Grow Young with Your Dog

You and your dog can feel better at any age!

Do you or your dog ever feel stiff or achy? Stressed or anxious? Wish you could turn back the clock?

What if you could spend just minutes a week doing simple exercises that could help you and your dog feel better today AND help keep you moving freely in the future? While deepening your bond at the same time?

Using easy, innovative exercises, you can learn how to enhance freedom of movement and youthful vitality of both you AND your dog. Perfect for dog lovers, this book makes a great gift!

FREE BONUS! Book readers have online access to 55 minutes of video and 3 1/2 hours of audio instruction at no extra cost.

Many people are looking for a holistic approach that can help their dogs stay happy and healthy for as long as possible. They also wish to feel youthful themselves, avoiding the decline in flexibility, balance, and stamina that often occurs as people age.

The book, Grow Young with Your Dog, guides readers toward a more hopeful future for themselves and their canine companions.

Grow Young with Your Dog can teach you how to:

• Reduce stress and anxiety
• Minimize the risk of injury
• Comfort the aging and infirm
• Improve athletic performance
• Enhance vitality and well-being
• Facilitate healing after injury, surgery or illness
• Reduce stress and anxiety
• Minimize the risk of injury
• Comfort the aging and infirm

One of the unique characteristics of Grow Young with Your Dog is that it is designed to help you improve right along with your dog. That’s why this book is accompanied by audio recordings of easy-to-do exercises that can help rid you of stiffness, stress, aches and poor posture, while gaining flexibility, better balance and improved coordination. In short, you’ll feel younger. I think of this program as investing in yourself and your dog, because what you do today will affect how you’ll feel in ten or more years.

Taking the time to move more comfortably now can reduce wear and tear on joints and muscles. We know that excessive wear and tear can lead to canine arthritis and human arthritis, so moving better today may help keep you and your dog moving easier in the future. In other words, it’s never too early to start feeling younger.

But it’s also never too late to start! Several of the dogs portrayed in this book were at an advanced age with a poor prognosis when I met them. But yet they improved their abilities considerably. These plucky dogs taught me that regardless of age or physical condition, you can improve your quality of life. This is true for humans and canines alike.

With this book in hand, you no longer have to choose between spending quality time with your dog and taking care of yourself. As you do the basic techniques with your dog, you may discover that your body moves more freely, your mind is calmer and clearer, and your spirit more joyful. Wouldn’t you like to grow young with your dog? Well, let’s get started!

From the Introduction

Do you feel older today than you did 25 years ago? Many people respond to that question with, “Of course I feel older!” They expect to feel older with the passage of time, and they have the stiffness, pains, and limitations to prove it.

What makes you feel older? Are you no longer able to do activities that you once enjoyed, such as hiking up a mountain, running through a forest or kayaking through white water? Or is it difficult to do even mundane things like taking a long walk, going up and down stairs or sitting on the floor? Is your balance not as good as it once was? Do you get stiff and achy and assume that’s what “getting older” feels like?

Is your state of mind “old”? Do you tend to worry and obsess over things? Do you feel stuck in some part of your life? When was the last time you acted spontaneously? Have you lost your curiosity and optimism about life?

When I was in my late 20’s, I suffered from a variety of aches and pains. I had bi-lateral carpal tunnel syndrome that resulted in nerve damage, a very painful hip, and stiffness in my back and neck. As I was rubbing my sore lower back one day, I thought, “Well, I have to expect this. I’m getting older.” For goodness’ sake, I was in my twenties! Although quite some years have passed since that day, I feel younger now than I did back then.

Over the past 25+ years, I’ve learned a lot about how to feel and move more youthfully.[1]

I learned that when we stay stuck in our habitual ways of thinking and moving, we get physically get stuck too. We develop sore muscles and stiff joints. We hesitate to explore new activities. We lose our balance and become afraid to fall. We fuss and worry about some version of the same old thing decade after decade. We become limited in our thoughts and limited in our movements. In short, we feel old. To grow younger, I released the habits that kept me stuck in unhealthy patterns, and I learned to think and act in different ways. I discovered that it’s the newness of our thoughts, sensations, and movements that help the brain continue to grow and develop as we age. Both in mind and body, novelty is the key to expanding our abilities. And that helps us feel young.

As dog lovers, we want the same thing for our dogs. We’d like our dogs to be happy, healthy and active for as long as possible. In short, we want our dogs to grow young with us. After all, what fun would a hike up a mountain be without your beloved canine romping by your side?

That’s why I developed Debono Moves^sm and wrote this book to share it. Debono Moves is an approach that you can easily use to help yourself and your dog feel better and move more joyfully. In this book, I describe how I have helped dogs heal completely from injuries and surgeries, move well despite arthritis and hip dysplasia, recover from a paralyzing stroke and run and play again after being classified as “too old to recover.”

Debono Moves combines the science of neuroplasticity, the ability of the brain to overcome injury or disease by forming new neural pathways, with the healing power of love. This potent synergy helps us achieve higher levels of functioning, connection, and awareness with our animal companions. Using gentle contact and supportive movements, you will learn how to:

• Reduce stress and anxiety
• Minimize the risk of injury
• Comfort the aging and infirm
• Improve athletic performance
• Enhance vitality and well-being
• Facilitate healing after injury, surgery or illness
• Cultivate a deep bond between human and canine
• Lessen the effects of arthritis, hip dysplasia and aging

One of the unique characteristics of Debono Moves is that it is designed to help you improve right along with your dog. That’s why this book is accompanied by audio recordings of easy-to-do exercises.

