companion animals with cancer is that they have no control over the process. They see their animal suffering. They are told they are going to die. And then they are left trying to figure out what direction to go and that becomes extremely difficult to decide with someone you love.

In addition when they turn to the Internet they are blasted with an amazing amount of articles, supplements, stories about what you should do for an animal with cancer and chronic illness. It is almost impossible to find a right course. I have seen that even when people have their dogs or cats on multiple cancer supplements/treatments that they go back again and again to the internet hoping for a new article, a new cure.

There is no solid cure for cancer and many other chronic diseases. However there are many things that help to control the pain and symptoms and sometimes we get cures.

But one of the most important things for any practitioner working with people who are facing cancer or chronic illness in a loved animal is to make these wonderful people part of the cure. It is only natural that when we see our animals suffer that we want to help. We don’t want to be the one in control but we do want to have something we can do that gives us some control and some power over suffering. This eases anxiety and turns worry into actions.

I find it is different client to client but I try to add in some treatments they can do at home. Acupressure points that help with stimulating the immune system. A diet or additives they can cook to help with health. Topical treatments that can be applied at home. Medication for when there is pain or nausea or other difficulties. Herbals that they can lovingly mix in with their dogs’ food, that actually help and work. While I do have people use capsules if an animal will not eat the herbs I provide, my preference is for the whole herbs I make that smell good and fresh. If people do use capsules they are filling them on their own which also involves them in the healing process.

In my own herb business we have a rule that herbs can only be made if you are in a good place. If anyone is in a particularly bad mood they cannot make herbs, because their energy can effect the herbs. The funny flip side of that is that the herbs seem to make all of our moods better. If I am in a bad place I simply go sit with the herbs for a while and the world seems better. Every herbal we make gets a hand drawn heart on the package. That is the love that is added. I learned that years ago from my first herbal teacher’s wife. Always add love, it does make a difference.

I know that was a bit off topic but I guess what I am trying to say is that in medicine we have worked so hard to remove the connection between medicine and love. Love can be medicine and when we involve people in their animals’ treatments, we are adding love. And that is no small thing.

We are all connected, let’s use that connection to heal!

Further reading

• Acupressure For Animals with Cancer
• You Are What You Think