I’ll never forget the look on my consultant’s face when he told me a had an ‘aggressive form of leukaemia’ in May 2021.
I’d been chasing a more holistic and healthier way of life for the last few years. I was the one to help people and their animals feel better. Physical strength and vitality were things I took for granted; that made me who I was and enabled me to do the work I loved.
I’d always seen life as a voyage, but I’d never faced a potentially fatal storm before. I’d never even been admitted to hospital.
And people…well, it’s a shock to realise how one’s own proximity to death can freak out even the longest held acquaintance.
There’s a reason that therapy animals exist - because the company of an animal, unencumbered with pity, confusion or fear of their own mortality, is utter balm.
I want to bring here both meanings of dogs days: terrible days that suck every iota of resilience and happier days populated by canine company.
Sometimes prose, sometimes poems, you’ll just have to wait and see.
