How a Keto diet changed my dog’s life
I wish I knew then what I know now.
Does your dog chew at her paws, get ear infections and hot spots, have paws that smell like corn chips, or moist and yeasty smelling skin folds? These are common signs that your dog likely has skin allergies. Some breeds like Cocker Spaniels, French bulldogs, & Shar Pei’s are more prone to skin issues. There are a number of medicines your vet can prescribe like Apoquel or cortisone shots, but in my experience, those are band aids and you'll likely have to keep your dog on these medicines for life for them to be effective. Additionally, steroid shots like cortisone are known to cause tissue damage if over administered.
I grew up with Cocker Spaniels but it wasn't until high school that I got my own Cocker Spaniel, Makana, and learned first hand, how prone the breed is to skin problems. It seemed like every vet I took him to just threw up their hands and said it was because of his breed. Like I should give up and accept it. Makana spent many years of his life on cortisone shots to relieve him of his discomfort. At the time, no one, including myself, thought to change up his diet, which I'm now horrified to say, was Pedigree kibble. I wish I knew then what I know now.
Fast forward almost a decade later to Sadie Jayne, my French bulldog, that history began to repeat itself. Despite being on a high quality raw dog food, she’d gnaw at her paws all night long. I always had Apoquel on hand for when her gnawing got really bad. I knew her quality of life was being affected greatly, and frankly, so was mine.
Her vet gave me the same spill as Makana’s vet (“its just the breed...”) but I was determined to do things differently this time. He suggested I taker her off foods that contain turkey and start her on exotic proteins like venison, rabbit, bison, salmon, or duck. I tried them all including raw diets and top shelf dry foods from brands like Orien, Royal Canin, and Acana. This was a long process of elimination because I had to keep her on each food for at least 2-3 months in order to see any physical changes. I learned that Sadie’s allergies did worsen when she ate turkey, as the vet warned, but the exotic proteins didn’t yield great results either. Nothing was working and I was beginning to feel defeated, again.
I was told Sadie’s skin allergies could also be from her environment. Before going down that rabbit hole, I decided to stick to eliminating any possible food allergens first since there’s only so much I could do about our environment.
I had heard about a veterinarian on Oahu that specialized in holistic animal medicine like acupuncture, essential oils, and ozone therapy. She was pricey but I gave her a shot, and thank God I did.
She told me that Sadie's skin issues appeared to be fungal, caused by yeast. She explained that yeast comes from sugar and sugar comes from carbohydrates. Most dog kibble is almost completely carbohydrates, even the fancy ones I was buying. She suggested Sadie go on a ketogenic diet meaning no carbs, as much as possible. She directed me to a website, Ketopetsanctuary.com. It was and still remains and incredible resource for me, packed with information, case studies, and testimonials of dogs with allergies, autoimmune diseases, cancer and seizures; how ketogenic diets have transformed these dogs' health and even gotten many of them off medication. On their website, you can enter your pet's weight and activity level into their free keto diet calculator and it’ll generate two customized ketogenic diets for your dog—a home cooked diet and a recommended kibble available from Visionary Pets. Bonus: You can also download their ebook on ketogenic dog diets for free.
I decided to go with the home cooked option first. Boiled chicken, kabocha (Japanese pumpkin), choy sum (or other green leafy vegetables), and chia seeds. Sadie was basically eating shabushabu every night, and it’s safe to say, she was eating better than me on most days. After a few weeks, I noticed a drastic improvement in her skin and in her paw chewing, but she was losing an alarming amount of weight because of this ultra lean diet. I began to add in cottage cheese or yogurt to her food for fat and she gained back some of her weight, but not enough. I also put her on a canine multi vitamin because I was concerned she wasn't receiving all the proper vitamins and nutrients you typically see listed on the back of dry dog food bags. I eventually switched her to the Visionary ketogenic kibble that was recommended on ketopetsanctuary.com. I wish I knew then what I know now! This food did wonders for Sadie and it was kibble so that meant no more cooking for me! Unfortunately, Visionary has discontinued their dry kibble line but I found another great keto dry dog food that has yielded amazing results in Sadie for the past 8 months. Ketona from KetoNaural Pet Foods is a low carb (only 6%), high protein (46%), grain-free kibble. It aims to provide all the nutrients of a raw dog food diet but the convenience of kibble. Sadie’s on the chicken recipe. There’s also a salmon recipe. Neither contain any grains or fillers, including potato, which sadly, is a carb. Ketona is made in the USA with natural ingredients like non-GMO and antibiotic free chicken. It checks off a lot of boxes and I’m personally very grateful to companies like KetoNatural Pet Foods that aim to produce quality food for our dogs.
Please shoot me an email and share with me what has worked for your dog’s keto diet needs!
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