Liver Spring Primer

Hi, this is Rita Hogan and welcome to the Dogs are Individuals podcast. I'm a clinical canine herbalist and I've been practicing for over 20 years. This podcast is all about your dog through an herbal lens. So let's get to it and dive right in. Hello, everyone. Welcome to another edition of my podcast. We are gonna talk about the liver today. And the reason why we're talking about it is because this is liver time. If you live in the northern hemisph, the liver's waking up. If it would stop snowing everywhere, that would help. But the liver knows it's springtime. You know, springtime is the opening. It's when energy rises and starts to move around and we have to deal with liver at that time. And so I thought this was a good subject for today. Let's get into some specifics for the liver. One thing is a lot of people think that the liver is this storage organ, right? Don't eat liver. It has all these toxins in it. And you know, I have to say that a long time ago, I used to believe that too. It's actually a fallacy. It is a pass through organ. It doesn't store toxins. It stores other things like vitamins and blood and things like that, but it does not store toxins. It filters toxins. It helps the body filter toxins, but those toxins get rendered and then get pushed out to the elimination organs. They don't stay in the liver. So that's one thing to know. It's kind of what's called passive filtration. It's broken down into like two phases which, which I'll talk about in a minute. The liver is very like, it's very regenerative and it can regenerate tissues and really break them down into these substances that our dog's body kind of can metabolize. It helps the body metabolize toxic substance and other substances. And so it really plays a significant role in your dog's metabolism. You know, the metabolism is basically how the function of the body for everyday use. And then it has a role in the body's temperature. It helps control the thyroid, it's responsible for thyroid hormones along with the endocrine system. I mean, it has like over 500 functions that science has figured out. And you, you know, your dog's metabolism, a lot of people don't understand that word as well. And that's just again, it's your everyday things that you do. It's breathing, it's cellular reproduction, it's digestion, your elimination organs. And of course, I'm talking about your dog, too. And it's how you repair things in the body. It's basically overall organ function. The liver touches everything, and it helps the body create balance. It is definitely an underlying factor in good assimilation. That means absorbing nutrients, and it helps deal with hormones and produce hormones and produce cholesterol. I know we'll talk about cholesterol some other time, but don't be afraid of cholesterol, especially healthy cholesterol. We need cholesterol. Cholesterol is just like big, bad enemy. But we need cholesterol. Our brains need cholesterol, our bodies need cholesterol. And then the liver helps work with the immune system. Again, I said before, it stores vitamins, but it also stores minerals, and it helps produce proteins in the body. So very, very important functions. And if you've listened to my podcast before, you might have heard me say that one of the things that is missing in medicine is that the nervous system needs care. I don't care what you're treating. The nervous system needs support, and the liver definitely touches the nervous system. It deals with circulating fluids, which can add moisture, deplete moisture, cause dryness and dryness and too much moisture highly affect the nervous system. So when you're supporting the liver, you want to support the nervous system. When you're working with imbalances, the liver pretty much governs the disease function, and autoimmune cascades and inflammation and musculoskeletal system, along with the kidneys and definitely digestive dysfunction. Everything is connected. The liver is associated with aggression and anger. When you're giving herbs to the liver, if your dog gets more aggressive, you want to cut back. You want to stop that program and then try a different one. Like, for instance, milk thistle can bring that on pretty readily. If there's an issue in the liver that is just too much for milk thistle to deal with at this time, I would switch to something like, if it's energetically appropriate, dandelion root or even, like, a gentle kidney remedy can help take the pressure off of the liver so that you can use other remedies. I definitely would just use very gentle liver remedies, even maybe a homeopathic remedy for that, and then get some kind of, like, momentum going and then try very low dosages. Like, I would definitely try, instead of a tincture, I would try, like, a ground seed of milk thistle and see how the aggression goes. But dogs that have aggression need stress relief. And so, you know, again, this is all connected. The