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Heavy Metal Detox For Dogs: Why It’s Important!

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John Moore almost died from mercury poisoning in 1974. Since then, he has become a leading mercury and dental health researcher and has traveled a long road looking for answers to mercury poisoning and spreading a warning.

He now refers to mercury as the planet’s most ubiquitous contaminant, a base poison that really rose at the start of the industrial age as a pollutant, is used as a preservative in making plastics and is in practically everything we make from concrete to medicines.

What do we do in the face of such ubiquitous “base poisons” – heavy metals like mercury, aluminum and lead? I share Moore’s mantra: Learn to live a life of detoxification!

How do we detox? This is the million-dollar question because there are millions of us who need to be doing this every day.

When we’re surrounded by heavy metals in our air, our water and our foods, embarking on an overall lifestyle detox is overwhelming to say the least. Remember a journey of a thousand miles begins with just one step. Take it one step at a time and day by day.

An every day detox begins by eating whole foods, organic – and even biodynamic – if possible. And for our fourlegged friends?

A species appropriate raw diet. The raw meaty bones should be the joints and not the long bones unless purchased from a company that tests their bones for heavy metals.

Glyphosate: The Hidden Poison In Your Dog’s Diet

It isn’t just the heavy metal mercury but the use of glyphosate (sold under the trade name Roundup) that needs to be addressed.

Foods are another form of heavy metal poisoning so we need to be focused on choosing GMO-free foods.

Besides naming all the pet foods that contained high levels of the herbicide, he discusses the addition of sodium nitrite to foods as a preservative; in the presence of glyphosate, sodium nitrite is deadly and a carcinogen.

Corn, soy, sugar beets, cotton, canola, all genetically modified, use the glyphosate as a dessicant prior to harvesting. Wheat barley and sorghum are sprayed with glyphosate. These foods are not only fed to our dogs, they are fed to the food animals all of us eat!

MIT researcher Dr Stephani Seneff has authored The Destructive Effects of Heavy Metals and Glyphosate. Glyphosate, it turns out, is a major driver of disease.

This toxin stays in bones – our bones – but also in the bones of the food-producing animals where our “raw meaty bones” are obtained to feed our dogs. My colleague the late Dr Gloria Dodd evaluated the presence of metals in pet foods and aluminum is one of the metals found in high levels.

Dr Seneff talks about the aluminum accumulation in the brain and the synergistic promotion by glyphosate. Not only do heavy metals sequester in bones, but so does the glyphosate and this is a staggeringly toxic combination. Mercury and aluminum are all the more toxic in the context of glyphosate.

Vaccines become much more toxic because glyphosate inhibits detoxification organs from eliminating these chemical toxins. This combination restricts the liver’s ability to activate vitamin D and therefore accounts for the broad-spectrum vitamin D deficiency we’re seeing.

Without the right stuff, we have leaky guts, allergies, overgrowth of harmful pathogens, celiac disease, SIBO (small intestine bacterial overgrowth), and harmful pathogens like C. difficile. The bottom line is that heavy metals like mercury, in the presence of the toxin and herbicide glyphosate, means the toxins are 1,000 times more toxic than they are in isolation.

That’s why detox for dogs is so important.

11 Ways To Combat Your Dog’s Exposure To Heavy Metals:

1.  Heal Leaky Gut First

Humans and our pets in bad shape with leaky gut will have allergies, especially to the things they’ve been eating. That’s because the gut was in fact leaking back into the blood stream which causes a sensitivity (allergy) as the body reacts to these invaders.

Much more information about healing leaky gut can be found in the May-June 2016 issue of Dogs Naturally.

Suffice it to say, you must remove the trauma (vaccines, processed food, etc.), support the liver; rebalance with prebiotics, probiotics and digestive enzymes; replenish with a healthy whole food diet along with aloe, slippery elm and marshmallow root; and restore with homeopathic remedies that support trauma and heal the body.

For those like myself with leaky gut and digestive issues, I use bone broths and inner leaf fillet of aloe for a week to help repair the gut. I advise using Stockton One aloe because it’s hand filleted for the inner leaf and otherwise unprocessed, and shipped frozen.

I’d give a 60 pound dog about 15 to 20 cc of this aloe by mouth twice a day. Adjust up or down depending on the size of your dog.

For the bone broth, use whole chickens, lots of joints like necks and feet, and pig bones for their chondroitin, which is very healing for the gut. Metals don’t generally store in the joints so also use a hock or stifle.

Place the bones in a stockpot and cover with water; add three to four tablespoons of organic apple cider vinegar, bring to a boil and simmer for at least 24 hours. Strain the broth (throw away the bones), cool and refrigerate. Fat may harden on the top and you can remove it before feeding. Give your dog a few tablespoons daily with food or as a separate snack.

