26/08/2023
In Honor of Lady Jiu Jitsu
5/20/2008 – 8/28/2022
This is one of the hardest tributes I’ve ever had to write for a four-legged companion. It is one of the most traumatic losses we’ve ever experienced with our fur babies, as it’s the only loss that wasn’t brought on by disease or illness, but rather a freak and unexpected accident.
On May 20, 2008, Lady Jiu Jitsu (Ju-Ju) was born in Rhode Island. Michael flew to pick her up at 7 weeks old from the Stiglet family before they went on a long family vacation. We had a litter that was slightly younger than her, so when we brought her home, she immediately started playing with new friends, and that helped her adjust nicely to her new home. After that litter went to their new homes, Ju-Ju bonded strongly with Sami. They were like Frick and Frack. Where Sami went, Ju-Ju followed until she became an adult herself.
Around this time, I was regularly writing articles for our kennel blog. It didn’t take us long to discover that Ju-Ju LOVED the camera. So, she became my official model for the blog. No matter the topic, Ju-Ju would pose happily for the camera. She was such a natural at it and followed direction so well that I could give her a hand gesture asking her to tilt her head and she would immediately do it. A perfect example of this is the happy birthday blog picture we took of her with the balloon backdrop background. Other memorable pictures of her include the one where she is wearing my wedding veil (for a blog post about including your dog in your wedding ceremony), and another of her “reading” a book (for a blog post about how difficult it can be for dogs when kids return to school during the day after a long summer break).
In August, 2010, Ju-Ju had the first of 3 litters. She was an amazing mother – not only to her puppies, but to Geisha’s puppies when she had some. Ju-Ju took “mothering” very seriously. You could tell that every interaction she had with her babies was meant to teach them something – whether it be how to play and interact appropriately with others (dogs and humans), to bite inhibition, to basic manners. And, if Ju-Ju ever thought that Geisha wasn’t doing a good enough job teaching her puppies these important skills, Ju-Ju would step in and handle the teaching herself – with Geisha’s blessing.
After puppies, Ju-Ju’s favorite thing in the world was brain-games and mentally stimulating puzzles. She was, hands-down, the smartest Japanese Spitz we’ve ever known. She could figure out the most complicated of puzzles and wouldn’t give up until she did. She also knew that every Sunday was “puzzle day”, and she would bug Valerie until we loaded up puzzles with treats so that she and the other dogs could solve them.
From the time she was young, Ju-Ju took on the role of “peace maker” in our house. If dogs spoke English, I swear we would have frequently heard Ju-Ju mediating a truce and/or agreement with other dogs in the home if there was a disagreement.
Ju-Ju was pretty selfless, which is an amazing quality in a dog. She was the kind of dog that would share anything she felt valuable with the other dogs in the house. She had a very strong sense of “fairness”. She made sure that all the dogs and humans in the house abided by that fairness rule. She also always had a lot of “puppy” in her. She had a youthful, fun-loving demeanor and absolutely loved playing with her son Ronin up until her very last day.
When we lost Sami to an illness in 2018, Ju-Ju grieved like no dog I had ever witnessed. We kept Sami the back bathroom for 12 hours while we made arrangements for his cremation. That allowed the other dogs to say goodbye to him. We led Ju-Ju to the bathroom to let her say goodbye and help her understand that her close buddy, the Frick to her Frack, was gone. And when the realization hit her, she literally wailed in grief. It was heartbreaking. And she kept vigil by that bathroom door for many hours, until we took Sami away.
After I lost Kita in July, 2021, Ju-Ju bonded strongly with me. She and I had always had a special relationship, but nothing like the relationship they developed after Kita’s passing. Ju-Ju stuck by my side from that night forward.
In fall of 2021, Ju-Ju was diagnosed with an oral melanoma. But we caught it quickly, had it removed, and she fully recovered with no need for radiation or chemo. That alone was a miracle b/c dogs typically die within 60 days of an oral melanoma, but we caught this one so quickly and, after two surgeries, all of the cancer was removed.
5-6 months after that cancer remission, Ju-Ju developed another cancerous tumor in her leg. This one was a different kind of cancer, so we opted for a new treatment meant to dissolve the tumor from the inside. We knew Ju-Ju was a fighter and she was up for the challenge. And so she beat this cancer, too! She had cataracts and couldn’t hear very well, but she was a healthy and energetic lady who had beat cancer twice!
After Michael’s heart attack in early August, 2021, Ju-Ju having beaten two cancers, our 20th wedding anniversary in mid-August, and having just welcomed a new Japanese Spitz pup from the Ukraine a month earlier, we decided a celebratory trip was warranted. Plus, Ju-Ju absolutely LOVED to go on adventures! So, on August, 28, 2022 (her son Ronin’s birthday), we loaded up all four dogs into the truck, and headed to an Airbnb that we rented in the Smoky Mountains. It was an awesome house, with a fully fenced in yard and plenty of room for the dogs to run. Part of the yard contained a retaining wall that connected to the concrete driveway. Parts of the retaining wall were only 2-3 feet off the ground. But there was another part of the retaining wall that was more than 5 feet off the ground. That is where Ju-Ju was standing beside me. And when she saw Ronin jump off the retaining wall that was only 2 feet off the ground, she mistakenly thought she could jump, too. Her cataracts had impaired her vision to the point that she couldn’t see how high it was. And it all happened so fast that I couldn’t stop her.
She hit the driveway and started screaming. We’ve never heard any dog make the sounds that she made. We knew immediately something was horribly wrong. She was completely paralyzed from the middle of her back down. The nearest vet was an hour away, but we rushed her there. They immediately sent us to the UT veterinary college, who stayed open past 10 pm to give us enough time to get there. They tried. They ran a bunch of tests, but ultimately told us there was nothing they could do. Ju-Ju would never recover and she was in pain.
So, on that day, after the trauma of the accident, and on her son’s birthday, we had to make the very difficult decision to let Ju-Ju go. It was so hard and so horrible. And so difficult to come to terms with that neither Michael nor I could deal with it. We couldn’t talk about it. We couldn’t do the things that we typically do to help us heal after losing a special family member. Here it is, a full year later, and we’re still struggling to write this tribute to Ju-Ju and honor her in the way she deserves.
I hope all who read this post see how special this sweet girl was. She wasn’t special because of her relationship with her humans (though we are grateful for every minute). She was special because she was such an amazing dog.
