July 8, 2025 • 52 mins
Calling all dog lovers!
In this resource-rich episode, I’m joined by clinical canine herbalist Rita Hogan, who brings over 20 years of experience helping dogs heal naturally. Her new book, The Herbal Dog: Holistic Canine Herbalism Applications and Practice, is a treasure trove of wisdom for anyone who wants their pup to thrive.
Rita shares empowering, easy-to-apply tips for supporting your dog’s health using herbs, nutrition, and holistic care — and many of her insights are surprisingly helpful for humans, too. Whether you're new to herbalism or just love your dog like family, this conversation will give you tools to help them live a longer, happier life by your side.
In this episode, Rita discusses:
- The importance of organ health in dogs
- How she became interested in dog health
- The uptick in cancer in dogs
- How dogs know when you're not "present"
- The canine nervous system
- Chlorine and histamine
- How her book, The Herbal Dog, gives specific remedies, dosages and preparation guidance
- The impact of toxic environments
- Spaying and neutering too young
- Vaccinations
- Flea and tick meds
- Psych meds for dogs
- Antibiotics
- How to remedy your dog's health
- Diet suggestions
- Clues to identify health issues before they become problems
- The best thing you can do to help your dog friend
Visit: The Canine Herbalist website
________
For more information about Wendy's new book, Raven's Daughter, or to purchase a copy, visit Three Worlds Press
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Wendy (00:02):
This is Wendy Halley, and you're listening to Lucid Cafe.
(00:31):
Hello and thanks for joining mefor another episode of Lucid
Cafe. Actually this is the finalepisode of season seven and it's
been quite a season. We startedout last fall with my friend
Linda River Valente giving us usan astrological glimpse into
2025 and I'm not gonna lie I waskind of hoping that Linda's dire
(00:54):
seeming glimpse wouldn't be asaccurate as it has been. I'll
have Linda back next season, atleast I'm hoping to, so we can
get an idea of the comingtrends.
In the meantime, I'm in theprocess of creating a talk that
will explore some of the deeperthemes I wrote about in my
(01:15):
latest book Raven's Daughter.The working title of this talk
is Entering the Age ofPossibility where I'll tie
indigenous prophecies about thisparticular time on planet Earth
into what my shamanicexperiences over the last
fifteen or so years have alsorevealed. If you're in Vermont
(01:36):
and are interested in checkingit out, either sign up for my
newsletter or keep an eye on theevents page on either the
threeworlds.media orlucidpathwellness.com websites.
Alright, so today's episode isfor dog lovers. My guest Rita
Hogan is a clinical canineherbalist who's been helping
(01:59):
pups for twenty years.
She's captured what she'slearned in her comprehensive new
book, The Herbal Dog (02:04):
Holistic Canine Herbalism, Applications
and Practice. In this hands onherbal guide and in our
conversation Rita will empoweryou to become your dog's
wellness hero. She gives simplevital tips to help your dog
thrive, live their best life andstay by your side for years to
(02:26):
come. And maybe not surprisinglymany of the tips she shares are
applicable to humans too. Soplease enjoy my resource rich
conversation with Rita Hogan.
Hi, Rita. Thanks so much forcoming on the show.
Rita (02:47):
Hi. You're welcome. I'm excited to be here for sure.
Wendy (02:51):
When I got the invitation to chat with you about your new
book, I was pretty excitedbecause I am a big proponent of
alternative medicine. And I am,as I mentioned before we started
recording, I have a dog family,and that's your world. You wrote
(03:13):
this book called The Herbal Dog,Holistic Canine Herbalism,
Applications and Practice. Andwhat an amazing book.
Rita (03:23):
Thank you.
Wendy (03:24):
Because it's like, it's chock full of information for
folks to help their dog friendsYeah. With all kinds of
presenting issues, like, wholegamut. Super handy resource.
Rita (03:39):
Yeah. It's definitely based on, you know, not just
herbal medicine, but gettingyour dog to a point where
they're they're healthy. It's awith a focus on organ health,
teaching people that dogs areindividuals, that everything in
the body is connected, and thatmost of the symptoms well, I
(03:59):
mean, most of the issues thatanyone goes to a vet for, maybe
not yet, obviously not a caraccident or getting hit by a car
or something like that.
Wendy (04:10):
Like a trauma, yeah.
Rita (04:11):
Yeah, a trauma. But other than that, everything is a
symptom of organ health. So whenwe focus on our organs,
including the gastrointestinaltract, know, outcomes are
better. Even, you know, they'rehit by a car, a dog is gonna
heal better if they have betterorgan health. So it really all
(04:31):
it does come down toassimilation and elimination and
and how healthy our dog's organsare.
And a lot of people don'trealize and don't even know how
certain organs work. A lot ofpeople think that the liver
stores toxins, which it doesn't,and or they don't know what the
lymphatic system is and what itdoes and how important it is,
(04:54):
and I it's not mentioned like itshould be. So, yeah, it's a it
it definitely is all the thingsthat I want people to know as an
introductory to natural healingfor their animals, for their
dog.
Wendy (05:07):
Yeah. And I can't wait to dive in because there's like a
zillion questions I alreadyhave. But before we dive into
the actual content of your book,you do describe your
introduction to the the world ofherbalism in the beginning of
your book, but I would love tohear your story. How did you get
here?
Rita (05:27):
Yeah. So I was a what do you well, I just saw a meme on
it this morning on Facebook.Latchkey kids, you know, like,
we were the kids of we didn'thave babysitters. We were
outside all the time.
Wendy (05:41):
We were feral!
Rita (05:43):
Yes. We were feral. So I grew up on a farm. So I think
that that definitely colored myvision of what the world was
like. I spent a lot of time inthe woods.
I spent a lot of time aroundanimals. Farms aren't pretty
places every now and then. Youknow? So I I did have some, I
would definitely say, animalbased trauma. And I brought that
(06:05):
into my my world growing up.
You know, I did the normaltwenties. I did the normal
twenties. Every you know,everyone has their twenties
stories. Right? And then I didgo to the University of
Minnesota, studied easternreligion and feminism and and
anthropology, and none of itresonated with me.
So I did five years in the inschool, and then I moved to
(06:29):
Tennessee, and then I startedboarding dogs. Like, I started
boarding dogs, and it was camelfree boarding and the dogs
running around everywhere, like,35 dogs a day just following you
nonstop and just you you learnso much about behavior and so
much about animals. And what Ireal I realized was how sick
(06:50):
these dogs were, and I it waskind of an eye opener. I learned
a lot about my own dogs and thenall of these dogs I was
boarding. And the owners were sofrustrated with their dog's
behavior and their dog's healththat it kinda just exploded from
(07:11):
there.
And I was like, okay. I knewthat I wanted to go back to
western herbalism because Istudied Ayurveda in when I was
in college as kind of like aside hustle. I I studied
Ayurveda when I was doing theEastern religions thing, and it
it didn't resonate with me asfar as a teaching modality for
(07:31):
for myself and for dogs, and Iwent back to Western herbalism
where, you know, those were theplants I grew up with. And I
started rescuing pugs andhelping these dogs that were
boarding with me, and it wasphenomenal to see the changes in
them even with a diet, just aplain old diet change. Even with
(07:52):
an upgraded kibble, like a highend kibble, the changes were
phenomenal.
And so when when I stoppedboarding dogs, I went headfirst
into raw feeding and, you know,things just kinda built up from
there. And but my dog boardingclients were some of my first
clients, you know, and we taughteach other a lot of stuff. And
(08:17):
it was just phenomenal. But thehealth outcomes were were
amazing. But, you know, when Iwrote my book about organ
health, I remember that it whenI opened up my kennel, it was
around 02/2003, February, maybe'2 I don't know.
February and '3 and 02/2005. I Ididn't I don't I'm not good with
(08:37):
timelines, but it's right aroundthen. It was definitely over
twenty years ago. But, like, Inever had met a dog with cancer
in Really? '3.
No. Never.
Wendy (08:49):
Not until later. Yeah. Never.
Rita (08:52):
I I'd never heard of one. I never met one. I never met a
person with cancer. I neverheard of one. It wasn't part of
the conversation that we werehaving.
And now one in two dogs will dieof cancer and people one in four
people will be diagnosed withcancer. And I think that's
actually a low statistic. Ithink it's one in three now.
(09:14):
Jesus. And, you know, they arepredicting it's not if you'll
get cancer, it's when.
I think that's a travesty in intwo decades. In two decades that
that's where we're at. And so Iwanna push that baseline theory
back to its normalcy back in theseventies where dogs didn't get
(09:38):
these disease, these autoimmunediseases, these things that
they're getting now. Like, whathas changed in the last what has
changed in the last twenty yearsthat has really accelerated
everything? And pollution haschanged.
Our food system has changed. Wehave Wi Fi in our houses now. We
wear our tech on our bodies.Some people put tech on their
dogs' bodies now. And all ofthese things are
Wendy (10:01):
They put tech on their dogs' bodies? What do--
Rita (10:04):
Yeah. They'll put, like, Wi Fi collars on them.
Wendy (10:08):
--those do? Like, so that they can get their phone calls?!
Rita (10:12):
Whole bunches of things, like geotrackers and all of
these yeah. There's a lot oftech coming up.
Wendy (10:17):
Okay. Alright.
Rita (10:20):
My opinion, those are they mess with resiliency. And so now
we're living in this day and agethat evolution hasn't been able
to catch up to. Right? I thinkin fifty to a hundred years,
we'll be able to deal with a lotof tech, but our bodies will
change. But I don't thinkthey're catching up right now.
(10:42):
And the thing is is that we haveto build resilient bodies, and
we have to stop talking aboutdogs being geriatric when
they're seven and eight yearsold. That conversation needs to
go away because it's not thedogs. It's what we're doing to
them that is causing rapidaging. So my book is about
bringing those things to light.I don't cover, like, EMF in my
(11:04):
book.
They cut out. My publisher hadto shorten it, make it more
concise, which I appreciate thatthey did. But it is all about
inner terrain. It's all aboutwhat's inside and herbs and
homeopathy, herbs, and othermodalities can really help with
building resiliency because Ithink we've we've lost a lot of
(11:27):
that with ourselves and ourpets.
Wendy (11:30):
Well, and I think we forget that we're animals too,
but all of us, we animals, wehave such sensitive nervous
systems. And just talking aboutbeing exposed to all these
frequencies all the time, it'sprobably a lot for our our
systems to process all the time.Yeah. And it's probably a strain
(11:50):
or stress.
Rita (11:51):
It definitely is.
Wendy (11:53):
And why wouldn't it be for animal friends too?
Rita (11:58):
And they you know, when we're stressed, they're
stressed.
Wendy (12:01):
Yeah. So They do mirror us, don't they?
Rita (12:03):
Yes. And they they you know, I was at an event
yesterday for my book tour, andI was talking to people. And I
was just discussing that wethink that we interact with our
dogs through speech. Right?Through tone and speech, and
that can be a component.
But our dogs interact with usthrough smell.
Wendy (12:24):
Oh, wow.
