The Story Of Pretty Miss Emma

[Pretty Miss Emma]

Warning, may be long and rambly; but it says what I want to share and hopefully you can understand why everyone loved Emma!

For me this story starts on Friday 23 November 2007. That was the night before I was going to do a volunteer shift at the RSPCA. As I sometimes did I checked out their dogs for adoption on their website. There was this most adorable grey shaggy terrier thing. I didn't have a dog at the time, so figured I'd check him out when I was there the next day. There were also 2 border collies, obviously brought in together, but they were old.

So did my shift the next day then wandered down to adoptions. No shaggy grey terrier. But the most beautiful black and white border collie, Emma, was there. In the pen beside her was Merlin, he had lived with her and both had been surrendered. Both were 9 years old. Merlin was busy being a border collie, jumping, running, etc etc. Emma was hanging out down the back of her pen. But when I bent down and asked her to come over she came up to the front and we had a bit of a chat and a scratch through the door. She was so small and lovely. I can still take you to the pen she was in (and I always check out who's in there when I visit).

I wasn't in the market for a border collie, they're active and bigger than I thought I'd get. But maybe this Emma would be different she seemed different. Everytime I ever researched dogs it was always border collies. Anyway, I went and visited my parents for the rest of the day. I heard a week or so later that all I did was spend my whole day talking about this beautiful border collie I had seen.

Sunday 26 November. For some reason I went to the stockfeed store and bought a dog bed. I wasn't getting a dog just yet, but had decided that I would in the near future and it's good to be prepared. Visited a friend. After me telling them for 2 hours about this beautiful border collie I had seen the previous day they persuaded me to go back out to the RSPCA (45 min drive!)at 3pm to go and meet her properly. We spent 45 minutes together. Spoke at length with the adoption officer about her age and what that may bring. I didn't care, she was perfect. She was to be mine. I had to go on school camp the next day, so we agreed they would hold her there for me for the week and I would call to confirm the next morning that I still wanted her. I don't think they were expecting a 7am phone call to say of course I wanted her!!!

I think the whole year level I was on camp with knew that I couldn't wait for us all to get back to Melbourne and for them to get picked up. I believe the most frequent statement out of my mouth that camp was "I'm getting a dog on Saturday and she's beautiful!". The kids were sick of hearing it by the end of the week!!

Saturday 1 December 2007, one of the best days of my life. Around 10am I was out there ready to pick up my beautiful girl. From the moment we walked out of the place she belonged to me and I belonged to her. We visited Mum and Dad so they could meet their new "grandchild" (as close as they were getting to having one anyway!!). Where ever I went Emma followed. I learnt that day that when you have a very special border collie you never even go to the toilet alone!!!

Pretty Miss Emma on her very first day of her life with me!!

2008 was our first year of milestones. Emma became an RSPCA education dog (I was volunteering on school holidays and she would come along to interact with the children). That's when we figured out that everyone who met this dog would fall in love with her. She had something to give to everyone who she met.

Seeing as though she had just been adopted from the RSPCA I applied for her to be considered for the 2009 RSPCA dog calendar. Of course she made the cut!! My little Miss April 2009!

2008 was also the year I joined my local dog club (Keilor Obedience Dog Training Centre). Everyone thought I was stupid. I had such a well behaved dog who would do anything I asked of her and she was 9 years old, why did she need obedience school. My answer to this, she's a border collie it doesn't matter how old she is she needs mental stimulation and she'll find it fun. So I coerced some friends to join also (I'm the only one still going!!). Everyone at KODTC fell in love with her straight away, even the non-BC people!! She zoomed through the classes and was in the top class by the end of the year.

In June of 2008 Emma also was tested and approved to become a Delta Therapy Dog. We started visiting a nursing home and she was just a delight to those that lived there. There were a few people who she was really special for. One lady suffered extremely severe depression, she often wouldn't let anyone come into her room; but as soon as she saw Emma's freckled nose poke through the door we were welcomed with open arms. Another lady had very bad memory issues; we had the same conversation every time I was there (that's a lovely dog, what breed is she, what does she get for dinner, how old is she), I remeber so clearly the day we walked in and she announced "Emma the border collie is here, she's 9 years old. I think she's going to have sardines for dinner tonight" - it just about made me cry that my beautiful girl could have such a massive impact on someone who she saw for 15 minutes once a week.

