22/09/2026
Today would have marked Jimmy's 15th birthday. Strangely though, as I lay awake at 5am this morning, it wasn't his posthumous birthday that I was dwelling on, it was the phone call I had with a vet when we had to let Harry go.
We said goodbye to Harry almost 10 years ago, but that phone call still haunts me. He died because of something stupid; he ate a piece of bark from the garden without us realising. The bark pierced his gut, which then died off. There were no symptoms until it was too late and at the time we were in the middle of a house move. As his symptoms developed out of hours we had to take him to an emergency vet who gave me a choice with only seconds to decide as he was already on the operating table.
Either remove a large portion of his gut, which would mean he'd not be able to process his food, resulting in him losing a considerable amount of weight, then suffering from chronic vomiting and diarrhoea for the rest of his life, or let him go.
We chose the latter as we didn't want him to suffer continually, and to this day I wonder if it was the right choice. I know it was really, but I still question myself.
That's the strange thing about dog ownership and grief isn't it. You'd imagine that on his birthday I'd be thinking more about Jimmy, my snaggle-toothed little man, but instead I just can't get Harry out of my head.
No matter who I'm thinking of today though, I'm sure that all three members of the original Petiquette Pack; Harry, Lucy and Jimmy are all having a venison strip on the Rainbow Bridge 🐾🌈