Rita (12:25):
And that's how they gauge their entire world is through
their nose. And we smell likestress and fear and cortisol and
adrenaline, and we're giving offthese frequencies of being
unsafe. And even, like, the actof scrolling puts you in a low
level of fight or flight,looking at social media and
(12:47):
caring about what's on socialmedia and and connecting with
other people through socialmedia. This, like, contrived,
curated idea of what someone'slife is. Right?
We don't put we hardly ever putthe the real stuff out there. I
mean, yeah, it's real, but it'snot the other. It's all the
other things. So we get thisone-sided view of what life is
(13:09):
like, and that's reallystressful to to put that strain
on us and also to live up tocertain expectations and and
always trying to look good. Andwe smell unsafe.
You know, we're stressed out.
Wendy (13:23):
It's so interesting.
Rita (13:25):
Yeah.
Wendy (13:26):
I don't mean to cut you off.
Rita (13:27):
Oh, interrupt. Interrupt. Absolutely.
Wendy (13:29):
I'm just thinking about our girl dog, Zora, who is she
is an unusual dog friend. She isa combination. We think she's a
rescue mutt girl. A combinationwhippet chihuahua. Fun.
So she's got the head of achihuahua and the body of a
whippet. And she's about 14 nowand is still quite youthful. If
(13:55):
dogs can be on the spectrum, wewould say she is on the
spectrum. Because, like, one ofthe weird quirks and ticks that
she has is when the electricitygoes out, she freaks out. When
everything quiets down, like,there's no electromagnetic
frequency going through thehouse, she is beside she can't
(14:19):
calm down.
It's almost like she's it's theweirdest thing. Right? Yeah. I
mean, it's like the opposite ofwhat you would think. You would
think she would calm down whenthe electricity would go out,
but it's actually I don't knowif it's just the difference
between the frequency.
Yeah. Like, even if it justblips for like, the electricity
(14:43):
just goes out for, like, a fewseconds and comes back on again,
she'll start pacing and whining,and she'll go upstairs and hide
in the place that she alwayshides. It's the weirdest thing.
You ever heard of that?
Rita (14:56):
No. I've never heard of that one, but it doesn't it
doesn't surprise me.
Wendy (15:00):
She's she's quite quirky like her mom. Anyway, I'm sorry
to interrupt, but that was Oh,no. When we were just talking
about frequencies, was like,
Rita (15:10):
Maybe that's what Zora's responding to. Anyway, getting
back to your points about ourdogs responding to us and how
even on social media, when we'reon our cell phones and stuff
like that. When you're with yourdog, you know, your dog knows
when you're not present. Yourdog knows when you're not
(15:31):
listening. My biggest thing thatI tell people is get off the
phone when you're walking yourdog.
Get off the phone when you'rewith your dog. They know it.
And, when you're on the phone,you smell like stress. And I
don't think we need a lot tofeel stress in this world right
now.
Wendy (15:50):
You don't think so?
Rita (15:51):
A lot of people no. No. Jeez. I think a lot of people
are feeling unsafe, and I thinkthat we have to really you know,
there's only so much our brainscan handle, and dogs are looking
to you for guidance, and what ishappening is dogs are mirroring
(16:12):
their owner's stress and a lotof their physical ailments, and
it's pretty interesting how ourcreatures, you know, are coming
together to help us heal thesediseases that we have,
encountered through inflammationand stress. And so there's a big
part of my book, there's asection called Everything's
(16:33):
Connected, and I talk about thevagus nerve and the nervous
system and how we regulate itand vagal flexibility and, you
know, that ability to go fromfight or flight to relaxation
pretty quickly.
And some dogs have good vagaltone while others do not. And
then there's some that aregenetically bred to be on, like
(16:56):
Australian Shepherds andMelanois and Border Collies,
certain types of guard dogs, youknow, they really need nervous
system support to help them calmdown and not be so reactive. And
then there's, you know, there'sa lot of toxins out there that
cause reactivity and panic andfright, like like chlorine.
(17:19):
Chlorine causes histamine levelsto to skyrocket, and a lot of
people don't filter their dog'swater or for themselves, or
they're feeding bottled water inplastic bottles, which is an
endocrine disruptor. And dogshave a real hard time with
hypothyroid right now.
A lot of them are spayed andneutered. You know? Well, ninety
(17:42):
nine percent of them are spayedand neutered, which is a big
assault to the endocrine system.So dealing with organ health in
general and learning how tosupport the body, I think, is
one of the main tenets of mybook. And it's just beautiful to
see people using the book andhaving better outcomes and
figuring how to deal with theroot cause of their dog's
(18:04):
condition.
Because a lot of books that youget, they're awesome. But, like,
if you get an herbal, right, aan herbal book, whether it for
be for humans or for animals,it'll say, you know, use
ashwagandha for stress andanxiety or use this and try milk
(18:24):
thistle. But it doesn't tell youwhat type of remedy. Do how do I
know if that herb is good for myown individual dog? How much do
I give of it?
If it's a tea, how do I makethat tea, and how much do I give
it? If it's a dried herb, howhow do I give it? Do I give it
with food? Do I not give it withfood? All of those questions are
(18:46):
answered in the book.
All the dosages are discussed inthe back. Chapter three is the
best chapter in the book toreally help your dog deal with
themselves as an individual. Butyou said you had lots of
questions, and I'm prattling on.So what what questions do you
have?
Wendy (19:02):
Well, I more and more are generating as you're talking.
Just an observation, it soundslike what you're saying is that
our dog friends, they'remirroring us.
Rita (19:12):
Yeah.
Wendy (19:13):
Or they can be a mirror for us because clearly, we're
not healthy and they're nothealthy either. And I don't
know. Is it because we're eatingshit and they're eating shit
because we're eating shit andthat's everybody eats shit now
or like shitty diets? Yeah. Oris it because we are highly
(19:36):
stressed and our systems arejust not processing the way they
used to?
Rita (19:41):
Or a conversation Yeah. Like, you know, I have this
little in fact, I think, I'm Ihave an event tonight too. I've
got, like, four back to backs.And I don't talk about the same
thing in my book signings. Andso I, tonight, I'm gonna talk
about I have this little speechthat I've been creating over the
last, I don't know, maybe threemonths that when I'm driving in
(20:04):
my car to these differentevents, I I think about, like,
I'm nerding out with myself inthe car.
And these things that we forgetwe're doing to our animals,
right? And a lot of them mirrorwhat we're doing to ourselves.
But you have a lot of thingsgoing on. The average American
dog gets less than fifteenminutes of exercise a day. And
(20:25):
if you were to ask the majorityof people, they probably get
less than fifteen minutes ofexercise a day.
We're not breathing fresh airlike we need to. We need to be
outside. We we're in our homes,and our dogs are in our homes,
and they're laying on all of ourtoxic laundry soap and and dryer
(20:47):
sheet covered. Oh, now there'sscent boosters. Scent boosters
are some of my faves and walkedinto an Airbnb the other day and
immediately took out the Gladeplug ins, you know, or the
Febreze plug ins.
Wendy (20:59):
That shit is the worst.
Rita (21:01):
I'm like, it smells like ivory soap in here. That's
weird. I went back to mychildhood of ivory soap, and I I
was like, oh, and I pulled itout of the wall. But they're in
our homes, and we havedomesticated our dogs so much
that they are mirroring ourlifestyles. And so they're
probably within a 10 footproximity to us a lot of the
(21:23):
time.
So there's that. There's notbreathing fresh air. There's not
giving enough exercise, whichaffects organ health and
lymphatic health. And then wediscussed EMF, but then we have,
like, these dog specific things.So we spay and neuter our dogs
without thinking.
Right? Even if we're really goodowners that aren't gonna allow
(21:45):
our dogs to be impregnated, it'sjust what we do. Right? Okay.
And we we do it, and then theonly thing that we're concerned
about afterwards is the incisiongetting infected.
We're not concerned about thatyou just took out twenty five
percent. Don't quote me on thepercentage. It's roughly twenty
five percent, a quarter of yourdog's endocrine system. You just
(22:09):
disrupted their nervous system.And you just disrupted their
everything connected organsystems that are talking to that
endocrine system consistentlyall day, all night.
Right? And you just rip thatout.
Wendy (22:26):
You know, I've wondered about that. Support. Because, I
mean, I understand at least myunderstanding of the reason why
we spay and neuter is because wedon't wanna create an
overpopulation of dogs withouthomes.
Rita (22:40):
Yeah. So in certain areas of the country, that can be an
issue. Like, I did my rescue sixyears of rescue in the South,
and over dog overpopulation isterrible due to human ignorance.
But if you are a dog owner thatis responsible, I don't suggest
spay and neuter. However, I havefive dogs.
(23:02):
Four are spayed and neutered.Okay? You have to do what you
need to do. However, you need tostop spaying and neutering under
the age of one because whathappens is some dogs are getting
spayed and neutered at, like, 12old and younger. Those hormones
that are produced by ourreproductive systems affect
(23:23):
everything, especially when dogsare young.
Okay? So, like, for instance, ifyou have a Great Dane and you
spay and neuter them at a youngage, under the age of one, you
are upping their chances ofosteosarcoma by over forty
percent.
Wendy (23:43):
I wondered if that's where you were gonna go.
Rita (23:45):
Yes. And osteosarcoma and hermangiosarcoma are killing our
dogs right now, like, terrible.And
Wendy (23:53):
We've buried four mastiffs, English mastiffs, that
were rescues. And I think well,two of them had bone cancer.
Rita (24:06):
Yes. Large dogs. Yeah. Because what happens is is those
growth plates, hormones kind ofnegotiate with the body on when
to close or leave open thegrowth plates so that a dog's
bones can grow. And big dogs,those are a huge factor in their
(24:27):
stability and, how their bones,develop and grow.
Right? And when they end thegrowth. So we're completely
messing with them. In largebreed dogs, it is imperative
that you do not spay and neuteruntil that dog is 100% fully
grown, and that I personallywould wait three years.
Wendy (24:51):
Okay.
Rita (24:51):
And then spay and neuter. Right? And it's the same thing
for hemangiosarcoma. And
Wendy (25:00):
What kind of cancer is that one?
Rita (25:01):
That one is dire. It is a like a blood cancer. Okay. It
happens in the spleen and theheart, and it can happen under
the dermis, and it it it's ableeding out. Okay?
So it bleeds out. And Oh my god.It kills tons and tons of
aggressive, just likeosteosarcoma. So we're seeing
(25:22):
all of these aggressive cancers.So spay and neuter is one of
them.
We don't do it mindfully, right?Oh, you're going to get
pyrometra or you're going gettesticular cancer. Well, you
know, if your dog getspyrometra, then spay them when
they have pyrometra.
Wendy (25:36):
I don't even know what that is.
Rita (25:38):
Oh, it's a a pyrometra is something that happens to girls
that is life threatening. Ithappens when dogs I mean,
obviously, when they're notspayed because that's one of the
things that dogs can get, butpyrometric comes from
stagnation, from organs notworking correctly.
Wendy (25:54):
Oh, okay.
Rita (25:56):
It's not a reason to spay your dog, in my opinion. We need
to be more mindful because we'vebit just we've just grown
accustomed to these things. Thisthis is just what we do. Okay.