2009 we continued doing what we were doing. Pet therapy once a week, obedience school on a Sunday (by this point I was so hooked on training that I had started doing the internal volunteer training course we offer!!), school holiday programs at the RSPCA (which was when she met Leo - an Ellagant dog!) and then the agility bug bit! Some friends did some agility training and I though Em would love that. But she was 10 years old now, could you do that with a 10 year old? I figured we'd just do fun stuff and stick to ground work. Let her do what she could and just enjoy. So late 2009 we started doing NADAC trials. Everyone loved watching Emma run, with her tiny little legs (she was only 16.5" and all the missing height came from her legs!!) and being an oldie running the courses. She always got claps!! She often managed to come first or second in her division and usually managed pull a qualie at most trials.

This year I was awarded best female hander at KODTC!! When I asked why, I just do what I do with my dog, I was told that was exactly why because of the way we work together and all the things that we do. That made me quite proud!

2009 was also a big year in Emma's lifetime. It was the year I decided that I was in love with border collies and one wasn't enough. Making that decision helped a lot of things fall in to place. I got in contact with breeders, narrowed down my search, found someone who was going to have a pup for me when the timing was perfect. In the weeks leading up to this I visited the Dog Day Out at KCC. Of course BC's gravitate to BC's!! We visited the BCCV group. While I was there I was asked where Emma was from, answer - RSPCA! That's when I was told no, this is a dog that has breeding behind her (I always thought she was beautiful and perfect, but didn't expect others to say that she might be this good!!). So I sent the person all the details I had about Em from when adopted her and a bit of extra stuff I had managed to find out. I had a phone call within the day telling me that the knew exactly who this dog was and that she was an Ellagant dog (felt a bit weird seeing as though I'd just been meeting Ellagant aussies!!)!!! Talk about suprised, I never expected to know anything more than I already did. It turned out that Emma was not only a dog with good breeding, but she had been a champion show puppy - then her legs stopped growing!! When she didn't make height she was placed in a pet home at the age of around 10 months or so, which is where she had spent the last 8 years of her life before she and I met. When I contacted the breeder they were mortified one of their dogs had ended up in a shelter, but so glad that she had ended up with me.

So December 2009 Kenzie came on the scene, the adorable munchkin who was to make Em's life miserable for about a week and then all of a sudden she figured that it was actually ok to have someone to hang out with.

2010. Everything went along the same as it had been until April. Em wasn't quite right. She was diagnosed with diabeted. For about 3 days I was convinced the world was over, of course she just got on with life and looked at me as if to say "come on let's go for a walk". A diabetic dog is really not very different to any other dog, I know that now. There was a routine we had to follow, and we had to be a bit more strict with treats. But other than that the world kept turning. She had to stop her pet therapy as it was difficult to fit in with her insulin regime. But she kept attending obedience and agility classes, she kept running at NADAC trials. And she kept loving everyone and making everyone fall in love with her.

October brought us some new challenges and stresses. Em ran a 2 day trial in early October, she had a fall on one of the days (and not a good one). She did follow that run with a qualie run - so typical of her to do something like that!! But I knew her vision was not what it should be. At my Mum and Dad's she had been running into wallks and not finding the door. So a couple of weeks later I took her to see a vet opthalmologist. She had cataracts and was totally blind, she only had light perception. Again, my world was over. She wasn't coping so well with this vision thing. Going totally blind in 2 weeks must be a pretty scary thing, and I could tell that she was struggling. So after lots of testing and weighing up the options she had cataract surgery. Everything went great for the first 10 days and then we hit trouble. She developed glaucoma. So the month of December was spent driving to the eye clinic almost every day. Of course what did this do? Cause a whole heap of new people to fall in love with her!!! They didn't like that she was coming in as it meant something was wrong, but they adored having her there. She was the perfect patient. She sometimes had to have the fluid in her eye drained (with a needle) to reduce the pressure, she would just sit there and let them do it. Had she been a different dog they would have given up on her, but even just last week she still had an appointment to try and deal with these issues!!

