How to build the forever dog | Rodney Habib | TEDxMexicoCitySalon

Digital storyteller Rodney Habib's dog, Sam, was diagnosed with cancer, which sent him on a mission to save her life. Rodney has spent the last several years travelling the globe gathering the most up-to-date information on canine cancer. During his talk at TEDxMexicoCitySalon, Rodney shared the secret formula to build the "forever dog."

Rodney is a digital artist, social media influencer, filmmaker, multiple award-winning vlogger, professional speaker, founder of the world’s largest pet health page on Facebook called Planet Paws, and, more importantly, a pet parent. Rodney recently established the Paws For Change Foundation to raise money through charitable donations to further education and research in the areas of animal nutrition and the role of nutraceuticals, herbs, and natural healing in promoting animal longevity and well-being.

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx

Before I get started,

I just want to say thank you
for allowing us in Mexico,

the most beautiful country, and
the most beautiful people in the world.

(Applause)

[How to Build the Forever Dog]

Now, I want to show you guys
something pretty amazing.

It's really incredible actually.

And it's the story behind this next clip

that's so incredible.

Meet Tigger.

This beautiful pit bull from Waco, Texas,
is rolling around in the grass

and enjoying the day.

You see, her birthday just passed.

And if Tigger could explain herself
very quickly to you guys,

she'd probably tell you she loves pizza,

she hates cats,

and there's this squirrel family
that's on the other side of the fence -

every morning they tease her;
she hates them too.

But that's not the most
incredible part of this story.

This dog's pet parents,
Julie Morris and Brady,

unknowingly had no idea they were raising

the tenth oldest dog in the world today.

A 22-year pit bull

(Applause)

which is incredible,
and she's still going strong.

And so for a lot of pet parents today,
when we say 22, we're like,

"Jeez. Holy smokes."

You know, we've heard of
the 14- or the 15-year-old dog, but 22?

Is it achievable?

What if I told you my friends
that once upon a time, the 20-year-old dog

may have been a natural thing.

You see, if we go back
8,000 years ago, before the Bible,

in the second oldest surviving piece
of Western literature,

there was a story
that was written by Homer,

and the story was called the Odyssey.

And what you're seeing is
a metal etching that sits above my desk.

It was the first interaction
between man and dog.

But the clue that was in this,
not a lot of people picked up on.

You see, Odysseus left his house when
his loyal dog, Argos, was just a baby,

and he came back 20 years later
to return to his old dog.

Now, I'm not saying that the story
of the Odyssey is a true story,

but what I am saying is the clue
for the age of a dog

could have been the fact of that time
when Homer was writing it.

But are we seeing that today?

Are we seeing 20 year old dogs?

In 2010, the British Small Animal
Veterinary Association

put together a study, done on a survey.

And today if you ask,
"How old does a typical dog live for?"

11.3 years is your answer.

But that's 2010.
Has there been anything updated?

Ten years later, in 2014,
the Kennel Club did a study

on a survey of dogs, polar cohort,
but they went back one year.

One year!

You talk to longevity experts,
they'll tell you

that the dog ages seven times
faster than a human.

What about cats?
We've got to talk about cats.

Banfield State of Health,
on over 400,000 cats in their database,

found that the typical cat lives to be 12.

So as pet parents today, should we settle
for 10-year-old dogs and 12-year-old cats?

Should this be the norm
or is there something we can do about it?

And according to the top scientists
in the world, my friends,

there's something
that we can do about it.

You see, I spent the last few years
of my life collecting information

because I want my dogs to live
a very long time, you see.

I got to sit down with the top scientists,
Ph.D.s, geneticists, microbiologists,

the best of the best
in cancer research, collecting data.

And I do this to share it
back to the people.

And today, Facebook tells me

that I have the largest
pet health page in the world.

But that's not my driver.

My driver are these guys,
the loves of my lives.

And science tells me today
that the two of these beautiful dogs

have reached the end of the line,

that this is it; I should
get ready to lose my dogs.

But the information that I've been
collecting from these researchers

is profound information

that will not only slow down
the aging process,

but will increase longevity according to
the top scientists in the world.

But if I had to pick five simple things
that all of you can do

for your dogs, your cats,
and yourselves, what would they be?

Five tips to help you
increase your longevity.

Well, the first thing
is stress resistance.

We're all stressed out all the time.

My coffee's too cold this morning;
Wi-Fi is not working - I got one bar.

We stress about
the silliest things in the world.

And stress can really effect us.

In fact, if we looked at
some of the oldest pets in the world,

Jake Perry, who set
the Guinness World Record twice

for a 38- and 34-year-old cat.