Caution: Do not use high fat bones like marrow bones or pork bones for dogs with pancreatitis or Exocrine Pancreatic Insufficiency (EPI).

This combination is the best detox I know of for the GI tract. After a week of detoxing, I also supplement with fermented vegetables, which you can buy or make yourself.

(Are you looking for a natural product to heal your dog’s leaky gut syndrome? Visit our store)

2.  Vitamin D

I learned in herbal certification class the importance of vitamin D in “tightening up the weave” of the gastrointestinal (GI) tract, especially where it gets down to a single cell of thickness between the mucosa of the digestive tract and the bloodstream that is home to our antibodies.

With adequate natural sunlight, your body can produce its own vitamin D but dogs don’t absorb much vitamin D from the sun, so they need to obtain it via whole foods like liver from grass-fed cows, whole raw eggs from free-range chickens and wild-caught fish like sardines, tuna, mackerel and salmon. Remember, your dog should have organ meats at least once a week, or as 10 percent of his diet.

3.  Prevent And Treat Candida

If candida is present it’s probably due to heavy metals as it will eat its weight in heavy metals. It’s important not to aggravate candida as it can release more than 60 toxic substances including the heavy metals and ethanols.

You must remove the cause of the poisoning or all treatments will be moot. When you treat for candida, don’t feed the beast. Get rid of the carbs, sugar and grains that shouldn’t be a part of the carnivore diet in the first place.

4.  Provide Clean, Filtered Water

You need to provide your dog with clean drinking water, preferably mountain spring water that has been put through a filter.

In this age of industrial pollution – coal burning plants, chemtrails and purple rain – you need to be cleaning your water source.  To find out more about the hidden dangers in your dogs water click here.

5.  Boost These Nutrients

This is a list of critical nutrients that are made deficient in the face of mercury poisoning:

  • Antioxidant vitamins A, C, E and vitamin D
  • The complex of B vitamins, zinc, magnesium and selenium.

Coincidentally, these are also important to help treat the TH 2 polarization that happens with vaccinations.

Good sources of these nutrients that you can add to your dog’s meals include:

  • Vitamin A: liver, yellow and orange fruits and vegetables, dark leafy greens, eggs
  • Vitamin C: berries, citrus, red bell peppers (or, in supplement form, berry powders, ½ tsp per 25 lbs of weight)
  • Vitamin E: grains, seeds and their oils, wheat germ oil
  • Vitamin D: liver, eggs, oily fish like sardines, mackerel, salmon B vitamins: liver, venison (or supplement with moringa leaf powder, ½ tsp per 25 lbs)
  • Zinc: red meat, poultry
  • Magnesium: dark leafy greens, seeds, fish
  • Selenium: oily fish, grass fed beef and beef liver, chicken, egg
  • Turmeric: is a powerful supplement to help treat and prevent gene damage caused by toxins of heavy metals and glyphosate. Give 1/8 to ¼ tsp per 10 pounds of body weight per day, combined with fat (coconut oil is a good choice) and some fresh ground black pepper for better absorption.

6.  No Fake Food Or Vitamins

I am now a firm believer that the use of chemical synthetic, isolates and imitation vitamins are NOT a long-term solution for living a life of detoxification.

Synthetic vitamins can be as dangerous – if not more so – than the use of drugs. That is why I formulate intelligent supplements from whole food sources. I supplement with real whole foods and add gentle chelators like open cell wall chlorella and use super foods like spirulina.

7.  Greens, Minerals and Herbs

The use of juvenile grasses is very detoxifying and provides the magnesium necessary to undergo a detox. Sea vegetables are used as sources of calcium, iodine and trace minerals.

Herbs like curcumin, ginger and cayenne are potent antioxidants, and ginger and curcumin are amazing in DNA repair.

Green leafy vegetables like spinach are a must and along with broccoli, are capable of going inside cells and turning off the switched-on inflammatory pathways.

Blend or lightly steam veggies to increase digestibility, then add one tablespoon to the dinner of smaller dogs, or three to four tablespoons for larger dogs.

Broccoli sprouts are a potent anti-inflammatory and you can buy the sprouts at most grocery stores, or purchase a concentrated powder; this latter is actually the most effective delivery method.

8.  Probiotics And More

Probiotics help restore healthy gut bacteria and are responsible for so many things, from gene repair to the synthesis of nutrients like vitamin B 12.

Probiotics are also very helpful in removing mercury from the body if the mercury doesn’t kill them first. Cultivating a gut garden of beneficial bugs is one of my favorite ways to get my patients healthy.

Probiotics from whole foods include kefir and fermented vegetables. Add a teaspoon or two to the dinner of small dogs, or as much as a tablespoon or two for larger dogs.

You can also give your dog a high quality refrigerated probiotic supplement. If it’s made for animals, follow the package directions; otherwise, for human products, assume the dose is for a 150 pound person and adjust for your dog’s weight.

