Meet Dr. Ruth Roberts: The Heart Behind Holistic Pet Health

Welcome to Healing Tails. I'm Dr. Ruth Roberts here to help you become the best pet parent you can be. With simple, natural care that works for real life, real budget and real pets.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:00:19 - 00:01:03]
Welcome to Happy Tails, the official podcast of Dr. Ruth Roberts. Now I know what you're thinking. I'm not Dr. Ruth, but for this launch episode, we decided to do things a little differently. I am Melissa Natanson, a certified Holistic Pet Health Coach through Dr. Ruth Roberts' life-changing program. I'm also an anchor and reporter, so we thought let's turn the mic around and let you get to know the woman behind the holistic pet health movement, and I am so incredibly honored to be the one to interview her. She is a mentor, she's a pioneer, she's a teacher, and today she's in the hot seat. Hi, Dr. Ruth!

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:01:04 - 00:01:06]
Hey Melissa. How are you? What's up?

Melissa Natanson:
[00:01:07 - 00:01:55]
I'm doing well. I'm doing well. This is gonna be fun. I'm so excited to dig in and get to know you better and show everybody your incredible heart, because I'm gonna say, I'm gonna take a personal note here for a minute. Having been through your program and continuing to learn from you and continuing to be mentored by you has truly been life changing for me. One of the important things that I want people to know from this podcast is how absolutely incredible your heart is and that you are truly in this because you're a change maker in the world of pet wellness. And with that, what inspired you to start this podcast?

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:01:56 - 00:03:06]
There's so many opinions out there, and some of them are pretty extreme. The way I like to think about this is that like many aspects of our life right now, there is no middle way. And if we think about what the middle way is in terms of Buddhism, it was a way to keep us from the extremes of aestheticism. So literally creating suffering in your life because you thought it might make you a better person, and hedonism. And for us in the holistic pet world, I think it's the balance between using natural solutions for health versus only using conventional medicines.
And that's the difficulty is that for everyone there is a middle way, and ultimately it is up to the pet parent to take a deep breath and see, does that information make sense for my dog or for my cat? And can I incorporate that information into what I'm already doing to make things a little better?

Melissa Natanson:
[00:03:07 - 00:03:40]
Right. Well, and I feel like this well-rounded integrative approach is the only way that we can move forward. And this is why you created the certified holistic pet health coaching program because we are there to bridge the gap between vets and pet parents. Was there a moment in your career that was just the tip of the iceberg? You decided to jump off the iceberg and catch your wings and think, I've gotta do something.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:03:41 - 00:05:17]
Yeah, the story I tell, and this is the truth, there's a client I had named Janet. She had a 15-year-old Westie, Rosie, who had a litany of health problems. And the deal is that Janet had been able to support Rosie to a high quality of life. The face of all of these health concerns working with an internal medicine specialist, her local vet, and with me. And so Janet knew that the integrative approach was what was going to keep Rosie going.
And what happened is that one day Janet took Rosie in for her monthly appointment with her internist, and this is… Sort of during the middle of the pandemic and veterinary offices were already overrun. They'd gotten some blood work drawn and the internist was looking at the results and she turned around and looked at Janet and said, "I'm really sorry, but there's nothing else I can do to help Rosie." And Janet's like, "What are you talking about? Rosie's feeling and eating and doing all the same things she was last month." And so the internist looked at her and said, "Janet, I'm really sorry, but there's nothing else I can do. And I think euthanasia is really the next logical step for Rosie." So Janet is flummoxed. She gets a copy of the lab results. She walks out to the car, she pays the bill first, of course, she walks out to the car, she looks at the labs and Rosie's creatinine—one of the kidney values—is up 0.1. Oh God. Ludicrous. That is not a death sentence.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:05:18 - 00:06:12]
No. And so...
What happened next is she gets on a call with me and she's like, "I just, I feel betrayed. I don't even know how to process this." And so, you know, it is just heartbreaking. So we worked together. She said, "Well, there's a guy that's another internist that's opening up a practice."
I'm like, "Let me know how I can support you." And I think I had a quick conversation with the new fellow in town and we talked about some different options to support Rosie's kidneys. And he kept working with Janet. And the long story is that Rosie lived another year, of course. And so this is heartbreaking to me. What if Janet didn't have me? Yeah. Rosie would've been dead a year too early.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:06:13 - 00:07:34]
And this is what really started this program off because there were so many people in the same shoes. I kept seeing posts on social media and hearing from friends: "We went to the vet and it was either $10,000 for surgery or euthanasia."
Now that number's up to $20,000 in some places, and this is the thing that's just so horrifying to me—that veterinary medicine…In its path to being corporatized has ended up where human medicine is and where the doctors have 15 minutes, maybe 20 minutes in the exam room. They don't have the time to explain to the pet parent: "This is what's going on with your pet. This is what we think will happen over time. Here's what to expect." And if you don't like the limited options that we have in conventional medicine for chronic disease... You have no other options.

