# 20 week old GSD



## Nico0laGouldsmith (Apr 23, 2011)

Hi everyone. 
I have had numerous threads in other sections about my little man but I just wanted to post in here.
In July my gorgeous 20 week old german shepherd puppy David died suddenly at the vets. He was always at the vets because he kept getting tummy upsets. They found him to have campylobacter and he was treated for it resulting in then testing negative for it and seemed to go back to normal. Then started with the diarrhoea again. So I'm not kidding he was at the vets about once a week or at the very least once a fortnight in the time we had him. Mostly just because I'm so crazy careful with all my animals. 
This one day it was a Sunday and he pood in the kitchen which was odd because he was pretty much housetrained apart from the very occasional wee if he'd been outside and been too distracted by everything and then come back in and realised he did need to go. But that was rare. Anyway. He did a poo and ate it. Probably out of fear of getting told off despite us never telling him off for pooping even when he was tiny and wasn't house trained at all. 
He then vomited all over the settee. 
I had to take my cat to the vets because she had sloppy poos and had refused to eat from Saturday night to Sunday morning so I said to my partner that if he vomited again whilst I was out then we would take him to the vets too. We are fortunate in that our vets has an animal hospital 30 minutes drive away. 
So I came back and he had vomited again and my OH had to bath him because he did it on himself. So I asked him to ring the vets whilst I took him outside because he was crying to go out. He then did a watery poo in the garden so my OH told the vets that and they said that it was probably all to do with eating his poo but to fetch him anyway because of his age. He was eating and drinking by this point of the day and still running around and wagging his tail but didn't react to the kitten in his usually crazy excited way. He just wanted to lick the kitten usually and would go crazy until we let him haha
So we drove him there and I cuddled him on the back seat as usual despite him being 20kg and clipped in to a seatbelt by his harness. I always did it because he got travel sick every time. This time he didn't. 
We got to the vets and the vet examined him and said he seemed to have liquidy poo in his bowel, no dehydration. She asked how he was at home and we said absolutely fine now apart from the liquid poo he did before we brought him in, told her about the vomiting and she was ready to send him home and to be checked again in a few days. Then we remembered his apathy towards the kitten. She said that even though he was bounding around the vets loving her that could be a sign he isn't right if he didn't want to play with the kitten like normal. So she said she wanted to keep him in for blood tests and she would give him IV antibiotics and see if they can get to the bottom of the ongoing issues. So we agreed and told him we loved him and that we would see him tomorrow. Kissed and cuddled him. He happily went with her after staring at us for a few seconds as though he was posing for a photo. Thinking back now I think he knew that would be the last time we would see him alive.
Sometime between midnight and 1am we got a phone call saying he just collapsed and they couldn't resuscitate him. We didn't understand. When we realised it wasn't a nightmare we went to the hospital to see him. He looked so different. I prayed all the way there that they had the wrong dog. They had made a mistake. The vet had been crying. The vet nurse who let us in ran off in tears. None of them could believe it. The vet thanked us over and over for bringing him saying that most people would have waited to see if he was better the next day and then he would have died in our house. No way of trying drugs to resuscitate and we would have lived with that guilt forever.
We said no to a post mortem and he was due to be sent away the next day to be cremated on his own for us to have just his ashes.
The vet who saw my cat that Sunday called me the following day and talked me into a post mortem. She worked all day and all evening making sure he didn't get cremated. The reception at my vet practice even told her she would drive to the cremation place herself and fetch his body back if he had gone (it is hours away). Luckily he hadn't gone and they did the post mortem on the Tuesday. Dead parts of his bowel Which looked like it had twisted and untwisted and died off. He hadn't seemed in any pain during the day. So it could have happened after we took him to the vets or just before but it's so difficult to diagnose and he would have had a 1-2% chance of surviving the op if they had found it.
He also tested positive for PARVO which could have contributed. No parvo symptoms. Fully vaccinated. So may have been that it was present but his body was fighting it. 

