Viccis Story V2
Vicci's story
Everything about this story happened backwards.
The dog got the therapy. The therapist got the lesson. And the skeptic in the house asked for his own.
Vicci Tibbetts, with BaxterMental health and biofeedback therapist in private practice. Fifty years in holistic health. The one who usually does the helping.
The healer helps the patient⇄The patient's dog fixes the healer's practice
Vicci Tibbetts has been the helper for fifty years.
Mental health therapist. Biofeedback and heart rate variability. Therapeutic touch for the better part of four decades. Alternative health since she was eighteen, and she's almost seventy now. People bring her their nervous systems, and she teaches them to settle down.
So when the worst case of a bad nervous system she'd ever seen showed up in her own living room, she did what she always does. She went to work on it.
Except this time the patient was a seventy-five-pound Australian shepherd named Baxter, and none of it worked.
The calm one⇄The one who bit them twice
The calm dog became the dog who bit.
Six Australian shepherds over the years, and Baxter was the only easy one. Sweet as could be. They called him their Bubby.
About eight months before this was written, the nights flipped. Pacing. Standing in the yard staring at nothing. Then rubbing his nose raw, knocking things over onto himself, unable to stop, from sundown until two or three in the morning. He bit them twice. A dog who had never bitten anyone in thirteen and a half years.
The name for it is sundowners. She ran through everything she knew: ThunderCoats, Xanax, calming chews, pheromone collars, essential oils, homeopathics. Each one calmed him for a moment. Then it was back. Then a vet tech told her what people usually do about sundowners, and she couldn't bear it.
Afraid it wouldn't work⇄Afraid it would
Most people worry a thing won't work. She worried it would.
Searching online, she found devices for the vagus nerve and knew enough about the vagus nerve to know they wouldn't reach the brainwave states involved in dementia. She kept looking, found Resona Health, and read the cognitive study and the PTSD study.
Then came the backwards reaction.
"As a therapist, initially I was a little scared. Maybe this is going to put me out of business. Thirty days? I can't achieve that with the stuff I do in therapy."
Vicci, on reading the studies
She had never heard of PEMF in fifty years of holistic health, though it had been around for forty of them. Within a few days she took it to her husband. His logic was simpler: if I can get one night of good sleep, it's worth three hundred bucks.
She bought two.
Try it on yourself, then help the dog⇄Buy it for the dog, wear it yourself
She bought it for the dog. She put it on herself.
Baxter didn't even like the Dremel on his toenails. So before anything went around his neck, it went around hers. She wanted to know exactly what he was going to feel.
Then Baxter's routine: Gamma in the morning at full intensity, because 40 Hz gamma was part of the cognitive study. Vagus Nerve and then Sleep at night, at about a four or five.
Week one, a little shift. Week two, a big one: calming easier, staying calm longer, no more bleeding nose, fewer things knocked over. Week three, bedtime creeping the right way, 3:00 to 2:00 to 1:00 to midnight. Week four, a normal bedtime. On the nights he stirred, one run of Vagus Nerve and he went back to sleep.
3 AMwhere the nights used to end
4weeks to a regular bedtime
8more good months with Baxter
By week six he was sleeping so well she dropped the night protocols and just ran Gamma in the morning. And an old arthritic dog whose walks had become a sniffing fest started hearing tennis balls at the park again and going over to people to be petted.
Losing him to the nights⇄Eight good months, then a peaceful goodbye
Baxter passed about a week and a half before this was written.
Not the dementia. Age and arthritis, the years catching up with a big dog's back end. He'd lost twenty pounds, and when he could no longer stand to eat they knew he was suffering in a different way and wouldn't do that to him.
That's the reversal she holds onto. The story was supposed to end in the middle of the night, with a dog who didn't know them anymore. Instead it ended eight good months later, with a dog who was happy, and it was easy to see.
"Thank you for eight months more of my dog. That's a gift."
Vicci, to Mark L Fox, founder of Resona Health
She convinces the skeptic⇄The skeptic asks for his own
She never had to sell her husband. He sold himself.
The second VIBE, the one she'd worn to test, started getting lent to her husband here and there. Very skeptical man, in her words. About a week and a half in, he came to her.
"He said, 'I want my own. I don't know why, but I want my own.' And I said, 'Okay honey, there you go.'"