And so that was my goal, was to create a core of people dedicated to pet health, to optimizing the health span as well as the lifespan of pets using food, nutrition, supplementation, and basic things that don't cost a ton of money to help pets live happier lives.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:07:35 - 00:08:44]
Boy, if you can't feel Dr. Ruth's heart in that, I know I can. And...I have my own testimony that I've had a dog dealing with kidney issues just like you were talking about. And she has far outlived her diagnosis by years, in fact. Um, and it's taking the exact same principles that Dr. Ruth is teaching. And my husband took my dog to the vet a couple of months ago. And he wanted a straight story from her and so he said, "I wanna know what's the deal, what's going on?" And she said, "If it was any other dog and Melissa wasn't being taken care of, she'd be gone already."

Now. That's the mentality in conventional veterinary medicine. And it's a little bit a testimony to you and it—well, obviously a big testimony to you—about what we can do to help them live longer and healthier. And another one of those things—your proud moment—is the CrockPET diet. How did that come about?

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:08:45 - 00:09:28]
So there you are a fire. And Melissa, don't sell yourself short because you already knew a lot about supporting dogs with kidney disease. So you just took what I had to offer and amplified your own knowledge base. So please...The Original CrockPET Diet—here's another story that just... I mean, our pets show us things that we just cannot not believe. So I had a dog that had bacterial endocarditis and a second dog. And that's another story. So you know what that is? It's an infection on the heart valve. And on ultrasound, I could see something this big—about an inch in diameter—on one of her heart valves.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:09:29 - 00:09:31]
Bad.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:09:32 - 00:10:16]
Um, and so, you know, I did all the conventional things. We got it under control. I had just started learning acupuncture. I took her with me to the Chi Institute—and now it's the Chi University—and asked my professors: "I need some help with this girl 'cause she's stable, but she's not well." And they said, "Okay, do these acupoints, use these herbs, and then start cooking for her." And it was like, "Oh my God, that's heresy." Because we're trained as veterinarians that you can only use the bag of food—it's a complete imbalance for all life stages in every bite. Well, it is what it is. There's good points and bad points to that.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:10:16 - 00:10:16]
Yeah

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:10:17 - 00:11:05]
But the deal is that you can create a balanced diet out of home-cooked food, raw food, whatever your thing is. But here’s what happened to my dog. She was having no parts, no part whatsoever of having acupuncture needles. That was not happening. Even just massaging acupoints, she's like, "No." Um, so it's like, okay. Yeah. And the herbs she thought were okay. That was possible. The food, she thought, was an outstanding idea. And so over the next three months, I watched as this thing on her heart valve went from a centimeter in thickness to three millimeters—which is about the thickness of a piece of paper.
That ain't supposed to happen.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:11:05 - 00:11:05]
Yeah.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:11:06 - 00:11:44]
So, And to be fair, she needed lifesaving drugs. She needed antibiotics, she needed heart medications—enalapril and furosemide, which is a diuretic initially. And then by the time, over that period of three months...We finished up the antibiotics, did some very rudimentary work in fixing her microbiome at the time, and weaned her off of the meds. So she's down to one medication and two herbal formulas and a couple of other bits and pieces. So this is at nine. She had this experience. She lived until she was 13.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:11:45 - 00:11:45]
Wow.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:11:46 - 00:12:01]
And she did indeed die of heart failure. So eventually it got her in the end, but that's 4 years later. And in the meantime, she had a fabulous life. So that convinced me of the value of home cooking. So I started talking to...I'm sorry, once more. 

Melissa Natanson:
[00:12:01 - 00:12:22]
No, I was gonna say it's about quality of life as much as quantity. Like if we're making them live forever but they have no quality, that's a big issue. And um, I wanna hear what you're gonna say next, but I know that's something we talk about a lot. Our pets are living longer, but they're coming with a laundry list of chronic issues.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:12:22 - 00:14:23]
Right on. So that convinced me I had to start talking to my clients about food—and not about kibble. So I tried out my very early first version of The Original Crock-Pot Diet. And the first person that went on it was a woman whose dog had cutaneous hemangiosarcoma. So the pup had a big tumor on its head that we removed surgically. By the time you find it, it's already gonna come back. So here she is—two months later, it's starting to come back. We started cooking. She started cooking for her dog using foods that support nourishing blood, moving blood, all of these things, plus herbal formulas. That dog's cancer went into remission and he lived another five years. So I'm like, "Oh wow, okay. This is getting really good." And then I started talking to all my clients, and about that time, that very first pet food recall in 2007 happened. And all of a sudden I had a thousand dogs and cats eating this food because they didn't know what to trust. Wow.
So here we are. It was like, holy smokes. Now I have this total huge population of dogs—and cats too—trying out this diet. And what was happening was astonishing. My clients are—I mean, we had strangers, we had their buddies telling them: "Go down to Dr. Ruth's office and get this thing." And so we had strangers coming in off the streets to get copies of the diet. My staff is like, "Should we give it to 'em?" Like, "Yeah, sure, go ahead."
But then later what happened is my clients were coming in and they're telling me:
"Doc, my dog doesn't itch anymore."
"Doc, my dog doesn't have diarrhea anymore."
"Doc, my dog can get up and down without a problem anymore."
And then finally it was things like, "Doc, she'll cook for the dog, but not for me." And I'm like, "Just ask for some salt, buddy."