This year... I was off to Africa for 7 weeks. I so didn't want to leave either of my girls but I was really scared leaving Emma. What if something went wrong? She had lovely people looking after her while I was gone, and I was able to have my holiday. She did what she always did - looked after everyone else!!! While I was away she had no problems, she made everyone's life easy. And yet again caused a few more people to fall in love with her!! After I got home the eye problems started again, this time retina detatching in April; she was pretty much blind again due to all the problems also. Treatment of this ended up with her in emergency with pneumonia (it had been lurking), then a few days later with hyperglycaemia. A very stressful time for everyone and I though I was going to lose my beautiful girl. But she pulled through and also made a few people in emergency fall in love with her!

A few weeks after she came out of hospital I had a pet photographer here to take photos of the girls for a book the RSPCA is releasing. She also fell in love with her! Her diabetes had still not stabilised following her hospitalisation so we were at the vet each week looking at her BGL and adjusting her insulin. Then a few weeks ago, coinciding with an insulin dose increase she decided she didn't want to eat properly anymore. Everything else was normal. She still loved her treats, loved going for walks, would give Kenzie kisses each morning and night, loved sitting in the garden and listening to the birds and in the last week I had her loved coming to see the kids at school holidays program and getting as many pats as she could from them. Then we hit the time of what will be will be. She didn't want to eat, we did test and found out what was going on and while I was coming to grips over the last few weeks that she probably wouldn't be around as long as I wanted her to be I didn't think that she wasn't coming home form the vet last week.

So on that day they calld me to come in immediately. I took Kenzie. They called my Mum and asked her to come over. Kenzie and I spent about an hour sitting with her. Kenzie kept lying beside her (she doesn't normally do this), kept laying her head on Em's legs (never does this!) and often would sniff her face and give her gentle kisses. Just before I had Emma put to sleep she licked Kenzie so gently all over her face and Kenzie just sat there and let her do it and then gave her a quick kiss back.

Now it's been just over a week since my beautiful girl has been gone. My front door looks empty without an old black and white girl sitting there. And I miss taking my blind girl for a walk and having her so happy just to be out and about. I miss having my blind dog look at me and still be actually looking at my face even though I know she can't see me. I miss hearing Kenzie talk to her (this weird grumbly whingy thing!!). Today I got her ashes back and that makes it a tiny bit better. There have been many tears shed by very very many people in the last week about my beautiful girl - I'm so happy that she was able to touch so many people. While I miss her so much and want her back so badly I'm so glad that I was able to do what I did for her, both in the last 3.5 years of her life and also in the last hours of it. I hope everyone gets to meet the perfect dog just like I did. It was too short a time, but as I said to my Dad when he questioned me about getting an old "I'd rather have a great dog for a short time than never have her at all".

And everyone who met her said - she was just a great dog, one you never forget.

Pretty Miss Emma in January of this year.

[BCPuppy]

What a wonderful time you had, even though it was short, Miss Emma was a wonderful ambassador and will obviously be remembered by many for the joy and happiness she gave along with the lessons that age and not being the perfect example of breed do not stop you from enjoying every minute to the full. Cherish the wonderful memories you have of her.

RIP Miss Emma and godspeed

[Gayle.]

That was beautiful. What a lovely tribute to your gorgeous girl. I tried to post something earlier this morning but couldn't see for the tears.

I wrote something similar about Benson for our club newsletter, as I was writing it I felt it helped enormously to ease some of the pain.

Rainbow bridge must have had a shortage of awesome dogs cos quite a few very special ones made the trip last week.

[*Avanti*]

Thanks for sharing your lovely tribute.

I'm sorry for your loss.

RIP Pretty Miss Emma.