Amino acids, the primary building blocks of proteins, are also an integral part of the detoxification process. Dogs need a range of amino acids found in different protein sources so feeding your dog a variety of meats as well as fish and eggs will provide these nutrients.

Digestive enzymes are a good way to boost health and to prop up your heavy metal damaged patient while they are recovering. Our carnivore pets will need enzymes as well to utilize the plant foods given as medicine. Your dog’s enzyme supplement should include a wide variety of enzymes.

Cellulase is a plant enzyme and one that I make sure is part of the detoxification plan. It’s not an enzyme the dogs would even make, but it’s an enzyme needed to help digest cellulose from plant material. It also just so happens to help pull mercury out of the body.

Since mercury destroys our enzymes in general I like to supplement with a lot of catalysts like this. Look for plant enzyme supplements that contain cellulase.  You can read more about the importance of probiotics here.

9.  Feed Probiotics With Prebiotics

Prebiotics are the preferred food sources for the probiotics. Prebiotics occur naturally in a number of common foods with high fiber content including cruciferous vegetables such as broccoli, Brussels sprouts and spinach. I also use carrots, beets and spirulina for the beneficial bugs I want to cultivate in the gut.

When you cultivate the right garden of beneficial bugs and probiotics, the health of the gut is established and restores detoxification ability as well as assimilation of critical nutrients. Add a teaspoon or two for small dogs; a tablespoon or two or three for larger dogs.

10.  Raw Food For Detox

I can’t tell you how much I really hate fake foods. Get rid of commercially processed foods and don’t use chemical synthetic vitamins.

Go for raw and whole foods, add fermented foods and supplement intelligently with whole food based supplements.

Just getting the dog on a good raw whole food diet and off commercial, processed food is detoxing. It’s even better if the food is from organic sources and grass fed animals, and even better if it’s biodynamic.

11.  Glandulars

Glandulars are a must-have and I source mine from neonatal animals from grass-fed mothers and not from slaughterhouses where industrially raised older animals are often the victims of lots of drugs, hormones and vaccinations.

I also found that large populations of cows were being fed candy corn during a bad hay year! Seriously!

I can’t imagine how screwed up a cow is going to be when industrially raised to the point they are line fed candy corn with all that high fructose corn syrup that includes – guess what? MERCURY!

Is Detox Working?

As the body detoxifies, it is not uncommon to experience flu-like symptoms including headache, joint and muscle pain, body aches, sore throat, general malaise, sweating, chills, nausea or other symptoms.

This is known as the Herxheimer Reaction and it is short-term, from days to a few weeks. Detoxing in your dog can mean discharging from ears, eyes, skin, rectum – some unsavory stuff.

If the animal is really toxic the discharges will be more extreme – like diarrhea. I’m seeing fewer extreme cases as more people feed their dogs raw, species-appropriate diets and minimize vaccinations.

What you see with detox for dogs can be amazing: old dogs getting off the couch and joining back into activities, more cognitive function and awareness, more life or spark to their being.

Lipomas shrink down, coats get better and grow in shinier and the skin gets healthy. As our largest organ, the skin is reflective of the immune system as a whole. Eyes get clearer and there is regression of lenticular cloudiness.

This provides some essential basics to begin a detox. If you can only make subtle changes that helps. An every day gentle detox will be able to keep your pets healthier.

Of course, when I individualize a detoxification program for a patient I can go into greater detail with protocols specific to each case. Working with someone knowledgeable ensures there is someone to handle a crisis like diarrhea with homeopathy or some other natural remedies.

Detox For Dogs Is An Every Day Practice

If there is one thing I would impart as a final word it would be to start adding these steps so you can detox yourself and your pets every day. We’re no longer living in a world where you can take clean or safe for granted. It is better to face the facts and know that reversing chronic disease is a lifetime process.

  • Avoid chemicals and toxins in every way: household cleaners, body products and lawn care. Grow your own food or get to know your local farmer.
  • Become diligent in your sourcing for clean, unprocessed food. Learn about biodynamic farming and step up from organic to biodynamic.
  • Don’t allow the dysregulation of your immune system or that of your four-legged companion with unsafe and unnecessary vaccinations and drugs.
  • Spend time in the sunshine. There is a host of nutrition that comes from the sun.
  • Exercise is vital. You don’t purge spent mitochondria or make new ones without it. Your lymphatic system won’t work without it. Your brain doesn’t work without it.
  • Make friends with beneficial bugs through pre- and probiotics and enzymes. Learn to ferment and sprout and implement both of these nutritious foods today. These are for the whole family, two-legged and four-legged.

It sounds simplistic but it’s one foot in front of the other, step by step. Every step you take makes the next one easier toward a life of ongoing detoxification.

5 minutes a day. Healthier Dog.

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