Melissa Natanson:
[00:14:23 - 00:14:25]
I've eaten it before.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:14:26 - 00:14:38]
Yeah, really? In a pinch, it does the job. But this is the astonishing thing—it was beyond a shadow of a doubt. There's proof of the power of whole foods.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:14:39 - 00:15:02]
Absolutely. Absolutely. I've definitely experienced that with my own dog. I've been cooking for her—something similar to what you came up with—for 12 years. And I think it's the reason she's 15 when conventional vets told me she probably wouldn't make it past 8, 9, 10. And she's still running around here today, so... Right on.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:15:02 - 00:15:02]
Right on.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:15:03 - 00:15:38]
So, right? I wanna dig in this a little bit because I kind of…i feel like it’s something we kind of have to bang our heads against this brick wall with the veterinarians right when it comes to fresh and homemade food. I, I, I've dealt with it before, Lord knows you have. Why do you think this is that? It's just, it can't be accepted that burnt brown balls. Are not biologically appropriate. If you want to eat crackers and you know, some coconut oil all day, we can't really live on that. Why would we think our dogs can? It's frustrating.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:15:39 - 00:17:37]
It is frustrating. And, here's my experience. So when I started talking to my clients about Whole Foods that they're cooking at home, I was really pretty sure the Afco police were gonna come and get me and lock me up and, and so, right, so this is the deal is that. Our nutrition training is limited at best. And whose training is literally when I was in veterinary school in 1990, so this is in 1987. Oh. Um, the textbook was called Hills Textbook of Clinical Veterinary Nutrition. So that tells you who Yeah. And it's not called Hills anymore. 'cause Royal Canin wanted to throw some money in and I, and all of them, but that's the deal is that they're teaching us that because. That's what makes money. And, uh, they are beating it into our heads that this is the only way. And so veterinarians are understandably afraid. 

And there's two things that happen when you're afraid and somebody confronts you with that issue that you're worried about.Either you're like, yep, you're probably right. And I don't know the answer. I'm not even sure where to point you or you double down on the fear. And I think that's a lot of what's happening right now in veterinary medicine. Whatever thorny topic you want to pick. Um, veterinarians are so overwhelmed, so overworked and so overloaded that when people ask them questions. That they maybe have an inkling in the back of their minds that the party line is not maybe correct. Um, if they're gonna go one of two ways. And unfortunately, if you're in a corporate practice, you have to go with the party line. And so what's happening is vets are sometimes doubling down in a very aggressive manner.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:17:38 - 00:18:49]
Yeah. And I think I get the feeling that. Vets are so many things. They're anesthesiologists, they're orthopedists, they're internists, they're general medicine. They're ophthalmologists. They're looking at everything. Nutritionists are something that they're not, but I feel like there's a little ego involved sometimes in thinking if they admit that they don't really know or that it's going to lower their value, it doesn't. but I always get the feeling like if they admit they don't know, then that means that they don't know everything. But that fear is then driving them to possibly give, well, I'm not gonna say possibly. I, I'm gonna flat out say, I think it's bad advice to say that a dog can only eat kibble, but we won't go down that road a whole ton. So you have, you've created the CrockPET Diet, and the bottom line is, it has improved lives. Of thousands of pets, if not tens of thousands. Because how many years has this been around now, Dr. Ruth?

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:18:50 - 00:20:20]
Well, we're working on 20. And, and hundreds of thousands is appropriate because what has happened is that there are some of my colleagues that are like. I don't know. I mean, there is the best story I can tell you. There's Dr. Chip down in South Carolina, good old country boy. His clients were coming down to see me and then coming back to him for the routine stuff. And so finally one of them handed and he's like, what are you doing? Your dog looks amazing. So the client literally handed him a copy of the diet and he's like, well, all right, I'll try it. He called me up and he said “I don't know how you come up with  this, and I'm making him”. He is a South Carolina boy, so he's a smart guy. Really smart guy. But this is, this is how he talks. Um, “I don't know how you come up with this, but my dog's lipomas went away. I'm gonna tell every client I know to use this diet”. And I'm like, wow. And, and it's really cool because one of our colleagues, uh, Lori Magginson actually works with Dr. Chip and so she's helping to bring him back up to the speed on some of the improvements that have been made over the last 20 years. Well, that is, but that's happened all over the country. And you know, and they never said, Hey, thanks, I'm using your diet. But it keeps turning up in really interesting places. So it's not just me. And this is, it is that it takes all of us. To change the trajectory of health and we do it in our own small way.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:20:20 - 00:20:40]
Right. Well, there's been a lot of hub going around about holistic. You are a pioneer in the holistic pet health world. Clearly the crockpot has been around for 20 years. And I wanna know—what does holistic mean to you?

