Does YOUR Mood Affect Your Dog's Health?

Hello this is Krista with episode #137 on the Wag Out Loud podcast. Do you feed your dog goat milk? Well, I think it's an amazing superfood. Your dog's body can digest goat milk in about 20 minutes, because the fat molecules are about 1/5 the size of those and cow's milk, which makes it easily digestible. And it's why even dogs with digestive issues may tolerate it, give it a try.

Welcome to the Wag Out Loud pawdcast, where we are obsessed with bringing you helpful tips on canine health care, nutrition, and overall wellbeing. If you'd like to support the show, check out the amazing online events, products and resources that I personally recommend on the Wag Out Loud website. I'm your host, Krista and I'm super excited to be bringing you yet another tail wagging episode.

Dr. Melissa Walker is an integrative holistic veterinarian in Seattle who has worked in the animal care field for 28 years.  She is passionate about the mind-body connection and how our energy affects our pet's health.  She practices acupuncture, herbal medicine, and Chinese food therapy, among other modalities.  She also is a certified yoga teacher, meditates regularly, and has a deep spiritual practice.  She celebrates the human animal bond and strives to empower you to have healthier relationships with your pets.

Hi there dog lovers, and welcome to another learning opportunity here on the Wag Out Loud pawdcast. Today Dr. Melissa Walker is going to talk to us about does your mood affect your dog's health? So Dr. Melissa, thank you so much for being here. I would love it if you could introduce yourself and tell us why are you so passionate about the mind body connection, and how our energy affects our dog's health.

Thank you so much, Krista. I'm so excited to be here and talk about this topic, because I am extremely passionate about it. I actually started back in 1993, working in the veterinary field. And so I have had a lot of experience witnessing interactions between pets and their people. And what I noticed is that our moods and our health and the way that we are really does affect our pets. And I'm excited to kind of share some of my insights around that and offer some potential things that may be helpful to increase, you know, the relationship that we have with our pets, because what I witness is that our health can actually affect their health, too.

Absolutely, yeah. Well, before we dive into this, I know that dogs are sentient animals, meaning that they can experience both positive and negative emotions like pleasure, comfort, fear, things like anxiety, and a poor mental state, where a dog is regularly experiencing negative emotions from us, you know, if we're stressed out, that has been proven to show poor health on their part, and I think a study published on or actually in the publication Animal Cognition, that dogs can actually smell emotional states. So why don't we start with energy, because we're all made of energy. And I know that you have a lot to share about that.

Absolutely, we are all made of energy, the earth’s made of energy, our pets are made of energy. And we're made of energy. And we actually radiate as well as our pets, an electromagnetic field. And the largest field that we radiate is actually generated from our hearts. And you might think it comes from our head, because we spend a lot of time there. But really, the greatest field, it's 100 times more strong coming from our heart, from an electrical standpoint, what we're putting out in the world, versus what our brain is putting out in the world. And then also we can actually attract things from this magnetic point of view 1000 times stronger back into our hearts. And so we have a negative and a positive terminal, just like a magnet on the head we’re positive and you know, kind of in our groin, we're negative and we actually circulate energy, and that energy can be shifted based on our emotional states, our physical states and our mental states so our pets can actually feel that energy, we can actually feel that energy from our pets. And we also emit things like chemicals like what we were just mentioning, and we actually there are actual chemicals that we emit when we are stressed and in fear. And dogs as you know, they can smell everything. And they can actually sense that and they can also witness our body posture and our facial expressions. And so there's really no hiding our emotional state from our pet. They can, they can feel it, they can smell it, they can see it, and that's okay. But it's just something to be aware of, especially if we are in prolonged negative emotional states because that can be a drain over time, that's one of the things to be aware of.

Okay. So we all know when we get sad, our dogs can sense it, and they, you know, they put their head in their in our laps, or they just want to be calm and be with us. Right? I was going somewhere with this, oh, if somebody is depressed, like constantly in a state of depression, that dog is inevitably going to become depressed as well, correct?