liver and the heart are really at the hub of these things. And the liver governs the body's ligaments and tendons along with the kidney and its meridian, which are energetic lines in the body. They are a product of traditional Chinese medicine. If you don't know about meridians, I highly recommend that you look into them. There's just an amazing system that you can use to help balance your body and figure out what's going on. Like the liver meridian opens up to the eyes. And when you give a liver remedy, you're gonna have discharge from the eyes and you're gonna have discharge from the other elimination organs. But a lot of people freak out when there's discharge from the eyes. I was recently detoxing a chemical out of my body that I was exposed to. And I will tell you right now, all day long it looked like I was crying for like, I don't know, maybe six or seven days. The liver and meridian opens out into the eyes. And a lot of times when dogs have cataracts and red eyes and chronic tearing and conjunctivitis, this is very much liver related. You know, it's not just the eyes that are malfunctioning, it's the liver as well. So you wanna address the liver when you have eye issues like that. Another thing is speaking of traditional Chinese medicine, the liver time, the circadian rhythm clock, the liver time is between 11pm and 3am so if you have a hard time between those hours, and if your dog's waking up between those hours and you know, you wake up like a clockwork at 2:30 in the morning, I would look to the liver. So support your liver. Eat better. I can say speaking to humans. Cause I know you guys are listening to this. It involves you. People need to eat more greens. You know, my hand's up too. I work every day eating something more green. Carrots are great, but step away from the easy vegetables. Leafy greens. Let's talk about some kind of negative influences on the liver. I'll tell you right now, our dog's liver and our livers are congested and tired because we're living right now in a very highly toxic environment. Like when my mom was young, they had to deal with coal, burning coal, that kind of thing. The air quality in cities was poor, but in the country it was nice and fresh. But they weren't dealing with all of the pollution that we're dealing with right now. And of course the processed food that we eat, the chips, the middle of the grocery aisle is going to bring down liver function. Cooked food without Digestive enzymes. Cooked food is great, but you need to add digestive enzymes. Vaccines over vaccination in dogs is nutty. I was working on my introduction in my book and I was writing just a couple sentences about the relationship my dad had with the veterinarian that we used when we were young on our farm. And they didn't over vaccinate. This vaccination schedule that we've got going on right now is insane. Vaccinating your dog every year for a whole bunch of things is insane. The antibodies are there, you know, not for every vaccine, but for most of them. Semper parvo, rabies. I know rabies is by law, so I can't really say anything about that, but it's the only one in the United States that's required by law. Get yourself a pet sitter, get yourself a dog walker, stop boarding your dog, and stop grooming your dog at places that require these insane vaccines. Yep, I said it. I'm sorry. Actually, I'm not sorry. We have to stop over vaccinating our dogs. I'm not telling you not to vaccinate. I'm telling you to stop over vaccinating your dogs. You know, we don't vaccinate ourselves for all of our vaccinations that, you know, kids have, we don't vaccinate them every year. That's insanity. More vaccine does not equal more immunity. Check with any immune specialist. More vaccine does not equal more immunity. And it's really hard on the liver. Anxiety, stress is another stressor on the liver. Stress and anxiety. Our stress and anxiety, their stress and anxiety. Loud environments. When you're playing those video games and killing everything, put your dog outside, put your dog in another room. It's not good for you, it's not good for your dog. Really aggressive movies, things like that, it's been proven. It changes the vibration and energy and that's really hard on your dog. Anxiety and stress is the number one cause of disease because it affects the heart, it affects the liver, it affects the kidneys, it affects the fight or flight response, which shuts down digestion, elimination, rest and relaxation. And it speeds up the heart and it works it really hard. So, you know, again, even outside of the body, everything is connected. Definitely what we put on and in our dogs can be a problem. So, like, poor quality fats, poor water, not filtering your water. Bottled water. Bottled water is a crock. It is. You know, I'm not saying every bottled water out there is bad. I would definitely say 98% of them. Are. And, you know, if you think they're flowing off a