It Takes a Team

This is a painting of our two dogs – Dunkin on the left and Petey on the right sharing a dog bed together when Petey was still with us.  These 2 “brothers from another mother” were the definition of “best buds” and when I saw them lying like this, I had to take a photo of them and paint it. 

It is a small painting – but it packs in a lot about the closeness of their relationship.

In my head, I always thought about the 2 of them in that painting looking like a Yin and Yang symbol.  Not only because of how they are intertwined, but also considering their fur colors. 

The painting was submitted for a Valentine’s themed art show at a local gallery, and a lovely woman purchased it as a reminder of her beautiful dog.

Sadly, we unexpectedly lost our Petey to cancer in 2019.  

But this story is about more than this painting.  Please stay with me -  I will come back to how this painting plays in.

Dunkin starts coughing…

The story I want to tell is about our trying to help our dog Dunkin (again the one on the left in the painting) get over a significant cough that quickly and unexpectedly developed in April 2023.  I first took him to an emergency veterinarian clinic to make sure it wasn’t Kennel Cough because I was leaving that week for a long-time planned trip.  The vet took x-rays, confirmed it wasn’t Kennel Cough, and assured me that Dunkin wasn’t contagious—our biggest concern since he’d be around other dogs.

So with that, I left on my trip. 

What does the holistic veterinarian say…

When I came back, Dunkin was still coughing so I then took him to our holistic veterinarian to make sure he hadn’t developed a new allergy and to see what we could do.  She suggested some supplements, which after some time helped, but didn’t take the cough completely away.

What does the conventional veterinarian say…

So after a couple of months without enough improvement, I took Dunkin to his conventional vet.  There they did bloodwork and more x-rays to see if anything had changed from his prior films.  They said the bloodwork looked good meaning he didn’t seem to having something like cancer, but that his lungs had a lot of inflammation.  With that, they gave him a diagnosis of Bronchitis and a course of antibiotics to see if that helped. 

If the antibiotics worked and his cough returned sometime after the course (indicating it wasn’t an allergy condition), then they would prescribe steroids for the rest of his life because they cannot “cure” the bronchitis, only treat the symptoms. 

I was certainly not thrilled with the idea of long-term steroid use, but we did put him on the antibiotics and he did improve while on them.  However, after a period of time, the persistent coughing returned.

Let’s use an animal communicator…

While we were working with our veterinarians, I also scheduled a session for Dunkin with an animal communicator we’ve worked with from time to time. (I’ll need to write a whole separate piece on intuitive animal communication—it’s a fascinating subject.) But for now, here’s a quick explanation: an animal communicator is someone who has developed their intuitive abilities to the point where they can have a back-and-forth exchange with an animal. It’s an incredible process that can offer meaningful insight into what an animal might be experiencing—physically, mentally and emotionally.

I chose this communicator because, in the past, she has very accurately relayed what is happening both physically and emotionally with our animals.

To further set the scenario, the communication takes place over the phone.  She is in her office and Dunkin was at home with us. The communicator would not be able to physically see or hear Dunkin before his reading.

Without knowing anything in advance about Dunkin’s health (she insists on having no prior information before her initial connection), she immediately picked up on congestion in his lungs and throat.

Later in the reading, she went on to say that he is experiencing a significant amount of “grief and sadness”. When we then told her about how Dunkin’s buddy Petey had passed several years earlier, she said Yes, that makes sense and said she saw them as a Yin and Yang pair with each other - 2 parts of one whole.  And that Dunkin was still carrying the sadness and grief of Petey's passing with him.

Now when she said the part about the Yin and Yang of Dunkin and Petey, I didn’t even connect the idea about the painting I had done until the next day when it popped into my mind. 

Her reading was an amazingly accurate description / connection about our 2 dogs' relationship.  The fact that she immediately detected Dunkin's physical condition gave me trust that what she said about his emotional state was very accurate as well.

OK so at this point, I was still looking for a course of action that would help Dunkin (and us as well frankly because we were getting NO sleep at night when his persistent coughing).

What does the veterinary acupuncturist say…

Prior to working with the communicator, I made an appointment with a mobile, veterinary acupuncturist we used years before for our dog Petey.   I was grateful she was still working in this way, and she was able to come to our home a few days after the session with the communicator. 

Using acupuncture to treat animals can be a very effective course of action for healing. Similar to how people can benefit from acupuncture’s ability to work on the energy flow within one’s body (again a whole other post is needed for this), animals take to it quite readily.

Before treatment, a veterinarian acupuncturist does an assessment that describes the energetic condition of the patient.  The description of conditions has very different phrasing than what is generally used in conventional medicine.  Based on the assessment, an acupuncturist will generally prescribe herbal supplements if needed and a 20 to 30 min session with needle placements.

Above is a typical look from Dunkin whenever we try something new with him... The acupuncture needles have light blue ends on them so you can easily find them when finished.

Here is a bit more relaxed pose which usually happens after a few minutes of the needles being in.  Hopefully the needles with their light blue ends can be seen across his body in this photo.

Our acupuncturist is a conventionally trained emergency room veterinarian, and was very interested to hear Dunkin's bloodwork and x-ray results.  After evaluating Dunkin via eastern protocols, her assessment was he had a “Chi Deficiency” and a “Yin Deficiency”.   

When she said “Yin Deficiency” my ears totally perked up to tell the acupuncturist that the animal communicator used similar phrasing in that Dunkin was experiencing a lot of sadness and grief because his close friend, with whom he was like Yin and Yang, had passed. 

In my mind, I went back to the painting and thinking “Yes, he is missing his YIN!”

Working with the diagnosis…

The acupuncturist said that was really interesting because “grief”, from an eastern / energetic perspective, is held in the lungs.  So not that grief causes an ailment, but grief can weaken the lungs allowing unwanted things to settle there.

The acupuncturist prescribed some supplements and did a series of treatments over the course of 6 months to see if there could be improvement in both his conditions (the Yin and Chi Deficiencies).

I appreciated her open attitude about whether it would help or not, and gratefully it did work amazingly well.

Dunkin’s bronchitis did resolve, he did not need to go on steroids, and we are all sleeping much better.

Upon sharing this information, we (I, the communicator and acupuncturist) all thought the connection just seemed amazing and confirming as to what was potentially going on with Dunkin’s persistent cough.

Summary

It takes a team…

In my mind, this time with Dunkin's illness shows how you sometimes need to take a multi-disciplined approach to solving an issue.

• Bloodwork and x-rays from the conventional veterinarian gave us valuable clarity in understanding both what was happening and what wasn’t.

• Ensuring proper nutrition with the holistic veterinarian is always a critical first step in supporting overall health.

• Insight from an animal communicator can be surprisingly helpful in understanding what your pet may be experiencing.

• Holistic or energetic treatments, such as acupuncture, can be highly effective, often addressing the root cause of an issue without the risk of side effects.

It was a lot of effort, and thankfully our pet insurance covered a helpful portion of the cost (another future topic).  By exploring these different options, I was deeply grateful that we were able to avoid putting Dunkin on long-term medication for this issue.

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