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:20:41 - 00:21:38]
I think if you look at the definition of that word, it means taking a holistic—and if you put a W in front of it, then it makes a little more sense—a whole view of the body and health. And so holistic medicine literally means incorporating different modalities. That can be acupuncture, homeopathy, herbals, aromatherapy, chiropractic—all these things along with conventional medicine or instead of it. But a holistic practitioner typically incorporates multiple modalities of support for their patients and their clients. And I think that's the distinction. There's this concept that holistic means only natural stuff, and the thing we need to realize is that only natural stuff can also be toxic if used inappropriately.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:21:39 - 00:22:33]
Right, and that's really what I want the pet parents listening to this to understand. That your concept of holistic is that we treat the pet as a whole body system—not parts, not symptoms, not organs. We look at the whole body, and it doesn't necessarily mean that every single thing is going to be 100% pure and natural. There are some synthetic vitamins in total holistic body support, but you've explained how that works. Do you wanna clarify anything else on that?
Because I think there's a lot of definitions of holistic rolling around, and that can get confused and lost in the message where your message is: "I treat the pet as a whole and give it biologically appropriate food."

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:22:34 - 00:24:06]
Right on. And so that's the other thing to think about in terms of holistic. So in terms of a holistic practitioner, they incorporate multiple modalities. But truly holistic means looking at all aspects of life, as you just said. So diet, exercise, behavior—we call it in pets, but really mental stability, mental support. The opportunity to form close bonds, the opportunity to have pure fresh water—and really looking at all the aspects of life that make it good. If we broke it down to its just diet and supplements, we're missing a lot. So I think that there are many people that have many different approaches in the holistic space. And what's important to recognize is that each of them have some level of excellence that they've developed and have been able to offer to pet parents.
Now, does that mean that somebody that's got excellence in aromatherapy should be knocking down the person that has excellence in chiropractic? Absolutely not. And the reason that there are so many modalities is because not one works for every single pet or every single person.
And this is what I keep trying to emphasize—is that you have to find the right way for your pet.
Not what James' right way is. Take her information, see if it's applicable or not. If it's not, then move on. Find another support system that works better.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:24:07 - 00:24:17]
Well, knowledge is power, and that's one of the reasons you're doing this podcast.
Because as pet parents learn to become their pet's best advocate, the more you know, the more you know.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:24:18 - 00:24:22]
Right on. Make a choice. Know better, do better. Right on.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:24:22 - 00:24:31]
Yeah. If you could say three words that describe your approach to holistic pet healing, what would they be? Uh-ah. I know. Hot seat.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:24:32 - 00:24:53]
Right on. Hot seat. So, I mean I think the three words are Rational, client-centered, and pet-centered. That's actually four, so I'm cheating a little bit. But I can make a plan that's beautiful—it looks great on paper. But if it doesn't make sense in that client and that pet's life, it's useless.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:24:53 - 00:25:31]
Yeah, and one of the main things you've taught us as your holistic pet health coaches is to meet the clients where they're at. We've gotta work together because just like you described, there's different definitions of holistic from providers out there. And there's different definitions of holistic in the pet parents' minds as well. They may think what they think is holistic is incorporating a couple of Chinese herbs while keeping their dog on some other conventional medicines. That's okay too, because those things can work synergistically. The main thing is that we try to make strides to help those pets.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:25:31 - 00:25:32]
Right on.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:25:33 - 00:25:40]
What is one of your proudest moments since you have been doing this?

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:25:41 - 00:26:29]
Honestly, when we had that meeting—we had our very first annual International Holistic Pet Health Coach Association meeting in Chicago last September. My heart was so filled with joy to be there with everybody. We've been looking at each other on Zoom calls for a year or more. And feel the energy—feel the energy of the community. And that was so profound because it helped me understand how much you all have taken from this program. And how much you've been able to expand this knowledge and this method with others within our pet lovers community. It's the honor of my life.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:26:30 - 00:26:46]
And it's an education that doesn't stop, and it's a movement. And you should be very proud because I'm proud of you and all of us are. You've changed my life for sure.
Look at me—I'm interviewing you, and I-

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:26:27 - 00:26:49]

I do this to you all the time. I'm so sorry.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:26:49 - 00:27:30]
It’s okay. But um, I wanna know that you changed the course of my life. So it's important because we're all connected through our hearts and through what we wanna do for animals.
And I really want that to be one of the most important things that's known today.Is where Dr. Ruth is coming from and where we're all coming from and why she's doing this podcast.
Because it's to make the pet health world a better place and make it easier on you guys as pet parents. 'Cause it's hard—it's hard to be a dog and cat mama. I don't have kids. You don't either, but I can't imagine 'cause it's hard enough having dog and cat kids.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:27:30 - 00:28:07]
Right on. And it's so confusing. And that's kind of it—I want to give as many different viewpoints as possible. So that you can take that under consideration and decide if it's good or it's not good for where you are with your pets right now. But I think the one thing I want you to bear in mind—if somebody tells you that something is absolutely wrong 100% of the time, think twice about taking that advice. Because what they're doing is discounting others' experience and level of excellence, and that's not right.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:28:08 - 00:28:26]
That's right. That's right. Well, I want to talk a little bit more about you—instead of the industry. So I wanna know—tell me about little Dr. Ruth. Where'd you grow up and when did you know that you wanted to be a vet?