[MsKatie]

What a wonderful tribute to a very special girl

Run free beautiful Emma

[Sezy]

What a lovely tribute for a beautiful dog.

RIP Emma

[Swizzlestick]

I think I too just fell in love with Emma. Just like so many did during her time with you.

What a terrific bond the two of you had.

RIP Emma.

[harley]

Beautiful tribute to your special girl, may she rest in peace.

I made it all the way to the last paragraph....

[Kirty]

That was the most beautiful tribute. Emma was a truly special dog.

[Kirislin]

You've made me cry. That was a lovely tribute. How lucky you both were to be lived some of your lives together, and how much better both lives were for that time.

[kelpiechick]

Lovely ! Emma was such a lucky girl to spend her last few years with someone who loved her so much.

I have a friend with a BC with Ellagant bloodlines (father was an Ellagant dog) and he looks very similar to Emma, will try and find a photo for you. My friend was also a member of KODTC for a couple of years where he worked his younger BC - and ran some NADAC trials too I believe, small world.

[BC Crazy]

What a fitting tribute to a beautiful partnership. I had trouble reading the last few lines cause my eyes were filled with tears.

Just goes to show you you can never underestimate a Border Collie. They are just amazing, beautiful, loyal & very intelligent.

R.I.P. Pretty Miss Emma, run free lovely girl.

[Pretty Miss Emma]

So it's nearly 7 weeks since my beautiful girl left me.

There are still tears on a daily basis, somedays more than others. They're happy memories but so many tears because that's what they are now - memories - and I still really want my dog back.

I just found a video from 5 days before she was PTS, and she looked so happy and there was justno obvious sign of what was to come.

I'm hoping that soon the tears will stop and I can smile at the memories. I try to do this, but the tears keep winning out at the moment!!

So Kenzie gets a special hug every night, the one that was always for her and the one that was for Emma. I think she misses Em a bit, but she's doing a lot better at getting on with the life without her than I am at the moment. Maybe I'll have to start following in my little girls footsteps and trying to be a bit braver about it!!

[Her Majesty Dogmad]

Hugs to you, Emma was a very special dog and you had 3.5 amazing years together. You did so much for her and gave her a very happy and fulfilled life. What a hole they leave in our hearts when they go. RIP Emma.

[suziwong66]

Vale Emma you were a shining star. Pretty Miss Emma, your pain is so raw and your love for Emma so deep. Thank you for sharing Emma's time with you; even the sad end.

[ozjen]

Warning, may be long and rambly; but it says what I want to share and hopefully you can understand why everyone loved Emma!

For me this story starts on Friday 23 November 2007. That was the night before I was going to do a volunteer shift at the RSPCA. As I sometimes did I checked out their dogs for adoption on their website. There was this most adorable grey shaggy terrier thing. I didn't have a dog at the time, so figured I'd check him out when I was there the next day. There were also 2 border collies, obviously brought in together, but they were old.

So did my shift the next day then wandered down to adoptions. No shaggy grey terrier. But the most beautiful black and white border collie, Emma, was there. In the pen beside her was Merlin, he had lived with her and both had been surrendered. Both were 9 years old. Merlin was busy being a border collie, jumping, running, etc etc. Emma was hanging out down the back of her pen. But when I bent down and asked her to come over she came up to the front and we had a bit of a chat and a scratch through the door. She was so small and lovely. I can still take you to the pen she was in (and I always check out who's in there when I visit).

I wasn't in the market for a border collie, they're active and bigger than I thought I'd get. But maybe this Emma would be different she seemed different. Everytime I ever researched dogs it was always border collies. Anyway, I went and visited my parents for the rest of the day. I heard a week or so later that all I did was spend my whole day talking about this beautiful border collie I had seen.

