Back Massage for Your Dog

A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to visit the folks at Kroger for a blogger tour. On the second day of the tour, we visited the Pet Suites Pet Resort and Spa, a really nice boarding facility in the Cincinnati area.

And while we were there we met Dr. Heather Oxford, a veterinarian who specializes in integrative holistic medicine, including massage for you dog.  With her focus on rehabilitative medicine and treating canine athletes, we were particularly interested in what she had to say.

Dr. Oxford shows us some rear leg stretches

Dr. Oxford showed us a few good stretching exercises, similar to ones I'm already doing with Rocco, including front and rear leg stretches and the cookie stretch, a great neck stretch where you lead your dog's head back toward their tail with the help of a cookie!

She also gave us a really nice demonstration of how to give your dog a back massage. I was able to capture this on video so I could remember what to do once I got home.

And now you can try it yourself. Take a look!




I also met a group of really great bloggers who I'd never met before because most of them were food bloggers. Honestly, I thought Kroger must've made a mistake when they invited me!

The reason Kroger invited all of us, including me, was a big mystery for everyone. And they made us wait through a full day of fun cooking activities, before they revealed the big surprise.

So guess what?! You're going to have to wait too! Next week I'll post about the reason why we were all at Kroger, share with you our fun cooking challenge and there will be a great giveaway too! 

Some of our new blogging buddies from the Kroger tour.

But now, back to massage… lots of our agility pals take their dogs for massage and there's often a canine massage therapist at our trials. Some vets say that massage can help dogs recover from illness, injury and stress.

Rocco has enjoyed a professional massage when he was dealing with some muscle soreness. Have you ever taken your dog for a massage or do you massage your dog yourself? Does your dog like massage? Let us know in the comments below! 

And finally… you may notice a new person in one of our co-host chairs. We're super excited to welcome Joy and Emma from My GBGV Life as our newest FitDog Friday co-host. We're sad to see Peggy leave us, but as her blog has been taking a different direction, she's decided to pass along the FitDog torch to a new co-host. It was a pleasure getting to know Peggy and co-hosting with her and we wish her the best and hope to still see her around! 

Please help us give Joy and Emma (and Bailie too!) a big FitDog Friday welcome!

The fun and games continue every Friday with FitDog Friday, the weekly Blog Hop brought to you by To Dog With Love, SlimDoggy and My GBGV Life to promote a healthy active lifestyle for pets (and their people, too!). Join in every Friday by linking up your FitDog story or visiting the blogs in the Hop.