Puppy love

I totally agree – a tiny puppy licking your face beats going to a psychologist (YOU Say, 29 November)!

I lost my beloved toy pom one week short of his seventh birthday recently. He wasn’t ill but he couldn’t take the extreme heat and died suddenly and unexpectedly. I was heartbroken and felt totally bereft.

We’ve always had dogs in our home and my son and daughter-in-law decided to get me another dog to help me in my healing process.

This isn’t what I would’ve chosen, but I have to say this tiny four-monthold toy poodle has so quickly crept into my heart. He’s taken away so much of the grief I was feeling.

He seems to know when I’m feeling down and he licks me and sits on my lap. It’s so comforting to know I’m loved by this little dog. My grief turns to laughter at his antics. P BALDWIN, EMAIL

I’d love to tell you something wonderful my baby sister Jean said to me around Christmas years ago. Being an animal-lover, I was forever having troubles with my brood. I had kitties from the gutter, dogs from the pound, you name it. The only problem was, no matter how much I loved them they mostly all came to a sticky end!

One would get nephritis, another leukaemia, or a kitty would run off and come to a horrible end.

I became profoundly depressed and decided I was a rotten animal-lover. When my dear Jean called me on the phone she asked me why I sounded like a dying duck, so I told her.

She listened carefully then her clear voice came over. “You cheer up now and look at it like this: you’re utterly great with all your pets [I gulped]. You need to remember that when you get them, they’re close to their appointed time. [More gulping!]

“They’re sent to you to have the best time of their lives before pegging off [she never minced her words either!]. So instead of feeling like a mass murderer, see yourself as their Mother Teresa to love them the way only you can do before they have to go. You see?”

I did see and promptly burst into tears of gratitude. Now that’s how angels talk! MARIE, EMAIL