Vicci
That's how her whole approach works now, backwards from what you'd expect. She doesn't pitch. She isn't out mass marketing. She listens for someone who could use it, tells them about Baxter, and lets the story do the work. There's less skepticism that way, she says, and it feels honest.
She's given the device away to six people who couldn't afford one. She loosely keeps an eye on about forty people who use it, dogs included. And she has not met one person she's been involved with who hasn't had some benefit.
It would put her out of business⇄It's in every session
The thing she thought would replace her is now in every session.
She runs what Resona Health calls the Power of Four, four protocols back to back, with every single client. The HRV improvement she teaches takes twenty minutes of practice every day, and she's seeing the same kind of shift from a button.
When Mark L Fox told her that sounded like cheating, she turned that around too.
"If there's something out there that gives us an alternative that isn't surgery or medicine or hours of meditation, I consider it to be a smart way of living one's life. You can still do all the things you want to do. You just don't have to put so much time into self-care."
Vicci, almost 70, alternative health since she was 18
The stories she hears back run the same direction. A woman with twenty years of diabetes said her A1C went from nine to six in about five weeks. A man with twenty years of back pain from a car accident used it twice and doesn't feel it. Vicci scraped her own knee badly, ran Wound Healing, no bruise, no scar.
And, a little reluctantly, she'll tell you that after five weeks on the Power of Four she's noticing a difference in her marriage. Two calmer nervous systems in one house. She's already wondering what that would do in couples therapy.
What she ran, and what she runs now.
Every protocol on the VIBE is a one-button preset. These are the ones in this story, with the notes Mark L Fox gave her on the call.
- GammaBaxter's morning protocol, at full intensity. Mark's note: 40 Hz gamma makes a dog more alert, so mornings only, never at night.
- Vagus NerveBaxter's evening protocol, and the one she reached for when he woke up. Now part of her Power of Four with every client.
- SleepAfter Vagus Nerve at bedtime, at about a four or five.
- AnxietyFirst of the Power of Four.
- PTSDMark's suggestion for any dog that's been through trauma, and automatic for any rescue.
- Relax and BalanceMark's pick as the closest thing on the device to a thunder blanket. Think Temple Grandin's squeeze machine.
- Wound HealingThe one she ran on her knee.
One more reversal from watching forty people: the ones who don't get results aren't the ones it doesn't work for. They're the ones who stop. She went to Boston for a week and wore hers around her neck all day, every day. Some things are immediate. Some take patience, like a deep cut takes time to close. Keep with it.
The VIBE, from Resona Health
$299 $399
A pocket-sized PEMF device with 60 core protocols and 70 expansion protocols built in, including every one above. One button. No app, no subscription, nothing to figure out. Works on people and on dogs.
- Fits in a pocket, wears on the included lanyard, or tucks into a dog's vest, and works through clothing and fur
- Rechargeable, about 5 hours per charge at full power
- Safe for people and pets
- Free shipping worldwide
- 30-day money-back guarantee and 1-year warranty
Baxter's first shift showed up in a week. You get 30 days. If it does nothing for you, send it back for a full refund.
Or get it the way Baxter wore it
VIBE + Dog Vest Bundle
$328.99
The VIBE plus a soft, adjustable, washable vest that holds it on the chest over the heart and vagus nerve. Small through Extra Large; when in doubt, size up.
Get the Vest Bundle
VIBE + Dog Bandana Bundle
$328.99
The VIBE plus a bandana with a zip pocket that sits it at the neck, right where Vicci ran Vagus Nerve on Baxter. Small through Extra Large.
Get the Bandana BundleWait until you're sure⇄Try it, then decide
Baxter didn't believe in it. That was the point.
A dog can't be talked into feeling better. He had no idea what was around his neck. He just stopped pacing, stopped bleeding, and went to sleep. She's spent her life learning what the mind can do. This wasn't that.
The helper got helped. The skeptic asked for his own. The thing she was afraid of is in every session now. And the dog who was supposed to be put down got eight good months instead.
Do it backwards. Try it first. Decide later. You have thirty days.
The VIBE is an FDA general wellness device. These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Individual results vary.
Nothing on this page is medical advice. The stories here are Vicci Tibbetts's own and those of people and pets she knows. Protocol names are the names of settings on the device, not claims of treatment for any condition. See your physician for any health concern, including blood sugar or medication changes, and your veterinarian before using any device on a pet.
Vicci Tibbetts is an independent affiliate of Resona Health and earns a commission on purchases made through the links on this page, at no additional cost to you.