Category: The Animal’s Key

What We Have Learned Healing Thousands Of Dogs From Cancer, Seizures, Dementia, And Many Other Health Issues.  

Grapes Aren’t The Problem – Treatments Are. Read Before You Panic.

If you live outside the United States or the United Kingdom, chances are you’ve never heard of the danger of feeding grapes to dogs. That’s because the idea that grapes are toxic is not grounded in universal science or clinical evidence.  It’s a uniquely Western myth, born out of fear, industry marketing, and a fundamental misunderstanding of health. In this article, I’m going to explain how this myth started, why it continues to be propagated, and why grapes, like all fruits, are not only safe but incredibly healing when fed appropriately as part of the natural diet.

Grapes in the Natural Diet

I’ve been feeding grapes to my rescues for more than a decade. Not just a few grapes here and there, either, but full meals of them. Over 130 dogs, many of them seniors with cancer, seizures, dementia, heart murmurs, and other so-called “incurable” conditions, have eaten pounds of grapes weekly while under my care. The result? Reversal of dementia, cessation of seizures, healing of cancers, heart disease, skin conditions, and a long list of other chronic health conditions. In short, a return to pristine health.  Our senior dogs run and play like puppies, often running circles around the kibble-fed puppies at the dog park.   In our natural diet support group, we have thousands of members feeding pounds of grapes to their dogs as well. The result: healthy, happy dogs.  

Growing up, long before the grape myth existed, our family dog, Max, loved sharing grapes with me on hot summer days.  He lived to 19 years old, happy and healthy to the end.   My friends in Italy mentioned that grapes are a common ingredient in commercial pet foods there.  So naturally, the claim of grape toxicity sparked my interest.  Grapes are hydrating, filled with essential sugars that every cell in the body requires for energy.  They are easy to digest and are digested quickly, reducing the burden of digestion on the body. In short, they are a perfect food for healing our dogs that are chronically ill. They are also a favorite of dogs.   I can’t count how many times my poorly guarded bowl of grapes has become the snack of one of our dogs.  They run off like they have acquired a prize greater than gold or fine silver.   

And yet, this fruit has been demonized, while kibble filled with synthetic chemicals, denatured proteins, and inflammatory grains is sold as “complete and balanced.” Something just doesn’t add up. 

This pattern isn’t limited to modern rescues either. Wolves, our dogs’ closest wild relatives, have also been documented eating grapes and other fruits. Various studies of wolf scat from the 1970s through the 1990s revealed fruit such as cherries, berries, apples, pears, figs, plums, grapes, and melon in wolves’ diets across southern Europe (Italy, Greece, Spain and Portugal), Eastern Europe (the Czech Republic and Russia), and China. Source: International Wolf Center

Why, if a food is so natural to the canine diet, are those who advertise themselves as the health experts for our furry companions so intent on selling the idea that this fruit is deadly and dangerous?   Below, I will lay out how this myth was born and the profitable results of its proliferation, along with the dangers inherent in continuing to spread this myth.  

Where the Myth Began

The grape hysteria appears to have originated between 1999 and 2002, when a handful of anecdotal reports were submitted to the ASPCA. These reports described dogs experiencing gastrointestinal upset after ingesting grapes, and a few of the dogs later developed kidney failure. Despite no identification of a toxic compound and no clinical evidence linking grapes directly to the cause of death, grapes were quietly added to the ASPCA’s list of toxic foods around 2003.

From that point on, the veterinary industry adopted the narrative and began issuing warnings. But here’s the problem: correlation is not causation. None of these early reports controlled for other variables, especially what treatments were given after the dogs ate grapes, or the commercial foods, known to be disease-causing, that they were ingesting on a daily basis prior to the grape ingestion. And that’s where the real danger lies.

