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Poppy's story was sent to me by her doting owners Dave and Cheryl Bayliss from Richmond in Surrey. Dave takes up the story.
My Labrador Poppy, who is 8 years old, loves retrieving and will chase anything that is thrown for her, and will run to it like her life depends on it, giving 200% always. On one particular lovely sunny Sunday last year we were at our agility training ground which we share with the scouts. The scouts were doing a camp-over and as usual when the scouts were there they enjoyed watching the dogs working. We had finished for the day and were clearing away the equipment. Most of the dogs were now off lead and enjoying the run around. While our backs were turned one of the scouts picked up a stick and threw it for Poppy. Poppy along with 2 or 3 others dogs raced off after it, Poppy was not used to being last for anything and despite her age, got to it first. The stick was just landing and sticking point first out of the ground when Poppy pounced on it. She did not cry out, in fact we wouldn't have noticed anything was wrong if it was not for Poppy's reaction She would normally race back but on this occasion she stumbled to the floor coughing. Although she soon got up, I went over to see if she was all right. At first I thought she was ok, there didn't seem to be any sign of a problem but Poppy didn't quite seem herself so I took a closer look. This time when I opened her mouth there seemed to be blood everywhere, even coming out of her nose. I could see what looked like a hole in the soft palate. I was horrified. I scooped her up and carried her to the car. It's at times like these that you wish you had a blue light to get you though the traffic, meanwhile my wife was telephoning the vet's to tell them we were on the way.
However, we insisted that Poppy needed to be seen now and would not take NO for an answer. We arrived at the vet's only to be kept waiting for 5-10 minutes. When we did go in to see the vet she confirmed that the stick had punctured the soft palate but could not tell how bad the damage was or if there was any of the stick still embedded in the wound. Poppy was rushed into surgery for a life-saving operation. The vet could only offer a 50/50 chance of her pulling though. Can you imagine how we felt? We went home distraught, waiting for a phone call. |
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It was 1½ hours before we got a call from the vet to say that the surgery had gone well. The wound had been deep but the stick had not travelled beyond her palate. No splinters had been found and the wound had been stitched. We could pick her up the following morning. So the following morning we collected Poppy from the vet's. We were given tablets to stop infection and instructions on what to feed her, only very soft food, no off lead exercise and told to try to keep her quiet. Everything was fine for 3 days until we heard Poppy coughing and noticed blood in her mouth again. A call the vet's and we on our way back, despite carrying out all the instructions to the letter. The stitches had broken down and Poppy had to undergo yet another emergency operation to save her life. Luckily this time the operation was successful! A few weeks of soft food, plenty of rest (not easy for our Poppy) and 2-3 visits back to the vets for checkups and Poppy was finally given a clean bill of health (I won't mention the bill that we were given !!!).
We had nearly lost Poppy and put her through many weeks of pain and discomfort and we felt so guilty that we had let her down by letting it happen. And all we had done
was turn our backs for a second." |
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"As
a dog trainer I was aware of the dangers of throwing sticks and the
injuries that they could cause . 
" No need
to bring her in now! If she's still not well in the morning, bring her
then" we were told by the vet's nurse.
