Grateful to be a Chiropractor!
Recently, on the first Friday in January, I returned home to find my dog limping. My husband and son told me that she had just come in like that after being outside in our back yard.
Patsy
Patsy is a beautiful black lab-golden retriever cross. She is a “companion” dog we acquired from the National Service Dogs organization who train service dogs for people in the autistic spectrum. Being a companion dog means that our Patsy didn’t quite make the grade as a full service dog. She gets too distracted with other dogs and people when out walking. Her big heart wants to interact with everyone she meets. Patsy has an amazing gentle personality and has woven herself into our hearts and family thoroughly.
It was quite distressing to see her in so much pain and refusing to weight bear on her front left leg. She was hopping on her three remaining legs. I immediately put on my chiropractor hat and started to check her. When I first got out of school, long before there was a requirement to be certified, I did a short internship with a doc north of Toronto who worked on horses. I loved it and it was fascinating but circumstances did not allow me to pursue it at the time. Regardless, what I learned then about working on quadrupeds (four legged animals) came back to me while checking Patsy. Now a chiropractor is supposed do special training to get certified before adjusting animals in their practice.
Patsy must have been running and slipped on the ice landing on her front left side. She had subluxation in her neck. Her shoulder and knee were out of alignment and needed some attention too. While I was adjusting her she slowly wagged her tail and locked her big brown eyes onto mine. She seemed to instinctively know that what I was doing would help. The horses I had worked with were the same trusting way. She did whimper somewhat while I was palpating her shoulder and knee. After the first adjustment Patsy seemed a bit better with her walking but was still not fully weight bearing. She went and laid down in her bed. I adjusted her again a few hours later and after the second adjustment Patsy walked normally and ran up the stairs in her usual manner. I was absolutely grateful for chiropractic to be able to release Patsy from her pain and restore nerve function.
I knew the adjustments would facilitate Patsy’s healing—the science and principles of chiropractic transcend species—but even I was pleasantly surprised at how quickly she literally bounced back! Chiropractic is so cool!