Gastrointestinal upset is a common effect of mixing a fast-digesting fruit with a severely constipating kibble.  Since kibble is dry and difficult to digest, it moves very slowly through the digestive system.  Fruits are easy to digest, full of water and sugar, and they move quickly.   Since fruits contain sugar, they have the ability to ferment if they are not digested in a proper time frame.   Fermentation creates gas, and because fermentation creates alcohol, the body is triggered to create diarrhea to remove the fermenting matter.   So, if a kibble-fed dog is fed fruit, the logical result is digestive upset and diarrhea.  This is not a pathological condition; it is the body functioning appropriately, rushing out the fermenting (rotten) food before it poisons the body.   So the initial claims of gastrointestinal upset after ingesting grapes are a reasonable response of a properly working body.  

The Treatment, Not The Grapes, Leads To Organ Failure And Death

When a dog is brought in for ingesting grapes, the standard veterinary protocol involves induced vomiting, gastric lavage (stomach pumping), anti-diarrheal and anti-nausea drugs, and intravenous saline drips. Each of these interventions, particularly the saline drip, carries serious risks.

Saline is often marketed as benign, but it is a cellular poison when injected into the bloodstream. It’s been directly linked to kidney failure – ironically, the very condition grapes are blamed for. We covered this in detail in: The Dangers of Saline Drips.

In addition to the dangers of saline, let’s look at some of the common drugs used to treat gastrointestinal upset and their known poisoning effects, which the industry calls “side effects”. 

• Bismuth subsalicylate – Salicylates are associated with GI ulceration and renal failure. Salicylate toxicity damages the kidneys.   Also causes liver toxicity and hepatic necrosis, especially in small dogs or when given repeatedly.
• Ondansetron – Case reports and retrospective human data link ondansetron to acute interstitial nephritis.  Safety reports for dogs is lacking.  Regular monitoring for liver damage is also noted for dogs put on this drug.
• Famotidine – Some human reports of acute interstitial nephritis.  Veterinary safety is lacking but Veterinary notes report dose reduction in dogs with renal impairment, indicating they are aware of its damaging effects upon the kidneys.  
• Sucralfate – Human literature documents aluminum accumulation/toxicity with sucralfate in renal impairment
• Maropitant (Cerenia) – Reports of liver enzyme elevation listed in the product label and hepatic disease noted post approval. 
• Metronidazole (Flagyl) – one of the most common drugs used on dogs – associated with liver enzyme elevations and hepatocellular damage. Veterinary toxicology lists it as a possible cause of drug-induced liver injury (DILI).
• Omeprazole (Prilosec, PPI) – liver injury reports in humans, documented cases of drug-induced hepatitis and cholestasis. Limited data available on dogs, but ACVIM urges cautious use.   

So let’s break it down: a dog eats a few grapes. The owner, panicked by misinformation, rushes the dog to the vet. The vet administers a cocktail of drugs known to cause liver and kidney damage. The unlucky dog dies. And the death is blamed on the fruit.

Profiting From Fear

This isn’t just a mistake-it’s a business model. Emergency treatment for grape ingestion can cost thousands to tens of thousands of dollars. The vet industry, like the pharmaceutical industry it aligns with, is a disease-for-profit system. They do not profit from healthy dogs eating grapes. They profit from fear-driven responses that result in medical intervention. This convenient bit of misinformation is far too profitable for them to admit they were ever wrong, so they continue to push it knowing that most of the public will not bother to push back, or ask any questions.   

The narrative is further fueled by the hero complex: “Your dog almost died, but we saved them.” This is the story told by the vet, echoed in the media, reinforced in Hollywood scripts. But the truth is, the dog was never in danger-until the treatment began.   The medical industry is forever narrating their application of various poisons to the body as heroic efforts that save lives when the person or animal survives their poisoning, and when the person or animal dies from the application of the drugs, the drugs never take the blame.  Instead, we are told that the disease was just too strong; they made every valiant effort, every heroic measure was used, but the body just could not withstand the attack of the powerful disease.   

But biological reality differs from narrative.  Once death is in motion, nothing can stop death.  How could anyone possibly be “pulled back from the brink of death”.  Either you are dead, or you are not dead.  There is no “brink of death”, no pulling back from that brink.  It’s a false concept we accept because it’s been programmed in our heads by movies and TV, but it’s simply not in alignment with reality.   

