The Power of Canine Chiropractic Care

An unplanned trip to the chiropractor tonight has prompted me to write a blog post. This is rather rare for me since I usually just blog about our adventures or agility, flyball or frisbee and I'm always behind.


Tonight I took the pups to the lake by our house for some swimming and play time. All 3 dogs did some swimming. Mariah did the least since she's not overly fond of swimming. The hot weather helped convince her that swimming was a good idea today. The pups had fun and there was lots of rolling in the green grass and playing. Everyone had fun and looked good when we left. I got home and Brisco and Trek happily got out of the Explorer and went inside. Mariah was in the front and didn't want to jump over the seat to come out the back, so I opened the door and let her out. She went inside and was looking a bit odd like she had something stuck in her fur and she sat down really quick with her ears down. I cleaned all the weeds out of her fur and we went out back. She went a few steps and sat down and looked miserable. I got her to move a little bit more and noticed that her back end wasn't moving quite right. I felt her back legs and the muscles in one of them were super tight. I laid her down and did some massaging to relax the muscle and tried to do some easy stretches. She's used to this and is usually really good about it, but this time she would not let me stretch out her back left leg. I knew something was off, so I went inside, called the chiropractor (Boulder Sol Chiro) and was lucky enough to squeeze into an opening. I just had to get in the car immediately and start driving there to make it on time! We got pretty lucky and traffic wasn't too bad. We made it there right at our appt time.


A little background: Mariah LOVES going to see Dr. Jay and Dr. Jason and she's always pulling on the leash to go in, whining impatiently (sometimes barking) when she has to wait her turn and she's always trying to explore and go see who's there and track down Jay. Whenever she sees him, her entire butt wiggles with excitement and sometimes she'll jump up and down! She will even give Jay kisses and she hardly does that to anyone. 2 days ago, Dr. Jay said that Mariah had to be their happiest client! At 11 yrs old, she still acts like a puppy when we go there - except tonight. Tonight was very odd... she went in and just laid down. She didn't look for Jay, wasn't begging for treats or anything. Jay wasn't in so we got to see Jason tonight. We went to the dog room and again, Mariah just laid down, ears flat and looking miserable. When Jason came in, she didn't even react or say hi. I have never seen her like that and was really worried. Jason started checking her out and noticed right away that her entire lower spine was twisted really bad. It was putting a strain on all the muscles around it making it uncomfortable for her to move. He slowly worked on her and she was squirming more than usual. She was really messed up and I have no clue how she got that way! We were just in for one of our regular post flyball adjustements 2 days before and she was great! After lots of adjusting, Jason was finally able to get Mariah's little body back to the point where he could stretch out her back legs and move comfortably. He said I'll want to ice her lower back because the muscles will be a bit sore, but he said she should be good to go! As soon as he said that, Mariah returned to her normal office crazy puppy stage! She was excited for treats and when we opened the door, she went running around checking out the place and smiling! I had my girl back!!! The receptionist had seen us there on Tuesday and noticed that Mariah was definitely feeling bad when we got there and after the adjustment she said "that's the dog I remember from the other day!" If anyone had seen the before and after, there's no way they couldn't believe in the power of chiropractic adjustments. It was night and day difference all in the span of 10-15 min. I've seen my dogs attitudes change with adjustments, but this was by far the most amazing one yet!


I've been taking my pups in to Boulder Sol to see Dr. Jay for the past 6+ years. Dr. Jason is fairly new to the office, but he is just as amazing with dogs. Most of our visits are routine adjustments after flyball tournaments or when we've been doing a lot of agility. If you watch dogs in agility and flyball in slow motion, you can see the impact that being a competition dog has on their bodies. They take impacts to their shoulders, wrists, spines, etc when jumping, turning and other motions on the field. Most of the impacts aren't that bad, but over time it all adds up. Brisco usually has a wrist and toes jammed, a rib or vertebrae out or other minor things that adjust easily. Mariah always seems to be different, but even at 11 years old, her body still adjusts easily. Trek has only been in twice, but he hasn't been competing much. Over the years I have seen my pups go from a little stiff and sore to moving easily from getting adjustments. They both really enjoy getting adjusted and you can see it on their faces when something has been bugging them and it gets fixed. Brisco is usually really serious and doesn't show to much emotion, but one time he had a vertebrae turned upward that was locking up his back end. Jay got it rotated back in place and Brisco just melted in his hands! I've never seen Brisco react to anything like that and it was really cool.


I'm not saying that chiropractic adjustements are the cure to everything, but for my hard working, hard playing pups, I feel that it definitely helps their day-to-day happiness if we go in every once in awhile. Dr. Jay & Jason know dogs bodies so well that they can find things that normal vets can't always find. Whenever my pups come up limping or sore, the first thing I do is go to the chiropractor! For Mariah tonight - that was the 100% right thing to do. I don't think our normal vet would have been able to help and we probably would have been told to do ex-rays or rest & take painkillers for a few days.

If you have a furry member of the family that seems to be moving slower or isn't quite right, I would highly recommend taking them to the chiropractor. There are more of them popping up around the cities and I'm sure there are good ones all over. Just be sure to check around first to make sure you trust them with your pups. I completely trust Dr. Jay and Dr. Jason and would recommend them to anyone! They also adjust horses and people so if I'm lucky, I get myself adjusted once in awhile too. :) You never like to see your furry friends in pain and to be at an adjustment and see that pain melt away is something I won't forget anytime soon!