Yeah, I mean, usually, there are some really resilient pets that just have a happy go lucky attitude, you know, regardless, but a lot, a lot of the time, and I see this more depression, yes, but more with anxiety that, you know, it's very hard. If you're constantly even if you think about our human to human interactions, you are constantly around someone who is very anxious or depressed, you know, it does definitely affect you. And you can even walk into a room and feel that so like, the animals definitely do pick up on that. And for depending on their personality, in Chinese medicine, we look at the different five elements, and there's different types of personality, we've got fire types, which are usually kind of joyful and exuberant, but on the the unbalanced end of that they can know kind of exhibit anxiety, that wood types that are usually kind of motivated and like to do things by, you know, they can kind of tend toward frustration, and then there's like the spleen types, which is like for digestion, they actually, you know, they can be very empathetic, like you were talking about putting their head in your lap and being kind to you, but they also kind of really take on worry. And that can that can actually affect their digestion. And so that's one of the cool things that I love about Chinese medicine, is that we don't delineate just physical symptoms. And so this is just a digestive problem, kind of look at the emotional aspects as well. Is there worry in the household is this, you know, is the dog worrying? Are you worrying? or things like that, and in shifting those sorts of emotional states can actually have a positive effect on our health.

You bring up a good point, especially during COVID, when, you know, we were spending so much more time with our dogs, that if they are our teacher, our family, our therapist, you know, if we are seeking stress relief from them, are we giving them the outlets that they need? Which, what would those be?

Yeah, and there's balance, right? In every relationship, there's balance. So there's, you know, that's one of the beautiful things about having a pet, it's like, You're okay, you know, you're allowed to have a bad day. And, you know, as human beings, we have, you know, challenging times in our life, it's more about how long does that prolong right? Is it? Is it a bad mood? Or is this going, you know, kind of coming back into your temperament person, no personality, and yeah, it can be, it can be a big strain. One of one of the interesting things that I, I noticed, because I do house calls in Seattle, and one of the interesting things that I noticed during COVID times is that I always had muzzles, but I usually kept them in my car. But during times of high stress, around election time around things, when there were big news events and things like that, I actually felt like I needed to keep my muzzles in my bag, because I was noticing there was actually a little more aggression being exhibited in some of my patients that wouldn't normally exhibit aggression. And so, I just found that an interesting kind of observation during the challenging times of COVID. And, yeah, so that's one of the things that I recognized. And then, you know, over time is this, you know, has been as collective, you know, lately so there's been a lot of stress, kind of, you know, kind of worrying about the future and, you know, wondering what's going on, and the animals definitely are picking up on that I'm noticing more anxiety and, you know, kind of drains to their drains to their health. So there are ways to kind of approach that though. So that's the exciting thing. It's not all doom and gloom.

So we should spend more time with our dogs, let them be dogs, let them play on walks, let them sniff you know, make it their walk. Try not to speak on your phone while you're walking your dog because it's a great bonding time for both of you. Anything else that you can think of that we really need to focus on with our dogs’ stress release.