The “Toxic Ingredient” Argument Falls Flat

Since the goal is to maintain the narrative that grapes are deadly, a great study has been undertaken to determine the poisoning agent present in the grape.   Some claim that tartaric acid is the toxic ingredient in grapes. This is based on a weak study that used cream of tartar, a concentrated, inorganic form of tartaric acid, not whole grapes. Using this logic, we’d have to declare tomatoes, lettuce, and celery dangerous due to their sodium content simply because table salt is toxic and causes death in high doses.

Organic compounds in food behave very differently from isolated, inorganic chemicals. Grapes contain naturally occurring tartaric acid in trace amounts, just as oranges contain citric acid and spinach contains oxalates. These are harmless, even beneficial, in the whole-food matrix.   Learn more about the differences between Organic and Inorganic Minerals.

The same flawed logic applies to grape seeds. While some may claim that toxins “accumulate” over time from grape seeds, this doesn’t hold up scientifically. Most grapes today are seedless, and even when seeds are present, they must be thoroughly ground to release any measurable compounds. Dogs don’t grind seeds with molars. Their teeth and jaw lack the ability for grinding food; their teeth work more like a scissor, tearing flesh and cutting fruits into small enough pieces just to swallow, not grinding their fruit like human frugivores do, or other herbivores.  This claim simply doesn’t stand up to scrutiny.

For a further breakdown of the scientific flaws and historical timeline behind the grape myth, see this article: Grapes Poison Dogs? A Modern Myth.

Why the Myth is So Dangerous

People often say, “Why not just avoid grapes to be safe?” Here’s why that logic is deadly:

• Grapes are a favorite of dogs. If a dog grabs a grape off the floor and the owner believes it’s toxic, they may rush to the vet and subject their dog to the very interventions that actually kill.
  
• Believing in the myth makes you vulnerable to fear-based decisions that lead to poisoning by treatment.
  
• The “better safe than sorry” mindset feeds the machine that kills animals, intentionally or unintentionally,  for profit.
  

If you teach a generation that grapes are toxic, you are not protecting dogs-you are putting them at risk of lethal treatment. And you are discouraging the use of a fruit that could save their life.

Common Sense Over Hysteria

Dogs have lived on vineyards for centuries. Italian kibble brands still include grapes in their formulas. Before the ASPCA’s 2003 decision, no one thought twice about a dog eating fruit. My own childhood dog ate grapes by the pool every summer. He lived a long, healthy life.

So what changed? Not the grape. The marketing.

Common Rebuttals and Why They Don’t Hold Up

In addition to anecdotal stories from grieving pet parents, there are a handful of frequently repeated rebuttals used to support the grape toxicity myth. Here’s a breakdown of the most common claims-and why they simply don’t stand up to logic, science, or observation.

“Only some dogs are sensitive to grapes.”

Claim: Some dogs are fine while others experience kidney failure. Therefore, grapes must contain an unpredictable toxin.

Why it doesn’t hold up:
A truly toxic substance affects every member of a species consistently. That’s the definition of poison. We don’t say “only some dogs are sensitive” to bleach or chocolate-it’s either toxic or it’s not. If grapes were truly toxic, we would see consistent, repeatable results. The fact that many dogs consume grapes regularly with no symptoms disproves the idea of a hidden universal toxin².

“We don’t know the mechanism, but we know it’s dangerous.”

Claim: The cause of toxicity is unknown, but kidney failure happens, and therefore, we must assume grapes are dangerous.

Why it doesn’t hold up:
Science without a mechanism of action is not science – it’s speculation. If no one has been able to isolate a toxin after two decades of investigation, perhaps it’s because there is none.³ This unknown-mechanism argument exists only because the assumption of toxicity came first, and the evidence was expected to follow. But it never has.  This is not science. We don’t just make things up when the findings do not match the assumptions. 

“Tartaric acid is the culprit”

Claim: Tartaric acid found in grapes is toxic to dogs, and the levels vary between varieties, making grapes unpredictable and dangerous.

