Your Love Can Heal Your Dogs

By Christina Chambreau, DVM, CVH.

Are you struggling with health, behavior problems or conflicting advice? Worried about making the right decision, feeding the right food, who to trust? Often our worry decreases quality of life for all and even impedes healing. Many articles and posts say that love heals. I have many examples of how “loving” contributed a lot to healing.

Let’s start with examples of love being a healer.

Bernie Siegel, a surgeon who came to realize that love and acceptance were keys to healing (Love, Medicine and Miracles) lived with a household full of animals and children. One dog was feeling not well and the veterinarian said there was nothing to be done for the cancer, so recommended euthanasian right away. Bernie called his family and the son who answered said, “Dad, we do not do that. Bring him home and we will love him.” He lived another 3 years with love, attention, vitamins, fresh food.

Read Bernie Siegel’s recent book, Love, Animals and Miracles, for stories of how love helped animals heal and kept his family of many kids and even more pets on even keel. His children’s mice, snakes, birds, cats, dogs all ranged free and did not eat each other! Stories from others fill the book with demonstrations of love by people and by animals, and of connections between very different species. Mowgli was at a shelter for 8 years when someone brought him home, very shy and averse to touch yet shining love out of his eyes. With great patience, attention, acceptance of how he was, and modifying her behaviors, he finally put his head in her lap and loved trips to the ocean.

Allen Schoen, a pioneer holistic veterinarian, speaks in his book, Love, Miracles and Animal Healing (title was approved by Bernie Siegel), about one of his dogs who took on the job of giving love to any ill animal. One time, when her blood was needed for a transfusion, she totally understood and even held out her front leg to have the needle inserted. Many stories fill his book with how the love of people or animals was healing for other species.

While Path to Pet Wellness by Jeff Feinman (read his many articles here at Happy Healthy Dog Magazine) is full of holistic suggestions for healing, it is grounded in interspecies communication – loving and learning from each other. Paying attention to clues and looking for the context of the problem. Rather than quick fixes, he guides us to use your dog’s natural energy to heal. Assuming that dogs bodies are designed to re-balance and heal, you can help them by engaging them with a positive mindset. A focus on Conscious Compassionate Communication actually optimizes mitochondrial function, and much more. You can do this.

A final book leads us to perceiving all animals from a different paradigm – that of being sentient equals, Kinship With All Life by J. Allen Boone (1954). When providing a temporary home for the first dog movie star, Strongheart, he was present enough to communicate and hear. When able to empty himself of all preconceived ideas about dogs, flies, ants and more, he could have amazing relationships.

Practical use of healing with love

Most of us have a goal of living happily with healthy animals and people. Regardless of the challenges, you do have a wonderful place to start– LOVE.

So what does love mean? It is not merely a feeling, it is something we do with people, plants, animals, all atoms on this wonderful planet. We can strive to be:

• Paying attention, being fully present, listening, creating connection
• Listening to what your dog is communicating through body language
• Respecting the other’s needs, offering compassion, comfort and patience
• Accepting without judgment of ourselves or others, knowing there is no one right way
• Expressing gratitude, supporting well-being, providing safety, being trustworthy

Often we know we love our pets, yet may not be in the habit of demonstrating it. When you walk past them lying there, stop and pet or say something you appreciate about them (even if they have made you irritated earlier), or say “good job” if you have asked your task oriented dog or cat to do something. This will help your happiness as well. Part of loving them actively is observing and listening to them. For decades I firmly patted my horse, thinking this was how you showed appreciation. Then I was told they are very sensitive and prefer stroking. Then I realized it could be different for each individual horse. Pay attention to their very subtle response to anything you do, feed, say, offer. Also notice how they respond to other beings in the house or out on walks. The more content they are, the more balance and the less likely to become ill. Keep a journal (e-books at my site) to help you remember these subtle clues to happiness and health. A journal will help evaluate the response to any changes as well.

Paying careful attention to what nourishes each animal, and ourselves as well, we can:

• Sit quietly near each other, cuddle, read out loud, play music, just watching the world go by and learning from each other
• Respecting their preferences and offer choices
• Making time for play, laughter yoga, dancing, learning tricks, toys
• Offering gentle touch, or whatever this dog prefers, massage, tui na and more
• Creating a safe environment, quiet areas to sleep a lot,
• Being their advocate when they are ill, having a health care team, learning energy healing approaches

Be sure you are taking the seconds & minutes to deeply appreciate and love each of the animals in your life. We know they return our love unconditionally. If love seems not to be working, offer more. Life gets busy, so remind yourself.

Now, on the soul journeys each individual has chosen, there may be illness or other challenges. We may be seeking help from many sources – holistic veterinary care, the great articles in this magazine, wonderful people to help us with behavior problems, and so much more. We may be stressed, not sure which decision to make, have financial limitations, or just full of grief. This is the perfect time to remember that love is the key to creating a satisfying life regardless of the challenges.

As our dogs show us over and over again, all we have is today, this moment, with all its ups and downs. Do not worry about the past (have no guild – our dogs tell us), do not worry about the future – focus on having the best possible moment right now. I love when people I coach take a deep breath and relax into the joy, love and happiness of the moment.

One person had never lived with a fearful dog, and the current one came with incredible fears. He allowed her to be as she was. Over the next year, patience and love were the key. Tiny steps, building trust, loving, communicating, observing and she slowly moved to 80% less fear. He remembered that each environment may stimulate fears, so patiently would repeat the lessons each time she regressed.

A lovely Golden with degenerative myelopathy (rear end paralysis) came to me with a recommendation for euthanasia. Her family was at the end of their rope, sad, worried, stressed. They had tried conventional, chiropractic, TCVM, homeopathy. Worse. They were so worried that the love was not clear. When focused on the positive (bright eyes, wiggle ears, a chuckle noise), and we repeated one of the homeopathic medicines and continued chiropractic their lovely dog kept walking for another 5 years.

A wonderful yellow labrador, Bonnie, had been struggling with mast cell tumors all over the skin. A human surgeon, this was her soul dog, her savior from some prior challenges. The dog had 3 rounds of surgery to remove them as they returned, but now there were over 30, and the veterinarian refused to do more surgery. These tumors tend to bleed often, the house was mostly white carpeting and furniture, so the housekeeper, husband and son all were pushing for euthanasia. She was not close to saying goodbye to this special being, yet had noticed that as she fought with the family and wrestled with next steps, the dog seemed progressively more sad and had less energy. When she stood up to her family and stopped worrying and just loving, even before starting the homeopathy medicine, Bonnie had 20% better attitude and energy. With the remedy as well, she returned to a quality of life as good as prior to the surgeries. Using Yunnan Bayio when they bled helped the family and housekeeper be more positive to the dog. With some ups and downs, and remedy changes, Bonnie lived another year or more with a good life, and Mom was ready to say goodbye when the energy declined rather sharply.

My wish for you is learning to live, love, be joyful in the moment regardless of outer circumstances and to keep learning from your dog.

Health reminders from earlier articles:

• Do you have a wonderful holistic health care team? 11 & 12/2024; 7/2025;
• Have you learned and are practicing energy healing techniques? 7/2025;
• Are you doing regular physical exams? 1/2026;
• Are you tracking symptoms in a journal? 8/25, 1/2026

Dr. Christina Chambreau graduated from veterinary college in 1980 and has been helping families be healthy since the late eighties. She offers Virtual Pet Health Coaching and is faculty at the Holistic Actions Academy. Email her at HealThyAnimals@aol.com if you are struggling in any way to be joyful or want to prevent future problems.