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:28:28 - 00:30:36]
I grew up in Louisville, Kentucky—and you can tell 'cause I said it that way. This is when Louisville was still considered to be part of the south. And so, like a lot of folks, we spent a few years in New Orleans—my dad worked there. This is in the good old days when dogs and cats were still not spayed or neutered. And a lot of 'em were running around and sometimes they met with peril for sure. But we always had a dog in the family. We always had cats that would come and visit. My mother was like a cat whisperer. You know, I had a pretty normal childhood for the most part. I did get diagnosed with dyslexia very early on. I attended at the time what was considered special education—this is in 1972. So special ed was just being developed.

And I was very fortunate that my mother was actually teaching children as part of her work—how to work through problems associated with disabilities. And so I attended a special school for a couple of years, which was a little bizarre, but it helped me get to where I am today.
So I went from not being able to add up two three-column figures to being able to get through calculus two in college for pre-veterinary prerequisites. There's always an advantage to dyslexia or ADD or ADHD or whatever the alphabet soup is these days. There's a curse and a blessing. The blessing is that it allows you to multitask much more efficiently. And in veterinary medicine, that is a day in and day out thing. Because you might walk from a room where you're working with a puppy into a very elderly dog with cancer into surgery and so on and so forth. That ability to learn how to work with that disability helped me be able to do the work that I'm doing today—to move from one thing to another seamlessly.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:30:36 - 00:30:42]
Wow. That's really an accomplishment. And that takes a lot of dedication to get through vet school.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:30:42 - 00:31:00]
That was my mom actually teaching me how to learn how to do it. And without her, I would not be where I am today. She was the one that believed in me and helped push me forward through what would've been the old education system saying, "She's stupid—just let her go to finishing school."

Melissa Natanson:
[00:31:00 - 00:31:06]
You grew up with animals, loved animals, but when did you decide, "Hey, I'm gonna be a vet?"

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:31:07 - 00:31:31]
When I was 12. You know, it just—I don't know why. It's just that's like, that's it. It came to me that that's what I needed to do. And actually, I had been training in classical singing up till the time I was probably 20. And so I thought, "Well, maybe I'll do this." But no, every time it was like I kept making decision points—it's like, "Nope, veterinary medicine is the way I need to go."

Melissa Natanson:
[00:31:31 - 00:31:36]
Dr. Ruth, I did not know this.
Um, I'm a classically trained vocalist.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:31:36 - 00:31:48]
There you go. But that's one of the things that's carried me through life too. It's like when it's so bad, if you sing, it just burns out the bad. Right. And then you can come back to the center.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:31:48 - 00:32:12]
That's right. Well, I love hearing that. And how have we all, I feel like, had our fair share of health challenges in this world. I think it's just part of being human these days—unfortunately or fortunately. We're here to learn some lessons.

But how have your own health struggles shaped the way you approach pet health and even maybe the pet parents?

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:32:12 - 00:33:45]
I mean, any doctor that's been sick and then figured out how to recover—whether that's through conventional methods or holistic or alternative therapy—becomes a better doctor. Because we have walked in the shoes of the patient. And that made me get much better at listening to what my clients were telling me. The other thing is that was my introduction to functional medicine. So back in 2006—also about the inception of the CrockPET Diet—I was diagnosed with IBS with C. diff for the second time and with fibromyalgia.