Why it doesn’t hold up:
This theory stems from confusion between organic tartaric acid in whole fruit and inorganic tartaric acid (as found in cream of tartar). They are not the same. Just as table salt and sodium in lettuce are chemically distinct, tartaric acid in grapes is metabolized safely within the plant’s organic matrix. There is no evidence that naturally occurring tartaric acid in fruit causes harm.

“There are case reports showing genuine kidney damage.”

Claim: Veterinary reports link grape ingestion to acute renal failure.

Why it doesn’t hold up:
These are anecdotal correlations. Nearly all case studies involve treatment with nephrotoxic drugs, IV saline, and other interventions. Without controlled trials isolating grapes alone, there is no credible evidence of grapes as a primary cause. What’s observed in these reports is a downstream result of treatment, not of fruit.

“Even a single grape might kill, so it’s not worth the risk.”

Claim: Better safe than sorry. Even if we’re unsure, just avoid grapes entirely.

Why it doesn’t hold up:
This fear-based mindset is what kills dogs. When a dog ingests a grape and the owner panics, the vet’s treatment protocol often includes vomiting agents, enemas, IV saline, and anti-nausea drugs, all of which have known risks. When you act on a myth, the dog is harmed, not by the fruit, but by the treatment.

“My Vet Said Grapes Killed My Dog (or My Friend’s Dog)”

I hear this a lot, and I understand that people are often sharing these stories from a place of grief. But grief is not evidence, and memories are not science. Here are the key things to consider when someone claims grapes killed a dog:

• What treatments did the dog receive? IV saline, anti-nausea meds, anti-diarrheal drugs – all known to cause kidney failure and death.
  
• What were the side effects of those treatments? Look them up. You’ll often find the symptoms blamed on grapes are direct effects of the veterinary interventions.
  
• Why is there no consistent outcome? A truly toxic substance would harm all dogs consistently. But many dogs eat grapes with no issues whatsoever. That alone disproves the “toxin” theory.
  
• Why didn’t dogs die from grapes before 2003? The myth only exists in some countries, and only since the ASPCA began promoting it. Dogs in other nations, or before that time, lived just fine eating grapes  If grapes are toxic, then this would have been discovered many decades or even hundreds of years prior, based on dogs living on grape vineyards and even home gardeners growing grapes in their yard.  But it was not until there was a profitable motive that this claim got promoted in the United States alone.
  

Common stories include:

• A dog had bloody stool after grapes – this is an elimination symptom, not a deadly one. The body was trying to expel something. Fasting would have resolved it, but vet treatment led to poisoning a poisoned body, which can only lead to decline.
  
• A friend’s dog got a muscle tissue disease – unnamed, unlinked, unexplained. Sudden onset without diagnosis and without any evidence. These claims are emotional, not rational. They ignore known causes such as cooked foods, kibble, high-fat commercial raw foods, excess protein intake or excess fat intake. 
  
• “Smoking kills some people but not all” – but we know the mechanism, and smoking actually does kill everyone eventually, it’s just that some people have so many bad habits that they die from something else sooner.  Inhaling a poisonous substance always builds disease conditions until eventually the body can no longer survive the poisoning.   But people who smoke also tend toward other unhealthy habits like eating meat, consuming dairy products, consuming alcohol, taking drugs, etc, which also contribute to the poisoning of their body.  So while the person might not die from lung cancer, maybe they die of a heart attack, but that heart attack was still brought on by in the daily inhalation of poison, combined with other forms of poison they are ingesting.   Grapes have no proven toxins and no mechanism of action. Millions of dogs around the world have eaten pounds and pounds of grapes for thousands of years and lived long, healthy lives, passing naturally without disease conditions.  That comparison is flawed.
  
• “Tartaric acid levels vary by grape type.” – Even so, the tartaric acid in grapes is organic and plant-based. Toxic effects are only seen with inorganic forms like cream of tartar, in large doses, not from eating whole fruit. This is a false comparison, like saying apples are poisonous because cigarettes are poisonous, because both contain arsenic.
  

These claims often fall apart under even light scrutiny. No disease acts both instantly and over two months. No known muscle-wasting disorder is linked to grapes. No vet can diagnose “grape poisoning” without evidence. The truth is, these stories are emotional responses, often reinforced by a vet’s guess, not science.

