As a dog owner myself I am always looking for the best alternatives to care for my dogs. I currently have 3 dogs. They are 3, 13, and 16 years old. I want to keep them living healthy and long lives. Over the years I have tried many different natural products. On this page I am sharing with you some of the products that I use for my dogs today.
After listening to a holistic vet talk about CBD Oil and how careful we need to be choosing the right company. I did all the research that I learnt and this company ticks all the boxes. I have used the Heal product for my dog with Cushings Disease, the CBD Oil that is for preventing and helping arthritis for my 16 year old, so she can continue to go on walks and run in the backyard. Not only do their products work and are pure but they also have an animal rescue. Check out below.
CBD Dog Health
After listening to a holistic vet talk about CBD Oil and how careful we need to be choosing the right company. I did all the research that I learnt and this company ticks all the boxes. I have used the Heal product for my dog with Cushings Disease, the CBD Oil that is for preventing and helping arthritis for my 16 year old, so she can continue to go on walks and run in the backyard. Not only do their products work and are pure but they also have an animal rescue. Check out below.
CBD Dog Health
Flea and Tick Medication
Many of us are not familiar with the side effects of flea medication for our dogs. Usually the vet gives a pill to give our dog and we do not realize the side effects because the vet did not share this information with us. We buy the box of medication from our vet but do not read the back of the box.
Over the last few months I have met two dog owners whose dogs both had seizures due to the flea and tick medication.
The FDA posted a warning for vets and pet owners this year. Here is the information.
www.fda.gov/animal-veterinary/animal-health-literacy/fact-sheet-pet-owners-and-veterinarians-about-potential-adverse-events-associated-isoxazoline-flea
Check out Dr Judy's info on the products too and how much medically and behaviorally they impact our dogs.
drjudymorgan.com/blogs/blog/side-effects-from-common-flea-and-tick-products?_pos=2&_sid=ab0e6edfd&_ss=r
Many of us are not familiar with the side effects of flea medication for our dogs. Usually the vet gives a pill to give our dog and we do not realize the side effects because the vet did not share this information with us. We buy the box of medication from our vet but do not read the back of the box.
Over the last few months I have met two dog owners whose dogs both had seizures due to the flea and tick medication.
The FDA posted a warning for vets and pet owners this year. Here is the information.
www.fda.gov/animal-veterinary/animal-health-literacy/fact-sheet-pet-owners-and-veterinarians-about-potential-adverse-events-associated-isoxazoline-flea
Check out Dr Judy's info on the products too and how much medically and behaviorally they impact our dogs.
drjudymorgan.com/blogs/blog/side-effects-from-common-flea-and-tick-products?_pos=2&_sid=ab0e6edfd&_ss=r
Dr Karen Becker is one of the holistic vets that I follow for advice on how to have my dogs live a longer healthier life. She has created these free pdfs for you to download.
www.foreverdogextras.com/
www.foreverdogextras.com/
Your Dogs Teeth
SO many times I hear my clients telling me how many teeth their dog had to have removed. This has never happened to any of my dogs. I did some research to find out why and found this amazing video to tell you.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=nr7TLXg-vd4
SO many times I hear my clients telling me how many teeth their dog had to have removed. This has never happened to any of my dogs. I did some research to find out why and found this amazing video to tell you.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=nr7TLXg-vd4
WHAT'S IN YOUR DOG'S DRINKING WATER?
When we think of traveling to a foreign region – Mexico, Kathmandu, Beijing, Delhi – the overwhelming advice received from well-meaning friends is “Don’t drink the water.”
In my wildest dreams, I never thought I’d have to say the same about our own water supply in the US. Here at home, it’s just as difficult to obtain clean drinking water as it is in third world countries.
As a microbiologist, I became interested in learning more about water treatment. It was right up my alley since a great deal of the process involved using bugs or microbes to clean up waste water for drinking water. When I had the chance, I enrolled in a water treatment certification program offered at a local community college.