Now you ain't supposed to get better from fibromyalgia, are you? I haven't had pain for over 15 years other than disc pain. But that's the testament to what that functional medicine doctor was able to teach me. You heal your gut, you get rid of the stuff that's in there—the infection, the parasites, the whatever. And eat a whole food anti-inflammatory diet. Utilize supplements in a rational way to support mitochondrial deficiency—right, with fibromyalgia. Reduce pain without narcotics, without nonsteroidal drugs. And learn how to modulate your stress better because that's the underlying cause of a lot of this stuff.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:33:45 - 00:34:16]
That's right. And I feel like our pets and their parents—the pets are almost in a chronic state of stress because their parents are. This is something that I've learned from you and that I've worked on. I mean, I know it, but you called me out and I appreciate that. Because I feel like it's something we've all gotta work on. What kind of trend have you noticed with that—with this kind of passing back and forth of the stress and the health conditions with pets and their parents? I find that often they have the same.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:34:17 - 00:36:27]
It is true. And so in my own case, I have to be very careful about something taking me down a path I don't want to go. Because what I will see is as my stress level, anxiety level goes up, I'm looking over at Ohio and she's just like, "Yeah, yeah." So, you know, Dr. Barry Sands has a really great expression for that, and that is "taking responsibility for your energy." And I think that is critical. The other great teacher that I've had experience with in the last year is a woman named Sinclair Canali. And she and Michael are amazing coaches—health coaches. Sinclair's an ND as well. But they work on all the things, right? The toxins, the parasites, all of that. But part of what they help people work on is understanding where are you, emotionally? What impact did your family history have on you that may be creating part of this disease process—this dis-ease, this discomfort?
And recognize if something shifts you from a state that you like to be in to a state you don't like. What was the thing and what was your response to it? So that, the next time as you're in that shift, you can stop and say, "Mm-hmm, no, I don't need to do that. I know what this is." And, "Aunt Sue, I'm really sorry. I love you. Thank you. Bless you for this lesson." Breathe. And I think that that's important, right? Take a breath—where am I? How do I feel? And so for me, what I could do is take that breath and look over at Ohio and go, "Okay, we're good now." Or "Oh shit, I need to do a little more work on this." And so they do this job for us gladly and with honor. They're trying to show us—be our mirrors. "Here's what you're making me feel like, because this is where your energy is."

Melissa Natanson:
[00:36:28 - 00:37:08]
Yeah. And that's amazing to recognize because it's such an important aspect. And it's something that pet parents are gonna learn more about from you and from us because it is not in mainstream and conventional medicine. For the most part, for humans or pets, and it's really such an important aspect. I'm glad that you explained so much of that. And on the flip, it's gotta be hard to be the emotional sounding board at the same time. How many days did you go home and just have to have a good cry because it was so overwhelming—all the challenges you were facing?

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:37:09 - 00:38:54]
This is why the suicide rate is so high in veterinary medicine. Because I couldn't go home and have a good cry. I just went home and sucked it up. And this is what so many of my colleagues are doing. Because how can this be possible that we euthanize a dog we've seen for the last 11 years? And it's horrible, and the pet parent is bawling, and we're... you know, and this is ridiculous. I'm standing there trying to be really serious and not lose it and cry with them when that was actually the most appropriate thing to do.

Instead, what veterinary medicine taught us was to be stoic and to suck it up. And that's so harmful. And that's part of what I teach you all is that you need to get that energy out of you—that's not yours. And when something like that happens, you need to feel the feeling and be there with your client to help them go through that. Because that kind of grief when it comes on a regular basis is crushing if you don't know how to deal with it appropriately. And that's part of where my chronic disease came from—right back in 2006. I was in a practice where it was not unusual for me to euthanize five to seven animals a day. And is it because I'm an idiot doctor? No. It's because they could find no hope. And by the time they got to me, it was way too late. And I think that's something that... how do you say, "God, if you'd come to me earlier, blah, blah, blah." You can't say that. No, but that's horrifying, right? And so sucking all of that up—yeah, made me sick.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:38:55 - 00:39:27]
Oh gosh, Dr. Ruth, I can't imagine what a lot of the vets are going through now.Again, a testament to the amazing program that you started. Because it aims to take the pressure off of them one little step at a time. We're gonna get there. But I know I've seen it with my own vet, and luckily she's not afraid to cry in front of me when she has a tough day. Um, you're changing the tide. The tide is turning. Uh, so because I can't imagine how overwhelming that must have been for you. But let's... let's...

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:39:27 - 00:39:55]
And it's everybody. I mean, and this is the thing—I think we wanna say, "Oh, the damn vets, blah, blah, blah." They're doing the level best they can. They really are. And they've got the tools that they know how to use, and that's what they're using. They don't have time, right? They don't have the energy to learn new tricks—It’s survival mode. So how can we support them to give them the time to decompress and to learn some new tricks?

Melissa Natanson:
[00:40:05 - 00:40:16]
Yeah. Yeah. Well, let's flip it onto a more positive note, just a little bit. What has been—what is your favorite thing about life now? Currently, you are the original holistic pet health coach. You're America's favorite holistic pet health coach. What's your favorite thing about life now?

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:40:16 - 00:41:06]
Uh, I mean, so I'm sitting here in Montenegro. Which was part of Yugoslavia, so it's just south of Croatia. And that's the most amazing thing. I spent almost 30 years chained to a building, and I loved clinical practice—I really did. But the freedom to travel and see different countries, see how different people live, see how they interact with their animals has been an incredible gift. I mean, it's amazing. I'm sitting in a three-building apartment complex. Every afternoon our neighbors walk their sheep and goats through the yard to mow the grass. How much fun is that? That's amazing. It's amazing. So the gift of travel, the gift of seeing things differently has been... ah, beautiful.

