In Oct. 1999 our dream came through – we picked up our very first dog. The beautiful Dane pup we chose to call Damara – meaning “nice girl”. From the very first day she was a symbol of kindness, love, patience and grace. She followed us everywhere, and was appreciated and loved by everyone she met. She was a playful, yet calm and pleasant dog, always giving us laughs with her funny streaks. She loved to collect socks, teddybears and other soft things she could show everytime we got home, or had visitors over. She slept in our bed every night, and cuddled up in the sofa with us in the evenings.
When she was almost two she got a playmate called Elvis. He is a St. Bernard, and they clicked from day one. Their favorite thing was to play and run in our big garden. We decided to have puppies on Damara, and this was carefully planned. In April 2002 we had chosen the male to breed her with, and in July she was mated. We waited unpatiently for the puppies to arrive, joyfully seing the changes in Damara. We took her to get an ultrasound, and everything was just fine.
Early in the morning of Sept. 12th. labor began, and at 3.15 pm the same day she had given birth to 6 wonderful puppies. The birth went perfectly fine, or so we thought, but the next day she had a fever, which was rapidly rising. We took her to the vet, who gave her a shot to see if there where more puppies waiting to come out. Nothing happened, and the next day her fever was so high we rushed to the vet again.
After taking an x – ray he saw that there where three puppies left, and he had to perform a c – section. She lost a lot of blood, and was very cold when we got her home. In the days following she wouldn’t go outside, and wouldn’t eat. We had to force food into her, and was happy everytime she swallowed it. We went back to the vet on three occations to get intravenous fluids into her, and things where looking a little brighter. But then she got trouble breathing. The vet thought it was because she was worn out, or had stomach ache, possibly it was because of the blood loss.
Friday Sept. 20th. she was a little better, even went outside and finally was able to relieve herself. Once inside she went to check on her puppies, and cleaned the litter box. But only minutes later she quickly deteriorated. We rushed to the vet, she got out of the car and walked into his office, but while he was checking her heartbeat it stopped. It was all over in less than a minute…
The pain we feel now is tremendous. We are in a state of shock, cannot believe that we are never going to see her again, to receive sweet kisses from her, to pet her soft fur, take walks in the forest and everything else we loved about her. We are raising her little puppies, thankful that she left us these wonderful babies that give us something to live for.
We will never forget Damara, there will never be anyone like her! Some people may not understand how anyone can grieve this much for a dog, but to those I say they haven’t shared their life with Damara…
We miss our little baby so much it feels like someone
ripped our hearts out…
If only you would come running
through the garden once again,
sweet girl…
With love and longing,
Mommy and Daddy
| Damara |
| Camilla and Thomas |