What I got was a cold splash in the face and a wake-up call for all of us. I learned that safe water treatment methods, like using UV radiation (sun) to eliminate micro-organisms, were seldom
used! I was curious about the method of removing multiple pharmaceutical drug classes, antibiotics, endocrine disruptors and birth control hormones – so I asked the instructors.
They had no answer; instead they asked me, “How would you do it?”
Obviously there was no plan in place to deal with these environmental hazards. I realized that like many unregulated environmental toxins, they all were recycled into the drinking water!
The horror on my face was obvious. Then my instructor told me this: as a private contractor he went to nursing homes where pharmaceuticals that didn’t get digested in the weakened digestive tracts of the patients were clogging the drains. Drugs were passing through and were not being broken down from the original form!
ROCKET-FUELED WATERMany military bases are linked to fuels and other environmental pollutants mainly because of solvents from fuels stored underground. In my own backyard is the largest military amphibious base in the world, Camp Lejeune. It has recently been forced to settle with many families who were poisoned with drinking water processed through the military base’s water treatment facility from 1953 to 1987 ... and the legal claims continue now, with the Camp Lejeune Justice Act of 2022, after 30 years of denial.
There are many more of these toxic substances in our tap water because no safeguard was put in place when the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) released them into the environment.
JUST FLUSH ITWhen I sold a veterinary business in North Carolina, I knew I was to take my inventory of controlled drugs to the DEA (Drug Enforcement Agency) in Raleigh for disposal. The office agent told me no one had ever brought controlled substances to them before.
Their method of disposal? They flushed the powerful drugs down the toilet right into the wastewater. I was stunned that this was how the most advanced country in the world dealt with powerful pharmaceuticals that certainly did not belong in our drinking water.
Here’s a list of toxic chemicals, poisons, carcinogens, heavy metals, pesticides, endocrine disruptors and pharmaceuticals that have been found at toxic and near toxic levels in the US water supply. This is not a complete list of the contaminants in our water, nor the health problems they are responsible for.
Drugs
Pharmaceuticals are ubiquitous in our waterways. Our fish are mesmerized on Paxil, our crayfish are sick on naproxen. The drugs are getting into our waterways, lakes, bays, rivers and ground water affecting the ecosystems.
They are also getting into the food chain and ultimately back into our tap water. Painkillers, hormones, anti- depressants, cholesterol, diabetes, high blood pressure medicines and dozens of others are now a part of what’s on tap.
Food crops are absorbing these toxic pharmaceuticals and hitting our food chain with a double whammy. Antibiotics are being unwittingly ingested at unregulated levels. So much contamination is coming from drugs that there’s a movement calling for the pharmaceutical industry to be responsible for cleaning up the toxicity.
Addictive Drugs
Drugs like methamphetamines and hydrocodone are affecting the moss that grows on rocks and the bacteria that live in the water, and are not being removed from our wastewater.
Personal Care Products
Chemicals from cosmetics and creams and lotions also contaminate our water. I advocate making your own or purchasing organic products that can also be eaten – meaning don’t use it on yourself if you wouldn’t put it in your mouth.
Solvents
These include benzene and hexavalent chromium, otherwise known as chromium 6 or Cr(VI) of Erin Brockovich fame. Two- thirds of all US citizens have consumed this solvent. Many health problems are linked to Cr(VI), including cancer.
Trichloroethylene (TCE), used for cleaning metal parts, was recently found in the wells of neighborhoods in Wake Forest, NC. The finding of high levels of TCE led to the warning to stop drinking and showering in the water.
Perchlorate, used in explosives and rocket fuel, is another one that appears in our water supply, especially on military bases.
Repellents
Insecticides like Deet are in your tap water. We no longer use it on our bodies but the industry still allows its sale and use.