When they said to Jake,
"What on earth did you do, Jake?"

He said, "You know what?
I built my cats a movie theater."

(Laughter)

And if they're stressed out,
they watch movies at the end of the night.

May seem crazy,
but look what he's achieved.

In fact, there's researchers right now

traveling around the world
researching Rottweillers.

Rottweillers die of cancer really early,
you see - around 8 or 9.

And what the researchers want to know,
the Rottweillers that live to be 15 or 16,

what was so special about them?

They had no stress in their lives.

Now, we can come home and, we can say,

"I had a fight with somebody
this morning that pissed me off.

I'm so angry, but I'm over it,
and my dog can't tell."

But not according to science.

According to science, your dog can smell

if you had a fight earlier on
in the day or the day before.

And what's worse is they can adapt
to that emotion that you're feeling.

You see, that I had to travel all the way
to the other side of the world,

To the University of Naples,

where I got to sit down
with Dr. Biagio D'Aniello

and his team of scientists,

and they were conducting
a mind-blowing study

that literally made major
media headlines all over the world.

They were collecting sweat samples:
people who watched happy movies

and people who watched scary movies.

And they collected the sweat in bottles,
and then they did this unbelievable study.

In a small room where
there was a pet owner on one side

and a stranger on the other.

If they were to take the sweat
of somebody that was happy,

and the person, and put it in the middle,
how would the dog react?

And it was unbelievable.

The second the dog smelled
the happy sweat,

the dog instantly became happy and wanted
to meet the stranger on the other side.

But what would happen

if they put the sweat
of the person the scary movie?

Instantly when the dogs
would smell it, they would run,

they would hide behind the owner.

Some dog would be so scared
they would press up against the wall,

and they would want to make
no interaction with anybody.

And what the scientist found was

that these dogs were not only
smelling these emotions,

but they were also adapting
into those emotions.

And so what's hugely important,
and the one tip that we can talk about,

is, man, try to get rid of
some of the stress in your life.

Do some yoga, meditate, go for a walk,
whatever you can do,

it will affect your pet dramatically
and yourself, believe me.

When I asked the scientists,

"What piece of advice would you like
to give to the world?"

"Take more showers: wipe the sweat off you
so your dog can't smell it."

The second tip we would talk about,
and this one is really important:

Caloric restriction.

If you talked to the top scientists
in the world and you said,

"How did we go from 11.3 years
all the way to 10?

How did we do that?"

Scientists will tell you
it's caloric restriction.

That's the problem. Why?

If we were to look at the pet obesity
statistics worldwide right now,

let's take the top eight countries
in the world, my friends.

We are seeing a huge increase
in pet obesity.

If you were to average all the major
countries around the world,

over 51% of animals - dogs and cats -
are overweight or obese today.

It's a huge problem.

So what can we do?

In the first study of its kind,

scientists wanted to know

what would happen
if they took two groups of dogs.

One group is the way
that we all feed our dogs:

Ah, I'll just put food in the bowl.
He'll eat when he wants to eat.

And in the other group,
let's just take 25% out of the bowl.

What could that do to the overall
longevity of the animal? 25%.

After the lifetime study
from birth to death,

the scientists found
that just by reducing food by 25%,

you could increase the lifespan
of your animal by two extra years.

Remember, longevity experts say
that animals age seven times faster.

Do the math.

So it's hugely important that
we don't feed our animals out of love,

because we can shorten
their lifespans dramatically.

Food should nourish you,
but it shouldn't hurt you.

OK.

The third tip that I could give you today
is insulin signaling.

This one's tough.

I had a hard time with a lot of
scientists with this one.

But here's what we know:
eat a lot of sugar, eat a lot of starch,

and your blood sugars are going to go up.

When your blood sugar goes up,

your body does something
and releases something called insulin.

Now, here's what we know today in science:

you release a lot of insulin,
it could be toxic.

Too much insulin can be inflammatory.

Too much insulin could age you
and can cell replicate.

Now, he just mentioned to you
that eating a lot of sugars and starches -

what's the big deal?

You can't make pet food, kibble,
without getting the stick.

Try to make a cookie
without starch. Can't do it.

So, the pet food manufacturer
has to add starch to the food.

The problem: pet owners
have no idea how much is in it.

These starches, a.k.a. carbohydrates,
are a major macronutrient.

So if the pet owner looks up and down
a bag of food, he won't see it.

The pet food manufacturer tells you
how much fat's in there.

That's a macronutrient.

He tells you how much protein's
in there. That's a macronutrient.

What about the macronutrient
that can fuel your animal?

You should know about that.

The entire bowl, over 50% of the bowl
is a macronutrient that feeds your animal,

and that's carbohydrates.