Well, if this is just what wedo, we need to be more mindful
of when we do it.
And then another thing that wedo to dogs specifically, and
it's happening more in horses aswell, is we're giving
(26:18):
vaccinations every single yearfor things that our dogs already
have immunity to. Get your puppyshots and be done with it. Now
rabies is required by law in TheUnited States, so I can't speak
anything ill against that. Butin my book, I have a pre and
post vaccination protocol tohelp your dog deal with those
vaccinations. And the all theother vaccinations are not
(26:41):
required by law.
I do recommend parvo anddistemper as puppies, and then
you can test for antibodiesfive, six years down the road.
We have to we have to changethis. This is one of the things
that changed. This overvaccination is definitely one of
the things that has changedwhile our dogs are getting
(27:01):
sicker and sicker. It causesrapid it got more aging.
It causes a higher toxic load.It affects the nervous system.
And another factor on thatvaccination is they're giving
multiple vaccinations in oneshot, and that is not a good
practice. Oof. There's lots ofresearch that shows when you do
(27:22):
single vaccines, it is muchhealthier outcomes than the,
like, six in one.
And they're doing it withhorses, and horses are starting
to get a lot of Cushing'sdisease. They're getting
Addison's disease. They'regetting they're getting cancers,
lots of tumors that never everoccurred in regular horse
(27:45):
rearing, husbandry, if you wannacall it. It it's insane. So over
vaccination, automatic spay andneuter at a really young age,
just those are things that we'rejust we've forgotten, and we
haven't we're not supporting ouranimals when we do it.
So and and that's one of thethings my book talks about.
(28:05):
Doesn't talk about a lot aboutspay and neuter because it was
one of the things that was kindof cut out of the book, but I
talk about it a lot on mypodcast and in my courses and
things like that. And thenanother one is flea and tick
meds, right? This is anotherthing that was not on the scene
when I was young. We didn't giveflea and tick meds because our
(28:25):
dogs had a more vital resiliencyto them.
My dogs had ticks and fleas allthe time, but they didn't
overcome everything. We didn'tdo anything. They were naturally
resilient to them. Flea and tickmeds are poison. And if I took
that poison, that activeingredient in the flea and tick
(28:47):
meds, and I put it in a shotglass and I asked you to drink
it, would you?
Wendy (28:53):
Fuck no?
Rita (28:55):
No. Nobody would. Nobody would.
Wendy (28:58):
Okay. No. So you're saying it's actually poisonous
to ingest, but usually flea andtick meds are topical. Correct?
Is that what you're
Rita (29:07):
they're not? Those are those are almost worse because
the topicals get into ourenvironment. They get into our
water supply. They get into yourbodies. They get into your
children.
If you test in a home that usestopical flea and tick meds,
they'll they will be ineverybody.
Wendy (29:23):
How did you come to these conclusions that all this stuff
would was, like, poison? Like,hurting.
Rita (29:29):
Tons of research on it.
Wendy (29:30):
Okay.
Rita (29:31):
If you Google, in Google Scholar and if you Google flea
and tick meds in theenvironment, you will be floored
by what you'll see. If you,Google residues getting into
humans and the testing they'vedone on these flea and tick
meds, all around the world,they're making pleas to, like
they're killing and decimatingbird populations and fish
populations. They're gettinginto our waters. It's in our
(29:53):
atmosphere. It's crazy.
And then you have the internalpills. All of them are
neurotoxins. They're they'renerve toxins, and they're liver
toxins. They're they they'recause hepatic injury. So when
you're if you're gonna givethese medicines I cover this in
my flea course.
Like, if you're gonna give thesemedicines, you have to prepare
(30:14):
the body's organs to deal withthem. But if I gave you that
poison in a shot glass, youwouldn't drink it. And then why
are our animals any different?So, you know, we're
rationalizing the use of thesejust absolute poisons for our
animals. And
Wendy (30:29):
It sounds like what you're describing is what I am
discovering with the clients whocome into my wellness center who
are struggling with chronicillness and what they've run
into with their doctors andgetting prescribed lots of
medications and then medicationsto deal with the side effects of
(30:51):
the first medications. And sothere's this whole cocktail of
of
Rita (30:56):
Yeah. Like Rexulti.
Wendy (30:58):
It's like making our immune systems, breaking them
down even more, it seems. I'mnot an expert, but it seems like
people are just getting sickeror they're plateauing at this
sort of place that's nothealthy, but I don't know. It
but that's what you're kind ofdescribing. The same approach is
(31:18):
happening in the veterinaryworld too.
Rita (31:20):
Exactly. And in the human industry, you know, like,
antidepressants, they cause ademyelination of nerves in the
brain when given long term. Anda lot of people have been on
them for years, and it's reallyhard to get them off. It takes
over a year to really like weanthem off. One of my good friends
is a research pharmacist, andshe knows everything about so
(31:45):
many drugs and what the negativeeffects that they're doing.
Dogs are actually getting a lotof antidepressants in mainstream
medicine and Prozacs anddifferent types of medicines.
It's just awful.
Wendy (31:57):
You're serious?
Rita (31:58):
Yes, I'm very serious. And it's really sad and very high
dosages. And so that's also inthe things, but it's not as
common as these other things,but the use of the flea and tick
meds, the heartworm meds,depending on where you live in
the world for heartworm, like Idon't live in a high vector
area, but testing is a reallygood method. Giving a wormer
(32:24):
without a dog having worms hasits own negative effects on the
gut. And then also givingantibiotics out like it's candy.
The standard of care fordiarrhea in dogs is Flagyl
metronidazole, and that's a giftthat keeps on giving for years.
It can cause what's referred toas IBD or IBS, which in my
(32:46):
opinion is, I don't know what iswrong with your dog's gut. This
is what I'm going to label it,or severe gastritis, Crohn's.
Wendy (32:54):
This all sounds so familiar.
Rita (32:55):
Yeah, it's the same. And so like, my opinion is don't use
antibiotics unless your dog isgoing to die. If your dog is
gonna die like I recently had alittle dog that I was working
with and he's not mobile. So hehas a lot of stagnation, right?
So he can get pneumonia prettyquickly.
And he got an infection in hislungs and of course, you're
(33:16):
gonna give antibiotics. It's notsomething that herbs are gonna
work for because he couldn'tbreathe. So he had to go on a
low steroid and an antibiotic,and of course, it saved his
life, and we're, you know, nowwe're dealing with cleanup. But
the cleanup lasts for it lastsvery long. It's not something
where, well, we're just gonnagive probiotics for a couple of
weeks and and, oh, I gave it tohim when he was on the
(33:38):
antibiotic.
The antibiotics cause severedamage, you can't get that gut
back. Like, the gut prior to anantibiotic dosage is not the gut
after the cleanup. It's acompletely different set of
species.
Wendy (33:50):
And there's
Rita (33:51):
some really awesome companies making some really
great different types offermented and cultured
probiotics that are notcurrently on the market these
days, but there's some reallygreat stuff coming up in the
transom by companies like GreenJuju. I love that company, and
they're doing some just reallyawesome different types of
probiotics, but for more speciesdiversity. But it's
Wendy (34:14):
Is it for for canines in particular? Yes. Okay.
Rita (34:17):
And it's just so interesting that, like, these
are things that we have tosupport our dogs for the long
term, And we just kind of forgetbecause they become they have
become everyday occurrences, andwe've gotten conditioned that
they're normal. But they're notnormal. They're not normal.
(34:38):
We're destroying our dog'simmune system. We're destroying
their health.
We're destroying their organhealth. And not only are we
destroying it, we're not givingthem anything to fix it, and
that is causing rapid aging.
Wendy (34:54):
Okay. So let's talk a little bit about fixing
Rita (34:58):
Yeah.
Wendy (34:59):
Before we end our conversation. I think that's
important because, I mean, itsounds so dire. Everything
you're just touching the surfaceof
Rita (35:06):
Yeah.
Wendy (35:06):
All of the all of the things that you cover in your
book. Alright. So maybe diet isa good thing to talk about?
Rita (35:16):
Fixing it isn't hard. And Okay. You know, it may sound
dire, but it's not hard. Like Isaid, every symptom that your
dog has is a or maybe I didn'tsay it, but I'm gonna say it.
Every symptom that your dog hasis a product of organ health.
And I think I did at thebeginning. Yes, you did. Yeah.
It's a product of organ healthbecause our bodies and our dogs'
(35:39):
bodies are amazing at beingresilient. Right?
I mean, we are pushing them toYes.
Wendy (35:45):
They are. Yeah.
Rita (35:46):
Drink right now. But they are amazing when they get what
they need for good organ health.And I definitely go through that
in my book. And, yes, diet isvery, very important. But even,
like, even if you are feeding ahigh end kibble, no rendered
meal ingredients that you canpronounce and know what they
(36:08):
are, limited ingredient, thoseare the, like carnivores and
excellent kibble, open farm,these are our higher end
kibbles.
There is a kibble hierarchy, Italk about it in my book. If you
feel you can't afford to feed aminimally processed diet, you
wanna add fresh to the bowl.That's where, like, companies
like Green Juju come in. You addfresh to the bowl. Any type of
(36:30):
fresh food that you add is goingto change the microbiome in the
large intestine for the better.
And I go through all of, like,these different types of of
improvements that you can makein the book and improving diet,
but also get your dog outside.Their feet on the ground. Take
those booties off unless there'santifreeze or or salts in the
(36:53):
winter. I see more and more dogwith booties on. Get those
booties off.
That that's not what they'remeant for.
Wendy (36:59):
But but it's not fun to to have dogs without booties on,
I guess, the on the TikTok.
Rita (37:05):
Well, I don't yeah. Probably not. It's not fun.
Their their little paws need tobe on the ground and and get
them outside breeding fresh air.Get their organs moving.
There's a big section on thelymphatics in my book. It is so
dire to read it. Read chapterthree on energetics. It helps
your dog teach about your dog asan individual. But when you
(37:27):
systematically support organhealth, all the other outcomes
are better.
You're gonna see more longevity.You're gonna see less aging.
When we be more mindful of whatwe're doing to our dog because
if I again, if I took what a dognormally gets in their first
year of life and took the liquidmedicine and put it in shot
(37:52):
glasses, you would not drink it.You wouldn't drink the flea and
tick. You wouldn't drink theheartworm med.
You definitely wouldn't drinkall the vaccines. And you would
be just flabbergasted by theamount of medicine that we are
putting in our dogs' bodies ascommonplace, but not helping our
(38:13):
dogs' bodies deal with them.Right? I spend a good amount of
money per month on food for mydogs, but they're my children.
Right?
I don't have any physicalchildren. I have a daughter, a a
a kind of an adopted daughter,but I don't have any, like,
physically children. So I spenda good amount of money on my
(38:34):
dog's food. However, I don't doflea and tick meds. I test for
heartworm every three monthswhen I live in places that have
a high vector.
Right now, I don't do anytesting because I live in the
Pacific Northwest. I might testto, like, every two years. I
don't get vaccines unless I'mforced to to give the rabies
(38:58):
vaccine. I I just I focus ontheir health, their inner
terrain. And usually when I goto the vet, it's for my wellness
checkup is a vet doing an x-rayor feeling around my dog.
