A Dog’s Nine Lives…or at least two…

Hey, ya’ll…Thanks for being here at our NEW website. I hope you have taken time to look around and feel at-home. Please let us know how we can make you more comfortable by providing the content that satisfies your needs and interests the most. There is so much more to our site than this Update (blog) section. In fact, I have no desire to be a blogger. I’ll leave that to the folks who study that kind of thing and thrive on it. I am just a wife, mama, friend who wants to share life and maybe pass along an idea or two. Some weeks I may make an attempt at insightfulness and others, I may just chat with you—kinda like if we were swinging on one of our front porch swings. If something inspires you, then all glory to God. If a topic is of no interest to you, then check back next time. As a family, we just share our likes and projects—which happen to be the Heritage Ways.

 

Since this little section of our site isn’t intended to be a blog with such insightful material so as to alter your life to the very core, I will often just kinda hang out with you and provide an update on…..well, just our lives–the simple acts of living and loving.

 

Loving. Yep, we fell in love with a sweet Golden puppy one Mother’s Day when visiting friends in Beech Grove, TN. They graciously allowed us to bring her home and that was in 2007. Young Morgan claimed her as “his” dog. Homerlean is her name. She is supposed to be dead. Poor thing.

As we were headed out for Annual Family Week-end events last year (2017) we noticed her odd behavior, swollen belly and lethargy. Two of our Bigs hauled her off to the local vet and said they’d just catch up with us at the bowling alley. You see, we had just buried our other beloved dog, a loyal Great Pyrenees, a couple of years prior. Chrissy and Homerlean were adopted sisters and loved each other so. The final act of Chrissy was to lick Homerlean on the face before she died. The thought of more dog cancer put a damper on our spirits.

 

The fellows met us at the bowling alley after their trip to the vet. Now, let me just say right now that we respect and appreciate our local vet. He is kind, thorough and very sympathetic. The guys relayed to us the vet’s report. Tumor. He didn’t know exactly what kind but x-rays indicated it was large. He didn’t offer her a good prognosis and suggested that a $900 surgery would need to be performed to even give her a chance. No guarantees even with that procedure. Her activity and playing with other animals and people may even cause the tumor to rupture, causing an ugly death, he warned.

 

Well, surgery was not an option for us. Remembering once that this doc had told me he felt that commercial cat and dog food was a main contributor to feline and canine cancers, I set out to make Homerlean my project, a test case. I had dabbled in this type of research in years past but dove into it now to help our Homerlean. And I am not even a dog-lover. But, my kids are and I love them, so that’s how that works. 🙂

Here was my game plan (with Little Miss Homemaker’s assistance)…

• Brought Homerlean inside for a couple of months to decrease activity. We had a VERY active German Shepherd-Rottweiler puppy outside and had the fear that the dogs’ play would cause the tumor to rupture and cause some major bleed-out. Not desirable in front of the littles, or any of us for that matter!
• Rubbed diluted frankincense essential oil on her belly at least once a day.
• Prayed for her health and for Jesus to heal her if that was His will.
• Put about a ¼ cup colloidal silver in her purified drinking water per day.
• Provided a LOT of caressing and attention.
• Provided only homemade dog food, part raw.

 

This plan went on for a couple of months until I decided Homerlean needed to return to the great outdoors. She and I both had had enough of her being in the house.

 

She did fine. She played with the puppy, ran with the kids, chased after birds, and eagerly awaited our wonderful neighbor man’s daily dog biscuit.

 

And…she is still doing so. She loved the recent and rare Tennessee snow that blanketed our farm last week!

 

A year later Homerlean shows no signs of sickness. In fact, she could barely climb stairs this time last year and now she can do so with more ease. I am not suggesting the tumor is gone; actually, we haven’t returned to the doc to find out. The bill to learn she had a tumor was over $200 and that just isn’t in our budget at this time. I’d rather use that money to offer her some quality food. We are trusting our instincts on this, just as we did when she was diagnosed. She could pass away at anytime but the indications are not present that she will do so.

 

We have ceased the protocol that I created last February. I do currently have homemade dog food made that the kids feed her but that is not an on-going practice. We now try to buy high quality dry dog food; however, we are not convinced that any of it is especially beneficial other than to fill a void.

 

Homerlean’s Homemade Food Guidelines

• High protein
• High to moderate fat
• Very low grains
• Raw bones

 

Homerlean’s Homemade Dog Food Recipe (very flexible recipe!)

Note: When giving raw food to dogs, especially meat, work up to it gradually. Always give raw food in the mornings rather than nighttime.

• 4 pounds ground meat, preferably grass-fed
• 1 cup homemade yogurt or cottage cheese (I used homemade.)
• 3 raw eggs including shells (I used free range.)
• 1 chopped raw apple, seeds removed
• 2 carrots (We used pulp from making juice.)
• About 2 pounds mixed vegetables, sometimes cooked and sometimes not (sweet potatoes, kale, broccoli, spinach, zucchini)

 

These ratios made a week’s worth of food for her. She loved it!

 

When we served it in her bowl, we added…

• About ½ teaspoon of turmeric
• Dash of black pepper (It brings out the effectiveness of turmeric.)
• Splash of olive oil

 

And every now and then, I would add kelp, spirulina, or ground flax seeds.

 

About the cost of making this food…We buy raw milk and eggs from Mennonites at very low prices so I can make healthy yogurt very cheaply. The grass-fed meat was not cheap but Aldi makes it more affordable. Plus, I wasn’t paying for a $900 surgery so that helped. Veggies are cheaper at Aldi, as well. I buy spirulina and flax in bulk.

RECIPE/METHOD for EASY CROCK-POT YOGURT

There you have it….our dog, Homerlean, isn’t dead after all. She looks forward to playing with us in more rare Tennessee snow.

 

And so do we.

 

Disclaimer: I am not a vet nor do I play one in my kitchen. I am not claiming that our experience would be yours as well. I only claim that our dog isn’t dead from her year-old tumor and she likes my cooking.