[DeepSouthBamaGRITS]

I’m 66 yrs old and I can really tell I’m slowing down these last couple of years. I can’t do near what I used to do but I am afraid if I totally stop, that may be the end of my dreams.
I also used to feed my lil Yorkie raw. He will be 14 in April. He got very sick from being over vaxxed and had a very serious reaction to a flea/tick/heartworm preventative. He almost died. His old “traditional” Vet changed it without telling me (since they started taking our babies to the “BACK” for exams). By the time I got home with him he was semi-convulsing and was scratching himself literally RAW and I mean NON-STOP pawing at himself all over his body. I called the Vet and was told to wait til morning & if he was no better to bring him back in & they would see him. NO SLEEP that night as Baylee was scratching non-stop. I gave him a bath with some goat milk soap I had gotten from a friend that made this especially for our fur babies. It “may” have eased his misery somewhat but by now he was almost a bloody mess in places. I was sitting at the Vet’s office when they opened. They took him to the back & examined him and gave him a 6 month antibiotic shot called Convenia. 6 months worth of antibiotics in one shot that was WAY too much for his little body at one time. Bet most folks don’t know that they give the little fur babies the same amount/dose of meds that they give a 150 lb. dog. There was no reversing this shot if he had a bad reaction. It wears off over time. Well, with that much antibiotics, he developed a whole body YEAST infection, in his eyes, ears, mouth…all over his body ON TOP of the mess from the scratching himself raw….ANOTHER trip to the vet and they gave him something else, can’t remember now as that was almost 10 yrs ago. I looked up all these meds & that danged Flea/Tick/Heartworm preventative and I almost fainted at the bad side affects THEY ALL had on our pets. Some had lifelong neurological problems, some had huge open sores that wouldn’t heal and some didn’t make it. That is when I found out, too that all flea/tick/heartworm meds were PESTICIDES. That is why they never got any more fleas/ticks/heartworms. The flea/tick would bite them and get poisoned & die. What the heck?? PESTICIDES…that they are giving our babies. The one she had switched him to had already been pulled from the market TWICE because of many pets getting very sick & dying. They had to reformulate it two different times before it could be put back on the market PLUS the pets owner HAD to be given a CONSENT form to sign and the Vet was to have discussed all the potential side affects with me…which DID NOT HAPPEN! Long story short, I searched high & low for a natural med Vet or a Holistic Vet. I did find one in a major city here in my state 4 hour drive, ONE WAY but I had to go to see if she could save him. VERY VERY EXPENSIVE to see a Holistic Vet but she did get Baylee on the road to getting better but the damage had already been done. After much testing, it was found his liver, kidneys, spleen & lymph system were no longer removing all the toxins from his body. What didn’t get removed would come out thru his skin so he was diagnosed with an Autoimmune Disease with Chronic Skin disease. It would never be cured but could be treated. He also has collapsing trachea and is in the final stages of this. Any anxiety, stress will cause him to struggle to breathe, he loses his breath & the only way I can get him back breathing is to hold him and talk softly to him to calm him down. Excessive heat/humidity causes him breathing problems so in our heat/humidity, I have to keep it COLD year around in the house. With his liver not working properly this causes him to be extremely hot, burning up from the inside out. He is one sick little boy ALL DUE to uncaring Vets taking kickbacks from Big Pharma. Yes, they are in on our pets healthcare, too. The only reason I know all of this is the Holistic Vet was once a regular traditional Vet. She cares for animals and their well being and felt something was not right with what they were taught in Vet school, all the meds the drug reps were pushing them to use, etc., so she talked with some Naturopathic Friends of hers and decided to go BACK to school to learn Holistic & Natural Healing. This Vet is a miracle worker and has even cured some dogs of cancer, healed lame dogs and they are now walking again, her healing practices are well known. She has been shut down several times by the powers that be. Another long story. It got to where I couldn’t afford to keep making that long 8 hr round trip drive every 4-6 weeks plus the cost of the visit $350-$500 a pop. Baylee was getting better so I decided to stop all unnecessary meds & started treating him as best I KNEW & COULD with natural remedies.