Absolutely, I mean, that's one of the joys of having a dog right, they show us how to have fun and to not take life so seriously, right. So that's actually like one of the biggest key things I think of having having dogs, right. And so like, if we can look to them to kind of guide us in that way, but exercise is awesome doing it together with your pet, even better, they're touching the, you know, the ground with their feet. So they're automatically grounding, which is actually helping their energetic field, if you can do the same, and take your shoes off and get in the sand and sit under a tree that will definitely help your energetic field as well. laughing, doing, I think you mentioned some of these things, yoga, eating well, and making sure you're taking care of yourself, they love you, they want you to, you know, they want you to be feeling good. And one of the most powerful things that we can do, actually to, that we can do to really kind of take care of our emotional state is one, a gratitude practice, just kind of coming back into ourselves and our heart and looking around and really just taking note of what is good, and what we have to be thankful for. And that may be them, you know, like, you know them just being in our life and expressing that to them, because they will feel that love, they will feel that gratitude and data, the you know, even the smartest dog can't really read your mind, but they can feel your intention and your love. And that is really, really grateful. And being grateful that anything, they can feel that. And then the other thing is just like really, you know, taking good deep belly breaths. Like if you're noticing that your mind is spinning and out of you know, out of control. You're looping thoughts and things like that just one of the best ways to kind of get back in your body is to take nice, deep belly breaths, and actually take a longer exhale than your inhale. I actually have some clients and pets that like they meditate and the pets actually look, you know, the dogs and I've definitely heard this story with a bunny as well. They look forward to it. I have a friend. And I love the bunny because the bunny will actually like stamp their little feet like pop, you know. I mean, like it's time to meditate now. And so our pets actually try to you know, they're they're our teachers. They're like, hey, let's have fun. Let's walk away from the work. You know, a lot of us are sitting at the desk all day. And you know, great way to kind of move your energy and it's to go out for a little walk or a little bit of play time. And being really actively present during that time can make a huge difference in the quality and the impact.

Wow, great tips. And yes, Winston and I do meditate together every morning. And that's how we start our day. And I highly recommend that we use the calm app in case anybody is wondering. best thing ever! guided meditations or just music or nature sounds. It's really powerful. Well, Dr. Melissa, we are at a time where we need to take a quick commercial break so we will be right back.

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Welcome back everyone! we are with Dr. Melissa Walker. And we are learning about how our energy and emotions affect the health of our dogs. And it's just fascinating. So Dr. Melissa, I know that there was a Swedish study back in 2019. I remember reading about this, where they did a study of hair cortisol of dogs. Can you tell us a little bit about the outcome?

Yeah, that was a really interesting study, they researched 58 people with their dogs. I think it was primarily Border Collies and Shetland Sheep dogs. And what they did is they measured the cortisol, which is essentially stress hormone, and they measured that in the hair. So over, you know, it kind of shows stress over a period of time, not just an isolated event. And one of the really interesting and fascinating outcomes of the study was that they recognized that the owner’s personality, the people's personality actually had a lot more of an effect on the dog's cortisol levels than vice versa. Meaning that even if the pets were, you know, neurotic, or stressed, it really didn't affect their people too much. But if the people were stressed, and I think they use the words in the, in the thing, neuroticism, which I looked up to mean mental, emotional, and physical reactions that are drastic and irrational conscientiousness and openness, it really did have a significant statistically impact on the the cortisol concentration. And this is describing, you know, just suggested that the, you know, the pets really do mirror, our emotional state. And interestingly, when I think about this, as a doctor, you know, I look at what cortisol does in the system. And cortisol is great, if you have a, you know, have a life or death situation, you really need to like, move fast and mobilize your energy to you know, get out of harm's way, but prolonged stress, over time can actually, you know, suppress our immune system. And so, you know, we have things that, you know, we want to have a strong immune system. Over time, actually, cortisol can weaken our connective tissues, and so we've got dogs that are outside playing, and it might be a little bit more likely for them to sprain or strain, you know, a ligament or tendon with prolonged stress, just because the tissues themselves can get weaker, prolonged cortisol, actually, we have to make it in our body. And so it actually picks some of the building blocks that we might use to make hormones so it can actually affect our hormonal balance and their hormonal balance. And, you know, with that can, you know, change the behavior and with immune suppression, we can see an increase in cancer risk and, and actually increasing inflammation, which is, you know, a large problem in our pets, so, so cortisol really does, you know, in the long term have an impact on overall health in so many ways. And so, so I found that study interesting, and just really kind of thinking about what the ramifications of an increased cortisol level could be.

Yeah, that makes sense. Interesting. Well, I know, during the break, you were telling me that you have a story about a dog that was seizing, do you want to share that?