They can feel for things that wecan't feel like we don't know
what we're feeling. Right?
Wendy (39:18):
Right.
Rita (39:19):
Or I bring my dog to the vet for an acupressure session
or an acupuncture session or aveterinary chiropractic for
wellness and prevention versusworking from a mentality of of
reaction, waiting for them toget sick. One of the book one of
the things the book does in theEverything's Connected section
(39:39):
is it gives you lists of redflags that tell you, hey, your
dog's liver needs help, or, hey,your dog's lymphatic system is
stagnant. Hey, this is an earlywarning sign of kidney of kidney
health going down. Right? Sothat we can work in a
preventative mindset versus justwaiting for our dogs to get
(40:00):
sick.
Wendy (40:00):
So helpful. I mean, I I wish there was a book like this
for every species.
Rita (40:08):
I'll get working on that.
Wendy (40:10):
Okay. But I've and and humans also. But that makes me
wonder. My husband, he doestherapeutic canine massage
Rita (40:20):
Yeah.
Wendy (40:21):
And is quite brilliant working with especially dogs who
are aging or are post surgery.Yeah. Almost almost like in a PT
way. But Yeah. He's not aphysical therapist, so he can't
call himself that.
So we feed our dogs raw. It's acombination of fruit and veggies
and meaty bones and raw chickenor turkey or both. And the
(40:45):
younger ones we've rescued arevery healthy. They don't seem to
get sick. No.
The ones we've rescued who areolder usually end up
unfortunately getting sick,cancer and dying earlier than we
we would we would like. Yeah.Anyway, what I was gonna ask is
(41:06):
because John, my husband, he wassaying because he went to school
to learn bodywork for humans.And then he said that there's
the anatomy is very similar forcanines. He just translated did
some study on on justtranslating the the practice for
dogs.
Is that true with with thetreatments too? I mean, this is
(41:30):
probably the lamest questionever, but, like, can can we
humans look at these
Rita (41:34):
Oh, absolutely. Remedience. Really big thing
about dogs versus humans is thesize of their gastrointestinal
tract. It's very short. So,like, when I talk about bloody
diarrhea in there, it does notapply to humans.
You know? If you have bloodydiarrhea, you need to go to the
hospital.
Wendy (41:48):
Yeah. That's different. Yeah.
Rita (41:49):
Yeah. It's different. Bloody diarrhea really isn't
that big of a deal for dogs. Ido tell you when to when to go
to the vet. I'm not anti vet inany way, shape, or form.
Some of my really good friendsare vets. I respect what vets
do. I do think that they'rebeing misinformed in veterinary
school. They're not learningabout nutrition. They're not
even learning how the body worksas an ecosystem.
(42:11):
One book that I can recommend toyour husband is a book called
Four Paws, Five Directions bydoctor Cheryl Swartz. It will
help his massage practiceexponentially. It's just a
wonderful book. I love massagebecause it helps with
stagnation, and it helps gettrauma out of the fascia. Know?
Fascia Lymphatic smoothing.Yeah. Yeah. And the the fascia
(42:33):
stores so much trauma. And a lotof our dogs have a ton of
trauma, and we just you know, wedon't acknowledge that either.
We just we we take them into ourhomes, we want them to abide, by
whatever we want them to do.Right? And some dogs are
especially rescue dogs arecarrying around a lot of trauma
that's inside their body. Somassage is just a really
(42:55):
wonderful way to get thelymphatics moving and to get
some of that trauma out. So,yeah, I love it.
Tell your husband thank you.
Wendy (43:03):
Oh, yeah. It brings some great joy, especially doing end
of life care. Like, he'll workwith dogs who are dying and and
help them transition, which
Rita (43:14):
is lovely.
Wendy (43:15):
Yeah. Yeah. It brings him a lot of joy. It breaks it
breaks our hearts, of course.But
Rita (43:22):
Yeah. Anyway. Yeah.
Wendy (43:23):
Yeah. But we probably could talk for another three
hours
Rita (43:27):
Yeah. I have no problem talking.
Wendy (43:29):
About all the things. I mean, we covered so little of
what Yeah. You covered in yourbook. And then you covered
beyond in this conversation,beyond what's in your book.
Rita (43:39):
Yeah. There is a great section on grief in that book,
though. Because that's a veryoverlooked object for animals.
Wendy (43:48):
I think overlook is kind of a a common denominator for
all of these these topics we'vebeen talking about today. Yeah.
We are overlooking things allthe time.
Rita (43:58):
Oh my god. Absolutely. But, you know, like, people ask
me all the time. They say, youknow, Rita, what's the best herb
I can give my dog so thatthey'll live for a long time?
Right?
It's not an herb.
Wendy (44:12):
Mhmm.
Rita (44:12):
It's get your stress underhand. Learn how to deal
with yourself. Improve yourself.Improve your relationship with
yourself. Tell yourself that youlove them.
You know? Tell treat yourselfkinder. Breathe from your belly,
and learn how to manage stress.However that resonates with you.
(44:35):
There's so many ways to do it.
And the great thing abouttechnology is there's there's no
excuse anymore because you canGoogle how do I deal with
stress, and 400 modalities willcome up. And with YouTube, so
many of them are free. There youcan do qigong. You can do you
can
Wendy (44:53):
Meditate, whatever.
Rita (44:55):
You can meditate. You can do yoga. You can just breathe
for three minutes, three times aday. Huge. Go sit on the earth
with your dog.
Go for a walk in the woods. Gofor the walk in the park. Just
being present brings downstress.
Wendy (45:09):
Right. But being present for That's I highly recommend
that. Being present is a toughthing in our contemporary
culture because we are sodistracted by everything. I'm
wondering too is, can we use ourdogs sort of as a litmus test?
So, like, if they're behaving ina certain way, instead of
(45:31):
focusing on their behavior,focus on ourselves to see what
they might be telling us throughtheir behavior.
Rita (45:38):
Absolutely. Absolutely. Now that's not always gonna be
the case, but absolutely. It'sthe first thing that I would try
for sure, especially if you'rebeing honest with yourself.
Right, you can ask yourself, amI an anxious person?
Mhmm. Do I feel that I'm I haveanxiety? And if you were on
their your phone, you can checkyour screen time. And if your
(46:00):
screen times are high, you canpretty much tell yourself, yeah.
The answer to that question isyes.
The more time we spend on ourphones looking down, scrolling,
the more anxious we become. Soand if just the mere talking
about limiting phone time evenjust resonates with you or
(46:22):
bothers you or you are gettingirritated by just even having
that conversation, know that youare addicted to your phone. I
had a little kid come up to mein a event. I I'd say he was
about 15 years old. And I wastalking about stress and how our
dogs mirror our stress, and hisdog is his best friend.
And he came up to me and said,you know, when you started
(46:47):
talking about scrolling, Iimmediately got irritated, and I
panicked. I started panicking.
Wendy (46:54):
Oh, man.
Rita (46:55):
And he goes, so I knew that I'm addicted to my phone.
And I'm on my phone all the timewhen I'm with my dog, and he's
my best friend. And I feel bad.And I said, well, don't feel
bad. You can't get the the pastmeans nothing, right, except to
learn by it.
We can learn from our past, butyou can't get it back. And I
(47:15):
said, just move forward. Spendmore time off your make that
your off your phone time whenyou are with your animals, when
you are with your kids, when youare trying to be present.
Wendy (47:26):
Dogs are really freaking entertaining too. Like, if you
if you put your phone down andyour dog is I mean, what are the
best videos to watch are, like,dog videos and cat videos.
Rita (47:37):
Oh my god. I love them.
Wendy (47:39):
If you have one in front of you, you can just be
entertained by your your dogfriends. Yes. Or all of the
animals that you have. Rita,this is very helpful.
Rita (47:52):
Thank you.
Wendy (47:54):
Thank you. No. I I hope people will because your book is
like a resource. If if you havedog friends, you should have
Rita's book on your shelf justto have and also make sure your
dog friend is getting, I guess,the best care we can give them.
Rita (48:10):
Yeah. And it is a good reference book. It's a good
learning tool. It will be comingout on Audible and other types
of places like that. I I I readit myself.
It was an undertaking.
Wendy (48:22):
I bet. Yeah. That's because it's it's no joke. Did
you read, like, every recipe andevery
Rita (48:27):
I do. I do. I I personally think that if you want in my
opinion, if you you love a bookbeing read to you, I would have
it at I would have the physicalbook as well because a lot of
the things you'll have to keeprewinding. Reference it.
Wendy (48:41):
Yeah. Exactly.
Rita (48:42):
Yeah. So you can look at the reference and the stuff. The
appendices will be attached as aPDF, the things in the back to
the Audible Oh,
Wendy (48:50):
that's great.
Rita (48:50):
Audio recording.
Wendy (48:51):
Yeah.
Rita (48:52):
Yeah. No. I I literally had to read two drops for extra
small dogs, three drops for youknow? And, I mean, the engineer
was like, oh my god. I've neverrecorded a book like this.
I'm like, yeah. Well, theywanted a book. They wanted a
recording, and here it is.
Wendy (49:07):
Here we are. Yes.
Rita (49:09):
Yeah. And it's also available, like, I I think what
is it called? Kindle?
Wendy (49:13):
Mhmm. Ebook. Yeah.
Rita (49:15):
Yeah. And then if you wanna get in touch with me, I
have a teaching platform,canineherbalism.com, and then I
have a store with dog productsand medicine that I make and and
a bunch of stuff. And myconsulting website is
canineherbalist.com. And then mybook's website, which the book
references the website a lot,it's a resource website. It also
(49:37):
has my book tour dates for mybook tour goes through November
of this year.
That is the herbaldog.com. Soand I'm on Instagram and
Facebook as canine herbalist.
Wendy (49:48):
Okay. Awesome. And then tell me about your podcast.
Rita (49:51):
I have a podcast. I think there's, like, about a 118
episodes so far. I do it weekly.At some months, there's only
three episodes depending onwhat's happening.
Wendy (50:01):
But It's better than I do.
Rita (50:02):
Yeah. So, usually, it's every week. It's, dogs are
individuals. Some of theepisodes are short. They're like
I call them shorts.
They're under fifteen minutes,and some are, like, thirty five,
forty minutes. And I don't haveguests. It's just me rambling on
about a certain subject. Maybenext year, I'll start having
guests, but I couldn't wrap myhead around that this year. And
(50:22):
this year, I'll be for most ofmy podcasts, I'll be, coming
from, different places aroundthe country and around the
world.
I'll be in Ireland, England, andSpain for my book tour as well.
Wendy (50:33):
Wow. Check you out. That's like a a very cool book
tour you got going on. Yeah.
Rita (50:40):
It's, you good for you. What it wants. My next book, I'm
I speak a lot during the year,but I'm not gonna be doing this
type of book tour only one timefor this first book. My next
book's on canine cancer.
Wendy (50:54):
Okay. Well, Rita, thank you so much for coming on the
show and sharing all of thiswisdom. I really appreciate it.
Rita (51:02):
You are so welcome. Thanks for having me on.