Before he got sick, I had started him on the raw feed diet. He did really well on it. You know it is a lot of work to do this diet. Well after all his problems from almost dying, the over vaxxing, Flea/Tick/Heartworm damage to his system, feeding raw kept him with colitis AND anal gland problems. Even with bones in his diet, he still couldn’t produce stools hard enough to express the anal glands and they kept getting impacted & ALMOST had to have surgery to fix. His Holistic vet recommended I stop the raw diet (and YES, she is ALL FOR raw feeding) and go to a balanced cooked meal. Usually some sort of protein, organ meat (usually chicken liver), a little steamed rice, potatoes or sweet potato, veggies like green peas, carrots (I like using dehydrated kale that I crunch up into an almost powder), I add some scrambled eggs and when that all cools, I will add either a few pieces of sauerkraut, a small piece of raw garlic that I smash & wait 10 min before feeding him to release all the medicinal properties. I might add a little plain yogurt for his gut health (same with the garlic & sauerkraut. Any fermented veggie helps their gut health. I cook his meals every other day. He gets breakfast & supper and a homemade jerky (chicken/deer/rabbit, turkey, etc.) that I make for him for a treat. I also bake sweet potatoes, mash them and roll into little sticks and roll in crushed flax seed, oregano or some other seeds/herbs. I add that to the jerky I make, too.
I also give him a small piece of crushed honey infused garlic when I take mine every morning. He REALLY loves that. He has a certificate of exemption from ALL vax’s., even rabies. Our state recognizes those certificates EXCEPT for groomers/boarders. I don’t ever board him but it was heck finding a groomer for him since I can’t do that anymore. I guess my arthritis in my hands made for a very long time to groom him and he got frustrated, anxious so I had to stop. I was lucky and found a local lady about 10 min from me that does grooming in a building at her house. She does not require any vax certificates as she is anti-vax so I was saved there. He now has to be kept cut short due to his skin condition & the longer hair making him too hot all the time. I will attach a before pic of him (before he got sick) and one of my fav pic’s of him plus what he looks like now. I had to get used to the short hair but for his health & safety, I do what is best for him.
One more thing, I have two of the NESCO digital canners, too. I still use the stove top pressure canners when I have a lot to can and even sometimes have both the digitals & the stove top going at the same time. I LOVE the convenience of the digital canner, especially when canning leftovers or small batches of meats, soups, etc. Mine will hold 6 pints or 4 quarts. I will have both going sometimes rather than drag out the stove top canner. It was getting hard for me to handle the weight of the stove top. I also like the convenience of getting it thru the 1st 15-20 min to shut off the exhaust then I can go about my business and not have to baby sit it & it turn off when it is done. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have near the meat, soups, etc., canned that I have now if I had to do it all with the stove top. I think they are perfect for 1-2 person households with small batches to can. LOVE MINE! I’ve had the CAREY which is now NESCO but I used it so much when I 1st got it that I burned up the control panel. Guess those weren’t made to use continuously like I was doing. It had a warranty so it was replaced with the NESCO and I loved it so much I bought a 2nd one. That was when they were just $129. I think now, IF YOU CAN FIND ONE, they were running over $300!!
I am in major coyote country as well as many other predators like bobcats, foxes, raccoons & opossums.
You don’t put the “BONES” in the garden. You roast them in the oven til they are almost a powder. Well, some will just turn to powder when you mash them between your fingers. The larger bones I smash with a hammer or small sledge hammer into a BONE MEAL POWDER. You spread that in the soil of your garden. It is just like buying store bought Bone Meal, no different, other than you are making it yourself. It has never drawn any predators to my knowledge. I also make my own Blood Meal when I dispatch chickens, rabbits and when I get to whitetail deer hunt. I bleed them out in a bucket then pour the blood in some old cookie sheets I don’t use for my own cooking anymore. You let it dry out to sheets of dried blood & crush it up or grind it in a food processor/blender. Didn’t do any of that this year.