How I Talked to a Vet While My Dog Was Choking

I want to be upfront that this is the scariest thing that's happened with any pet I've owned, and I'm writing it specifically because I froze in the moment and I don't think I'm the only person who would.

My dog Bear, a boxer mix, was chewing a rawhide chew when he suddenly started making a horrible gagging, retching sound, pawing at his mouth, clearly unable to breathe normally. I have never moved that fast in my life and also, contradictorily, I have never felt more frozen — I knew something was seriously wrong and had absolutely no idea what to physically do about it.

I got the Waggle app open with hands that were not cooperating and got connected to a vet within under two minutes, which in that moment felt like both an eternity and impossibly fast. The vet's first question wasn't gentle small talk, it was direct: is he still able to make any sound, is he pawing at his face, can you see anything in his mouth. Because he could still make some sound, she said this suggested partial obstruction rather than complete blockage, which changed what she told me to do.

She walked me through, in real time, opening his mouth and looking for the object — I could see part of the rawhide lodged toward the back — and then talked me through a modified Heimlich-style maneuver for dogs, exactly where to place my hands and how much pressure to use given his size, while staying on the call the entire time watching through the camera as best she could given how frantically I was moving.

It came loose on the second attempt. He coughed hard, threw up a little, and then within a minute was breathing normally and looking at me like I was the one who needed comforting, which, fair.

She stayed on another several minutes making sure his breathing stayed normal and there was no residual distress, and told me clearly that if it hadn't come loose within a couple of attempts, or if he'd lost consciousness, the next step would have been rushing to the nearest emergency vet immediately, maneuver or not.

I've since learned the actual dog Heimlich technique properly, not just in the panic of the moment, and I genuinely think every dog owner should know it before they need it, not during. But in that specific moment, having someone talk me through it in real time was the difference between me freezing completely and actually doing something useful.

If you've had a scare with something your dog swallowed that didn't involve active choking, that's a different kind of situation with a slower timeline. And knowing where the emergency line actually sits is worth reading now, not in the middle of your own version of this.