Wendy (51:06):
I guess it's not surprising that if we take
better care of ourselves, ourdog friends will benefit greatly
too. Shocker. To get a copy ofRita's herbal guide, please
visit canineherbalist.com. Thatwraps up season seven of Lucid
Cafe. Thanks for going on thispodcast journey with me.
(51:27):
Whether you're a new listener ora regular listener, I so
appreciate you. I've alreadyscheduled like seven
conversations for next seasonand the subjects we'll be
covering are looking reallyintriguing so far. We'll be
exploring witchcraft and fairytales, consciousness and dreams,
shamanism, a unique take onastrology, and who knows what
(51:50):
else? I guess we'll find out. Sofor the time being, I'm wishing
you peace of mind and a happyheart.
I'll be back in the fall. Untilnext time.
This is Wendy Halley, and you're listening to Lucid Cafe.
(00:31):
Hello and thanks for joining mefor another episode of Lucid
Cafe. Actually this is the finalepisode of season seven and it's
been quite a season. We startedout last fall with my friend
Linda River Valente giving us usan astrological glimpse into
2025 and I'm not gonna lie I waskind of hoping that Linda's dire
(00:54):
seeming glimpse wouldn't be asaccurate as it has been. I'll
have Linda back next season, atleast I'm hoping to, so we can
get an idea of the comingtrends.
In the meantime, I'm in theprocess of creating a talk that
will explore some of the deeperthemes I wrote about in my
(01:15):
latest book Raven's Daughter.The working title of this talk
is Entering the Age ofPossibility where I'll tie
indigenous prophecies about thisparticular time on planet Earth
into what my shamanicexperiences over the last
fifteen or so years have alsorevealed. If you're in Vermont
(01:36):
and are interested in checkingit out, either sign up for my
newsletter or keep an eye on theevents page on either the
threeworlds.media orlucidpathwellness.com websites.
Alright, so today's episode isfor dog lovers. My guest Rita
Hogan is a clinical canineherbalist who's been helping
(01:59):
pups for twenty years.
She's captured what she'slearned in her comprehensive new
book, The Herbal Dog (02:04):
Holistic Canine Herbalism, Applications
and Practice. In this hands onherbal guide and in our
conversation Rita will empoweryou to become your dog's
wellness hero. She gives simplevital tips to help your dog
thrive, live their best life andstay by your side for years to
(02:26):
come. And maybe not surprisinglymany of the tips she shares are
applicable to humans too. Soplease enjoy my resource rich
conversation with Rita Hogan.
Hi, Rita. Thanks so much forcoming on the show.
Rita (02:47):
Hi. You're welcome. I'm excited to be here for sure.
Wendy (02:51):
When I got the invitation to chat with you about your new
book, I was pretty excitedbecause I am a big proponent of
alternative medicine. And I am,as I mentioned before we started
recording, I have a dog family,and that's your world. You wrote
(03:13):
this book called The Herbal Dog,Holistic Canine Herbalism,
Applications and Practice. Andwhat an amazing book.
Rita (03:23):
Thank you.
Wendy (03:24):
Because it's like, it's chock full of information for
folks to help their dog friendsYeah. With all kinds of
presenting issues, like, wholegamut. Super handy resource.
Rita (03:39):
Yeah. It's definitely based on, you know, not just
herbal medicine, but gettingyour dog to a point where
they're they're healthy. It's awith a focus on organ health,
teaching people that dogs areindividuals, that everything in
the body is connected, and thatmost of the symptoms well, I
(03:59):
mean, most of the issues thatanyone goes to a vet for, maybe
not yet, obviously not a caraccident or getting hit by a car
or something like that.
Wendy (04:10):
Like a trauma, yeah.
Rita (04:11):
Yeah, a trauma. But other than that, everything is a
symptom of organ health. So whenwe focus on our organs,
including the gastrointestinaltract, know, outcomes are
better. Even, you know, they'rehit by a car, a dog is gonna
heal better if they have betterorgan health. So it really all
(04:31):
it does come down toassimilation and elimination and
and how healthy our dog's organsare.
And a lot of people don'trealize and don't even know how
certain organs work. A lot ofpeople think that the liver
stores toxins, which it doesn't,and or they don't know what the
lymphatic system is and what itdoes and how important it is,
(04:54):
and I it's not mentioned like itshould be. So, yeah, it's a it
it definitely is all the thingsthat I want people to know as an
introductory to natural healingfor their animals, for their
dog.
Wendy (05:07):
Yeah. And I can't wait to dive in because there's like a
zillion questions I alreadyhave. But before we dive into
the actual content of your book,you do describe your
introduction to the the world ofherbalism in the beginning of
your book, but I would love tohear your story. How did you get
here?
Rita (05:27):
Yeah. So I was a what do you well, I just saw a meme on
it this morning on Facebook.Latchkey kids, you know, like,
we were the kids of we didn'thave babysitters. We were
outside all the time.
Wendy (05:41):
We were feral!
Rita (05:43):
Yes. We were feral. So I grew up on a farm. So I think
that that definitely colored myvision of what the world was
like. I spent a lot of time inthe woods.
I spent a lot of time aroundanimals. Farms aren't pretty
places every now and then. Youknow? So I I did have some, I
would definitely say, animalbased trauma. And I brought that
(06:05):
into my my world growing up.
You know, I did the normaltwenties. I did the normal
twenties. Every you know,everyone has their twenties
stories. Right? And then I didgo to the University of
Minnesota, studied easternreligion and feminism and and
anthropology, and none of itresonated with me.
So I did five years in the inschool, and then I moved to
(06:29):
Tennessee, and then I startedboarding dogs. Like, I started
boarding dogs, and it was camelfree boarding and the dogs
running around everywhere, like,35 dogs a day just following you
nonstop and just you you learnso much about behavior and so
much about animals. And what Ireal I realized was how sick
(06:50):
these dogs were, and I it waskind of an eye opener. I learned
a lot about my own dogs and thenall of these dogs I was
boarding. And the owners were sofrustrated with their dog's
behavior and their dog's healththat it kinda just exploded from
(07:11):
there.
And I was like, okay. I knewthat I wanted to go back to
western herbalism because Istudied Ayurveda in when I was
in college as kind of like aside hustle. I I studied
Ayurveda when I was doing theEastern religions thing, and it
it didn't resonate with me asfar as a teaching modality for
(07:31):
for myself and for dogs, and Iwent back to Western herbalism
where, you know, those were theplants I grew up with. And I
started rescuing pugs andhelping these dogs that were
boarding with me, and it wasphenomenal to see the changes in
them even with a diet, just aplain old diet change. Even with
(07:52):
an upgraded kibble, like a highend kibble, the changes were
phenomenal.
And so when when I stoppedboarding dogs, I went headfirst
into raw feeding and, you know,things just kinda built up from
there. And but my dog boardingclients were some of my first
clients, you know, and we taughteach other a lot of stuff. And
(08:17):
it was just phenomenal. But thehealth outcomes were were
amazing. But, you know, when Iwrote my book about organ
health, I remember that it whenI opened up my kennel, it was
around 02/2003, February, maybe'2 I don't know.
February and '3 and 02/2005. I Ididn't I don't I'm not good with
(08:37):
timelines, but it's right aroundthen. It was definitely over
twenty years ago. But, like, Inever had met a dog with cancer
in Really? '3.
No. Never.
Wendy (08:49):
Not until later. Yeah. Never.
Rita (08:52):
I I'd never heard of one. I never met one. I never met a
person with cancer. I neverheard of one. It wasn't part of
the conversation that we werehaving.
And now one in two dogs will dieof cancer and people one in four
people will be diagnosed withcancer. And I think that's
actually a low statistic. Ithink it's one in three now.
(09:14):
Jesus. And, you know, they arepredicting it's not if you'll
get cancer, it's when.
I think that's a travesty in intwo decades. In two decades that
that's where we're at. And so Iwanna push that baseline theory
back to its normalcy back in theseventies where dogs didn't get
(09:38):
these disease, these autoimmunediseases, these things that
they're getting now. Like, whathas changed in the last what has
changed in the last twenty yearsthat has really accelerated
everything? And pollution haschanged.
Our food system has changed. Wehave Wi Fi in our houses now. We
wear our tech on our bodies.Some people put tech on their
dogs' bodies now. And all ofthese things are
Wendy (10:01):
They put tech on their dogs' bodies? What do--
Rita (10:04):
Yeah. They'll put, like, Wi Fi collars on them.
Wendy (10:08):
--those do? Like, so that they can get their phone calls?!
Rita (10:12):
Whole bunches of things, like geotrackers and all of
these yeah. There's a lot oftech coming up.
Wendy (10:17):
Okay. Alright.
Rita (10:20):
My opinion, those are they mess with resiliency. And so now
we're living in this day and agethat evolution hasn't been able
to catch up to. Right? I thinkin fifty to a hundred years,
we'll be able to deal with a lotof tech, but our bodies will
change. But I don't thinkthey're catching up right now.
(10:42):
And the thing is is that we haveto build resilient bodies, and
we have to stop talking aboutdogs being geriatric when
they're seven and eight yearsold. That conversation needs to
go away because it's not thedogs. It's what we're doing to
them that is causing rapidaging. So my book is about
bringing those things to light.I don't cover, like, EMF in my
(11:04):
book.
They cut out. My publisher hadto shorten it, make it more
concise, which I appreciate thatthey did. But it is all about
inner terrain. It's all aboutwhat's inside and herbs and
homeopathy, herbs, and othermodalities can really help with
building resiliency because Ithink we've we've lost a lot of
(11:27):
that with ourselves and ourpets.
Wendy (11:30):
Well, and I think we forget that we're animals too,
but all of us, we animals, wehave such sensitive nervous
systems. And just talking aboutbeing exposed to all these
frequencies all the time, it'sprobably a lot for our our
systems to process all the time.Yeah. And it's probably a strain
(11:50):
or stress.
Rita (11:51):
It definitely is.
Wendy (11:53):
And why wouldn't it be for animal friends too?
Rita (11:58):
And they you know, when we're stressed, they're
stressed.
Wendy (12:01):
Yeah. So They do mirror us, don't they?
Rita (12:03):
Yes. And they they you know, I was at an event
yesterday for my book tour, andI was talking to people. And I
was just discussing that wethink that we interact with our
dogs through speech. Right?Through tone and speech, and
that can be a component.
But our dogs interact with usthrough smell.
Wendy (12:24):
Oh, wow.
Rita (12:25):
And that's how they gauge their entire world is through
their nose. And we smell likestress and fear and cortisol and
adrenaline, and we're giving offthese frequencies of being
unsafe. And even, like, the actof scrolling puts you in a low
level of fight or flight,looking at social media and
(12:47):
caring about what's on socialmedia and and connecting with
other people through socialmedia. This, like, contrived,
curated idea of what someone'slife is. Right?
We don't put we hardly ever putthe the real stuff out there. I
mean, yeah, it's real, but it'snot the other. It's all the
other things. So we get thisone-sided view of what life is
(13:09):
like, and that's reallystressful to to put that strain
on us and also to live up tocertain expectations and and
always trying to look good. Andwe smell unsafe.
You know, we're stressed out.
Wendy (13:23):
It's so interesting.
Rita (13:25):
Yeah.