We have his ashes at home.


This is weird but whenever I think of him when I'm out walking (I walk to and from work every day) I see long grey feathers. Enormous ones. He was a grey sable german shepherd. I know it sounds silly because they are probably just from a bird but they are always enormous ones. In different places on my walk and they bring me some kind of comfort. 

I miss him so much. I know a lot of human mummies will resent me for this but he was my baby and I feel like I have lost a child. I took him to puppy classes and we got him trained really well. He was absolutely perfect and had the most perfect face too. It was the beginning of July and I still cry at least twice a day.


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## StrawberryBlonde (May 27, 2015)

Oh my goodness, I am so sorry all this happened, just heartbreaking. It brought me to tears, not only because its a terribly sad story but also because you've managed to write about him so eloquently. I understand the feeling that your dog is your baby, I feel the same about mine. I am yet to loose a dog & absolutely dread the day. Your story will stick with me & I will remember to show my dogs love each & every day. *hugs*


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## LinznMilly (Jun 24, 2011)

Nico0laGouldsmith said:


> I miss him so much. I know a lot of human mummies will resent me for this but he was my baby and I feel like I have lost a child. I took him to puppy classes and we got him trained really well. He was absolutely perfect and had the most perfect face too. It was the beginning of July and I still cry at least twice a day.


So terribly sorry for your loss! Like you, I don't usually post in here because I'm dreading the day when I have to face the loss of my 2. :Shy

I wouldn't worry too much about upsetting any parents. The bond we have with our pets is still that of a caregiver/minor, which is like saying it's a parent/child bond. He was your baby, you _are _grieving, what you are feeling _is _real and you have every right to feel it.

Losing a pet is always tragic (I cried over fish and a budgie, FGS - for 3 days) but to lose one so young .... There are no words.


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## Nico0laGouldsmith (Apr 23, 2011)

StrawberryBlonde said:


> Oh my goodness, I am so sorry all this happened, just heartbreaking. It brought me to tears, not only because its a terribly sad story but also because you've managed to write about him so eloquently. I understand the feeling that your dog is your baby, I feel the same about mine. I am yet to loose a dog & absolutely dread the day. Your story will stick with me & I will remember to show my dogs love each & every day. *hugs*


Thanks  any errors is because I typed it on my phone whilst walking to work. It was because I was thinking about him and I saw a feather and I realised how often that happens. I then thought the only place where people would understand is here. I wish I could feel better about it but I just miss him literally all day every day. I have a really insensitive work colleague as well who talks about her puppy (that she got literally a few days after he died!) and I find myself saying things like "oh david sometimes....no...used to..." And then I realise and it makes me sad again 



LinznMilly said:


> So terribly sorry for your loss! Like you, I don't usually post in here because I'm dreading the day when I have to face the loss of my 2. :Shy
> 
> I wouldn't worry too much about upsetting any parents. The bond we have with our pets is still that of a caregiver/minor, which is like saying it's a parent/child bond. He was your baby, you _are _grieving, what you are feeling _is _real and you have every right to feel it.
> 
> Losing a pet is always tragic (I cried over fish and a budgie, FGS - for 3 days) but to lose one so young .... There are no words.


Thanks. I'm glad to see people understand how I am feeling. 
I was talking to my OH earlier and we wondered whether it would have been better if we had never had him and had to go through this... But my mum keeps telling me that we were meant to have him. Someone had to have him and if he was just going to have such a short life then he needed to be spoiled and loved unconditionally. We spoiled him so so much. He had more toys and things than human babies! we had to cancel a brand new car that we were buying just because he needed a bigger one for when he was fully grown (the man at the garage was lovely and he actually got us our deposit back because we told him when we signed for it that we were only getting it for the puppy and my OH had to ring him and tell him we needed to cancel because he died). We spent every minute we could with him and I only work a few hours in the afternoon but we had 2 weeks of annual leave with him and it was roasting hot for a few days and we went and bought an air conditioner for our lounge and a paddling pool for outside for the poor boy. He died on the last night and we had to call in sick for work for our first day back. It's so weird but it seems like even though we obviously didn't want him to die if it was going to happen it happened at the perfect time. I'd do anything to have him back though


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## Sophie17 (Feb 16, 2015)

I think the feathers were sign from David. So sorry for your loss.