spring somewhere, you're mistaken. Marketing is rough. And don't believe what's on the front of the bottle. Read what's on the back of the bottle. And kidney weakness is hard on the liver because it puts more pressure on the liver. So, you know, kidney health, organ health are very important. Pharmaceutical medicines can be really, really hard on the liver. So make sure that if you're giving pharmaceuticals that you're only giving pharmaceuticals that you know that are supporting life. If your dog is young, middle aged, or even geriatric, just, you know, minimize those pharmaceuticals. And another thing that's really hard in the liver that a lot of people don't realize is overeating. And I've mentioned this before, eating too much at one time is super hard on the liver. Overfeeding your dog, very, very hard. Or overfeeding yourself. There's a lot of obese dogs out there, and a lot of that is kibble related. But it's also, you know, so many treats, so much food at one time. You know, it's feeding, feeding, feeding, feeding, feeding. Our organs need time to rest. So overfeeding, not so good. Flea and tick and heartworm meds, those are hard on the liver. Eating really quickly is hard on the liver. So if your dog is just kind of just eating so quickly, get a slow feeder. And don't get a plastic one, get a glass one or ceramic one or a stainless steel one, get them to slow down. So those are a few things that are like, really a negative influence on the liver. And I apologize for being a downer. I try not to be a downer. Some things are what they are. You know, a lot of things that we're doing to ourselves and our dogs are creating disease are really hard. And we just, you know, just take it one step at a time. Try to do something every day to improve your health and your dog's health. Get outside, do age appropriate walking. Go sit on the ground with your bare feet. Go connect with nature. Let's talk about the liver. When it's stagnant, everything's connected. And the heart governs the entire body. And when the liver is stagnant, the heart needs support. When that happens, it takes stress off the kidneys and pretty much your entire, your dog's entire system. So when the liver's stagnant, the stomach suffers, the spleen suffers, the pancreas suffers. You get circulating fluids that decrease. And that means inflammation is going to increase because circulating fluids cool the body Your dog will show, like, gastrointestinal inflammation. They might show loose stool, stomach heat, irritable bowel. I think this is especially prevalent in dogs that, again, are overfed, that have excess, that have liver heat and congestion. You want to keep that in mind. Circulating fluids are really important because you need that for filtering and recycling fluids. You know, when blood circulation kind of dries up or slows down, you'll definitely see, like, vision issues, night blindness, brittle nails, lethargy, constipation, or alternating constipation with diarrhea. But definitely constipation. And your dog is constipated. If they don't poop at least two times a day, your dog is constipated. Even if they eat one times a day, they need to poop twice a day. Okay? When the blood isn't filtered correctly, it definitely cascades into inflammatory conditions like heart disease and cancer and lipomas and arthritis. Those are things that are a result of circulating fluids being low, blood not being filtered correctly, and the liver being congested. How do I know if my dog's liver needs help? We have some obvious symptoms. We've got aggression, agitation, things like arthritis and allergies. Anemia. Well, of course, cancer. Cancer is a toxicity issue. Constipation, definitely. Constipation with straining, excessive gas, excessive heat, really, really thirsty dogs, Redness in the eyes. Dogs that are hungry, they act hungry. But when you put the food down, they're not eating. That's a good indication. Histamine intolerance, high blood pressure, food sensitivities, eating excessive grass or dirt can be a liver issue, along with stomach heat, indigestion, inability to stay asleep with intact females, irregular menstrual cycles. I did mention lipomas, lethargy, muscle spasms, dogs that are obese, dogs that pant excessively, definitely poor vision, dogs that are chronically restless. Those all can be liver issues. And forgot about the big one. Ding, ding, ding. Skin conditions. Skin conditions are a huge indicator of liver problems. Inflexibility in emotional inflexibility, and also inflexibility in the body. Tight muscles, tight muscle system that also indicates dryness. And then when the liver wanes, you can have low bile. And bile is, you know, this green substance that helps break down fats and oils in the body. It also gives your dog stool that brown color, your stool that brown color the liver and the gallbladder, send bile to the small intestine for digestive functioning. And you need bile to