Wendy (13:26):
I don't mean to cut you off.
Rita (13:27):
Oh, interrupt. Interrupt. Absolutely.
Wendy (13:29):
I'm just thinking about our girl dog, Zora, who is she
is an unusual dog friend. She isa combination. We think she's a
rescue mutt girl. A combinationwhippet chihuahua. Fun.
So she's got the head of achihuahua and the body of a
whippet. And she's about 14 nowand is still quite youthful. If
(13:55):
dogs can be on the spectrum, wewould say she is on the
spectrum. Because, like, one ofthe weird quirks and ticks that
she has is when the electricitygoes out, she freaks out. When
everything quiets down, like,there's no electromagnetic
frequency going through thehouse, she is beside she can't
(14:19):
calm down.
It's almost like she's it's theweirdest thing. Right? Yeah. I
mean, it's like the opposite ofwhat you would think. You would
think she would calm down whenthe electricity would go out,
but it's actually I don't knowif it's just the difference
between the frequency.
Yeah. Like, even if it justblips for like, the electricity
(14:43):
just goes out for, like, a fewseconds and comes back on again,
she'll start pacing and whining,and she'll go upstairs and hide
in the place that she alwayshides. It's the weirdest thing.
You ever heard of that?
Rita (14:56):
No. I've never heard of that one, but it doesn't it
doesn't surprise me.
Wendy (15:00):
She's she's quite quirky like her mom. Anyway, I'm sorry
to interrupt, but that was Oh,no. When we were just talking
about frequencies, was like,
Rita (15:10):
Maybe that's what Zora's responding to. Anyway, getting
back to your points about ourdogs responding to us and how
even on social media, when we'reon our cell phones and stuff
like that. When you're with yourdog, you know, your dog knows
when you're not present. Yourdog knows when you're not
(15:31):
listening. My biggest thing thatI tell people is get off the
phone when you're walking yourdog.
Get off the phone when you'rewith your dog. They know it.
And, when you're on the phone,you smell like stress. And I
don't think we need a lot tofeel stress in this world right
now.
Wendy (15:50):
You don't think so?
Rita (15:51):
A lot of people no. No. Jeez. I think a lot of people
are feeling unsafe, and I thinkthat we have to really you know,
there's only so much our brainscan handle, and dogs are looking
to you for guidance, and what ishappening is dogs are mirroring
(16:12):
their owner's stress and a lotof their physical ailments, and
it's pretty interesting how ourcreatures, you know, are coming
together to help us heal thesediseases that we have,
encountered through inflammationand stress. And so there's a big
part of my book, there's asection called Everything's
(16:33):
Connected, and I talk about thevagus nerve and the nervous
system and how we regulate itand vagal flexibility and, you
know, that ability to go fromfight or flight to relaxation
pretty quickly.
And some dogs have good vagaltone while others do not. And
then there's some that aregenetically bred to be on, like
(16:56):
Australian Shepherds andMelanois and Border Collies,
certain types of guard dogs, youknow, they really need nervous
system support to help them calmdown and not be so reactive. And
then there's, you know, there'sa lot of toxins out there that
cause reactivity and panic andfright, like like chlorine.
(17:19):
Chlorine causes histamine levelsto to skyrocket, and a lot of
people don't filter their dog'swater or for themselves, or
they're feeding bottled water inplastic bottles, which is an
endocrine disruptor. And dogshave a real hard time with
hypothyroid right now.
A lot of them are spayed andneutered. You know? Well, ninety
(17:42):
nine percent of them are spayedand neutered, which is a big
assault to the endocrine system.So dealing with organ health in
general and learning how tosupport the body, I think, is
one of the main tenets of mybook. And it's just beautiful to
see people using the book andhaving better outcomes and
figuring how to deal with theroot cause of their dog's
(18:04):
condition.
Because a lot of books that youget, they're awesome. But, like,
if you get an herbal, right, aan herbal book, whether it for
be for humans or for animals,it'll say, you know, use
ashwagandha for stress andanxiety or use this and try milk
(18:24):
thistle. But it doesn't tell youwhat type of remedy. Do how do I
know if that herb is good for myown individual dog? How much do
I give of it?
If it's a tea, how do I makethat tea, and how much do I give
it? If it's a dried herb, howhow do I give it? Do I give it
with food? Do I not give it withfood? All of those questions are
(18:46):
answered in the book.
All the dosages are discussed inthe back. Chapter three is the
best chapter in the book toreally help your dog deal with
themselves as an individual. Butyou said you had lots of
questions, and I'm prattling on.So what what questions do you
have?
Wendy (19:02):
Well, I more and more are generating as you're talking.
Just an observation, it soundslike what you're saying is that
our dog friends, they'remirroring us.
Rita (19:12):
Yeah.
Wendy (19:13):
Or they can be a mirror for us because clearly, we're
not healthy and they're nothealthy either. And I don't
know. Is it because we're eatingshit and they're eating shit
because we're eating shit andthat's everybody eats shit now
or like shitty diets? Yeah. Oris it because we are highly
(19:36):
stressed and our systems arejust not processing the way they
used to?
Rita (19:41):
Or a conversation Yeah. Like, you know, I have this
little in fact, I think, I'm Ihave an event tonight too. I've
got, like, four back to backs.And I don't talk about the same
thing in my book signings. Andso I, tonight, I'm gonna talk
about I have this little speechthat I've been creating over the
last, I don't know, maybe threemonths that when I'm driving in
(20:04):
my car to these differentevents, I I think about, like,
I'm nerding out with myself inthe car.
And these things that we forgetwe're doing to our animals,
right? And a lot of them mirrorwhat we're doing to ourselves.
But you have a lot of thingsgoing on. The average American
dog gets less than fifteenminutes of exercise a day. And
(20:25):
if you were to ask the majorityof people, they probably get
less than fifteen minutes ofexercise a day.
We're not breathing fresh airlike we need to. We need to be
outside. We we're in our homes,and our dogs are in our homes,
and they're laying on all of ourtoxic laundry soap and and dryer
(20:47):
sheet covered. Oh, now there'sscent boosters. Scent boosters
are some of my faves and walkedinto an Airbnb the other day and
immediately took out the Gladeplug ins, you know, or the
Febreze plug ins.
Wendy (20:59):
That shit is the worst.
Rita (21:01):
I'm like, it smells like ivory soap in here. That's
weird. I went back to mychildhood of ivory soap, and I I
was like, oh, and I pulled itout of the wall. But they're in
our homes, and we havedomesticated our dogs so much
that they are mirroring ourlifestyles. And so they're
probably within a 10 footproximity to us a lot of the
(21:23):
time.
So there's that. There's notbreathing fresh air. There's not
giving enough exercise, whichaffects organ health and
lymphatic health. And then wediscussed EMF, but then we have,
like, these dog specific things.So we spay and neuter our dogs
without thinking.
Right? Even if we're really goodowners that aren't gonna allow
(21:45):
our dogs to be impregnated, it'sjust what we do. Right? Okay.
And we we do it, and then theonly thing that we're concerned
about afterwards is the incisiongetting infected.
We're not concerned about thatyou just took out twenty five
percent. Don't quote me on thepercentage. It's roughly twenty
five percent, a quarter of yourdog's endocrine system. You just
(22:09):
disrupted their nervous system.And you just disrupted their
everything connected organsystems that are talking to that
endocrine system consistentlyall day, all night.
Right? And you just rip thatout.
Wendy (22:26):
You know, I've wondered about that. Support. Because, I
mean, I understand at least myunderstanding of the reason why
we spay and neuter is because wedon't wanna create an
overpopulation of dogs withouthomes.
Rita (22:40):
Yeah. So in certain areas of the country, that can be an
issue. Like, I did my rescue sixyears of rescue in the South,
and over dog overpopulation isterrible due to human ignorance.
But if you are a dog owner thatis responsible, I don't suggest
spay and neuter. However, I havefive dogs.
(23:02):
Four are spayed and neutered.Okay? You have to do what you
need to do. However, you need tostop spaying and neutering under
the age of one because whathappens is some dogs are getting
spayed and neutered at, like, 12old and younger. Those hormones
that are produced by ourreproductive systems affect
(23:23):
everything, especially when dogsare young.
Okay? So, like, for instance, ifyou have a Great Dane and you
spay and neuter them at a youngage, under the age of one, you
are upping their chances ofosteosarcoma by over forty
percent.
Wendy (23:43):
I wondered if that's where you were gonna go.
Rita (23:45):
Yes. And osteosarcoma and hermangiosarcoma are killing our
dogs right now, like, terrible.And
Wendy (23:53):
We've buried four mastiffs, English mastiffs, that
were rescues. And I think well,two of them had bone cancer.
Rita (24:06):
Yes. Large dogs. Yeah. Because what happens is is those
growth plates, hormones kind ofnegotiate with the body on when
to close or leave open thegrowth plates so that a dog's
bones can grow. And big dogs,those are a huge factor in their
(24:27):
stability and, how their bones,develop and grow.
Right? And when they end thegrowth. So we're completely
messing with them. In largebreed dogs, it is imperative
that you do not spay and neuteruntil that dog is 100% fully
grown, and that I personallywould wait three years.
Wendy (24:51):
Okay.
Rita (24:51):
And then spay and neuter. Right? And it's the same thing
for hemangiosarcoma. And
Wendy (25:00):
What kind of cancer is that one?
Rita (25:01):
That one is dire. It is a like a blood cancer. Okay. It
happens in the spleen and theheart, and it can happen under
the dermis, and it it it's ableeding out. Okay?
So it bleeds out. And Oh my god.It kills tons and tons of
aggressive, just likeosteosarcoma. So we're seeing
(25:22):
all of these aggressive cancers.So spay and neuter is one of
them.
We don't do it mindfully, right?Oh, you're going to get
pyrometra or you're going gettesticular cancer. Well, you
know, if your dog getspyrometra, then spay them when
they have pyrometra.
Wendy (25:36):
I don't even know what that is.
Rita (25:38):
Oh, it's a a pyrometra is something that happens to girls
that is life threatening. Ithappens when dogs I mean,
obviously, when they're notspayed because that's one of the
things that dogs can get, butpyrometric comes from
stagnation, from organs notworking correctly.
Wendy (25:54):
Oh, okay.
Rita (25:56):
It's not a reason to spay your dog, in my opinion. We need
to be more mindful because we'vebit just we've just grown
accustomed to these things. Thisthis is just what we do. Okay.
Well, if this is just what wedo, we need to be more mindful
of when we do it.
And then another thing that wedo to dogs specifically, and
it's happening more in horses aswell, is we're giving
(26:18):
vaccinations every single yearfor things that our dogs already
have immunity to. Get your puppyshots and be done with it. Now
rabies is required by law in TheUnited States, so I can't speak
anything ill against that. Butin my book, I have a pre and
post vaccination protocol tohelp your dog deal with those
vaccinations. And the all theother vaccinations are not
(26:41):
required by law.
I do recommend parvo anddistemper as puppies, and then
you can test for antibodiesfive, six years down the road.
We have to we have to changethis. This is one of the things
that changed. This overvaccination is definitely one of
the things that has changedwhile our dogs are getting
(27:01):
sicker and sicker. It causesrapid it got more aging.