Conclusion: Trust the Body, Not the Industry

In the terrain model of health and Natural Hygiene science, disease is not caused by microbes or mysterious toxins in natural foods. Disease arises from toxemia, obstruction, and enervation. The solution is to stop adding burden to the body, especially pharmaceutical poisons, and start feeding our companions the diet that they are biologically designed to eat.

Fruit is part of that design. Grapes are part of that design.

The myth that grapes are toxic to dogs is not only false-it’s deadly. It kills through fear, through profit-driven medicine, and through our blind trust in an industry that has never healed a single chronic disease.

It’s time to think for ourselves. To observe. To feed nature, not fear.

Feed your dogs grapes, along with a variety of other fruits, and watch them heal.

To learn more about how we feed over 130 rescue dogs naturally-and how you can too get our quick start feeding guide and join our support group on facebook:  The Natural Dog & Cat Diet Support Group.

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Footnotes

1. See also Grapes Poison Dogs? A Modern Myth from The Dog Place.
   
2. Wolf scat studies from Europe and Asia regularly show grapes, cherries, plums, and other fruits in the natural diet of wild canines: International Wolf Center.
   
3. ASPCA and veterinary sources still list “unknown toxin” as the cause of supposed grape toxicity after 20+ years of research. ↩
   
4. See the speculative and flawed logic in vet blogs like Grady Vet’s “Mystery Solved” post, which conflates tartaric acid in cream of tartar with its trace presence in whole grapes.
   
5. Case studies such as PMC7517833 present correlations only; no blinded, controlled study has ever isolated grapes as the sole cause.
   

Standard treatments like saline drips are nephrotoxic and can cause kidney failure themselves: TheRawKey.com – The Dangers of Saline Drip

What Is Cancer? Why Do Our Companion Animals Get It? — And How I Heal It

Over the last 15 years, I have been deeply involved in dog and cat rescue, and through rescue, I have witnessed firsthand the epidemic of cancer in our companion animals.   To me, this is unacceptable, and so more than a decade ago, I set out to find the reasons our companions are getting cancer and how to heal those dogs and cats that have cancer.  Here is what I have learned along the way, and the exact steps we take with every rescue to take them from terminal cancer back to pristine health, running and playing like puppies!

1. Cancer is not a random strike of bad luck. Its causes are known and therefore, its causes can be removed.  
2. Cancer is not an outside invader.   It’s a metabolic process – created by the body, for the benefit of the body, due to toxic conditions being provided to the body.  Correct those conditions, and the body can heal itself.   
3. Cancer is not a mysterious curse falling on some “unlucky” animals while others are spared.  Cancer is a disease that is built with every meal fed.   What goes into your dog’s food bowl is the primary cause, and most importantly, correcting that input allows the body to heal.

Rewriting what you think you know about Cancer

The medical industry calls Cancer its own disease, but in reality, Cancer is the seventh stage of disease.  This is critical to understanding why medicine fails to heal where nature succeeds.    There is in fact, only ONE disease – toxemia/toxicosis – a toxic condition of the cells whereby the cellular waste is unable to be removed from the body as designed, resulting in ever-growing cellular distress.   In simple terms, the body becomes dirty, the areas around the cells become dirty, and this dirtiness impairs the functions of the cells, resulting in reduced and impaired cellular function.  

You can think of disease like a hoarder’s house.  Each day they bring in just one or two items, but because nothing ever leaves, as time passes, the rooms become filled.  Over time, the mess grows until the person can barely move around their home.  The ability to function becomes impaired.  The more the mess grows, the fewer rooms you can access until finally the house starts to fall down under the weight of all the mess.    

Our body, and our pets’ bodies, are just like that hoarder’s house.   Each meal, each day, more waste is being built up that the body cannot easily remove because the food is not correct for their physiology.  

Cancer is the body’s emergency defense. It is the body’s best attempt to survive under chronic disease conditions — conditions created when the body is overwhelmed with cellular waste, toxins, and poisons faster than it can repair and clean itself.