Melissa Natanson:
00:41:06 - 00:41:33]
I was just gonna ask you that—that's a, besides being classically trained, that's another thing we've shared. That we both love to travel and have spent time living in other countries. 'Cause I was gonna ask you how you felt like that changed your—you bring a global perspective now, I feel, to human and pet wellness. I mean, anything that you've learned in your travels that you're like, "Oh, why don't we implement this here?"

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:41:33 - 00:42:46]
Right on. And so, and that's it. I mean, so why do we have our dogs on concrete 24/7? Why do we have our cats on concrete in an enclosed house where they can't even exercise their basic hunting skills? I'm not saying turn 'em all loose in the streets, but create ways so that they can experience nature too. And I think one of the interesting things that Rodney Habib and Dr. Karen Becker bring up in their books—the Super Dog books—is that the animals that are touching the ground live longer and healthier. And in fact, he'd like to say, "Oh, it's all raw food," or "It's all cooked food."

But the fact is there was a huge blog post a woman pulled together: "Okay, what were all these long-lived dogs eating?" The vast majority of 'em were actually eating kibble. There's a dog from South Carolina that was literally eating a standard American diet—hot dogs, pizzas, et cetera. But they're living to 22, 23, 25 because they're outside with their feet on the ground. They're discharging into the earth. They're receiving the earth's energy. And it sounds like total woo-woo, but actually there is scientific proof around this.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:42:46 - 00:42:53]
Yeah. Yeah. It's the—is it the electrons that change that you absorb through your feet?

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:42:53 - 00:43:35]
Right on. So you shift your magnetic energy because you're receiving the earth's magnetic energy. And the other thing is too, is that we're living in about 600 square feet, which is like really what? And the reason is that in different countries, the home is where you might eat your meals with your family, you go to sleep, you hang out a little bit. But most people are out in their communities hanging out, talking, doing stuff. And that's part of the connection that we've lost with each other and with our pets. Ultimately, if we're all holed up, sitting on the sofa for four hours watching television, we're not interacting very much.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:43:36 - 00:43:42]
No. And we're not tuned into them. We're ultimately...We may be with them, but we're not really with them.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:43:42 - 00:43:46]
Yeah. That's it. Being present.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:43:46 - 00:43:59]
That's right. Being present. I love it. Uh, I love this global perspective that you bring. If you could have anyone on the show who would be like your big guest, your dream guest?

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:44:00 - 00:44:41]
I would actually really, really love to have Dr. Karen Becker and Rodney Habib come on. Because they bring so much energy and they are doing so much to try to heal the community. Um, and I was in London a week ago, and Rodney gave a talk that they've used in different places. But the message of the talk is always the same. There's lots of stuff you can do to support your dog's health. But if we separate ourselves in the holistic pet health community instead of coming together and acknowledging everyone has expertise, we are doing the whole community harm. 

Melissa Natanson:
[00:44:41 - 00:44:41]
Right. You're all pieces of a puzzle that can be really beautiful and really a beautiful scene. Until somebody decides that they don't fit or somebody else doesn't fit the way they think they should. And then it's not as beautiful anymore, but it can be a really beautiful scene.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:44:58 - 00:45:00]
Right on. And that's my goal.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:45:01 - 00:45:14]

Okay, so before we wrap this up, we're gonna do something fun. You have two choices—we can do pet perks or pet peeves. I haven't gotten to do it with you yet. Do you know about pet perks and pet peeves?

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:45:14 - 00:45:17]
No, but I think I'm fixing to learn.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:45:17 - 00:45:35]
Okay. Pet perks are the top three things in your life about pets where there's a product, something that you could never do without. It's kind of like tips for pet parents too. Pet peeves are three things if you could wave a magic wand and wipe 'em off the face of the planet and they'd be gone tomorrow—the world would be a better place. We can do that. 

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:45:35 - 00:45:38]
Let's go positive. Let's go with pet perks.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:45:38 - 00:45:40]
No, no. You have to do 'em both. You have to do 'em both.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:45:40 - 00:45:44]
Oh, okay. All right. So which one are we doing first? Let's go negative first.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:45:44 - 00:45:48]
Okay. What's your pet peeve you wanna wipe off the planet? Three things.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:45:48 - 00:47:54]

So the first thing is intolerance of others' opinions. The second thing is blindly following the standard of care without understanding its impact, good or bad, on pet health. And then the third thing is the skyrocketing cost of veterinary care. Yeah, I mean, it is incredibly heartbreaking. And I guess the pet peeve is this—that the veterinarian in whatever setting it is, whether it's an emergency or office setting… There's a problem present and they start doing all the things—the lab work, the test, the this, the that, the other. And instead of saying, "Oh, you know, this is how much it'll cost," and the client says, "Doc, I've only got a thousand bucks." And instead of saying, "Okay, let's do things that are going to support your pet's comfort, improve things as best we can given the circumstances." And then let's see if that works or doesn't work.

