Hydration

We usually think of hydration in terms of making sure your dog has enough water to drink, which is often directly connected to how hot the weather is, the level of exercise, and if there is enough ventilation in your home or your car, if you drive with your dog. You already know all that.

Before I go on to discuss what I would like to say about hydration, I’d like to briefly comment on the dynamics that go on if your dog happens to find himself in the situation where he is starved for water. For one, his blood cells become dehydrated and move slower. like thick sludge. The cells themselves cannot perform their duties for adequate metabolism, that is, they cannot move cellular waste products out and oxygen and nutrient rich materials, in. The cells in the brain are especially vulnerable. When they become dehydrated the entire neurological system is severely impacted.

How often have you told your dog not to go out to play in the heat of the sunshine without his baseball cap on? We know that most heat loss is through the top of the head! Will they ever listen?

This is usually what we talk about when we are on the subject of hydration. But you already knew all that and this was not what I wanted to share with you. So, I won’t. Or didn’t. Some of the signs of dehydration, by the way, that of course, you already know when you see them are sunken eyes, listlessness, dark and/or foamy tongue, slow capillary refill, when you either press on the gums with your finger or pinch the skin on the chest. Others are lethargy, loss of appetite, and unsteady gait. You knew all that. You could have written this so far.

Let’s consider hydration as an aspect of PetMassage™ bodywork. Its opposite is dehydration. Hydration is essentially, adding water. Its actual definition is: to provide water for somebody or something in order to reestablish or maintain a correct fluid balance. Dehydration, then, is removing water and diminishing fluid balance.

When you touch your dog, you are combining your liquid assets, connecting your fluid-filled body to his fluid-filled body. During a PetMassage™ session, you and your dog create and exist in your private intimate atmospheric bubble of water ch’i. Each of you is continuously and spontaneously interacting with and affecting the other’s fluid balance.

The balance is physical, such as enhancing cardiovascular and intracellular circulation, restoring heat distribution, and/or affecting things like proprioception by helping your dog with the intricate balance of fluid within his inner ear. It is mental, such as creating an ambient inner environment where you and your dog’s thoughts can drift and emotions can flow. It is spiritual, such as when you and your dog plumb the depths of the Aakash and recall ancient memories. The two of you, through the process of PetMassage™ are making a pact to continuously and forever have each others’ backs. This happens with the union of your spirits. It began while you were still within your primal, single cell organism bodies, wriggling around together in the original big chi pond. It continues and is reactivated during the PetMassage. Hydration.

PetMassage Canine Aquatic Massage is hydrating on several levels – or depths. PetMassage Canine Aquatic Massage adds the element of water to the dynamic reeducation and revivification inherent in your dog’s PetMassage™experience. It happens in every, yes every, session.

In the water, there are three participants: the practitioner, the dog, and the water.

1. The practitioner choreographs and facilitates the flow with a specific set of movements.
2. The dog adds patterns of responses, reactions, emotions, expressions, passive, resistive movements, dominant and submissive interactive movements, incorporating his direct input, from his own perspective.
3. The water provides pressure, support, heat and resistance. The water also provides waves, patterns, splashes, and offers a complex set of water sounds, such as when you slap it with your cupped hand and when its droplets slash back down onto the surface. Water ebbs, eddies, whirlpools, spouts and flows. It has a texture, a flavor, an aroma, a current. It even bubbles.

There is a delightful freedom of bodywork movement in water, with its full surround access, its buoyancy, its support and comfort. PetMassage Canine Aquatic Massage is a return to the birthing experience, which we were too busy surviving to notice while we were being born. PetMassage Canine Aquatic Massage is a vehicle for exaggerated extensions, heightening relaxation, and letting go of restrictive physical and emotional holding patterns. PetMassage Canine Aquatic Massage is amazing bodywork offering the opportunity for personal revelation. Wow! That’s some hydration for the spirit!

Another form of adding water is through a hose. This is usually the application of cold water to the exterior of the body, usually the legs. These are important forms of hydration, too. Hosing with cold water has different effects on the body depending on the direction the water hose is moving.

1. Moving the hose distal to proximal or from the extremities toward the heart, increases venous and lymphatic flow, closes pores in the skin, stimulates the erector pili muscles of the hair (and the nerves attached to them), and constricts capillaries and blood vessels until the body regulates itself and the blood vessels open again, actually increasing blood flow.
2. Hosing down the legs toward the toes cleanses the coat of hair and debris and clears and cleans the body’s aura, energy field, of tenacious energetic gunk.

Dry PetMassage™ and PetMassage Canine Aquatic Massage provide ways that you and your dog to sit, stay, and keep adequately hydrated, in all its forms and permutations.