It causes a higher toxic load.It affects the nervous system.
And another factor on thatvaccination is they're giving
multiple vaccinations in oneshot, and that is not a good
practice. Oof. There's lots ofresearch that shows when you do
(27:22):
single vaccines, it is muchhealthier outcomes than the,
like, six in one.
And they're doing it withhorses, and horses are starting
to get a lot of Cushing'sdisease. They're getting
Addison's disease. They'regetting they're getting cancers,
lots of tumors that never everoccurred in regular horse
(27:45):
rearing, husbandry, if you wannacall it. It it's insane. So over
vaccination, automatic spay andneuter at a really young age,
just those are things that we'rejust we've forgotten, and we
haven't we're not supporting ouranimals when we do it.
So and and that's one of thethings my book talks about.
(28:05):
Doesn't talk about a lot aboutspay and neuter because it was
one of the things that was kindof cut out of the book, but I
talk about it a lot on mypodcast and in my courses and
things like that. And thenanother one is flea and tick
meds, right? This is anotherthing that was not on the scene
when I was young. We didn't giveflea and tick meds because our
(28:25):
dogs had a more vital resiliencyto them.
My dogs had ticks and fleas allthe time, but they didn't
overcome everything. We didn'tdo anything. They were naturally
resilient to them. Flea and tickmeds are poison. And if I took
that poison, that activeingredient in the flea and tick
(28:47):
meds, and I put it in a shotglass and I asked you to drink
it, would you?
Wendy (28:53):
Fuck no?
Rita (28:55):
No. Nobody would. Nobody would.
Wendy (28:58):
Okay. No. So you're saying it's actually poisonous
to ingest, but usually flea andtick meds are topical. Correct?
Is that what you're
Rita (29:07):
they're not? Those are those are almost worse because
the topicals get into ourenvironment. They get into our
water supply. They get into yourbodies. They get into your
children.
If you test in a home that usestopical flea and tick meds,
they'll they will be ineverybody.
Wendy (29:23):
How did you come to these conclusions that all this stuff
would was, like, poison? Like,hurting.
Rita (29:29):
Tons of research on it.
Wendy (29:30):
Okay.
Rita (29:31):
If you Google, in Google Scholar and if you Google flea
and tick meds in theenvironment, you will be floored
by what you'll see. If you,Google residues getting into
humans and the testing they'vedone on these flea and tick
meds, all around the world,they're making pleas to, like
they're killing and decimatingbird populations and fish
populations. They're gettinginto our waters. It's in our
(29:53):
atmosphere. It's crazy.
And then you have the internalpills. All of them are
neurotoxins. They're they'renerve toxins, and they're liver
toxins. They're they they'recause hepatic injury. So when
you're if you're gonna givethese medicines I cover this in
my flea course.
Like, if you're gonna give thesemedicines, you have to prepare
(30:14):
the body's organs to deal withthem. But if I gave you that
poison in a shot glass, youwouldn't drink it. And then why
are our animals any different?So, you know, we're
rationalizing the use of thesejust absolute poisons for our
animals. And
Wendy (30:29):
It sounds like what you're describing is what I am
discovering with the clients whocome into my wellness center who
are struggling with chronicillness and what they've run
into with their doctors andgetting prescribed lots of
medications and then medicationsto deal with the side effects of
(30:51):
the first medications. And sothere's this whole cocktail of
of
Rita (30:56):
Yeah. Like Rexulti.
Wendy (30:58):
It's like making our immune systems, breaking them
down even more, it seems. I'mnot an expert, but it seems like
people are just getting sickeror they're plateauing at this
sort of place that's nothealthy, but I don't know. It
but that's what you're kind ofdescribing. The same approach is
(31:18):
happening in the veterinaryworld too.
Rita (31:20):
Exactly. And in the human industry, you know, like,
antidepressants, they cause ademyelination of nerves in the
brain when given long term. Anda lot of people have been on
them for years, and it's reallyhard to get them off. It takes
over a year to really like weanthem off. One of my good friends
is a research pharmacist, andshe knows everything about so
(31:45):
many drugs and what the negativeeffects that they're doing.
Dogs are actually getting a lotof antidepressants in mainstream
medicine and Prozacs anddifferent types of medicines.
It's just awful.
Wendy (31:57):
You're serious?
Rita (31:58):
Yes, I'm very serious. And it's really sad and very high
dosages. And so that's also inthe things, but it's not as
common as these other things,but the use of the flea and tick
meds, the heartworm meds,depending on where you live in
the world for heartworm, like Idon't live in a high vector
area, but testing is a reallygood method. Giving a wormer
(32:24):
without a dog having worms hasits own negative effects on the
gut. And then also givingantibiotics out like it's candy.
The standard of care fordiarrhea in dogs is Flagyl
metronidazole, and that's a giftthat keeps on giving for years.
It can cause what's referred toas IBD or IBS, which in my
(32:46):
opinion is, I don't know what iswrong with your dog's gut. This
is what I'm going to label it,or severe gastritis, Crohn's.
Wendy (32:54):
This all sounds so familiar.
Rita (32:55):
Yeah, it's the same. And so like, my opinion is don't use
antibiotics unless your dog isgoing to die. If your dog is
gonna die like I recently had alittle dog that I was working
with and he's not mobile. So hehas a lot of stagnation, right?
So he can get pneumonia prettyquickly.
And he got an infection in hislungs and of course, you're
(33:16):
gonna give antibiotics. It's notsomething that herbs are gonna
work for because he couldn'tbreathe. So he had to go on a
low steroid and an antibiotic,and of course, it saved his
life, and we're, you know, nowwe're dealing with cleanup. But
the cleanup lasts for it lastsvery long. It's not something
where, well, we're just gonnagive probiotics for a couple of
weeks and and, oh, I gave it tohim when he was on the
(33:38):
antibiotic.
The antibiotics cause severedamage, you can't get that gut
back. Like, the gut prior to anantibiotic dosage is not the gut
after the cleanup. It's acompletely different set of
species.
Wendy (33:50):
And there's
Rita (33:51):
some really awesome companies making some really
great different types offermented and cultured
probiotics that are notcurrently on the market these
days, but there's some reallygreat stuff coming up in the
transom by companies like GreenJuju. I love that company, and
they're doing some just reallyawesome different types of
probiotics, but for more speciesdiversity. But it's
Wendy (34:14):
Is it for for canines in particular? Yes. Okay.
Rita (34:17):
And it's just so interesting that, like, these
are things that we have tosupport our dogs for the long
term, And we just kind of forgetbecause they become they have
become everyday occurrences, andwe've gotten conditioned that
they're normal. But they're notnormal. They're not normal.
(34:38):
We're destroying our dog'simmune system. We're destroying
their health.
We're destroying their organhealth. And not only are we
destroying it, we're not givingthem anything to fix it, and
that is causing rapid aging.
Wendy (34:54):
Okay. So let's talk a little bit about fixing
Rita (34:58):
Yeah.
Wendy (34:59):
Before we end our conversation. I think that's
important because, I mean, itsounds so dire. Everything
you're just touching the surfaceof
Rita (35:06):
Yeah.
Wendy (35:06):
All of the all of the things that you cover in your
book. Alright. So maybe diet isa good thing to talk about?
Rita (35:16):
Fixing it isn't hard. And Okay. You know, it may sound
dire, but it's not hard. Like Isaid, every symptom that your
dog has is a or maybe I didn'tsay it, but I'm gonna say it.
Every symptom that your dog hasis a product of organ health.
And I think I did at thebeginning. Yes, you did. Yeah.
It's a product of organ healthbecause our bodies and our dogs'
(35:39):
bodies are amazing at beingresilient. Right?
I mean, we are pushing them toYes.
Wendy (35:45):
They are. Yeah.
Rita (35:46):
Drink right now. But they are amazing when they get what
they need for good organ health.And I definitely go through that
in my book. And, yes, diet isvery, very important. But even,
like, even if you are feeding ahigh end kibble, no rendered
meal ingredients that you canpronounce and know what they
(36:08):
are, limited ingredient, thoseare the, like carnivores and
excellent kibble, open farm,these are our higher end
kibbles.
There is a kibble hierarchy, Italk about it in my book. If you
feel you can't afford to feed aminimally processed diet, you
wanna add fresh to the bowl.That's where, like, companies
like Green Juju come in. You addfresh to the bowl. Any type of
(36:30):
fresh food that you add is goingto change the microbiome in the
large intestine for the better.
And I go through all of, like,these different types of of
improvements that you can makein the book and improving diet,
but also get your dog outside.Their feet on the ground. Take
those booties off unless there'santifreeze or or salts in the
(36:53):
winter. I see more and more dogwith booties on. Get those
booties off.
That that's not what they'remeant for.
Wendy (36:59):
But but it's not fun to to have dogs without booties on,
I guess, the on the TikTok.
Rita (37:05):
Well, I don't yeah. Probably not. It's not fun.
Their their little paws need tobe on the ground and and get
them outside breeding fresh air.Get their organs moving.
There's a big section on thelymphatics in my book. It is so
dire to read it. Read chapterthree on energetics. It helps
your dog teach about your dog asan individual. But when you
(37:27):
systematically support organhealth, all the other outcomes
are better.
You're gonna see more longevity.You're gonna see less aging.
When we be more mindful of whatwe're doing to our dog because
if I again, if I took what a dognormally gets in their first
year of life and took the liquidmedicine and put it in shot
(37:52):
glasses, you would not drink it.You wouldn't drink the flea and
tick. You wouldn't drink theheartworm med.
You definitely wouldn't drinkall the vaccines. And you would
be just flabbergasted by theamount of medicine that we are
putting in our dogs' bodies ascommonplace, but not helping our
(38:13):
dogs' bodies deal with them.Right? I spend a good amount of
money per month on food for mydogs, but they're my children.
Right?
I don't have any physicalchildren. I have a daughter, a a
a kind of an adopted daughter,but I don't have any, like,
physically children. So I spenda good amount of money on my
(38:34):
dog's food. However, I don't doflea and tick meds. I test for
heartworm every three monthswhen I live in places that have
a high vector.
Right now, I don't do anytesting because I live in the
Pacific Northwest. I might testto, like, every two years. I
don't get vaccines unless I'mforced to to give the rabies
(38:58):
vaccine. I I just I focus ontheir health, their inner
terrain. And usually when I goto the vet, it's for my wellness
checkup is a vet doing an x-rayor feeling around my dog.
They can feel for things that wecan't feel like we don't know
what we're feeling. Right?
Wendy (39:18):
Right.
Rita (39:19):
Or I bring my dog to the vet for an acupressure session
or an acupuncture session or aveterinary chiropractic for
wellness and prevention versusworking from a mentality of of
reaction, waiting for them toget sick. One of the book one of
the things the book does in theEverything's Connected section
(39:39):
is it gives you lists of redflags that tell you, hey, your
dog's liver needs help, or, hey,your dog's lymphatic system is
stagnant. Hey, this is an earlywarning sign of kidney of kidney
health going down. Right? Sothat we can work in a
preventative mindset versus justwaiting for our dogs to get
(40:00):
sick.