Sunday 26 November. For some reason I went to the stockfeed store and bought a dog bed. I wasn't getting a dog just yet, but had decided that I would in the near future and it's good to be prepared. Visited a friend. After me telling them for 2 hours about this beautiful border collie I had seen the previous day they persuaded me to go back out to the RSPCA (45 min drive!)at 3pm to go and meet her properly. We spent 45 minutes together. Spoke at length with the adoption officer about her age and what that may bring. I didn't care, she was perfect. She was to be mine. I had to go on school camp the next day, so we agreed they would hold her there for me for the week and I would call to confirm the next morning that I still wanted her. I don't think they were expecting a 7am phone call to say of course I wanted her!!!

I think the whole year level I was on camp with knew that I couldn't wait for us all to get back to Melbourne and for them to get picked up. I believe the most frequent statement out of my mouth that camp was "I'm getting a dog on Saturday and she's beautiful!". The kids were sick of hearing it by the end of the week!!

Saturday 1 December 2007, one of the best days of my life. Around 10am I was out there ready to pick up my beautiful girl. From the moment we walked out of the place she belonged to me and I belonged to her. We visited Mum and Dad so they could meet their new "grandchild" (as close as they were getting to having one anyway!!). Where ever I went Emma followed. I learnt that day that when you have a very special border collie you never even go to the toilet alone!!!

Pretty Miss Emma on her very first day of her life with me!!

2008 was our first year of milestones. Emma became an RSPCA education dog (I was volunteering on school holidays and she would come along to interact with the children). That's when we figured out that everyone who met this dog would fall in love with her. She had something to give to everyone who she met.

Seeing as though she had just been adopted from the RSPCA I applied for her to be considered for the 2009 RSPCA dog calendar. Of course she made the cut!! My little Miss April 2009!

2008 was also the year I joined my local dog club (Keilor Obedience Dog Training Centre). Everyone thought I was stupid. I had such a well behaved dog who would do anything I asked of her and she was 9 years old, why did she need obedience school. My answer to this, she's a border collie it doesn't matter how old she is she needs mental stimulation and she'll find it fun. So I coerced some friends to join also (I'm the only one still going!!). Everyone at KODTC fell in love with her straight away, even the non-BC people!! She zoomed through the classes and was in the top class by the end of the year.

In June of 2008 Emma also was tested and approved to become a Delta Therapy Dog. We started visiting a nursing home and she was just a delight to those that lived there. There were a few people who she was really special for. One lady suffered extremely severe depression, she often wouldn't let anyone come into her room; but as soon as she saw Emma's freckled nose poke through the door we were welcomed with open arms. Another lady had very bad memory issues; we had the same conversation every time I was there (that's a lovely dog, what breed is she, what does she get for dinner, how old is she), I remeber so clearly the day we walked in and she announced "Emma the border collie is here, she's 9 years old. I think she's going to have sardines for dinner tonight" - it just about made me cry that my beautiful girl could have such a massive impact on someone who she saw for 15 minutes once a week.

2009 we continued doing what we were doing. Pet therapy once a week, obedience school on a Sunday (by this point I was so hooked on training that I had started doing the internal volunteer training course we offer!!), school holiday programs at the RSPCA (which was when she met Leo - an Ellagant dog!) and then the agility bug bit! Some friends did some agility training and I though Em would love that. But she was 10 years old now, could you do that with a 10 year old? I figured we'd just do fun stuff and stick to ground work. Let her do what she could and just enjoy. So late 2009 we started doing NADAC trials. Everyone loved watching Emma run, with her tiny little legs (she was only 16.5" and all the missing height came from her legs!!) and being an oldie running the courses. She always got claps!! She often managed to come first or second in her division and usually managed pull a qualie at most trials.

This year I was awarded best female hander at KODTC!! When I asked why, I just do what I do with my dog, I was told that was exactly why because of the way we work together and all the things that we do. That made me quite proud!