That can help rid you of stiffness, stress, aches, and poor posture, while gaining flexibility, better balance and improved coordination. In short, you’ll feel younger.

I think of this program as investing in yourself and your dog, because what you do today will affect how you’ll feel in ten or more years. Taking the time to move more comfortably now can reduce wear and tear on joints and muscles in the future. In a nutshell, it’s never too early to start feeling younger.

But it’s also never too late to start! Several of the dogs portrayed in this book were at an advanced age with a poor prognosis when I met them. But yet they improved their abilities considerably. These plucky dogs taught me that regardless of age or physical condition, you can improve your quality of life. This is true for humans and canines alike.

With this book in hand, you no longer have to choose between spending quality time with your dog and taking care of yourself. As you do the basic techniques with your dog, you may discover that your body moves more freely, your mind is calmer and clearer, and your spirit more joyful.

Table of Contents

• Praise for Mary Debono
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• An Important Note to the Reader
• Chapter One: A Canine Mission Impossible?
• A Poodle On a Mission
• Guidelines for Doing the Exercises
• Find a Comfortable, Quiet Spot to Do the Exercises
• There Is No “Correct” Way to Do the Movements
• Take a Break Before Moving on to the Next Exercise
• Move with Mindfulness All Day
• Let Comfort Be Your Guide
• Small, Slow Movements Equal Big Improvements
• Breathe Easily
• Rest Frequently
• Embrace Novelty
• Use Your Imagination
• Are You Really Comfortable?
• Key Points of Chapter One
• Chapter Two: A Healing Connection Helps an Older Dog Walk Again
• Rocky Improves And So Do I
• Connected Breathing
• The Healing Power of Connection
• Human Exercise #1: Deeper Breath, Lighter Hands
• Getting to Know Your Dog in a New Way
• The Front Leg
• The Shoulder Blade
• The Ribs
• The Sternum
• The Spine
• The Hind Leg
• The Hip Joint
• The Ischium
• The Head
• Human Exercise #2: Improve Your Walking by Lying Down
• Key Points of Chapter Two
• Chapter Three: Improved Back Flexibility Got These Dogs Moving Again
• Cassie Overcomes Spinal Arthritis
• Mary Writes About Cassie
• Recovering from a Chronic Muscle Injury
• Human Exercise #3: Easier Sitting
• Make It All About You and Your Dog
• Back Lifts
• Ribcage Rolls
• Human Exercise #4: Lengthen Your Hamstrings Without Stretching
• Key Points of Chapter 3
• Chapter Four: Getting Rid of a Pain in the Neck
• A Neck Injury Doesnít Stop this Canine Athlete
• Learning for Life
• Human Exercise #5: Stirring the Soup
• Ribcage Circles
• Shoulder and Ribcage Circles
• Human Exercise #6: Turning Toward a Supple Spine
• Key Points of Chapter Four
• Chapter Five: What Do Torn Knee Ligaments, Arthritis, and Habits Have in Common?
• Sonny Heals His Torn Knee Ligament
• Jackson Stops Arthritis in Its Tracks
• Scanning Your Dogís Body
• Standing
• Sitting
• Lying Down
• Human Exercise #7: Hip and Shoulder Circles
• Hip and Shoulder Circles
• When Good Habits Go Bad
• Taking Off Your Pants Can Keep You Nimble
• Think Yourself Younger
• Key Points of Chapter Five
• Chapter Six: From Hip Dysplasia to Agility
• A Young Dog Overcomes Hip Dysplasia
• Managing Hip Dysplasia in the Active Dog
• How to Help an Anxious or Distracted Dog
• Human Exercise #8: Making Time for Freer Hips
• Human Exercise #9: Sitting on a Clock
• Muscle Lifts
• Shoulder Blade
• Lower Leg
• Hindquarters
• Muscle Rolls
• Key Points of Chapter Six
• Chapter Seven: Enhancing the Life of the Older Dog
• Geriatric Dog Learns How to Wag Her Tail Again
• Hope for an Older Dog Who Could No Longer Stand
• Lumbar Lifts
• Lumbar Circles
• Add More Time to Your Life And More Life to Your Time
• The Seven Suggestions
• Exercise #10: Better Posture Effortlessly
• Key Points of Chapter Seven
• Chapter Eight: Human Exercises
• Human Exercise #1: Deeper Breath, Lighter Hands
• Human Exercise #2: Improve Your Walking by Lying Down
• Human Exercise #3: Easier Sitting Variations
• Human Exercise #4: Lengthen Your Hamstrings Without Stretching
• Human Exercise #5: Stirring the Soup
• Human Exercise #6: Turning Toward a Supple Spine
• Human Exercise #7: Hip and Shoulder Circles
• Human Exercise #8: Making Time for Freer Hips
• Human Exercise #9: Sitting on a Clock
• Human Exercise #10: Better Posture Effortlessly
• Resources
• Educational Products and Classes
• Free Newsletter
• Workshops and Clinics
• Private Sessions
• Find a Feldenkrais MethodÆ Practitioner
• Locate a Holistic Veterinarian
• Dog Training
• Meet the Dogs!
• About the Author