Endocrine Disrupting Chemicals
EDCs are in the drinking water. This is very alarming, and all manner of metabolic crises are taking place because of the EDCs in our water. Xenoestrogens and xenoprogesterones are just two, and they’re responsible for uterine hyperplasia, tumors, fertility issues in males and females, prolonged gestations and impaired maternal behavior. These are bad signs for our ability to replicate and then raise healthy offspring.
Heavy Metals
The list is long: lead, arsenic, mercury, to name a few. A few years ago, Natural Science Journal published an issue with Heavy Metals On Tap as the focus of the entire publication.
I’ve spoken to animal producers whose goats were dying and having fertility problems due to high copper levels.
Fluoride
Everyone has heard the pros and cons of this debate. I urge you to watch the DVD Professional Perspectives On Water Fluoridation. Despite fluoride being a drug that you need a prescription to purchase, you’ll find it free-flowing in the US drinking water system.
The link to fluoride in water and accumulation in our bones, causing osteosarcoma in our children and our dogs, as well as arthritis and osteoporosis, gives us reason to question the fluoride in our drinking water.
Chlorine And Chlorine Vapors
If you can smell these toxic chemicals used to treat your wastewater, you’d better crack a window. I have a special shower filter because we shouldn’t be showering in this.
You shouldn’t wash your dog in it either.
Poop
We all know there is poop in the drinking water. Eighty percent of wastewater is contaminated by human waste plus all the drugs, hormones, etc that we’ve discussed.
If you want to get really worked up, watch the documentary NYC Poop Train to see how many million tons of untreated waste was dumped every day into the Hudson River.
Do we think things are better now? Not according to EWG (Environmental Working Group), who monitors what’s on tap. You can go to their water testing database to find out what’s in your municipal water.
Poop and toxic runoff from CAFOs (concentrated animal feeding operations) are perhaps the greatest contributor of toxic contaminants affecting humans, animals, wildlife and plants. There are also phosphorous, nitrogen and other farm fertilizers plus antibiotics and other growth promoters and hormones in this run- off. Every hurricane season we can see terrible results of overspill from sewage ponds on hog farms.
Pesticides
Number one is glyphosate) and number two is atrazine, the forgotten toxin. Atrazine may be even worse than glyphosate. Both of these are common run-offs and now contaminate our rivers and streams and the wetlands and all life that inhabits those ecosystems.
Breast cancer, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and thyroid cancers are all associated, as well as birth defects, abdominal defects and hairy cell leukemia.
Other pesticides like neonicotinoids, clothianidin, imidacloprid and thiamethioxan may look familiar. They should. These are our pollinator assassins (the bee killers) and they are also sold by veterinarians and pet supply companies for flea and tick control. These bind and activate receptor cells located in the central nervous system and peripheral nervous system. Over-stimulation leads to paralysis and death.
These spot-on chemicals are in our waterways, on our dogs (because we put them there) and they are now in our water.
WHAT TO DO ABOUT THIS?When I looked into how to find pure water, I was, once again, very disappointed to learn how little our government regulators like the EPA were doing to provide clean safe drinking water.
The next best thing is to filter the water you have access to. You need to do this for your whole family including your dogs.
CRISES MAKE CORRUPTION CLEARThe Flint, Michigan water crisis and the Colorado River basin water crisis should make it clear that those charged with ensuring clean water are not doing so. Instead the focus is on protecting corporations and industries that are making clean drinking water a problem for everyone.
Water utilities spend 19 times more on water treatment chemicals than the federal government invests to protect our lakes and rivers from pollution in the first place.
The EWG believes the federal government has a responsibility to do a national assessment of drinking water quality. It should establish new safety standards, set priorities for protection and prevention projects, and inform customers about the full range of pollutants in their water.
Are we asking for too much?
We all need to find the purest drinking water and explore different ways to rid water of contamination. It’s how we’ll arm ourselves to fight this battle because the next war will be over water, not oil.
Only filter water for your dog and yourself.
Patricia Jordan DVM