And let me tell you,
consuming that many carbohydrates,

according to science,
can age your pet dramatically.

And there's an equation

that the pet food
manufacturers will tell you,

"Hey, it's online.
Just go on and do the math yourself."

Who on earth does that?

Here's the thing.

I sat down with Dr. Richard Patton,
40-year nutritionist,

the man who helped formulate
all of these foods, and I asked him,

"Dr. Patton, how much starch
is too much starch?"

And he said to me, "Rodney,
if you went back in time

before the pet food revolution
of 100 years ago,

dogs ate meat, seeds, nuts,
berries - you name it."

Add it all up, it's
four percent carbohydrates.

Today's dog and cat

is consuming anywhere
between 50-70% carbohydrates.

And unless you're testing your dog's
blood sugars every single day,

unless you're pricking your animals
and taking them to your veterinarian

and testing their insulin levels,
you could be aging them very quickly.

So it's very important,
as pet parents around the world,

we learn how much starches
are in our foods.

The fourth tip is repair of damage.
Now this one's big.

If you damage your cells,
you have to fix your cells.

And how do you do that?

Talk to any health expert in the world
and they'll tell you

that your entire immune
system is your gut,

and when you have a healthy immune system,
you're going to repair cells,

whether you're human,
whether you're a dog, or you're a cat.

But what helps a healthy immune system?

I traveled all the way
to Udine University -

it can be a very tough one
for being an Italian word -

where these scientists
were doing something unbelievable.

Two scientists, Dr. Misa Sandri
and Dr. Bruno Stefanon -

and these scientists wanted to know

if feeding dogs a certain type of food
would help their microbiome,

make their immune system healthier.

So they went through a lot of crap -

like, no, literally, like a lot of poop -

analyzing the microbiome of animals,
the bacteria that's inside the poop.

And what they found was fascinating.

What these scientists did was
they took two panels of dogs.

On one side, the dogs ate the traditional
diet of kibble, the dry food in the bowl.

Here's what's really cool.

On the other side,

they replicated that same bowl,
but they just didn't cook it.

It's the same bowl uncooked
with fresh vegetables and fresh meat.

And so what kind of impact
would that have on animals?

Under a microscope,
the results were unbelievable.

The animals that ate the bowl uncooked
not only had a better microbiome,

but a more diverse microbiome.

So when I traveled
to the university in London,

King's College, Dr. Tim Spector,

one of the most cited scientists
in the entire world, microbiologist,

he told me, my friend, the more diverse
that your dog and cats bellies are,

the longer they'll live.

And if there's ever a time
to add a little bit of fresh food

that the good lord put on this planet
for all of us to share,

share it with your pets.

OK, the last tip of the day for you guys -
what would it be? Environmental factors.

Now, this is a tough category to cover.

This could be toxins, lawn pesticides,
floor cleaners, candles.

I wanted to pick one easy
that you could all do.

And what was that?

Exercise.

It's an environmental factor.

Some of you say, "What's the big deal?"

If we took two of some of the oldest
living dogs in the world,

the 31-year-old dog, Maggie,

who just passed away
a couple of years ago, God love her,

and the 25-year-old
vegan dog named Bramble.

What did these two dogs have in common?

You see, if you asked
Anne Heritage, Bramble's mother,

she said the one thing that she did
that was critical was exercise.

Well, I like to walk my dogs 20 minutes
around the neighborhood.

That'a a joke.

She gave her dog two hours of exercise
every single day plus swimming.

My 20-minute walk is a joke.

And here's what's even crazier.

When they asked Brian McClaren,

the man who put together the oldest dog
in the world, and they said to him,

"Brian, how much exercise
did you give your animal?"

And remember, exercise lowers stress,
lowers blood sugars, lowers insulin.

It's the cheapest form of therapy today.

Brian McClaren said,
"I didn't really exercise my dog.

You see, I would drive my tractor
and my dog would follow me

from one end of the farm -
it was only 10 kilometers -

then I would drive back
to the other side of the farm -

it was only 10 kilometers -
maybe 20 kilometers a day ...

every single day.

Exercise is critical.

Here's the thing.

We need more Tiggers on this planet.

This list that I share
with you, my friends,

is not for those people who say,
"It's just a dog or a cat.

I'm OK with 10 or 12; it's fine."

Don't bother with this list.

This list if for that pet parent
who lays up at night

and stares at the ceiling,
and in his soul,

he's ripped apart when he thinks about
the moment that he has to lose his pet,

his best friend.

This list, my friend,
is for that pet owner.

I hope this inspires you and these tips
help you create the forever pet.

Thank you.

(Applause) (Cheers)