have healthy digestion. You need bile for hormone fat soluble Hormones. Bile helps lubricate your dog's stool. So that's why constipation is definitely a sign of low liver function. Gallbladder issues are kind of tricksy, but the body speaks. You know, traditional Chinese medicine has definitely taught me a lot about how the body speaks and different parts of Western herbalism. Stiff hind end. When the hind end is very stiff or stiffness improved by motion is a gallbladder twitching. Lots and lots of twitching nervous system and gallbladder. Scratching first thing in the morning or scratching a lot right before they go to sleep. Definitely. Liver gallbladder. Low circulation. Dogs that have really, like, the tips of their ears are nice and cool when they should be warm. That can be liver gallbladder. And then also dogs that change positions often. There's the kidney, where they moan and groan all the time. And then there's dogs that change position just all the time. It just seems like they can never get comfortable. A lot of people think it's pain, and it can be, but it also can be liver and gallbladder weakness. That's a few things about the liver. We could go on forever. I mean, there's lots of things that we need to talk about. Later on, we'll talk about, like, phase one and phase two. Detoxification. We'll do that. But let's just talk about some foods for the liver. How do we support the liver? Apples are good. Apples are a good support. Asparagus, broccoli. Broccoli sprouts. Sprouts in general are lovely. Beets, bok choy. For those of you that feed grain, organic brown rice. It's also good for the kidney and very, very, very small amounts. Sometimes I see these pictures of, like an entire bowl full of rice and then some vegetables on the top and some meat. For me, like a golden retriever. Two tablespoons. Okay? Not a lot. Again, for those of you that feed grain, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, cauliflower, leafy greens, Leafy greens, Organic kale. Remember, always feed organic spinach and kale. They're bioaccumulators. Liver itself as a glandular, but you don't wanna give a lot of liver because it can cause copper problems. So, you know, people give way too many liver treats. Do not give your dog liver treats every day, okay? Especially if their food has liver in it. Don't do that because it can definitely mess with copper levels and we don't want that. Some supplements for the liver. Make sure your dog's getting enough B complex. And don't feed B complex. That has folic acid in it. Make sure it's folinic acid or sometimes L methylfolate, but not folic acid. Make sure your supplements do not contain folic acid. It is a synthetic form of folate and it binds to the receptors in your dog's body where natural folic acid needs to bind. Nac. Do not make me pronounce it, but I'll try. N acetyl cysteine, I believe so. NAC is a very good liver remedy. Omega 3 fatty acids, very important for liver function. Prebiotics, probiotics, quercetin, vestrol. These are all things that are found in food. Make sure you get a trace mineral like a humic and fulvic acid or like nettles. Wonderful nutritive. Make sure you're not giving your dog too many nutrients, too many trace minerals, vitamin C, vitamin E, beta carotene, things like that. These are all, you know, good vitamin levels are essential for a healthy body and a healthy liver. The most of it should come from food. You might need to do a little supplementation. But make sure you know what's in the supplements you're giving your dog so you don't over supplement. Cause then that's a whole nother conversation. Some herbs for the liver. Calendula right now. Milk thistle seed, artichoke, burdock root, chamomile, cleavers, dandelions. The root and the leaf right now are great together. The leaf is around right now too. Excellent for kidney function while you're supporting the liver. Decaffeinated green tea for your cool dogs out there. Deglycerized licorice. I did mention nettles. Turmeric for cool dogs as well. Yarrow, white yarrow, little tiny amounts of yellow dock. These are all good things for the liver. St. John's Wort. If you're not giving your dog any pharmaceuticals. Lovely for the liver. Know that when you start any of these remedies, they can cause a little itching and scratching. If it does go away within the first like three to four days, cut back on the dosage or try a different herb. We're going to talk about the liver more in upcoming episodes. In fact, maybe we'll do an extension of this conversation on our next episode. I do want to thank my sponsors in a liver way. Okay, let's talk about liver sponsorship. So my first sponsor is real mushrooms. Realmushrooms.com I also carry these on my website. What are some really good liver mushrooms for right now? In this season I would go with Reishi and Shiitake mushrooms. Reishi mushroom is excellent for the liver. It helps support liver, kidney