Martini "Tini"

Sometimes something so wonderful and totally life changing comes into your life and you don't realize what is happening. That is what happened when Martini came into our lives in November of 1990. She was God's gift to me to get well. I had been very ill before Tini came into my life. She was just what I needed-- the dog who never stopped playing frisbee. She was a handful. But what a girl she was! She competed in frisbee for 10 years. She was retired last fall at the age of 12. And she was always my therapy. She became an official therapy dog at the age of 9 when she earned her CGC and TDI. I had always wanted to share her special abilities with others. She became a welcome visitor at area nursing homes. She would lay her head in laps and look up with her beautiful amber eyes. She was so compassionate and loving.

Tini was the guardian of our daughter, Jordan. She would walk Jordan to the bus each morning and walk back to the house when the bus came. She checked on Jordan each night before she retired.

Tini truly changed our lives. We have so many friends because of her. She not only had the drive and determination to be the best she could be, she left that legacy to her children, their children and on and on. She was a real Aussie. They say that everything you need to know in life that is important you learn from your dog. I guess that is right. I know I learned a lot from her. I just hope that I can be the person she thought I was.

Martini closed her eyes to sleep for the last time on June 1, 2002. She was 13. Good night, Sweet Girl. Your footprints will dance on our hearts forever.

Owned, loved and sadly missed by Gayle & family

Tini died of ehrlichia, a tick borne disease.  I will never again forget the Frontline.  She may have had the disease for years, but because of her age, her immune system just broke down and it finally killed her.  There is always some degree of guilt with grief and somehow I feel responsible for her death.  She was always hunting through the tall grass.  She was always the one who would have ticks on her.  I would forget to put tick preventative on her until I saw them on her.  I guess it is just part of living in the country.  But I will never forget the Frontline now. 

Everyone has heard of Lyme's disease, but no one has ever died from it.  Hardly anyone has heard of ehrlichia and people and dogs die from it all the time.  My vet went from pathologist to pathologist trying to find out what was wrong with this dog.  The answer mostly was that she was old. 

But before she got sick in November, she was perfectly fine.  She played frisbee everyday.  My vet would not give up until he got an answer. 

I hope I didn't depress you, but I think that everyone should not that ehrlichia is a killer.  There is an upcoming article in the Aug "Dog World" magazine and there have been articles in the "Aussie Times," too.

Gayle
Bgrnaussie@aol.com

This was another note from Gayle about Tini...

Yes, I think that it would be a good thing if everyone knew how dangerous ehrlichia is. I had remembered reading the article in Aussie Times a few years ago. It was a very in depth article and I passed it along to my vet. When I saw that Dog World was doing the article for their August issue, I cried. This was a few days before Tini died. For 6 long months I nursed her. In February, she started to bleed from her nose and then she developed breathing problems. For her last few weeks, I put canned dog food in her mouth, because she could not bend over to eat because of the breathing problem. In January she had a "stroke". Neurological problems are just some of the symptoms. My vet was out of town at the time. What a nightmare. All this time, she was treated with doxacyclene, the only treatment for ehrlichia. The army dogs in VietNam were the 1st dogs that were noticed to have ehrlichia. Many of them died from severe bleeding. They were thought to have hemoragic [? spelling] fever, like ebola. It is just so sad that such a strong dog should die such a horrible death.

~ ~ ~

This is my mom/ daughter combo, Nellie and Sera.  Nellie's dad was a Las Rocosa dog and her mom is Katie, Tini's daughter.

Nellie, Tini's granddaughter

Sera, Tini's great-granddaughter

Cody, one of Tini's fur buddies

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