Poppy

This is Poppy. She's a 15 year old Hungarian Kuvatz I rescued from Battersea Dogs Home in January 2000. I took her because no one else wanted her; she'd been badly abused and dumped on the street in below freezing temperatures. She didn't know how to play, or how to eat dog food - any food she'd had before had been flung at her in scraps, or so the vet thought. For months I had to feed her by putting soft food in her mouth and making her swallow. The irony of it; my dog was as anorexic as me.

I left her, along with Shelley, in the care of my parents when I moved to Nottingham for uni. She was well cared for, though never seemed happy. It was like, despite having endless love with us, she expected abuse like she'd had before. Poppy was never any trouble. On a trip to the park she was content to trot along smelling the flowers; she didn't understand how to play with a stick or ball like Shelley.

These past few years Poppy's health has declined. Her arthiritic hips are now so painful she cannot go up and down stairs, and she cannot sit. Lying down takes ages, and she cries in pain as she does so. She doesn't like walks anymore, and looks so unhappy. She's incontinent, and her blindness and deafness make her very insecure and clingy. I've been trying to get my parents to put her to sleep to release her of her suffering for a few weeks now. Don't get me wrong, I don't want to lose her, but I see the look in her eyes and I know that suffering so well. Last winter, if I'd been an animal, I'd probably have been put down myself. I certainly begged for it to stop the pain.

So this Saturday she'll have a nice chickeny breakfast which she loves, then she'll go on her last car trip to the vet. The vet agrees its time now. Then she'll be set free. I wish I was going where she's going.