issues. It's an adaptogen, so it's gonna help with stress. Definitely the negative effects of stress. It really helps bring down inflammation, which is supporting the liver. It's high in antioxidants along with shiitake. Super high in antioxidants. We need a lot of antioxidants. Reishi mushroom can help up that ability. What I have found is that a lot of people don't give their dogs enough mushrooms, like enough, enough dosage in their mushroom department. So I would probably take the dosage that's on the mushrooms that you have right now, and I would up it by a quarter and see how your dog does. A lot of the dosages that I see for mushrooms are pretty low. And everyone knows I'm a low dosage person. But when it comes to powdered, hot extracted mushrooms, I find that a little more is better when you're trying to deal with the liver in this season, and then you can go back to a normal amount later if you want, if you cycle that mushroom throughout the year. But reishi is just wonderful because a, it does bring down inflammation, it does help with liver disease, it does support kidney function. It helps with food sensitivities and breathing problems and digestive issues and leaky gut and tumor growth. It's an anti cancer herb, It's a skin disorder herb. It can help with anxiety, it can help with insomnia and sleeping. So it's an immune modulator. I again could have an entire podcast about reishi, and I think I have, but maybe not. We could talk about reishi another time. Reishi is really good and I like to add shiitake mushroom with reishi. They work well together. Especially in the spring. I would give equal parts of shiitake and reishi mushroom. So realmushrooms.com, excellent source for reishi mushroom. Remember, for dogs, reishi is extremely bitter. Dogs don't like the taste of it. So make sure that you either give it in a capsule or give it in something that you're like a little meatball or something. Small amount of food so that your dog doesn't have to taste it and get ishy. It does not taste well. It doesn't do well in a tea. It's for me. Well, I mean, maybe some dogs would like it. Maybe some people will like it in a tea, not myself. When it's blended with other things, we're okay, but by itself, and even with shiitake, not so much My next sponsor is Adored Beast Apothecary. They have a lovely liver tonic. And the reason why I love this liver tonic so much is that it's a water based extraction of some pretty potent herbs like Chelidonium magus, which is greater celadyne, and also Berberis vulgaris, which is barberry. Now, if you were giving your dog alcoholic versions of this, because alkaloids love alcohol and alkaloids help the liver, but they also can hurt the liver. Okay? So I don't advise alcoholic extractions of either one of those herbs for dogs. Very, very minute doses for people. But this water extraction is lovely and it also has dandelion leaf and milk thistle and I really just together. It's a very synergistic tonic. You can use it without the fear of going overboard. And like for mast cell tumors, I sometimes double and triple the dose. It's very safe, it's very gentle, it can be used for sensitive dogs. You know, you may have to work with the dose. Just a really great overall liver support. I highly recommend it. You can get it at adoredbeastapothecary.com across the web and on my website, canineherbalist.com thanks for listening to this episode of Dogs Are Individuals. If you enjoyed this episode, please leave a review in your podcast app. And don't forget, sharing is caring. So if you love Dogs Are Individuals podcast, share it with your friends and family who love dogs. This will help me so much. And remember, as a listener, I appreciate you much. Thanks to Resonant Media, my podcast production team. This podcast is produced by Drake Peterson and edited by Mike Fry. Any questions, email the show, go to k9herbalist.com Click podcast contact in the menu and then fill out that form and I'll answer any questions here online. Okay, so thank you so much for listening to this episode of Dogs Are Individuals Podcast and I'm going to talk to you in our next episode. The content of this show is for educational and informational purposes only. It is not a substitute for veterinary care. This podcast doesn't constitute a provider patient relationship. As always, talk to your doctor, veterinarian or healthcare provider first before starting anything new. And that includes herbs. I'm not a doctor and I don't treat disease or prescribe anything. I'm a traditional herbalist providing herbal support education only. Regarding any products I may suggest, the statements made regarding these products have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. The efficacy of these products has not been confirmed by FDA approved research. These products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease. 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