Wendy (40:00):
So helpful. I mean, I I wish there was a book like this
for every species.
Rita (40:08):
I'll get working on that.
Wendy (40:10):
Okay. But I've and and humans also. But that makes me
wonder. My husband, he doestherapeutic canine massage
Rita (40:20):
Yeah.
Wendy (40:21):
And is quite brilliant working with especially dogs who
are aging or are post surgery.Yeah. Almost almost like in a PT
way. But Yeah. He's not aphysical therapist, so he can't
call himself that.
So we feed our dogs raw. It's acombination of fruit and veggies
and meaty bones and raw chickenor turkey or both. And the
(40:45):
younger ones we've rescued arevery healthy. They don't seem to
get sick. No.
The ones we've rescued who areolder usually end up
unfortunately getting sick,cancer and dying earlier than we
we would we would like. Yeah.Anyway, what I was gonna ask is
(41:06):
because John, my husband, he wassaying because he went to school
to learn bodywork for humans.And then he said that there's
the anatomy is very similar forcanines. He just translated did
some study on on justtranslating the the practice for
dogs.
Is that true with with thetreatments too? I mean, this is
(41:30):
probably the lamest questionever, but, like, can can we
humans look at these
Rita (41:34):
Oh, absolutely. Remedience. Really big thing
about dogs versus humans is thesize of their gastrointestinal
tract. It's very short. So,like, when I talk about bloody
diarrhea in there, it does notapply to humans.
You know? If you have bloodydiarrhea, you need to go to the
hospital.
Wendy (41:48):
Yeah. That's different. Yeah.
Rita (41:49):
Yeah. It's different. Bloody diarrhea really isn't
that big of a deal for dogs. Ido tell you when to when to go
to the vet. I'm not anti vet inany way, shape, or form.
Some of my really good friendsare vets. I respect what vets
do. I do think that they'rebeing misinformed in veterinary
school. They're not learningabout nutrition. They're not
even learning how the body worksas an ecosystem.
(42:11):
One book that I can recommend toyour husband is a book called
Four Paws, Five Directions bydoctor Cheryl Swartz. It will
help his massage practiceexponentially. It's just a
wonderful book. I love massagebecause it helps with
stagnation, and it helps gettrauma out of the fascia. Know?
Fascia Lymphatic smoothing.Yeah. Yeah. And the the fascia
(42:33):
stores so much trauma. And a lotof our dogs have a ton of
trauma, and we just you know, wedon't acknowledge that either.
We just we we take them into ourhomes, we want them to abide, by
whatever we want them to do.Right? And some dogs are
especially rescue dogs arecarrying around a lot of trauma
that's inside their body. Somassage is just a really
(42:55):
wonderful way to get thelymphatics moving and to get
some of that trauma out. So,yeah, I love it.
Tell your husband thank you.
Wendy (43:03):
Oh, yeah. It brings some great joy, especially doing end
of life care. Like, he'll workwith dogs who are dying and and
help them transition, which
Rita (43:14):
is lovely.
Wendy (43:15):
Yeah. Yeah. It brings him a lot of joy. It breaks it
breaks our hearts, of course.But
Rita (43:22):
Yeah. Anyway. Yeah.
Wendy (43:23):
Yeah. But we probably could talk for another three
hours
Rita (43:27):
Yeah. I have no problem talking.
Wendy (43:29):
About all the things. I mean, we covered so little of
what Yeah. You covered in yourbook. And then you covered
beyond in this conversation,beyond what's in your book.
Rita (43:39):
Yeah. There is a great section on grief in that book,
though. Because that's a veryoverlooked object for animals.
Wendy (43:48):
I think overlook is kind of a a common denominator for
all of these these topics we'vebeen talking about today. Yeah.
We are overlooking things allthe time.
Rita (43:58):
Oh my god. Absolutely. But, you know, like, people ask
me all the time. They say, youknow, Rita, what's the best herb
I can give my dog so thatthey'll live for a long time?
Right?
It's not an herb.
Wendy (44:12):
Mhmm.
Rita (44:12):
It's get your stress underhand. Learn how to deal
with yourself. Improve yourself.Improve your relationship with
yourself. Tell yourself that youlove them.
You know? Tell treat yourselfkinder. Breathe from your belly,
and learn how to manage stress.However that resonates with you.
(44:35):
There's so many ways to do it.
And the great thing abouttechnology is there's there's no
excuse anymore because you canGoogle how do I deal with
stress, and 400 modalities willcome up. And with YouTube, so
many of them are free. There youcan do qigong. You can do you
can
Wendy (44:53):
Meditate, whatever.
Rita (44:55):
You can meditate. You can do yoga. You can just breathe
for three minutes, three times aday. Huge. Go sit on the earth
with your dog.
Go for a walk in the woods. Gofor the walk in the park. Just
being present brings downstress.
Wendy (45:09):
Right. But being present for That's I highly recommend
that. Being present is a toughthing in our contemporary
culture because we are sodistracted by everything. I'm
wondering too is, can we use ourdogs sort of as a litmus test?
So, like, if they're behaving ina certain way, instead of
(45:31):
focusing on their behavior,focus on ourselves to see what
they might be telling us throughtheir behavior.
Rita (45:38):
Absolutely. Absolutely. Now that's not always gonna be
the case, but absolutely. It'sthe first thing that I would try
for sure, especially if you'rebeing honest with yourself.
Right, you can ask yourself, amI an anxious person?
Mhmm. Do I feel that I'm I haveanxiety? And if you were on
their your phone, you can checkyour screen time. And if your
(46:00):
screen times are high, you canpretty much tell yourself, yeah.
The answer to that question isyes.
The more time we spend on ourphones looking down, scrolling,
the more anxious we become. Soand if just the mere talking
about limiting phone time evenjust resonates with you or
(46:22):
bothers you or you are gettingirritated by just even having
that conversation, know that youare addicted to your phone. I
had a little kid come up to mein a event. I I'd say he was
about 15 years old. And I wastalking about stress and how our
dogs mirror our stress, and hisdog is his best friend.
And he came up to me and said,you know, when you started
(46:47):
talking about scrolling, Iimmediately got irritated, and I
panicked. I started panicking.
Wendy (46:54):
Oh, man.
Rita (46:55):
And he goes, so I knew that I'm addicted to my phone.
And I'm on my phone all the timewhen I'm with my dog, and he's
my best friend. And I feel bad.And I said, well, don't feel
bad. You can't get the the pastmeans nothing, right, except to
learn by it.
We can learn from our past, butyou can't get it back. And I
(47:15):
said, just move forward. Spendmore time off your make that
your off your phone time whenyou are with your animals, when
you are with your kids, when youare trying to be present.
Wendy (47:26):
Dogs are really freaking entertaining too. Like, if you
if you put your phone down andyour dog is I mean, what are the
best videos to watch are, like,dog videos and cat videos.
Rita (47:37):
Oh my god. I love them.
Wendy (47:39):
If you have one in front of you, you can just be
entertained by your your dogfriends. Yes. Or all of the
animals that you have. Rita,this is very helpful.
Rita (47:52):
Thank you.
Wendy (47:54):
Thank you. No. I I hope people will because your book is
like a resource. If if you havedog friends, you should have
Rita's book on your shelf justto have and also make sure your
dog friend is getting, I guess,the best care we can give them.
Rita (48:10):
Yeah. And it is a good reference book. It's a good
learning tool. It will be comingout on Audible and other types
of places like that. I I I readit myself.
It was an undertaking.
Wendy (48:22):
I bet. Yeah. That's because it's it's no joke. Did
you read, like, every recipe andevery
Rita (48:27):
I do. I do. I I personally think that if you want in my
opinion, if you you love a bookbeing read to you, I would have
it at I would have the physicalbook as well because a lot of
the things you'll have to keeprewinding. Reference it.
Wendy (48:41):
Yeah. Exactly.
Rita (48:42):
Yeah. So you can look at the reference and the stuff. The
appendices will be attached as aPDF, the things in the back to
the Audible Oh,
Wendy (48:50):
that's great.
Rita (48:50):
Audio recording.
Wendy (48:51):
Yeah.
Rita (48:52):
Yeah. No. I I literally had to read two drops for extra
small dogs, three drops for youknow? And, I mean, the engineer
was like, oh my god. I've neverrecorded a book like this.
I'm like, yeah. Well, theywanted a book. They wanted a
recording, and here it is.
Wendy (49:07):
Here we are. Yes.
Rita (49:09):
Yeah. And it's also available, like, I I think what
is it called? Kindle?
Wendy (49:13):
Mhmm. Ebook. Yeah.
Rita (49:15):
Yeah. And then if you wanna get in touch with me, I
have a teaching platform,canineherbalism.com, and then I
have a store with dog productsand medicine that I make and and
a bunch of stuff. And myconsulting website is
canineherbalist.com. And then mybook's website, which the book
references the website a lot,it's a resource website. It also
(49:37):
has my book tour dates for mybook tour goes through November
of this year.
That is the herbaldog.com. Soand I'm on Instagram and
Facebook as canine herbalist.
Wendy (49:48):
Okay. Awesome. And then tell me about your podcast.
Rita (49:51):
I have a podcast. I think there's, like, about a 118
episodes so far. I do it weekly.At some months, there's only
three episodes depending onwhat's happening.
Wendy (50:01):
But It's better than I do.
Rita (50:02):
Yeah. So, usually, it's every week. It's, dogs are
individuals. Some of theepisodes are short. They're like
I call them shorts.
They're under fifteen minutes,and some are, like, thirty five,
forty minutes. And I don't haveguests. It's just me rambling on
about a certain subject. Maybenext year, I'll start having
guests, but I couldn't wrap myhead around that this year. And
(50:22):
this year, I'll be for most ofmy podcasts, I'll be, coming
from, different places aroundthe country and around the
world.
I'll be in Ireland, England, andSpain for my book tour as well.
Wendy (50:33):
Wow. Check you out. That's like a a very cool book
tour you got going on. Yeah.
Rita (50:40):
It's, you good for you. What it wants. My next book, I'm
I speak a lot during the year,but I'm not gonna be doing this
type of book tour only one timefor this first book. My next
book's on canine cancer.
Wendy (50:54):
Okay. Well, Rita, thank you so much for coming on the
show and sharing all of thiswisdom. I really appreciate it.
Rita (51:02):
You are so welcome. Thanks for having me on.
Wendy (51:06):
I guess it's not surprising that if we take
better care of ourselves, ourdog friends will benefit greatly
too. Shocker. To get a copy ofRita's herbal guide, please
visit canineherbalist.com. Thatwraps up season seven of Lucid
Cafe. Thanks for going on thispodcast journey with me.
(51:27):
Whether you're a new listener ora regular listener, I so
appreciate you. I've alreadyscheduled like seven
conversations for next seasonand the subjects we'll be
covering are looking reallyintriguing so far. We'll be
exploring witchcraft and fairytales, consciousness and dreams,
shamanism, a unique take onastrology, and who knows what
(51:50):
else? I guess we'll find out. Sofor the time being, I'm wishing
you peace of mind and a happyheart.
I'll be back in the fall. Untilnext time.
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