To understand cancer and to heal cancer, we have to set aside the false, mechanical view of the body put forth by the medical industry. Our pets are not machines where parts can be swapped out, cut off, or replaced. They are living organisms. 

Every cell communicates, and every system is connected.  When the body is sick, the entire body is affected, from head to toe. Cutting a chunk of the body out does not correct the systemic, head-to-toe sickness.   

To solve any problem, we must first remove the cause, not the body parts.

Cancer arises because the body has been burdened beyond its ability to clean itself. Cancer is the symptom, not the cause, of disease. When we try to treat symptoms, we leave the causes in place.    Cutting out a tumor, amputating a limb, burning the body with radiation, or poisoning the body with chemotherapy does nothing to address the reason the body created cancer in the first place.  Adding more poison to an already poisoned body can never lead to a return to health.  

The only true way to heal cancer is to correct the conditions that have forced the body to create these pockets of waste, and “rogue” cells that we call tumors.

Why Do Our Dogs Get Cancer?

Diet is the primary cause of all disease, including cancer, and unfortunately, our beloved companion animals have been the victims of an industry that is more focused on profits than health.   As a result, the average commercial dog food is highly disease-causing, and feeding it to our pets day after day results in the body having no choice but to exist in a state of chronic disease. Those conditions grow more and more destructive the longer the body is subjected to them.  The longer our dogs are eating kibble, canned foods, and other cooked foods, the more the cellular waste builds, and the more malfunctions the body must endure.   

In addition to the disease-causing foods our companion animals are subjected to, they are also born into a toxic inheritance of the generations before them.  Every animal is the sum total of the choices made by its parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents. If your dog’s mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother were all fed kibble or canned foods, they are carrying the toxic load of each generation.   This is also why we see human babies and young children with cancers in modern times, a disease that just 100 years ago was extremely rare.  (Today, we estimate about 1 in 285 children in the U.S. will be diagnosed before age 20; in the early 1900s, it was <1 case per 10,000 children)

If we think of health like a rechargeable battery, some animals are born with 100% capacity, while others are born with only 60% or even 40%, depending on the health of their mother at the time of conception. They inherit not only the physical structures of their parents but also the weaknesses — weaker organs, weaker elimination systems, weaker resistance.

For dogs, this problem is worsened by:

• Severe inbreeding (purebred dogs come from an extremely narrow genetic pool).
  
• Generational misfeeding (most dogs have been raised for decades on dry kibble and cooked foods).
  

Dry kibble is one of the most damaging products to the canine body.  It is extremely dehydrating, clogging the lymphatic system – the body’s sewer system, which is responsible for carrying away waste, poisons, and damaged cells. 

When the lymphatic system becomes dehydrated, this thick, lipid-based fluid cannot efficiently flow.  The sewer system becomes clogged, and the elimination of toxic materials stagnates. The body, having no way to eliminate the waste externally,  in desperation, walls it off. This is how a tumor is formed – intentionally, by self-healing, self-cleaning, intelligently created body.   The tumor is a walled-off space holding the toxic debris to protect the surrounding cells from damage.     

Cancer is simply a pileup of waste, dead cells, and toxicity that the body has been unable to eliminate fast enough.  It’s like a hoarder’s house slowly filling up with junk, until the structure begins to collapse.   The problem is, if we don’t stop the input of toxic materials from building up by correcting the diet, then eventually the number of cells inside the tumor will be greater than those outside, and the function of the organ in which the tumor resides becomes impaired and eventually fails.   

So while the tumor is created intelligently and is the solution the body has put in place to the disease conditions present, it is a step to minimize the damage of the toxic buildup, not the solution to the toxic buildup.  If the body is not able to remove that material soon, the body will begin to malfunction and eventually fail.  