Sure, yeah, I have a had a patient who, you know, Great Pyrenees dog. And so they are programed to be hyper vigilant, they are great guard dogs and really, really sweet dog and this dog had a history of seizures. And you know, we were you know, doing a lot of different things like acupuncture, herbal medicine and traditional kind of therapies and things and this dog’s owners were great, they were you know, they were really, you know, they're present for the dog, they were doing everything that I asked them to, and so there's generally genuinely no kind of no judgment or blame around this, but there was a very distinct kind of observation that when when times were really stressful that this dog would actually would be fine, and then actually have seizures. And so it was it was pretty remarkable to like, be able to witness that like when when we're really stressed, you know, this dog would actually have seizures that were a little bit, you know, were more difficult to control and that when times were a little bit easier, this the the seizure activity went down. And so that's the kind of, you know, fascinating to me, that we can you know, that our emotions can have that much impact. And, obviously, there's no way to prove the cause and effect, but it was definitely an observation that we all witnessed and so for just, you know, kind of knowing that this is another kind of encouragement to take care of ourselves and to manage stress.

Yes, absolutely. Wow, that's fascinating. Well, you mentioned before we talked about what cortisol does to the body and you said that it could change behavior. So if over time dogs experience stress and anxiety could they become aggressive or possibly fearful you know, are those the changes of behavior you're thinking about?

Yeah, I think that is I do think that that is a is a possibility and I think that's part of what I was witnessing during you know, this this whole COVID lockdown actually, because this is one of the things that as humans we the way that our brain works like we can look back into the past and you know kind of you know, be depressed but we can also be worried in the future whereas dogs don't really kind of worry about their you don't really worry about their job or their finances or politics or anything like that and so when we're generating these thoughts in our brain it actually produces these chemicals that like we're fearful right and normally fear in you know in the wild is a short lived thing like I said you know we get out of yeah fight or flight there's a tiger and you know there's a tiger we have to run, we got to hide, you know fight and if that's prolonged right, you know when you think about that okay, we’ve got to run right okay. Oh we're stressed and you know that can you know manifest in that way where there's you know, there's pacing there's you know, avoidance there's there's things like that Oh, we’ve got to fight like I'm gonna like you know, kind of I call it you know, like I'm gonna beat you up before you you know, you get to me and so there's this hyper vigilance that can happen where there's just like kind of reactivity and then there's there's freeze there are you know, there are pets that can kind of just be like whoa, this is too much I don't know how to like my nervous system can't handle this I'm just gonna kind of like kind of like you know, isolate and kind of hide this so there's different ways we all have our own you know, personalities and stresses and how they react to it, but absolutely a constant state of fear or stress, you know, can result in aggression, just you know, because we don't feel secure.

That makes sense. And I know since you practice Chinese medicine that these negative emotions directly affect organs, our organs and our dog's organs. Can you briefly touch on that?