So veterinary medicine—when I started practice in 1990, that's 35 years ago. I came into a world where 90% of the animals were intact and they lived outside. And in some ways that was better, right? But not great. But people couldn't afford to spend a lot of money on their pets.
It was 50 bucks to spay a pet—that was a no-go for many people. So what I had to do was do the physical examination, make my best guess as to what was going on. And then work within that client's budget to optimize what I could for that pet. That is a skill that is missing from today's veterinary medicine. And I think it's something that they've got to learn in a hurry.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:47:54 - 00:48:22]
Yeah, agreed. This is why I do pet perks and pet peeves because we always come up with something good to talk about. Um, 'cause that was a really important point to make. Uh, I mean, I experienced the same like growing up on the farm. Um, I remember my cat had a ruptured diaphragm and needed surgery. And the surgery is $300—that, I mean, I can spend that in a day at the vet now. No problem. Like a little bit of blood work and a checkup—I'm walking out three fifty.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:48:22 - 00:48:27]
Yeah. And um, yeah, but back in the day, that was like five grand, right?

Melissa Natanson:
[00:48:28 - 00:48:36]
Oh yeah. You know. It was major. Okay. Pet perks. What are your top three?

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
[00:48:36 - 00:49:23]
Clean water. Water filter. Yeah. I mean, that's the cornerstone—a whole food diet that works for your pet. And then detox. So there's a couple of things I really love. One is C60 because it's easy to get into pets. And then there's a really cool project that has been going on for a while that one of our colleagues, Leah Bookhammers, finally brought to fruition. And that's Pets Amp.
So they're providing fulvic acid, humic acid products—things that will absorb and pull toxins out of the body. And I think that the way that the world is right now, that's a daily necessity.

Melissa Natanson:
[00:49:23 - 00:49:32]
Yeah, looks like it's starting to get that way. So we have one more fun thing we could do. It's rapid fire questions if you want to. Why not?

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
Let's do it.

Melissa Natanson:
It's easy. It's, you know, I tell everyone I'm gonna ask the really hard-hitting questions, so this is it. This is the tough one. What's your favorite color?

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
Depends. I realized Mary Jo looked at me the other day and she's like, "You've gotta buy some new clothes." I'm like, "Well, why?" And she said, "Because everything is blue." Okay. So I guess blue was my favorite color last year. 

Melissa Natanson:

You see me all the time, buy some peach clothes.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
There you go. I need to go red. I actually like it a lot.

Melissa Natanson:

Favorite food?

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
Whatever's in front of me.

Melissa Natanson:
Okay. Uh, I was gonna say, is there a culture like Italian, Mexican? No. Okay, got it. Name of this? Yeah. Country—favorite country.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
Montenegro and Slovenia are pretty up there. Slovenia is pretty awesome.

Melissa Natanson:
Okay. Breed of animal.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
Breed animals, I love them all. I really miss the Setter dogs. My head Setters for a lot of my life, but yeah, the size is tough right now.

Melissa Natanson:
I'm gonna do this to you—dog or cat.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
Dog. 

Melissa Natanson:
I mean, Ohio wouldn't have it any other way.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
No. I mean, it's like, come on. 

Melissa Natanson:
It's Ohio's world. You're just living in it. Right on, right on. Movie?

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
Oh, I hate that this movie is getting too close to true, but Idiocracy.

Melissa Natanson:
Oh, I haven't seen it. I guess I need to watch it. Yeah, I just try to quit the media in general. Maybe that's bad. Okay. And what's your sign?

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
I am a Libra, although 20 years ago they told me I'm supposed to be a Virgo. But at that point it was too old for that.

Melissa Natanson:
I can see the Virgo tendencies from one Virgo to another. I can see it a little bit. Okay. Well, that was fun. Anything else that people would surprise people about you that they might not know?

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
I don't know. I used to be a bodybuilder before I got sick in 2015. So that's been interesting—to go from being really buff and fit to not, to being overweight and flabby again. And trying to get back there and not doing all the negative self-talk along the way. That's been an interesting journey.

Melissa Natanson:
Whew. That's a tough one to do—that journey. We're really good at negative self-talk in this world.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
Oh boy. Aren't we?

Melissa Natanson:
Yeah, we are. This has been... oh, go ahead.

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
That's it. So yeah, it has been a lot of fun. And I really appreciate you doing this for me 'cause you know me well and you know what to highlight.

Melissa Natanson:
Well, thank you. And I wanna ask one last question before we go. What is one message you'd like to leave our listeners with as they begin this journey on your new podcast, Happy Tails?

Dr. Ruth Roberts:
Trust your instinct. That's where we go wrong. When something is like, yes, we feel it—we feel it in our guts. Or when something is not right, we feel that too. So if you're getting those little messages, believe them.

Melissa Natanson:
Absolutely fantastic advice. I thank you all for joining today. I hope you enjoyed this as much as I did. And look forward to many more episodes coming from Dr. Ruth with lots of exciting guests and topics on her new podcast, Happy Tails. See you soon and good.