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How I Heal Cancer in My Rescues

Over the past 15 years, it has been my privilege to rescue senior dogs with chronic and terminal disease conditions.  138 dogs and counting have come through my home, all with chronic disease conditions – cancer, seizures, dementia, heart murmurs, kidney disease, obesity, and many other conditions.    For each one, we return them to the natural, biologically appropriate foods, and over time, all of their conditions heal.   Not just heal, but these dogs return to pristine health, the cancer expels itself, the seizures stop, the heart repairs, the dementia fades, and they return to running around like puppies again.   Our 17 to 19-year-old dogs run circles around the puppies at the dog park.   As we correct their diet, we give the body the fuel it requires to make the repairs necessary.    There are healing processes that we must follow along the way.  We must allow time for rest and time for healing.   We must not suppress the healing symptoms, like medicine does.  If we allow the body’s own intelligently designed processes to work as designed, then we see a complete reversal of all disease.  Not only the cancer, but all the little symptoms they had along the way that built up to the cancer.   

Healing cancer is not about attacking the tumor.   The tumor is not the problem; it is the body’s created solution.   Healing cancer is not about fighting the body, but working with the body.    Healing cancer is not about applying various poisons to the tumor to try to shrink the tumor – it’s about removing the burden and giving the body the energy it requires to clean house itself.

Here’s how I do it:

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1️ Stop the Poison
The first and most urgent step is to stop feeding disease.
That means:

• Throw away all kibble (there is no good kibble — it’s all carcinogenic).
  
• Stop all cooked, processed, dehydrated, or unnatural foods.
  

We cannot heal if we are still pouring poison in.  Fast your dog for a minimum of  24 hours to allow the kibble, canned, or cooked foods time to exit, then move on to step 2.  

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2️ Feed the Natural Diet
For cancer cases, I start dogs on 100% fruit — yes, 100% fruit — for 30 to 90 days.
Why?

• Fruit naturally makes up around 60% of all wild canids’ diets.  It is severely lacking in our dogs that are fed commercial dog foods.   To maintain health, they need at least 50-60% fruit across their lifespan, so if they have been missing it, now is the time to make up for lost time.    To learn more about how Canid species eat in the wild, see “Evidence that Canids Eat Fruit in the Wild”
  
• Fruit is hydrating.  Their body is dehydrated and needs a jumpstart to get the lymphatic system hydrated so the waste can start moving out.
  
• Fruit clears out constipation.  Cooked foods, canned foods, and most especially kibble are highly constipating, which means the bowels are backed up with years of old waste.   As we feed fruit, this waste gets rehydrated and sloughs off the walls of the digestive tract, so the body can finally eliminate it, and stop being poisoned by it. 
  
• Fruit is easy to digest.  Fruit requires very little energy for digestion, but provides lots of sugar – the fuel source for every single cell in the body.   When the body digests fruit, it uses less energy than it is provided.  This means that there is extra energy left over for healing processes.  
  
• Fruit provides clean, easy energy that frees up the body’s resources for healing.  The body has a limited supply of energy each day.  That energy can either go into digestion or it can be used for cleaning and repair.   Right now, we want that extra energy going to healing and repair.  
  

Once the cancer begins to recede, I shift to a maintenance plan: 5 days of fruit, 1 day of meat, and continue until full recovery.  Typically, we do 60 to 90 days of all fruit and then assess their progress.  If the tumor or accompanying symptoms have not made a big improvement, then we will continue on with the fruit meals or utilize fasting to help the body correct the issues faster.    For more information on the power of fasting to heal, please read Dr Shelton’s book on Fasting, The Hygienic System – Vol. 3 – Fasting and Sunbathing – particularly Chapter 2 on fasting Animals.   You can also find more information about fasting as well as feeding naturally in our Facebook Support Group:  The Natural Dog Diet with TheRawKey.com