Sure, I think I think I mentioned a few earlier but with worry. So our spleen and our stomach that in Chinese medicine, the spleen really kind of relates to digestion and so with with worry, that can really affect digestion and one of the ways that I see that expressing itself is you know, I have a lot of patients that come to me because they have either chronic health issues, you know, cancer, things that other people can't figure out. And you know, it's been a long road and one of the things that I see sometimes is you know, making recommendations like feed this or take this and you know, in rightly so we should be you know, you know, making sure that we're doing the right thing but like if there is worry like if you're if you're like oh I don't know if this food is going to be good or Oh like I'm not sure if this is going to work and you put that food in the bowl for your pet while you're worried is like it's going to upset their tummy, they're going to pick up on that worry and be like Oh, I should be worried right? And we can't actually digest properly even if it's the best nutritious foods possible if we're in a state of worry. And so you know, one of the things that you know when you are putting down the food having that intention You know, this is for your you know, this is for your enjoyment This is for your nourishment and this is you know for your highest good and and even just that intention in itself and just like letting yourself off the hook because you are genuinely when you're feeding your pet, you're you are genuinely doing the best you can with, you know, with the resources you have with the knowledge you have and just like accepting that as truth, it's like I'm doing the best I can I'm doing the best for my pet. And you know, I anticipate that this is going to be good, it can actually change how they digest. And then yeah, I know, I know and know and you know, the lungs actually hold grief and sadness and so you know, when you're sad and taking that deep breath and elimination and so, you know, if we've got a prolonged kind of sadness and grief for that and I do see that sometimes especially with you know, losing Losing a pet or, you know, losing, you know, you know, when people go back to work, you know, losing their people, you know. Exactly you know, and you know, that's actually the lungs and the colon in Chinese medicine and so you know, we can have elimination kind of stressed colitis and things like that, that can kind of manifest and so kind of taking the day, like, if we're having a good day to day and this is, you know, just changing attitude and mindset can actually have an impact. Fear affects the urinary system, kidneys. And anxiety really affects the heart, cardiovascular system and the hormonal system. And anger, anger and frustration is really interesting, definitely see this quite prevalently in our animal population, but also in our human population. And, and really, the liver does a lot of really amazing things in the body. You know, from a kind of Western perspective, it's our major detoxing organ, it stores blood, makes clotting factors, it does a lot of really, I mean, it has, like, I don't even know, like 60 functions at least. And so it's really, you know, a busy, busy organ. in the Chinese paradigm. We look at it as coursing the chi, well, what does that mean? That means that it circulates the energy in the body. And when energy gets stuck in the body, we can have discomfort, we can have pain, you can have immobility and also detoxing emotions and things like that and so when we do have like prolonged periods of frustration and stress. I think they and anger, you know, they may be mirroring that back for us sometimes. Right? But it really can affect on a systemic level, our ability to circulate our circulate our energy, which can actually result in pain and issues with detoxification and, and our energy. So the liver in Chinese medicine, the liver can what we call overact on the spleen, so it can get so upset that we you know, negatively affect our digestion. And really, this does happen with pets as well. I always say we, but I always think we're all together.

Oh my gosh, well, this has just been mind blowing. And I'm sure there's so much more to it. But hopefully we've given people something to think about. Please do your further research. You know, your dog is intuitive and sensitive to your moods and reactions. So as Dr. Melissa said, self care, very important. If we show up in a good way in a good mood with great thoughts and intentions, our dogs are going to pick up on that energy. So Dr. Melissa, this has been amazing. Where can everyone find out more information about you and your practice?

Yes, thank you, Krista. And I love that you're meditating in the morning, which is awesome. I love it. Yes, you can find more about me my my practice website is www.vvcseattle.com or www.drmelissawalker.com . And I have a little pop up there for my newsletter. And please let me know any questions that you have any topics that you're interested in, I would love to hear any feedback and, and really, I'm interested as well as like, you know, do you share any symptoms with your pets? Or do you notice any changes when you're stressed? Like I'm really looking to be able to support all of you as pet owners, the best ways that I can so any feedback is welcome and encouraged that that's the best place to find me right now.

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All right, fantastic. Well, Dr. Melissa, we're gonna have to have you on again, because you have so much to share, and we really appreciate it. So thank you for being with us today.

Thank you so much, and I would love that.

Thanks again to the team at The Original Mine Pet Platter for sponsoring this episode.  Check out the ultimate mealware for all dog foods by going to https://minepetplatter.com/and be sure to use the code WOL10 for 10% off!

Thanks for listening. You'll find some helpful links in the show notes and if you enjoy the show, please be sure to follow and listen for free on your favorite podcast app. And please, please share your feedback. Visit WagOutLoud.com for great product recommendations with discounts, amazing online events and fantastic resources. That's also where to visit our Bark About It page where you can suggest topics, guests or products. Be advised that this show offers health and nutritional information and is designed for educational purposes only. You're encouraged to do your own research and should not rely on this information as a substitute for nor does it replace professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. If you have any concerns or questions about your dog's health, you should always consult a veterinarian or a nutrition expert. Have a tail wagging day and we'll catch you next time.

Hey Winston was that another tail wagging episode?