2009 was also a big year in Emma's lifetime. It was the year I decided that I was in love with border collies and one wasn't enough. Making that decision helped a lot of things fall in to place. I got in contact with breeders, narrowed down my search, found someone who was going to have a pup for me when the timing was perfect. In the weeks leading up to this I visited the Dog Day Out at KCC. Of course BC's gravitate to BC's!! We visited the BCCV group. While I was there I was asked where Emma was from, answer - RSPCA! That's when I was told no, this is a dog that has breeding behind her (I always thought she was beautiful and perfect, but didn't expect others to say that she might be this good!!). So I sent the person all the details I had about Em from when adopted her and a bit of extra stuff I had managed to find out. I had a phone call within the day telling me that the knew exactly who this dog was and that she was an Ellagant dog (felt a bit weird seeing as though I'd just been meeting Ellagant aussies!!)!!! Talk about suprised, I never expected to know anything more than I already did. It turned out that Emma was not only a dog with good breeding, but she had been a champion show puppy - then her legs stopped growing!! When she didn't make height she was placed in a pet home at the age of around 10 months or so, which is where she had spent the last 8 years of her life before she and I met. When I contacted the breeder they were mortified one of their dogs had ended up in a shelter, but so glad that she had ended up with me.

So December 2009 Kenzie came on the scene, the adorable munchkin who was to make Em's life miserable for about a week and then all of a sudden she figured that it was actually ok to have someone to hang out with.

2010. Everything went along the same as it had been until April. Em wasn't quite right. She was diagnosed with diabeted. For about 3 days I was convinced the world was over, of course she just got on with life and looked at me as if to say "come on let's go for a walk". A diabetic dog is really not very different to any other dog, I know that now. There was a routine we had to follow, and we had to be a bit more strict with treats. But other than that the world kept turning. She had to stop her pet therapy as it was difficult to fit in with her insulin regime. But she kept attending obedience and agility classes, she kept running at NADAC trials. And she kept loving everyone and making everyone fall in love with her.

October brought us some new challenges and stresses. Em ran a 2 day trial in early October, she had a fall on one of the days (and not a good one). She did follow that run with a qualie run - so typical of her to do something like that!! But I knew her vision was not what it should be. At my Mum and Dad's she had been running into wallks and not finding the door. So a couple of weeks later I took her to see a vet opthalmologist. She had cataracts and was totally blind, she only had light perception. Again, my world was over. She wasn't coping so well with this vision thing. Going totally blind in 2 weeks must be a pretty scary thing, and I could tell that she was struggling. So after lots of testing and weighing up the options she had cataract surgery. Everything went great for the first 10 days and then we hit trouble. She developed glaucoma. So the month of December was spent driving to the eye clinic almost every day. Of course what did this do? Cause a whole heap of new people to fall in love with her!!! They didn't like that she was coming in as it meant something was wrong, but they adored having her there. She was the perfect patient. She sometimes had to have the fluid in her eye drained (with a needle) to reduce the pressure, she would just sit there and let them do it. Had she been a different dog they would have given up on her, but even just last week she still had an appointment to try and deal with these issues!!

This year... I was off to Africa for 7 weeks. I so didn't want to leave either of my girls but I was really scared leaving Emma. What if something went wrong? She had lovely people looking after her while I was gone, and I was able to have my holiday. She did what she always did - looked after everyone else!!! While I was away she had no problems, she made everyone's life easy. And yet again caused a few more people to fall in love with her!! After I got home the eye problems started again, this time retina detatching in April; she was pretty much blind again due to all the problems also. Treatment of this ended up with her in emergency with pneumonia (it had been lurking), then a few days later with hyperglycaemia. A very stressful time for everyone and I though I was going to lose my beautiful girl. But she pulled through and also made a few people in emergency fall in love with her!

A few weeks after she came out of hospital I had a pet photographer here to take photos of the girls for a book the RSPCA is releasing. She also fell in love with her! Her diabetes had still not stabilised following her hospitalisation so we were at the vet each week looking at her BGL and adjusting her insulin. Then a few weeks ago, coinciding with an insulin dose increase she decided she didn't want to eat properly anymore. Everything else was normal. She still loved her treats, loved going for walks, would give Kenzie kisses each morning and night, loved sitting in the garden and listening to the birds and in the last week I had her loved coming to see the kids at school holidays program and getting as many pats as she could from them. Then we hit the time of what will be will be. She didn't want to eat, we did test and found out what was going on and while I was coming to grips over the last few weeks that she probably wouldn't be around as long as I wanted her to be I didn't think that she wasn't coming home form the vet last week.