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3️ Rest and Don’t Interfere 

By far, the hardest part of healing is allowing the body to rest and allowing the healing symptoms to progress uninterrupted.   Medicine has taught us our entire lives that every healing symptom the body creates is a disease that requires poisons, salves, or supplements to suppress.   When we are tired, instead of resting, we stimulate ourselves with coffee, tea, chocolate, soda, or salt.   When we get a cold or a flu, a body cleaning event, we turn to OTC cold medications, herbal remedies, or other toxic substances to stop the cleaning. Medicine tells us we are being attacked by invaders, and we must kill those invaders with some manner of poison in order to recover.  This goes against biological science and falls squarely in the court of marketing.   In reality, these colds and flus are the body’s cleaning and healing processes at work.  They are expulsion symptoms – the body pushing waste out.  The body has intelligently designed processes to push waste out on a regular and consistent basis, as needed, as disease conditions are built.  Rashes, itchy skin, dry skin, eye discharge, runny nose, these are all essential cleaning processes that our body creates when the disease conditions build up.  We can avoid them entirely by not making our bodies dirty in the first place, but if we stray from our natural foods, then the body is forced to create these cleaning events along the way.    Medicine teaches us to fear them and to suppress them because medicine is a for-profit business that only remains in profit if you, or your companion animal, remains chronically ill.

As your dog is healing, they will experience what we call a healing event or healing crisis.  During this period, there will be fatigue, lack of appetite, and a range of detox symptoms, or expulsion symptoms, which are the body’s cleansing itself.  These symptoms must be allowed to proceed uninterrupted because they are the only way the body can rid itself of the mess that led to the tumor being forced to be created in the first place.   It is therefore very important for you, as their caretaker, to learn about the body-created healing processes, so that you are not fearful and do not turn to suppressants when these healing processes begin.   Here are some articles to help you better understand these healing processes:   

What is Fatigue? 

The Medical Label of Infection

The Hardest Thing to Do is Nothing

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4 Continuing education
Surgery does not heal cancer, but it does do major and often irreversible damage to the lymphatic system required for the body to maintain health and remove disease.    Chemotherapy is a known carcinogen –  a cancer-causing chemical.  You cannot ever heal a poisoned body by adding carcinogenic poisons.

The healing processes that we follow to heal our animals, not only of cancer, but of all other conditions of disease, are based on the science of health, called Natural Hygiene, or Life Science, and they are based upon the science of the Terrain Model of disease.   Natural hygiene follows several basic truths: 

1. Violating the laws of life cannot undo the damage of a previous violation. You cannot poison a poisoned body back to health.
2. The body was intelligently created and follows intelligent processes.  These processes are not mistakes requiring poisons to correct.  They are biological requirements, requiring only that we not interfere and that we heed their warning. 
3. Acute disease is not an enemy at war with the body. It is not something to be expelled, subdued, opposed, destroyed, conquered, cured, or killed, since it is not a “thing” or “an entity” at all. Rather, acute disease is an action, a process, a remedial effort to be cooperated with.

We do not heal by doing things that would create disease in a healthy animal. We heal only by removing causes and allowing the body to repair itself.

The body eliminates cancer because it no longer needs it – not because we attack it. If we wish to address the cancer, we must remove the conditions that led to disease being created and instead replace them with the requirements of health.   Health is the natural state when we live in line with Nature.

To continue learning about why the body creates disease, what the purpose of disease is, and how it is reversed, please read:    

If you are ready to get started, please get a free copy of our feeding guide   

Join our support group on Facebook:   The Natural Dog Diet with TheRawKey.com 

Or book a consultation with Lauren to discuss your dog’s specific issues and get a plan today! 

Additional Resources: 

Videos:

How to get a dog to eat fruit – https://youtu.be/1G_es9pEF2Q?si=n45eEuLBlXw0LMu-

Video Interview: Lauren discusses healing rescue dogs with Cancer with Belinda of CB Rescue – https://youtu.be/ZvHSInEC7iQ?si=4GwBQv7ms2T8-d71

How To Prepare Meat Meals – https://youtu.be/NxoulehYZwk?si=5waG3iUNEE_kDf5J

Shopping for Meat Meals – https://youtu.be/8oixUTWmDP0?si=sXP6q__X-40i6zb9

Posts in our support group

Bones – https://www.facebook.com/groups/naturaldogdiet/posts/881796616747149/

Food Combining and Fruit list –  https://www.facebook.com/groups/naturaldogdiet/posts/844835857109892

How much to feed – https://www.facebook.com/groups/naturaldogdiet/posts/701400444786768/