Our children having
grown and flown, our dogs are our children now.
We have two beautiful toy poodles, Phoebe who is four and Lola who is
nearly two. Lola is the smaller, weighing
only 2.5 kilograms, just over half the weight of the average cat. They are lovely, bright, friendly, loving little dogs, who in spite of their small size
are very good watchdogs. We go
everywhere with our dogs, they mean the earth to us.
We have builders at
our house at present, putting in a loft room.
Last Tuesday morning my husband Colin, needed to tell the builders
something so he climbed up the scaffolding to call them. On the way down his foot slipped and he
dislodged a section of scaffolding that had been standing upright against the
main section. As usual Lola was right at
his heels and the scaffolding, weighing some 20 kilograms, landed right on top
of her. I was upstairs on my computer
when I heard an almighty crash them heart rending screaming. I ran
downstairs shouting out ‘What happened? Who’s hurt?’
Colin said ‘it’s Lola’
then I saw her, her little body twisted like a pretzel, her head on one side
and these screams coming from her mouth. I grabbed Colin’s fleece, which was the
nearest thing on hand and wrapped her in it and we headed for the car. I didn’t stop to put on shoes, or take my
handbag, or lock the doors. Colin drove
as fast as he could to the vets – asking me continuously to check that she was
still breathing. When we got there he
ran ahead and told them what had happened so the vet was waiting. He took us into the consulting room,
unwrapped her, said ‘she’s convulsing!’ Neither of us had recognized the strange
disjointed movements accompanying her screams, not having seen them before. He said he’d put her on a drip and took her
away, saying he would call us.
It was the longest
afternoon ever. At four o’clock the call
came – one of the vet assistants who said Lola was doing really well but the
vet wanted to see us at 6 o’clock. Colin
and I took the dogs (we had a friend’s dog staying for a few days) for a walk
and came back in time to get to our appointment early. Neither of us felt like talking much – the vet’s
summons sounded ominous. We were both
sure he’d want us to make some sort of decision. On the way there we discussed that we had to
do what was best for Lola, not for us.
When we got there,
somewhat early for our appointment, the assistant said we could see her, that
she was awake. There she was, looking
very shaken, and attached to a drip, but very happy to see us. I held her on my lap in front of her cage and
we cuddled and spoke to her. She seemed
almost normal – it was hard to believe.
When the vet came he said he was amazed at her progress, he had had to anaesthetize
her and had given her cortisone and pain killers. He said she’d been X rayed and there were no
bones broken. He said she wasn’t out of
the woods yet but he was cautiously optimistic.
He said they would see how she was overnight. He did say that it was easy to lose these
little dogs – a sudden bleed to the brain could cause it. He said I could call them at 8:30 next
morning .
That night neither of
us slept much, though we both prayed a lot, as we had been doing since the
accident. I remembered that on the
Sunday, two days previously we had had a sermon on St Francis, whose saint’s
day had been on the Saturday. I don’t think
I have ever prayed to a saint before but I prayed to St Francis all night, to
intercede for little Lola.
At 8:25 next morning , gathering all my
courage, I phoned the surgery. The
assistant said she had been about to call me.
‘Lola is wonderful’ she said – you can come and get her.’
Neither the vet we had
seen first nor the one I saw on Friday when I took her for a check up could
believe it – she seemed absolutely fine – no sign on any injury, no sign on
brain damage, just nothing! She is a
little diffident, and nervous near the scaffolding but that’s only to be
expected. She seems to sleep a lot,
perhaps a little more than usual, but that’s presumably her body telling to rest
– she had the incredible trauma, plus an anaesthetic, both of which can put
enormous strain on her little body. The
vet said she seemed remarkably resilient – but we know the truth. It was a miracle.
Till next time J