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## Nico0laGouldsmith (Apr 23, 2011)

Sophie17 said:


> I think the feathers were sign from David. So sorry for your loss.


I hope so and thank you
We had loads of weird stuff going off after he died. The fire alarm was playing up on the stairs even though it had a fresh battery. Just kept going off. It's fine now and working. When it kept doing it my OH went upstairs to take the battery out and he came down looking horrified and told me to go up but wouldn't tell me why. When I walked upstairs it was like walking through something. It didn't feel hot or cold. It just felt really weird and gave me goosebumps and afterwards he said that was what he felt and he just wanted to see if I felt it too. I'm waiting for my ashes in to glass ring to come. I should get it in September. I'm having "David momma's puppyboy" engraved inside because that's what I called him... Well that and "old el puppo" haha
I'm just glad we never ever took him for granted. If he'd died after a few more months there would have inevitably and understandably been the odd days where we would have taken him for granted or felt inconvenienced for needing to walk him when we were so busy or something. Like I know we all love our animals but we also have to be realistic it's not always easy fitting in doing things for them and we just have to try as hard as we can but we didn't have him long enough for that to have happened yet.
But we had him long enough to show him so much love and because we had him for 3 months our house was more his home than the breeders was because they only had him for 2 months. It's all these little things that I'm trying to find comfort in. I really would do anything to have one last cuddle.


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## jaycee05 (Sep 24, 2012)

Just read your story about your puppy, i am so sorry for you, and what a shock it must have been ,it it heatwrenching to lose a beloved pet, but when they are so young its harder to accept i think, when they are old and ill its hard to lose them ,but more to be expected
I am sure those feathers are a sign from your lovely boy that he is still with you in spirit


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## Nico0laGouldsmith (Apr 23, 2011)

jaycee05 said:


> Just read your story about your puppy, i am so sorry for you, and what a shock it must have been ,it it heatwrenching to lose a beloved pet, but when they are so young its harder to accept i think, when they are old and ill its hard to lose them ,but more to be expected
> I am sure those feathers are a sign from your lovely boy that he is still with you in spirit


Thank you lovely


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## Charity (Apr 17, 2013)

I'm so sorry about your beautiful little boy. We think we have years ahead with our pets when something tragic like this happens. I know what you mean about feathers, I had a litle white and tabby cat who died two years ago and I am always seeing little white feathers in the garden, which he loved to be in, and I tell myself he is near. RIP David


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## Nico0laGouldsmith (Apr 23, 2011)

Charity said:


> I'm so sorry about your beautiful little boy. We think we have years ahead with our pets when something tragic like this happens. I know what you mean about feathers, I had a litle white and tabby cat who died two years ago and I am always seeing little white feathers in the garden, which he loved to be in, and I tell myself he is near. RIP David
> 
> View attachment 241706


Thank you 
On the night he died I said to the vet that it didn't seem like a decision we should be making yet... To decide what type of urn or tube he would come back to us in  
Aw that's sweet I'm sure your little cat comes back to see you sometimes


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## jill3 (Feb 18, 2009)

So sorry for the loss of your Puppy David. It is Heart Breaking when all pets die but when they die young you feel that they have been cheated.
Loosing a furry or feathered friend is like loosing a Baby. You loved David just as much as anyone with their own Human Baby.
Look after yourselves and give your self time to grieve. When you are ready I am sure there will be someone just for you to share that love again with you and your family. Sending you some Big Hug xxx


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