So on that day they calld me to come in immediately. I took Kenzie. They called my Mum and asked her to come over. Kenzie and I spent about an hour sitting with her. Kenzie kept lying beside her (she doesn't normally do this), kept laying her head on Em's legs (never does this!) and often would sniff her face and give her gentle kisses. Just before I had Emma put to sleep she licked Kenzie so gently all over her face and Kenzie just sat there and let her do it and then gave her a quick kiss back.

Now it's been just over a week since my beautiful girl has been gone. My front door looks empty without an old black and white girl sitting there. And I miss taking my blind girl for a walk and having her so happy just to be out and about. I miss having my blind dog look at me and still be actually looking at my face even though I know she can't see me. I miss hearing Kenzie talk to her (this weird grumbly whingy thing!!). Today I got her ashes back and that makes it a tiny bit better. There have been many tears shed by very very many people in the last week about my beautiful girl - I'm so happy that she was able to touch so many people. While I miss her so much and want her back so badly I'm so glad that I was able to do what I did for her, both in the last 3.5 years of her life and also in the last hours of it. I hope everyone gets to meet the perfect dog just like I did. It was too short a time, but as I said to my Dad when he questioned me about getting an old "I'd rather have a great dog for a short time than never have her at all".

And everyone who met her said - she was just a great dog, one you never forget.

Pretty Miss Emma in January of this year.

What a beautiful tribute to your lovely Emma, she was a lucky dog to be so loved and it sounds like she brought alot of joy into all the lives she touched. I'm so sorry for you loss, RIP sweet Emma.

[MelodysMum]

What an absolutely wonderful tribute to an amazing dog. I have tears streaming down my face. You and Emma were so blessed to find each other. You opened your hearts to one another as true kindred spirits and I am sure everyone who met you both could see that. Thank you for sharing Emma's story, it was an absolute joy and privilege to read about your special girl. My thoughts and prayers are with you as you come to terms with her passing.

RIP Emma!

[Gayle.]

So it's nearly 7 weeks since my beautiful girl left me.

There are still tears on a daily basis, somedays more than others. They're happy memories but so many tears because that's what they are now - memories - and I still really want my dog back.

I just found a video from 5 days before she was PTS, and she looked so happy and there was justno obvious sign of what was to come.

I'm hoping that soon the tears will stop and I can smile at the memories. I try to do this, but the tears keep winning out at the moment!!

So Kenzie gets a special hug every night, the one that was always for her and the one that was for Emma. I think she misses Em a bit, but she's doing a lot better at getting on with the life without her than I am at the moment. Maybe I'll have to start following in my little girls footsteps and trying to be a bit braver about it!!

I have been thinking of you lately, wondering how you're getting on. I too, cry daily. Sometimes it's quiet gentle tears, other times it's not quiet at all. Our worlds were tipped over at the same time, mine feels like it might never be rightside up again, but I expect it will one day.

[hortfurball]

Beautiful tribute to your special girl, may she rest in peace.

I made it all the way to the last paragraph....

Me too.

Thank you for sharing this beautiful story of your wonderful girl

Run free Emma

[Pretty Miss Emma]

So this Friday would have been Emma's 13th birthday. I was so hoping she would have made it this far but that was not to be.

Today I had to break the news to a lot of people (who I used to work with and who knew Em from the day I got her) that she was no longer here. I thought I'd be ok, but there were tears for every person I had to tell . And I think they were also ready to burst in to tears when they heard the news.

So it's sort of a hard week and I think there will be many more tears to come this week. I wish I could be ok about her not being here, but happy memories make me cry as do the harder ones. So it's still a whole lot of crying!!!

I miss you Em and would do anything to have you with me on your birthday.

Oh, and Kenzie is also missing you big time. I've promised her a brother as soon as the right one comes our direction! He's not going to be close to filling your paw prints but at least she'll have a playmate again!